Today’s sponsor: Panorama Natural Burial is reimagining death care through natural burial, land conservation, and community

The opening of the Beijing Olympics, a president announces a resignation, and a certain incident took place on a Chicago bridge. These are just some of the things that have happened on other editions of August 8 throughout recent time. There has only been one regular edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement in the six years since publication began so when you’re done here go back and time travel.

In this edition:

Charlottesville to hire outside groups to manage emergency shelter and encampment clearance (read the story)
Voices speak out against upcoming ending of Rivanna River encampments (read the story)
Charlottesville City Manager Sam Sanders explains how 2000 Holiday Drive is just part of the city’s response to homelessness (read the story)
Albemarle EDA to support classes to assist wine industry learn new techniques after difficult spring (read the story)
More people using Ivy Solid Waste and Recycling Center (read the story)

Behind the scenes of #1104-A

Once again, the time it takes to put together the audio podcast ends up being much longer than it should be. Throughout the week as I am writing stories, I keep track of them in a spreadsheet. One of the columns indicates whether the story has a sound element to it. Not all stories come from meetings, but those that do are fodder for both the WTJU radio show as well as this podcast version.

For 650 editions or so, the newsletter and the podcast for one and the same. The reason there’s an anecdote at the moment is to serve as something the listener would hear to get used to my voice. It’s a way I personalize the newsletter and try to offer something more than just the information.

I learn so much in the course of doing that research and I’ve kept writing them because doing so wakes up my brain and gets me ready for the work of finishing the newsletter.

There are currently no plans to reunify the newsletter and the podcast because the audience interested in the sonic product is much smaller. I can imagine a time when there’s a partnership with a radio station or other production company to produce this work. Right now I’m very to be working with WTJU and glad the radio version was named Best News Program this year by the Alliance for Community Media.

If you’ve never heard one of these before, this is a good place to start. The segments are much longer than you’re going to hear anywhere else, and I think that’s incredibly important to have an alternative. This particular edition is a 30 minute summary of one of the most difficult issues of our time. It hits differently when you hear people’s voices.

Now, time to produce it so I can get on with the rest of the week. Thank you for reading or listening.

And now the cut-and-paste bit intended to get your help in getting more eyes on the stories:

I post stories over at BlueSky but don’t really do much else than that at this point. Here’s the account forInformation Charlottesville.
You can also subscribe to getInformation Charlottesville postings via email Wordpress. This is where I confess I don’t entirely know the link for this. Might be a pop-up?
Town Crier Productions has a Facebook page but I’m really not sure if it’s worth keeping as the site doesn’t really seem to like Substack material. Or Wordpress material. In six years of doing this, I’ve never had a post “go viral” and I think it’s all throttled. I don’t pay them any money anymore
And then there’s Instagram which gets a couple of likes every now and then though I am really bad at images!

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For some reason, there has only been one other August 1 edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement and that was back in 2024 with a recount underway in the Fifth District Republican Primary. This is a podcast edition that provides audio versions of stories and thus does not count toward a total number of produced newsletters. That number is 1,374 which comes from 375 Week Ahead versions and 1,099 general ones. There have been 2,210 days since #1. Somewhere here in may be a relevant statistic, but the best I can come up with is 0.62.

But what does it mean?

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council votes to move forward with a sales tax referendum this November (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council allocates funding from speed cameras to cover the cost of providing the service (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors approve policy to streamline installation of solar roofs (read the story)
Albemarle supervisors seek tighter regulation of concentrated agricultural feed operations (read the story on C-Ville Weekly)
Charlottesville City Council briefed on efforts to lower speed limits, prepare new mobility plan (read the story)

A sponsored message: Panorama Natural Burial

At Panorama Natural Burial, we believe caring for the deceased can be simple, meaningful, and deeply connected to the natural world. As a natural burial ground just outside Charlottesville, we offer families an alternative to traditional burial that honors both the people we love and the land that will carry them forward.

Whether you are planning ahead, navigating a recent loss, or are just curious about natural burial, we welcome the conversation. We host regular tours and community events throughout the year. At Panorama we are building new ways of understanding death, land, ecology, ritual, memory, and community. We believe that building community around death care helps us all to live fuller lives. We are open to the public daily 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Come visit!

A shout-out for Town Crier Productions: Not entirely cut and paste from last week!

It is Saturday and the final thing for me to do to end one week and begin another is to post this edition. The right move would be to produce the podcast version as soon as the WTJU version is completed, but that usually happens at a time when I want to stop working on a Friday.

After six years, I have found ways to directly cover the cost of producing the written newsletter and the Information Charlottesville. I have absolutely no direct revenue from producing the audio version as the work for WTJU is free. I do the work because it’s enjoyable. And I could just put the radio version in the podcast feed.

I choose not to because of the sponsor above. In the last few months I’ve been experimenting with charging for advertising across multiple products. I’m happy to send the media kit to anyone upon request so you can see the details.

I’ve also had at least one paid subscriber ask me if I could put all the shout-outs at the end. I cannot do that. If I’m to continue this newsletter I must diversify my revenue. I want to provide an affordable way for entities to reach an audience that I am still trying to understand myself.

In any case, thank you for reading! And now the cut-and-paste bit intended to get your help in getting more eyes on the stories:

I post stories over at BlueSky but don’t really do much else than that at this point. Here’s the account forInformation Charlottesville.
You can also subscribe to getInformation Charlottesville postings via email Wordpress. This is where I confess I don’t entirely know the link for this. Might be a pop-up?
Town Crier Productions has a Facebook page but I’m really not sure if it’s worth keeping as the site doesn’t really seem to like Substack material. Or Wordpress material. In six years of doing this, I’ve never had a post “go viral” and I think it’s all throttled. I don’t pay them any money anymore
And then there’s Instagram which gets a couple of likes every now and then though I am really bad at images!

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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On July 25, 1788, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completed his Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, a fact we know because the composer kept intricate records. I can tell you that so far there have only been two other July 25 editions of Charlottesville Community Engagement and they were in 2023 and 2024. What were you doing on any of those three days?

In this week’s stories:

Charlottesville City Council will not take another vote on design review of The Mark (read the story)
Charlottesville speakers provide multiple perspectives on how to help those without a home (learn more)
City of Charlottesville develops brochure in advance of encampment “transition” (read the story)
Albemarle County Supervisors learn about human services needs in the community (story posting Monday!)
Albemarle Supervisors get update on transportation projects (learn more)

A sponsored message: Panorama Natural Burial

A house shout-out for Town Crier Productions at the end of 1096-A

The posting of the podcast marks the end of one week and the beginning of another. These days it takes me a lot longer to do the very simple task of restripping the WTJU version with fresh audio. Fridays are usually very intense production days and it is my true hope to eventually have someone to assist with putting it all together.

All of this work is the result of one person with a vision for how to put it all together. When I look back in my archives, I see that this is what I wanted to do with the Charlottesville Podcasting Network back in 2005 but all of the tools were not in place yet to make it work.

We’re now six years into the experiment of Town Crier Productions which has allowed me to document a lot of events and decisions and details in this newsletter. This week we crossed the threshold of 5,000 subscribers in Substack, with about 820 of them paying into this newsletter. I’m going to write more notes to those paying because I need help thinking through some of the next steps of the business plan.

An issue with being on Substack is that most people who find this newsletter through the algorithm don’t have a connection to the area so they disappear fairly quickly. Aside from a few Facebook boosts, I’ve never done any targeted marketing to attract new people since the beginning when I emailed as many people as possible an update of what I was doing.

So this shout-out concludes with me once again giving you the opportunity to sign-up through various social media platforms.

I post stories over at BlueSky but don’t really do much else than that at this point. Here’s the account for Information Charlottesville.
You can also subscribe to get Information Charlottesville postings via email Wordpress. This is where I confess I don’t entirely know the link for this. Might be a pop-up?
Town Crier Productions has a Facebook page but I’m really not sure if it’s worth keeping as the site doesn’t really seem to like Substack material. Or Wordpress material. In six years of doing this, I’ve never had a post “go viral” and I think it’s all throttled. I don’t pay them any money anymore
And then there’s Instagram which gets a couple of likes. I’d like to have better images but that is another skill set I don’t have.

Okay. I have procrastinated a lot by writing this.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

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The rhythm of being an independent journalist who strives to cover a lot of ground sometimes is affected by alternate beats. The last two Saturdays have not been favorable to produce a new audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement so archive editions went out. But now it is time for the July 18, 2026 edition. I’m Sean Tubbs. This week’s return to the usual studio means more ability to focus so there are stories from all six localities on the same topic. Then there are some two stories from the week before I am only just getting around to completing.

This work is made possible by paid subscribers and the ratio is just below one in five at the moment. I’m grateful for those with means to support the time and research that goes into this public service.

In this edition:

Fluvanna Supervisors are the first in the region to initiate a process for a ballot question(read the story)
Louisa County Supervisors pull sales tax referendum resolution from agenda (read the story)
Greene Supervisors support sales tax referendum requested by Greene School Board (read the story)
Nelson Supervisors also vote to proceed with the referendum for school construction (read the story)
Albemarle County Supervisors vote to move forward and this story won’t be printed until Monday so hear it here first!
Charlottesville City Council discusses the finer points of how to use revenue from a sales tax increase to finance school construction (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors make brief announcements on Biscuit Run Trail, drought watch, and federal housing bill (read the story)
Albemarle and Charlottesville transportation planners identify next locations for further study (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council reviews process for funding nonprofit agencies (read the story)

New here? Go ahead and sign if you want to learn more about what’s happening in local and regional government around Charlottesville

First sponsored message: Panorama Natural Burial

Second message: An improvised bit about the state of shout-outs and the like

Will the words written here match what I say in the audio version? I don’t know. I’ve not done the narration yet. In addition to paid subscriptions, I diversify revenue coming in through a lot of different forms of advertising, underwriting, sponsorship and so on. The Piedmont Environmental Council has been sponsoring the Week Ahead since the beginning, for instance.

In the early days, some people opted for a $25 month tier or more on Patreon which got them a shout-out. Many of the shout-outs you see come from just that, though that’s no longer being offered. Others came through combinations like having a paid Substack subscription and Patreon member. That worked for a while but I’ve simplified.

Several have taken me up on an advertising package that offers placements at the top of the newsletter, in the two “shout-out” slots, and in visual ads on Information Charlottesville. I only send this out on request at this point because I’m at a point where I am trying to figure out things like inventory and scheduling and trying to ascertain audience. Are people really reading?

In any case, yes, they are, and that makes me work harder to keep it going and that includes offering additional ways to support.

Charitable gifts can be made to the Tiny News Collective and those are being directed to hiring additional people to assist me in the near future.
Patreon still exists as a way to contribute to the business, but this may in the future become something more artistic if I get up the courage to try to make music for an audience. It will be weird all the same.
Share stories on social media! Add a comment and share your thoughts as you do! The whole point of this is to spread information and discussion.

Thank you to all of the advertisers and sponsors and readers and more!

An experimental to read only paid subscriptions

I’m toying with the idea of making the epilogue something only paid subscribers can read. Or a portion of it each time. Perhaps “behind the scenes” stuff should be for those who have decided to take a stake in it by paying?

I’m not sure. Substack only started offering this up this time. And I’m not sure if I have any real “bonus” content here except to say that sometimes the soundbites in the audio version have extra phrases in them. This is because I try to not run quotes run too long.

I can also say I am so glad to finally get this edition done. Two weeks ago I had to turn in the WTJU version a day early and I didn’t have time to record new stories. I also figured July 4 was a good day for an archive.

The next week I was out of town and not in a place where it was easy to record audio. I’m grateful to be back in a place where all of my stuff is and where I can fix issues as they come up.

Anyway, I’m grateful you’re paying into this. I hope you’ll keep doing so. If you do have concerns about the subscription or what to switch to a different form of support, drop me a line.

Hooray! This edition is done!

This post has a very small amount of bonus content for paid subscribers. Behind the scenes stuff. Upgrade to get full access and to support the work.

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This edition and its copy comes straight from the radio version that aired on WTJU this morning

Good morning and welcome to Charlottesville Community Engagement for July 11, 2026. I’m Sean Tubbs, a writer and producer who covers local and regional government in the area in and around the University of Virginia. That includes Albemarle and Charlottesville, two communities in a nation wrestling with how to solve problems that often seem intractable.

I’m traveling this week and so this is an archive edition that captures two recent discussions about trying to get a low barrier shelter for the unhoused built at 2000 Holiday Drive. This is a document of a process still in motion created to remind people that solutions can take a long time in a complicated world. This kind of journalism is intended to remind people of who said what and when.

Source material:

Charlottesville City Council briefed on low-barrier shelter by groups that provide the programming, March 27, 2026
City Council presented with The State of Homelessness 2026 by four nonprofit groups working on the issue, May 12, 2026
Many details remain to be worked out for how three groups will work together at Charlottesville’s future low-barrier shelter, May 15, 2026
Work continues to develop operations plan for low-barrier shelter and service center for unhoused, July 10, 2026

New here? Sign up for the free newsletter, but please know that paid subscriptions keep it going!

First public service announcement: The Good Foundation event today

The GOOD Foundation invites community members to a FREE Urban Farming Workshop, Saturday from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at the Carver Recreation Center, 233 4th Street NW, Charlottesville. Master Gardener Sheila Jackson will teach you how to grow container vegetables and herbs in small spaces, and everyone receives a starter plant to take home. The workshop is part of The GOOD Foundation’s Black Farmers Initiative. For more information, contact Jackie Martin at goodfoundationcville@gmail.com or 434-202-8034.

Second public service announcement: Piedmont Master Gardeners

The Piedmont Master Gardeners will present “More Trees, PLEASE!”, a free Garden Basics class open to all, on Saturday, July 18th at 2 pm at Trinity Episcopal Church, 1118 Preston Avenue. It will focus on suitable trees for home landscapes, emphasizing appropriate placement of native species, and highlights the benefits of trees to our environment and well-being. Register at Piedmont Master Gardeners dot ORG to reserve your place in the class.

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For the second week in a row, I’m reusing the same production file that was used on WTJU. If I was awake and alert, it would maybe take 15 minutes to record new audio. However, this June 27 feels like the kind of day where such a direct task would take about two hours. I’m ready to get ready for the next set of stories.

If you are a new reader, I got my professional start at WVTF Public Radio in Roanoke, Virginia, as an intern. I was in my final year at Virginia Tech and I wanted to keep going with journalism. At some point not too long after, I made a deliberate choice to focus at the local level.

Every edition of this newsletter was a podcast for the first 650 editions or so. That changes in the spring of 2024 when I agreed to do a version of the podcast for WTJU. This airs Saturdays on WTJU at 6 a.m.

In any case, take a listen! And I’ve included the text of the WTJU public service announcements.

In this edition:

Most of Virginia continues to be under drought warning (read the story)
Charlottesville Planning Commission hears calls for reform at listening session on next round of zoning changes (read the story)
Council agrees to another extension of agreement with CRHA for additional housing vouchers (read the story)
Albemarle County prepares for new legislation including new biosolids testing requirements (read the story)
Albemarle Amateur Radio Club holding Field Day this weekend (read the story)
One archive story: Councilors push back on proposal to replace trash stickers with monthly trash fee charge more for trash collection (read the story from March 2025)

Public Service Announcement #1

C4K is now recruiting mentors for its Fall 2026 Cohort starting in late August. Be the trusted guide who helps a young person turn curiosity into capability. Work side-by-side with youth members on STEM projects of their choosing, like coding, robotics, design, or digital storytelling. No experience is necessary to collaborate, encourage, and expand possibilities for youth in our community. Visit the C4K website to learn more!

Public Service Announcement #2

Head to UVA’s Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library on Saturday, July 4th from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. for Revolutionary Printing, a family-friendly UVA250 celebration of the materials, crafts, and stories of the founding era. Print a copy of the Declaration of Independence, view paper- and ink-making demonstrations, or add your “John Hancock” to a giant copy of the Declaration. Hear music of the American Revolution, make a printer’s hat, screen print a keepsake, view special exhibitions, or create a custom silhouette, beadwork, or sewing sampler. Event parking is free in UVA’s Central Grounds Garage. For more information, visit this website.

Some nonsensical thoughts at the end of CCE-1079A

Technically this one is W26-23 and not CCE-1079A because I did not produce a separate version. That’s twice in a row. I would prefer to do an original version as well, but I must admit I appreciate the illusion of a break.

I assure any reader who made it to this part that I do not spend all of my hours working on this newsletter. I take a lot of breaks throughout the day, though almost none of that time is spent doing yardwork. Now that my eldest cat is no longer with us, the house is slowly being reclaimed from all of the spots damaged by incontinence.

On this Saturday, what will I do? I do not know the answer though I am going to try to get the March 2026 property transactions out of the way. I’m very slow on those now and as a result I can’t put them behind a paywall. Or at least, it wouldn’t feel right.

I do work seven days a week because I enjoy the research that goes into this newsletter. I see stories everywhere and the challenge is continuing to create an engine that allows me to produce as many as possible. It is my hope to find others willing to put in the work.

There are almost two weeks until the 6 year anniversary of the newsletter. I am soul-searching a bit at the moment to determine the future. Should I try to see more of the world while I am still relatively young? What would it be like to live somewhere else?

Yet, even thinking that thought triggers alarm as I really do want to continue trying to describe the minutiae of this community as it stumbles its way into the future. I’m so looking forward to hitting send and allowing myself to go into free association for the rest of the day.

One of the ways I sharpen my research skills when they’ll dulled by morning fog is to go to cvillepedia and make some edits at random. I do not own the website but I have been associated with it since its public unveiling in 2009. The Jefferson Madison Regional Library is now the owner, but they do not program it.

Who will program it in the future?

Who will tell the stories of our community?

I don’t have a way to look into the future except for continuing to do my part to document what I can. I hope to inspire others to do so and hopeful that in the future I’ll be better able to articulate what it is I’m doing.

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Astute listeners will realize that the audio for this version is the same as the version that ran on WTJU this morning at 6 a.m. I’ve done this one or twice before and today I want to use my morning to get on to the next set of stories rather than record a new version.

The switch to morning publication means there is a clock ticking the moment I wake up and motivation this morning has taken me in different directions and I want to get this finished and done.

The vast majority of people who consume Charlottesville Community Engagement do so via the written version, but I encourage people to listen to the audio version so you can hear people’s voices.

This time I’m putting the copy from the public service announcements than ran on the WTJU version. Did you know we won an award?

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Manager Sam Sanders provided an update on Monday on the encampment at Free Bridge as well as efforts to open a low-barrier emergency shelter (read the story)
Charlottesville appoints a member to the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority Board but one vacancy remains (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council favors Early Learning Center option that would build new gym (read the story)
Albemarle County Supervisors select an in-house candidate to lead the Community Development Department (read the story)
Local projects to receive revenue-sharing funds after Commonwealth Transportation Board vote (read the story)
VDOT installing mini-roundabout at Greenbrier / Hydraulic intersection (read the story)
The CEO of Jaunt talks to the Albemarle Supervisors about the future (read the story)
An archive story about regional transit priorities (read the story)

PSA #1

A coalition of five local nonprofits and community groups has formed The Grocery Card Campaign to help alleviate the food insecurity many immigrants are facing as a result of federal immigration enforcement activities. The Grocery Card Campaign puts grocery store gift cards immediately into the hands of our immigrant neighbors, and is an opportunity for community members to show their support by helping ensure that basic food needs are met. For more information, email grocerycardcampaign@gmail.com.

PSA #2

The 4th Annual Women’s Empowerment Day is happening Saturday, June 27th from 8 AM to 1 PM at the Jefferson School City Center in Charlottesville. This free, family-friendly event - “She Leads. She Builds. She Thrives” - brings together women entrepreneurs, community leaders, wellness advocates, and local organizations for a morning of inspiration, educational breakout sessions, fitness activities, and community connections. Proceeds support the TQ Evans Young Women Entrepreneur Scholarship. Check out “Beyond Fitness with Sabrina” on Facebook for details.

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On June 13, 1895, a two-seat vehicle driven by Émile Levassor crossed the finish line in Paris 48 hours and 48 minutes after leaving that city in the world’s first automobile race. The journey took contestants on a 1,178 kilometer course to Bordeaux and back and Levassor arrived six hours before the runner-up. However, the rules called for a four-seater and both were ineligible for victory. What sort of race is Charlottesville Community Engagement documenting? I’m Sean Tubbs, and we can only know through the stories.

In this edition:

Kellie Brown is stepping down as Charlottesville’s director of Neighborhood Development Services (read the story)
Area officials report from recent Chamber trip to Chapel Hill (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors presented with first transportation priority list in a few years (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors allow building to remain within stream buffer (read the story on C-Ville Weekly)
UVA Provost: Record number of applications for Class of 2030 (read the story)
Only two buildings left to be programmed at UVA’s Emmet-Ivy Corridor (read the story)
Buildings and Grounds Committee gets details on UVA’s next heat plant (read the story)

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

First shout-out: Plant Virginia Natives

Summertime means that the invasive vines are winning the battle at my house but one day I will attain the skills to make my garden something more palatable and less like it’s an exterior shot in the Walking Dead.

I often look longingly at the Plant Virginia Natives to inspire my dreams of a tidy yard. Plant Virginia Natives is part of a partnership with ten regional campaigns for ten different ecosystems across Virginia, from the Northern Piedmont to the Eastern Shore.

Take a look at the full map below for the campaign for native species where you are in the Commonwealth. For the Charlottesville area, download a free copy of the handbook: Piedmont Native Plants: A Guide for Landscapes and Garden

Second shout-out: Celebrating the community’s other information organizations!

There are a lot of stories each week that go out through this newsletter, but no one information outlet can put together the entire picture. That’s why each regular edition ends with a section called Reading Material.

Charlottesville is fortunate to have a media landscape that includes the Charlottesville Daily Progress, C-Ville Weekly, Charlottesville Tomorrow, and Cville Right Now, I curate links from these sources because I believe a truly informed community needs multiple perspectives.

There’s also the Cavalier Daily, Vinegar Hill Magazine, the Fluvanna Review, the Crozet Gazette, NBC29, CBS19, and other sources. But if you look every day, you’ll find links to articles in national publications, all linked to give you more perspectives on some of the issues of our times.

Now more than ever, journalism is needed. To be a citizen of a democracy, you must seek information from multiple sources. Consume only one and you are at risk of becoming a zombie!

#1069-A ends with a Town Crier Productions backstory

Saturday podcast editions mark the end of one work week and the beginning of another. As soon as “publish” is hit I’ll get to work on the next set of stories. Paid subscribers and other contributors have been keeping this newsletter afloat for nearly six years now.

The first edition on July 13, 2026 is a lot different from where the newsletter is now. The original idea was for the newsletter to be a five to ten minute podcast each day. My career began as an intern for WVTF Public Radio back in January 1995. That’s where I learned to write copy for broadcast, and learned to write quickly.

But there weren’t really a lot of jobs in public radio and unsettling experiences in New Hampshire in 1996 caused me to lose interest. It took living outside the country for a year to want to come back and want to get back to this career.

I’ve been in Charlottesville now for nearly 24 years moving here for a job in public radio but I was not a good fit for the organization that hired me. I went back to freelancing but that wasn’t enough to make a living so I worked at Court Square Tavern and created a business to try to figure out if I could make money off of podcasting.

I couldn’t, but the Charlottesville Podcasting Networkwas an experiment in trying to use audio to get information out in different ways. By 2007 I had to take a steady job and for eleven years I learned about this community in my time at Charlottesville Tomorrow.

And now I’ve just concluded a week in which I published five morning newsletters each day. I don’t think I could go back to afternoon publication anymore because the benefits of the switch become more clear each day.

For now, though, I really want to hit send so I can get on with the day. There are a lot of stories to dig into today. I’m grateful for paid subscribers, sponsors, and donors for their belief in the work I’m doing. In so many ways, I’m still that 21-year-old kid in Roanoke in awe that I got to write stories about local government. I believe in what I do and appreciate you reading to the last line.

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For the next set of stories to be written for Charlottesville Community Engagement, the audio versions of the previous ones must be distributed. That’s the purpose of this particular edition which collects four stories from the past week with an extra one thrown in from the archive. The podcast version is also slightly different from the version that aired on WTJU at 6 a.m. on June 6, 2026.

Please take a listen if you’d like a different way to experience these stories for my quest for financing the stage show seems to have stalled.

In this edition:

Buckingham commuter bus operated by Jaunt tops initial prioritization list (read the story)
Charlottesville Area Transit preparing for electric buses (read the story)
The Albemarle Planning Commission endorses an effort to make it easier to build rooftop solar on entrance corridors (read the story)
Albemarle Planning Commission recommends denial of rezoning for 18-unit development (read the story on C-Ville Weekly)
One June 9, the Albemarle Planning Commission will learn about five work products to implement the Comprehensive plan. The Board of Supervisors had their review in May and this is an archive story.

First shout-out: Charlottesville Jazz Fest continues this weekend!

The 50th anniversary of Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall is this July and kicks off with JazzFest2026, a celebration of culture and qualities of innovation, improvisation, and collaboration.

There are still two days left to dip your ear and tune in. Multiple stages in the Downtown Mall area are hosting special events with outstanding artists. One way to learn what’s happening is to follow the Charlottesville Jazz Society’s Facebook page.

Second shout-out: Cville Village

Can you drive a neighbor to a doctor’s appointment? Change an overhead lightbulb, plant a flower, walk a dog for someone who is sick, visit someone who is lonely? If so, Cville Village needs you!

Cville Village seeks to help seniors stay in their own homes as long as possible, and to build connections among them that diminish social isolation. Volunteers do small chores for, and have gatherings of, professors and schoolteachers, nurses and lawyers, aides and housekeepers. Time and chance come to all – a fall, an order not to drive, failing eyesight, a sudden stroke. They assist folks continue living at home, with a little help from their friends.

Cville Village volunteers consult software that shows them who has requested a service and where they are located. Volunteers accept only the requests that fit their schedule and their skills. Volunteering for Cville Village will expand your circle of friends and shower you with thanks.

To learn more, visit cvillevillage.org or attend one of their monthly Village “meet-ups” and see for yourself. To find out where and when the next meetup is, or to get more information and a volunteer application, email us at info@cvillevillage.org, or call us at (434) 218-3727.

End notes for #1064-A

What are the differences between the radio version and the podcast version? Different underwriting reads.

There is also different music underneath in the ad break. I have a lot of music I like to use that comes from a friend of mine, but only two of his compositions rotate in the radio version.

If you do listen, you’ll notice a couple of things. First, I use an effect on my voice when I read from something quoted. If I were doing this in a newsroom, I’d likely have colleagues do some of these voices. Earlier in the podcast I was sending copy to other people to use for this purpose, but I ended that when I began doing the research.

Doing the radio show has also made me focus attention to the detail of the audio production. I wasn’t thinking much about that back when every single newsletter was also a podcast. I liked being able to do that frequency.

According to my records, there is only one example of a June 6 podcast before this one. Here’s the one from 2023. Note that it is only about 15 minutes long.

Will I still be doing this in 2029? I can’t know that for certain, but I can say it is my intent to continue on as long as I can because there are many stories I want to see through.

Okay. I need to get to the next set of stories!

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It seems that we have arrived at the end of May 2026, as well as the end of another busy week at Charlottesville Community Engagement. This week began with a holiday and ushered in a switch to a morning publication as opposed to an afternoon one, a transition intended to prepare for a more active future covering local and regional government in the community. One hopes.

Mostly every story that features soundbites from a meeting is produced using skills I learned in radio over 30 years ago. The podcast is a weekly digest of some of those stories and is a slightly different edition from the award-winning radio show that airs on WTJU every Saturday. Well, one award. The Alliance for Community Media recently recognized the radio show with a 2026 Hometown Media Award for Best News Program. Hit play and listen!

In this edition show:

Albemarle Supervisors briefed on how county government plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (read the story)
Charlottesville Planning Commission briefed on environmental reviews underway (read the story)
RSWA can now safely accept lithium batteries; new baling facility cost less than expected (read the story)
RSWA Board approves $11.7 million budget for FY2027 (read the story)
Biosolids company reduces amount of land requested to be sludge eligible (read the story)
Health-oriented community fair happening midday Saturday at Washington Park (read the story)
The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review takes a look at new design for a student housing building near Westhaven (read the story on C-Ville Weekly)

When you’re done listening, share with someone else!

First shout-out: Charlottesville Jazz Festival is less than two weeks away!

In conjunction with the 50th anniversary of Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall, JazzFest2026 will offer audiences a chance to enjoy nationally and internationally acclaimed artists and many of Charlottesville‘s finest musicians over four days of club, concert, and featured performances.

Multiple stages in the Downtown Mall area will host special events with outstanding artists and the festival will feature a two-night/multi-venue Club Circuit with no cover charges. One way to learn what’s happening is to follow the Charlottesville Jazz Society’s Facebook page.

The Charlottesville Jazz Festival’s mission is to bring people together through the spirit of jazz—celebrating its culture and qualities of innovation, improvisation, and collaboration.

JazzFest 2026 will foster those qualities for the benefits they offer both the art form and the community.

Second shout-out: Consider support for Town Crier Productions!

In July, this newsletter and occasional podcast will mark the 6th anniversary. There have now been at least 1,060 regular editions, over 360 Week Ahead Versions, and dozens of property transaction editions. All of the work is done from my sense that people should know what’s happening in local and regional government.

I’m only able to do this work because of a steady stream of people who want to help cover the costs to research and produce stories about land use, transportation, economic development, and whatever else I can get together in a given edition.

This continues to be an experiment and one worth doing as long as I can. The business model is overly simple.

I’ll report as much as I can and keep building up a system that allows me to do more reporting
People who want to support the work can do so through ways that make sense to them

On that latter point, paid subscriptions through Substack work quite well. There is a chance at some point that the newsletter delivery mechanism moves somewhere else, but that’s a project term at least two or three horizons away. Any amount helps, but be warned I may increase the base price in July.

I’ve also set up a way for people to make a charitable contribution to support the journalism. This is through the Tiny News Collective and I’ve got a lot of ideas on what that might mean for the future of this work.

A bit about shout-outs. When I launched this venture back in 2020 during the pandemic, I promoted a Patreon account and offered brief promotional messages in exchange for them being at a certain tier. Many are still paid for that way, but I’m no longer taking new ones.

Instead I have an ever-evolving media kit for a sponsorship package that’s received a few bites. I introduced a line at the top of the regular newsletter and am trying to measure how many people click. This media kit is currently available by request because I am very much still trying to figure out that system.

In any case, the real question is: Did I read all of this in the podcast version or did I say something else? You’ll just have to hit play!

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Happy Birthday to the Associated Press which incorporated as a non-profit news cooperative on May 22, 1846 to share the costs of covering a war between the United States of America and Mexico. Charlottesville Community Engagement is an experiment in bringing people stories about an area that seems to be in constant change.

Once a week there’s an audio version and this is a chance to catch up on what’s been said:

Charlottesville’s budget for fiscal year 2026 is on track for surplus (read the story)
City Manager Sam Sanders given an update on development of a plan to make 2000 Holiday Drive a functioning support center for homeless (read the story)
Work to build a sidewalk to support additional development in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood is on pause due to higher than expected right of ways costs (read the story)
Bike Month continues and one Charlottesville City Councilor implores people to log rides with a government agency to beat Richmond (read the story)
Charlottesville will commemorate the late Mel Walker on May 30 with the unveiling of Mel’s Walk (read the story)
Supervisor Sally Duncan wants Albemarle to consider creating rental inspection program (read the story)

This edition has no shout-outs except this one

Crikey, I’m tired. I pretty much go at this work non-stop because there’s a lot to get to and I have a reputation to keep. A reputation for my dedication to doing the work. Is dedication or is it something more stubborn?

Either way, I didn’t put shout-outs in this one because I want to get it out the door so I can move on to writing two stories for C-Ville Weekly, possibly doing land use transactions, prepping what will likely be a fairly short Week Ahead, and then getting ready for next week’s stories.

But Fridays are a good day to send out this list of social media sites where you can help share the work.

And here are some social media possibilities:

I created a BlueSky account because I missed Twitter but I don’t do much except post links to Information Charlottesville stories. That may change.
There are 445 followers of the Town Crier Productions Facebook page which is currently solely used to let people know when a story has been posted to Information Charlottesville. I may begin using this to do live video of podcast recording. Interested?
There are slightly more followers on Instagram, but I have paused posting here because I want to make the images look better and so far that’s not been worth investing the time.
I post a version of the Week Ahead on Reddit each Sunday which is a little shorter. This is intended to attract people to the newsletter and many of you got here from there. But there is no official page and you have to know my username. Maybe I’ll change that in the future?
Except for reposts of this show, there is no new content on the Charlottesville Podcasting Networkbut it predates this newsletter by 15 years. I had a good idea and all I wanted to do was tell stories about the community. Here I am still, hoping to get more people involved.
I’m not doing video. Not everyone has to do video.

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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Where do you get your information about what’s happening in the greater Charlottesville area? Hopefully from multiple sources in order to expose yourself to multiple perspectives. But perhaps this is your first time looking at (or listening to) the opening words of a sonic edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that seeks to get more people to understand what’s happening at local and regional government.

Longtime readers are aware that there is a podcast edition of this newsletter that eventually shows up. No matter the day of publication, the sonic version also serves as a way for people who refuse to listen to still have an opportunity to sample stories from the past week that have since been posted over at Information Charlottesville.

This particular edition is a longer version than usual as there was no dedicated podcast last week. That means this one has audio stories from two WTJU radio editions plus some that didn’t fit in the broadcast version for May 16. There’s a lot happening in this community and I’m determine to cover what I can through the lens of local government.

I’m Sean Tubbs and I’ll remind everyone that this work is only possible due to paid subscriptions to Substack as well as charitable contributions. Since July 2020, this newsletter seeks to bring information to as many people as possible in the hope of improving conversations.

In this edition:

Salvation Army launches fundraising campaign for Center for Hope (read the story)
Many details remain to be worked out for how three groups will work together at Charlottesville’s future low-barrier shelter (read the story)
Albemarle staff working on five projects to implement new Comprehensive Plan (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors leave Comprehensive Plan amendment process as is (read the story)
Charlottesville to form committee of developers to encourage more Missing Middle housing (read the story)
Council holds first reading on how to use Community Development Block Grants CDBG funds in 2026 (read the story)
Tree Commission presents recommendations for how City Council can help improve tree canopy (read the story)
In a divided vote, MPO Policy Board moves forward with two Smart Scale projects without city support (read the story)
Albemarle and Charlottesville both mark Older Americans Month (read the story)

First shout-out: Camp Albemarle!

Since the middle of 2020, one way I’ve brought in revenue for Charlottesville Community Engagement has been by offering shout-outs to those who were willing to pay a little more to help this venture get off the ground.

For six years, one of those people has been someone who wanted you to know a little about Camp Albemarle, which has for over eighty years been a “wholesome rural, rustic and restful site for youth activities, church groups, civic events and occasional private programs.”

Rebuilt in the early 1980’s, a legacy of 4-H programming thrives along with a wide range of additional activities. Educational initiatives from schools across the region spark environmental learning moments at every turn. Visit the website to learn more!

Second shout-out: Support this journalism with a paid subscription or a charitable gift!

Every day I wake up and think about what I need to do to get stories out about what’s happening. Over the past six years, I’ve built an engine to remind me when I clock in what I need to do next. If life is a role-playing game, I rolled the dice and ended up in the weird category of observer.

I’m able to do this work and be prolific because of the investments of others over the past 20 years. For almost six years now, this newsletter has sought to document upcoming decisions about the future. There is a value to having someone consistently paying attention to help others understand how we got to here and how we might go forward.

Perhaps you want to help ensure the work continues?

A paid subscription through Substack is the most effective. There is little to no content behind the paywall, but this helps pay the bills.
You can make a charitable contribution through the Tiny News Collective. This directly supports journalism and is likely the way I’ll be able to hire people. Learn more here.
You can become an experimental advertiser! For a very low price, you can support the work by getting a message out in the form of a shout-out, a sponsorship message, or a display ad over at Information Charlottesville. Message me for more information.

But perhaps the most important thing is to share this newsletter with people you think might be interested. Right now I’m very close to 5,000 subscribers to this newsletter and it would be nice to cross that threshold some time this year.

Do your part and find out what the share button does!

And here are some social media possibilities:

I created a BlueSky account because I missed Twitter but I don’t do much except post links to Information Charlottesville stories. That may change.
There are 444 followers of the Town Crier Productions Facebook page which is currently solely used to let people know when a story has been posted to Information Charlottesville. I may begin using this to do live video of podcast recording. Interested?
There are slightly more followers on Instagram, but I have paused posting here because I want to make the images look better and so far that’s not been worth investing the time.
I post a version of the Week Ahead on Reddit each Sunday which is a little shorter. This is intended to attract people to the newsletter and many of you got here from there. But there is no official page and you have to know my username. Maybe I’ll change that in the future?
Except for reposts of this show, there is no new content on the Charlottesville Podcasting Networkbut it predates this newsletter by 15 years. I had a good idea and all I wanted to do was tell stories about the community. Here I am still, hoping to get more people involved.
Except for instructional videos on how to produce audio, I’m not doing video. Not everyone has to do video. But I just found this very unwatchable thing I did for Patreon supporters back in May 2021!

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Today’s edition is sponsored by Nola Builds

Five times five is not 125, but May 5 is the 125th day of the year and goes by 5/5 no matter what side of the Atlantic you are on. Charlottesville Community Engagement has so far been produced on the Western side but one potential future would be for at least some editions to be created in other parts of the world. After all, it has now been three years since the World Health Organization declared the end of the COVID-19 pandemic global health emergency. This opening paragraph was written while listening to an Italian radio station.

In this edition:

Four nonprofit groups that provide support for unhoused people present the annual State of Homelessness report to Charlottesville City Council
There’s no new public information about how three of those groups will operate a low-barrier shelter at 2000 Holiday Drive
More support has been requested for those in encampments along the Rivanna River but at least one Councilor said another plan is needed

First shout-out: Upcoming Charlottesville Area Tree Steward walks to celebrate May

The mission of the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards is to support rural and urban forests and promote knowledge and understanding of the value of trees for present and future generations.

One way the group does that is through holding guided tree walks and there are two opportunities coming up this month.

Charlottesville’s Belmont neighborhood is a good example of the city’s tree canopy. Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards Steve Huff and Scott Syverud will lead walks on at 9 a.m. on both May 7 and May 8 for people age 14. Sign up for May 7 here or register for May 8 here.
On May 9 at 10 a.m., Charlottesville Area Tree Steward Emily Ferguson will lead a two hour walk at the Virginia Department of Forestry to help identify Hickories, Oaks, and Pines - Oh My! Register here!
On May 12 at 9:30 a.m., Syverud will begin a walk to celebrate Springtime in the Forest at Ivy Creek. Sign up here.

All walks are free, but donations are always appreciated. Thanks!

The State of Homelessness 2026: Low-barrier homeless shelter edition

Every year, nonprofit organizations that work with the unhoused population present City Council with an update on their efforts. The annual State of Homelessness report provides an opportunity to get a big picture look at an intractable issue that the City of Charlottesville is investing millions to solve including the recent purchase of an office building off the U.S. 250 bypass.

“This year takes on a different lens because we’ve had a lot of conversations in regards to 2000 Holiday Drive,” said City Manager Sam Sanders. “This is a chance to go beyond that one facility that we’ve been discussing and gives the providers an opportunity to provide the Council and the public an update.”

Since the last report, several groups have come together to develop an operations plan to run a permanent shelter around the clock. That would include roles for The Haven, People and Congregations Engaged in Ministry (PACEM), and the Blue Ridge Area Coalition for the Homeless (BRACH).

BRACH leads the Continuum of Care

The executive director of the latter went first.

“Overall we’ve seen an increase in numbers across the board, stronger collaboration and partnerships between the agencies that are represented here today and just better cohesion of services,” said Shayla Washington. “So I think the overarching message is we’re all working together, but there’s still a greater need than what we can achieve as single entities.”

BRACH is the lead agency in the Continuum of Care, a framework established by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development in 1994 to coordinate services. BRACH formed in 1998 and became a tax-exempt non-profit in 2009.

“We are the HUD-designated system, mostly handling the HUD federal application for funding,” Washington said. “Currently, our CoC only receives funding for permanent supportive housing from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. But we do oversee regional planning, data collection and data performance, and really just trying to be that main body that’s coordinating all the regional housing and homeless services for folks who are experiencing homelessness.”

Every year, BRACH also coordinates the Point in Time count which records population data for HUD. This year’s event was held on January 28 in the middle of a long cold snap exacerbated by an ice storm. There was an emphasis on getting people inside that night through emergency hotel room stays but Washington said seven people slept in the cold overnight.

“We found four people who were sleeping outside and chose to stay outside for that night from Charlottesville and Albemarle, and then three from Louisa County,” Washington said. “We did not receive numbers from the other counties in our catchment area. We had 87 people who were hotel through emergency hotel stays.”

BRACH also runs the Coordinated Entry Management System which contains the names and identities of people documented as homeless. As of May 4, there were 333 individuals on what is referred to as the By Name List.

“This is people who are either outside or sleeping in a shelter, any place not meant for human habitation,” Washington said. “So if they have a roof over their head, it’s because it’s an emergency shelter or it’s because they are sleeping in a car or a place that doesn’t have running water or electricity. If they’re couch surfing or staying with friends or family and just kind of unstably housed, that does not count towards our by name list.”

Of those 333 people, 58 identified the City of Charlottesville as their last permanent address and 21 said from Albemarle County. Around two-thirds either did not say or were not asked. Washington said that could be improved over time through better training.

“Sometimes people aren’t willing to give a lot of information at the first point of contact with them,” Washington said. “And so it’s just reminding service providers to continue just trying to collect that data anytime you can.”

At the moment there are only 54 permanent shelter beds available year-round operated by the Salvation Army at their facility on Ridge Street. That number increases to just over 100 when PACEM operates night shelters in area churches. There are 30 spots for rapid rehousing. And 30 permanent supportive housing spaces.

“With permanent supportive housing, these are folks who are mostly older,” Washington said. “One third of them don’t have income and they all have disabling conditions and were homeless for very long periods of time before they got into this housing. And it’s the most stable that they’ve ever been in some cases, many cases.”

Supportworks Housing are building another 80 permanent supportive units at their Vista 29 facility on U.S. 29.

Rapid rehousing offers up to 24 months of case management to assist a person with handling their finances to stay in a place.

Washington also presented data on some of the reasons why Charlottesville is an easy place for some to fall out of the housing system. For instance, the average monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment is between $1,700 and $1,850

“As a reminder, affordable housing is defined as not paying more than 30% of your income towards rent,” Washington said.

The City of Charlottesville now designates BRACH as a fundamental agency so it receives $250,000 a year to provide services deemed to be vital. That has allowed them to hire a full-time grants and data manager. This year the agency will for the first time conduct a Point in Time count for unsheltered people in the summer.

PACEM began operations in 2003 and Deputy Director Cindy Chambers said the organization has traditionally relied on volunteers to operate the shelter in the cold weather months.

“One of our churches who hosted 40 men for two weeks required at least 100 volunteers and spent roughly $7,000 to do it,” Chambers said. “So we are an organization that has always thrived on the giving and the compassion of the congregations in our community.”

In recent years, staff has undergone some professionalization with additional resources from the City of Charlottesville.

Seven people work for the organization year round and there are 27 people who work during the season. In addition to the cold weather shelter, PACEM also runs a secure housing program which offers a year of case management to help a client get through to permanent housing.

“It’s similar to rapid rehousing in the sense that we give intensive case management,” Chambers said. “However, we do not get any sort of state funding. It’s all privately funded and we do this with just a bit of move-in help. And this is how we have sustained, this year, 20 folks in housing through our work.”

PACEM also offers additional case management to some clients who may have income but have difficulty going through the steps of securing a lease. She said six people this year have found a permanent home through this housing navigation street outreach.

“Unfortunately, we just don’t currently have the capacity to give everyone a case manager. So we really focus our efforts on folks who could potentially pay rent,” Chambers said.

Chambers said additional staffing and training has allowed the agency to step up some of its intake procedures to increase safety such as enhancing bag checks to stop prohibited items from coming in the doors.

“This year we also stopped holding people’s items that we used to hold based on feedback from our local police,” Chambers said. “We made 62 calls to 911 and only 10 of them were for folks that we really couldn’t handle behaviorally as opposed to last year we made 120 calls.”

PACEM is an example of a low-barrier shelter which means overnight guests are not required to participate in case management and there are no sobriety checks. Chambers said staff and volunteers are now trained in mental health first aid.

“We really are just there to ensure that you are safe tonight and that you receive a hot meal and you can use the restroom,” Chambers said. “To do that, we do still have standards. You have to be able to compose yourself in a group setting, for example, and you have to be able to take care of your basic activities of daily living.”

Chambers said PACEM helps provide places to live through shared housing and is working with property owners who want to be part of their solution while also getting paid steady rent. When Councilor Natalie Oschrin asked if they were looking for new participants, Chambers gave out her contact information. Take a look at the PACEM site.

Chambers concluded by telling Council that anything the city can do to help people stay in their homes helps the overall system.

“What’s been a challenge for us is stabilizing them in that they are all just like one step away from maybe not being able to pay rent,” Chambers said. “So we are relying on a lot of the other programs you all fund, like [Piedmont Housing Alliance] to provide arrears assistance if they do fall behind.”

That latter refers to a pilot project intended to help some residents at Kindlewood with higher-than-expected rates for newly constructed units.

Second shout-out: Design Develop

Architectural firm Design Develop is offering a new service aimed at the development community that the rest of us might want to know about , too — 3D point cloud scanning! This technique uses specialized equipment, such as 3D scanner systems, to gather a large amount of data points that represent the surface of the scanned object or scene. This really comes in handy when working with historic structures, as the firm knows from its experience in Baltimore and Charlottesville. Read their blog post for more information!The applications of 3D point cloud scanning are extensive and cover various fields, including architecture, construction, cultural heritage preservation, virtual reality, industrial design, manufacturing, and more. These applications require accurate 3D spatial information, and Design Develop’s workflow provides precise and comprehensive results, all while being more cost-effective than traditional methods.Design Develop has expertise in this workflow for their own needs and now has a dedicated team offering this service in the Charlottesville and Albemarle Area. If you’re involved in the real estate, design, or construction industry, contact them for more information or a free quote.

Visit their website for an introductory video that captures the 3D point cloud scanning of the Downtown Transit Center and a booklet that will explain more!

The Haven provides a day shelter in downtown Charlottesville

The Haven began operations in 2010 in a church on Market Street purchased by filmmaker Tom Shadyac for the express purpose of providing additional resources for those experiencing homelessness.

“The heart of what we have done historically is providing our day shelter respite care,” said Executive Director Owen Brennan. “Over the past year, we had just under 26,000 visits to the day shelter. That averages out to about 70 people per day. And then over the course of a year, we see about 430 unique guests. Over that same time, we serve just under 26,000 meals. We serve breakfast every day of the year, and we serve lunch every Friday.”

A partnership with UVA Health brings a primary health clinic each Wednesday to the site, a service that has expanded to include a psychiatric and addiction clinic.

Brennan said The Haven also implements Continuum of Care services such as staffing a Homeless Information line for anyone in need.

“This could be someone who is about to become evicted, someone who’s going through the eviction process, or someone who is currently experiencing homelessness,” Brennan said.

If that person does become homeless, they are asked to add their name into the coordinated entry system. Brennan said over 6,000 people called the hotline between April 1, 2025 and March 30 of this year. That’s up from about 5,000 the year before.

The Haven offers three assistance programs with one of them being direct financial assistance of up to $3,500 for people close to losing their rental unit within 14 days and have no other resources.

“Oftentimes, we’re partnering with other agencies, whether it’s the Pathways Fund for the city or [Albemarle County Emergency Relief Program] for the county,” Brennan said. “Piedmont Housing Alliance has rental assistance programs. So we’re doing a lot of really good collaboration to prevent folks from entering homelessness.”

The other two programs are the Laura DeLapp Haven Housing Fund and a Rapid Re-Housing initiative. This past winter, the Haven served as an emergency shelter during the intense cold and ice snap.

“We had an intense weather event this past January, February and the continuum of care came together,” Brennan said. “The city of Charlottesville contributed $25,000. Albemarle county contributed $25,000. And then we fundraised an additional $100,000 to provide hotel, shelter, food and support for a total of 109 unsheltered community members over 18 days.”

Salvation Army preparing to launch next phase of Center of Hope campaign next week

The Salvation Army has had a presence in Charlottesville since 1912 but began to get involved with providing shelter around 1980 according to Major Donald Wilson.

“In this past year we have impacted over 9,653 individuals non duplicated counts which includes 16,304 nights of shelter, 1,367 food boxes, over 51,000 meals and also 3,186 personal care kits to help individuals in whatever situation they find themselves,” Wilson said

Major Wilson said the Salvation Army has also pushed ahead with a plan to add six units for families with funding from Albemarle, Charlottesville and private donors. He said his office receives over 50 calls a day seeking assistance.

The Salvation Army also continues fundraising for an expansion of its facility on Ridge Street to be known as the Center for Hope. He said they’re about 59 percent of the way to the goal.

“$22 million in construction, $2.2 million in furnishings, fixtures and equipment,” Wilson said. “And the Salvation Army… requires that we establish an endowment for that particular structure. Not only for the maintenance of it, but primarily for the continuation of the program so that we won’t begin a program and not be able to operate.”

The goal is to have 114 beds and to break ground on construction in 2027. More on this when the media campaign launches on May 12.

Groups ask Council for additional support for Rivanna River encampment

One of the questions at the work session is what should be done before a shelter opens at 2000 Holiday Drive.

In late March, the City of Charlottesville hired a firm to go through a section of the Rivanna River embankment near Free Bridge where dozens of people have taken to living in tents. The idea was to both clean up trash but to provide outreach.

“Outreach efforts will include distributing informational materials and providing fire safety guidance related to heaters, open flames, and carbon monoxide risks, as well as information about available community services,” read a press release from the time.

No one was displaced as part of the clean-up. In February, both Brennan and Washington have joined a Public Spaces Working Group.

“Our goal is to from each of our respective vantage points identify solutions that we all can get on board with to improve safety, improve health qualities both for the people in camp down at the river, the environmental health and the repercussions for businesses and residents who are adjacent to those encampments,” Brennan said.

This week the group sent a letter to Council with additional requests. One is for delivery of portable toilets. The second is to identify an alternate location that would be much safer.

“One of the biggest safety concerns is that all of the encampments are currently within what’s called the floodway,” Brennan said. “So when we get a heavy rain, that’s where the water is actively running. So there was a significant flood. It was 18 months ago. No one died but belongings were washed away. So we would love to find alternative, safer spots for folks.”

Washington said BRACH has one outreach coordinator who goes out to the camp once a day to check on people.

City Councilor Michael Payne brought up the issue of fire risk after seeing lots of propane tanks being used for heating and cooking.

“I observed a lot of unsafe use around open flames,” Payne said. “We’re currently in a drought. It’s not just a thing to say. I mean, there’s a house in Albemarle that burnt down from a propane tank last year.”

There were no major updates on the low barrier shelter at 2000 Holiday Drive at this meeting until an hour and 45 minutes in when Washington said Sanders had been sent an updated estimate on Phase 1 that afternoon.

“We now have two concrete numbers for phases one and two,” Washington said. “So now we need the city to decide which phase you’d like to move forward with or if you’d like a third option.”

This information is not yet public.

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he had not seen the report but he said he had a concern.

“The broad concern that some of us looking in from the outside have had is that it seems as though the different organizations, the different nonprofits have sort of fundamentally different ways that they think they want to approach the problem and that we need to have one approach,” Snook said.

The story will continue to develop.

#1045 is also a podcast

This is an atypical edition. I very much wanted to be able to get one of these Council work sessions written up quickly. A lot happened at Council but I wanted to prioritize this very important story.

I say a lot how this newsletter intends to document complexity and that’s what this edition attempts to do. Is this the best way to have told the story? Could there be other voices?

The answer is always yes. But, what other media outlet in this community is capable of bringing you this information? Is anyone else even ambitious enough to try? I’m certainly willing to do so and glad for paid subscribers and donors to make it happen. You can learn more about the latter choice here.

Today we end with the DJs from Buenos Aires.

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No matter what late April got up to, the first day of May brings another shower of sonic stories made up of various reports from this week’s text editions of Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m Sean Tubbs and I got my professional start as an intern at a public radio in Roanoke over thirty years ago and believe the audio form is a good way to get information out to people. If you’ve not heard any of these stories before, today is a good day to listen. If not, this Friday edition of the newsletter provides links to just some of what I’ve reported this week:

In this edition:

City Council allows CRHA to form a nonprofit for fundraising purposes (read the story)
Charlottesville Area Transit director briefs CARTA (read the story)
Emily Couric Leadership Forum awards $250,000 in scholarships (read the story)
Regional cigarette tax board turns five this October (read the story)
UVA Finance Committee briefed on need for tuition increase (read the story)

First shout-out: Piedmont Master Gardeners’ Spring Plant Sale

Spring is well underway but there’s still time to get your home and garden the way you want. Get ready for the Piedmont Master Gardeners’ Spring Plant Sale coming up on Saturday, May 2 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Albemarle Square Shopping Center, U.S. 29 North at Rio Road, Charlottesville.

The Piedmont Master Gardeners’ Spring Plant Sale will offer thousands of annuals, perennials, vegetables, fruit-bearing plants, herbs and houseplants, including a wide selection of native plants. Bags of locally produced compost also will be available.

In addition, shoppers can purchase gently used tools, yard ornaments and outdoor furniture at The Green Elephant, a garden-themed thrift store. Cash and credit cards will be accepted. Master Gardeners will be on hand to help customers with their plant selections and will staff a Help Desk for answering gardening questions. An array of displays and information tables will cover such topics as conservation landscaping, soil health, composting, pest management, and controlling invasive plants.

All proceeds support the many free and low-cost programs the Piedmont Master Gardeners offer to the community. Learn more at their website!

Second shout-out: Inaugural Charlottesville Filipino Spring Festival

The Inaugural Charlottesville Filipino Spring Festival is coming to the IX Art Park on this Saturday from 3:00 to 8:00pm. This free, family-friendly event celebrates Filipino culture through cuisine, music, and dance, with performances by local and regional artists, including traditional and contemporary Filipino dance and musical groups. There’ll be a marketplace showcasing food vendors, retail businesses, artists, crafters, and nonprofits. The celebration aims to promote greater understanding of the Filipino American community in Central Virginia. Check them out on Instagram!

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The British government subsidized the publication of North America’s first continuously published newspaper which was produced for the first time ever on April 24, 1704. All issues of The Boston Newsletter had to be approved by the Royal Governor. Aside from one very brief ad buy that was discontinued, Charlottesville Community Engagement receives no contribution from the government and relies on readers and listeners to maintain its independence. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I’m glad to get to report on the details of local and state government as best as I can.

The links below go to Information Charlottesville, the companion website to this newsletter.

In this edition:

Albemarle County Supervisors adopt a budget for FY2027 that includes $7 million for affordable housing and $386,000 for the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors thank staff for turning meeting minutes around faster (read the story)
Council briefed on use of just under $4.5 million in surplus funds including $1.1 million for Angus Road crosswalk improvements (read the story)
City Council poised to reallocate $1.8M to cover cost overruns for Meadow Creek Trail, Pollocks Branch bridge (read the story)
Charlottesville City Manager Sanders provides update on work plan (read the story)
Charlottesville seeks applicants for boards and commissions (learn more)

New here? Sign up via email to get all of the various items. Next up: The Week Ahead on Sunday!

First shout-out: Piedmont Master Gardeners’ Spring Plant Sale

All proceeds support the many free and low-cost programs the Piedmont Master Gardeners offer to the community. Learn more at their website!

Second shout-out is a PSA for ways to pay for this newsletter

The above shout-out is something someone has paid for at an introductory rate that enables me to continue experimenting with using this space to bring in a little extra revenue in order to keep my living afloat. I’m not ready to publish the media kit, but the hope is to have a low-cost way for businesses to get their work out and for me to have a little more of a cushion.

Running Town Crier Productions is a seven day a week job, something I’m very glad to do because I believe this work is important. About 90 percent of my time goes into the reporting and other production related tasks. The other ten percent? Murky. Mysterious. Crucially important.

We’re close to 5,000 subscribers on Substack, and just under a fifth of the audience is a paid subscriber or makes a charitable contribution. . These days there’s very little premium content and there likely won’t be for a while. There could be in the future, but I do this work because I want as many people as possible to know what’s happening in local and regional government. I want to double the number of stories.

Want to help? There are many ways to do so and let me once again put all the social media links.

I created a BlueSky account because I missed Twitter but I don’t do much except post links to Information Charlottesville stories. I’m not interested in live-posting anything, but I do miss interaction sometimes. I may experiment.
There are 442 followers of the Town Crier Productions Facebook page which is currently solely used to let people know when a story has been posted to Information Charlottesville. I may begin using this to do live video of podcast recording. Interested?
There are slightly more followers on Instagram, but I have paused posting here because I want to make the images look better and so far that’s not been worth investing the time.
I post a version of the Week Ahead on Reddit each Sunday which is a little shorter. This is intended to attract people to the newsletter and many of you got here from there. But there is no official page and you have to know my username. Maybe I’ll change that in the future?
There is no TikTok page nor anything else with video because I do not know how to do that very well. One day I’d like to experiment, but I also don’t like being seen.
There is no new content on the Charlottesville Podcasting Networkbut it predates this newsletter by 15 years. I had a good idea and all I wanted to do was use to to tell stories about the community. Here I am still, hoping to get more people involved.

Now on to the next set of stories but I think I may take the afternoon off now that this is posted. Thanks for reading or listening!

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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Could it be that a pattern has emerged with another Friday edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement? And how will this burgeoning habit be affected by the WTJU Rock Marathon, a weeklong celebration of music that will preempt the April 25 radio edition of this newsletter? I’m Sean Tubbs, and I look forward to seeing how that goes.

Until then, here are the stories for this edition:

Albemarle Supervisors will not move forward with a personal property tax rate increase in 2026 (read the story)
However, Supervisors do find an additional $2 million for the Affordable Housing Investment Fund (story forthcoming at C-Ville Weekly)
Area planners hear from VDOT about a desire to coordinate transportation projects (read the story)
UVA representative to city PC reports on various projects including new access for Center for Politics (read the story)
Charlottesville’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services announces changes to the city’s Development Code (read the story)

A programming note for CCE-1035A

The second story uses two soundbites from the first story. That’s because I opted to write up a follow-up piece on Albemarle Affordable Housing Investment Program for C-Ville Weekly.

Interested in learning more about decisions I make in the process of reporting? Ask questions in the comments and I’m glad to answer.

First PSA: Olympic swimming champion Gretchen Walsh to speak

This year’s recipient of the Emily Couric Leadership Forum‘s leadership award is Olympic swimming champion Gretchen Walsh. She will be the speaker at a luncheon to be held at the Omni Hotel Charlottesville on Monday, April 27th at noon. Walsh, a 2025 UVA alum, is one of the most accomplished swimmers of her generation, holding 13 world records across long-course and short-course competition. Online ticket sales for the luncheon are available now. For more information, visit, Emily Couric Leadership Forum dot Org

Second PSA: Raising Courageous Humans in an Anxious World

The Charlottesville Waldorf School is hosting “Raising Courageous Humans in an Anxious World”, a panel discussion on children, anxiety, and resilience, in partnership with the 14th Annual Tom Tom Festival, Thursday, April 23rd at 6:00PM at the Violet Crown Cinema on the Downtown Mall. This timely panel discussion explores one of the most pressing concerns facing families today - the rise of anxiety among young children. The event is free and open to the public. Community members, educators, parents, and caregivers are warmly invited to attend.

Thoughts at the end of CCE-1035A

At publication I still have to find seven more minutes for the version that will air on WTJU tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. That is a volunteer activity for me and this podcast is the companion.

Next week there is no radio show and sometimes without that deadline it is difficult to get the motivation to produce the podcast.

I do not have the capacity yet to hire an editor and in the meantime, producing the audio version before I do the print version goes a long way to improving quality. I am hopeful to hire an editor, but that will take bringing in additional resources. While paid subscriptions through Substack help, I now have a way people can make charitable contributions to this journalistic enterprise. You can do that here.

I am not going to give up the audio even though the total amount of listeners is fairly low. I know many enjoy it, and that’s enough for me to keep going as long as I can.

For now, I post this image to give Substack something to use as the main frame.

Questions? Comments? Leave them in a comments or drop me an email.

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Friday has rolled around again which means it is time to scramble out another audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. This time around there is a big focus on municipal budgeting because the purpose of Town Crier Productions is to focus on the details of revenues and expenditures with a hope toward greater community understanding. At least, that’s the way this version of Sean Tubbs is programmed.

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council has adopted a budget for the next fiscal year that increased the real property tax rate by a penny, one fewer cent than had been proposed (full story below!)
Albemarle Supervisors have a few remaining decisions to make for the county’s FY2027 budget (read the story)
Albemarle and Charlottesville commemorate Dark Sky Week (read the story)
A preview of the Week Ahead

Shout-out / PSA #1: Friends of JMRL Book Sale

The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library’s Spring Book Sale is running now through this Sunday from 10:00am to 7:00pm each day at Albemarle Square Shopping Center. Additionally, April 11th and 12th are ½-price days. Choose from thousands of books, DVDs, CDs, LPs, games and puzzles, with restocking occurring throughout the sale. Proceeds benefit our regional public library system. Visit jmrlfriends DOT org for more information

Charlottesville goes with penny increase on real property tax rate rather than two

Note: The podcast edition of this budget story is stitched together from several reports. This is a consolidated version used for a script and lacks hyperlinks and other resources.

One of the most important duties of governing bodies in Virginia localities is to adopt a budget for each fiscal year.

For Charlottesville City Council, the process began this year on March 2 when Charlottesville City Manager Sam Sanders introduced a budget that was built on a two-cent increase in the real property tax rate to an even $1 for every $100 of assessed property.

Since then, there have been several work sessions in which Sander’s recommended budget gradually became the one that Council adopted on April 9.

These were mostly held on Thursdays beginning on March 5 with a work session dedicated to the Vibrant Community Fund on March 12. That’s the process through which the city provides money to nonprofit organizations.

Informal budget hearing

On March 19, the city held an informal public hearing during what is billed as the Community Budget Forum.

The only speaker was Jim Moore who said he has eight rental properties within Charlottesville.

“I tend to try to keep my rents a little below market, and I have some tenants that really can’t afford much more than that,” Moore said.

Moore said the property assessment for one of those rental units increased by 74 percent from 2021 to 2025. He asked for the city to lower the anticipated rate increase.

The budget forum ended up being more like a work session with staff presenting information to the City Councilors on potential ways to lower the rate. But first, budget director Krisy Hammill explained why the two cent real property rate increase had been proposed.

“Most of the new revenue for the tax increase was put in the budget to offset the deeper transit investments, the increased match for the schools, and also the impacts of collective bargaining,” Hammill said.

That two cent tax increase generates $2,467,724 a year.

To help eliminate one of those pennies, Hammill said staff were comfortable projecting slightly higher revenue forecasts and also showed some ways to reduce revenue, including less funding for Charlottesville Area Transit, tapping into a reserve fund, and eliminating funds for Council Strategic Initiatives.

“One other option would be to move the schools back to the original 2 million that we had originally built the budget around, thus reducing their increase by $569,000,” Hammill said.

The budget anticipates hiring ten additional drivers for Charlottesville Area Transit. Under one potential scenario to reduce funding, money would be in place to hire five in July and the other five would be hired in January as well as additional mechanics and supervisors. That might also mean scheduled service improvements might be delayed.

City Manager Sam Sanders said this would defer spending and Council would have to build positions into next year’s budget. That would create a structural imbalance that would have to be addressed.

“Any creation of a structural imbalance is a risk,” Sanders said. “The question is how much of a risk are you willing to take. When you create the imbalance this year and solve it this way next year, you’re saying that your reassessment should be higher to start with. And you can’t guarantee that.”

Councilor Jen Fleisher said she liked the idea of limiting the real property tax rate increase to a penny as a middle ground option.

Councilor Natalie Oschrin said she did not support delaying expanded transit.

“I appreciate coming up with the CAT adjustment scenario to try and make it fit,” Oschrin said. “I would prefer not to do that since it just kind of kicks the can down the road a little bit.”

Oschrin said she could support using the reserve and eliminating additional funding for Council’s strategic initiatives.

Councilor Michael Payne said he could support a one penny tax rate increase but said the risk to split funding for CAT personnel would be too high.

“I don’t like in the past when we’ve set ourselves up with kind of fiscal cliffs,” Payne said.

Mayor Juandiego Wade also said he could support a penny increase.

“I appreciate the work that I’ve done to kind of bring back because we’ve been hearing from residents about the, the cost of living, the, the tax increase and this I believe is a good, won’t satisfy everyone,” Wade said. “But I think it’s a good, good compromise if we decide to go in this direction.”

No decisions on tax rate at March 26 CIP work session

The March 26 work session dealt with the Capital Improvement Program.

That’s the portion of the budget that sets out what a locality expects to spend on infrastructure over the next five years.

“The CIP plan for 27 is just over $47 million with $196 million over the five years,” Hammill said. “If we were to look in terms of dollars spent, education is the highest in this plan, followed by transportation and access, and then affordable housing coming in third.”

There were no major changes in this year’s CIP. The Charlottesville Planning Commission had a work session on the capital budget in late November and later had a public hearing in December.

The five-year CIP currently includes $500,000 a year for a line item called Parks and Recreation Master Plan Implementation. Sanders said that number will increase in the years to come because the master plan adopted by Council in March 2025 had a $78 million price tag over ten years.

“We know that those numbers need to be dramatically different if we’re going to come anywhere close to that,” Sanders said. “But we now have an assistant city manager here who’s going to be working with the team to try to figure out how do we allocate better over the next five year cycle.”

Part of the plan calls for major changes to Market Street Park, Court Square Park, Washington Park, and Tonsler Park. Sanders said each will be expensive and staff still needs to work out the timing.

Parks and Recreation Director Riaan Anthony said the department will seek grants in addition to tax dollars to pay for the various projects.

“In order for us to get there, we have to right size our department and the city,” Anthony said. “We are working in partnership with Public Works, reaching out to their department to say hey, do you have any resources?”

There was further discussion of the parks and recreation master plan at the April 6 City Council work session.

March 26 work session

At the March 26 session there was a further discussion on the possibility of a one cent sales tax increase, what to do with anticipated payment-in-lieu fees for student housing projects, as well as miscellaneous discussions.

Toward the end, Sanders hit reset on the discussion of the tax rate. On March 19, there had appeared to be consensus to limit the increase to a penny but Council still had to make decisions.

“We’re looking for you to finalize what scenario we are actually going with for offsetting, for addressing the fact that you’re stepping back from two cent increase on the real estate tax to a one cent increase on the real estate tax,” Sanders said.

However, that discussion did not happen at the meeting. Instead, Councilors sent suggestions to Sanders and Hammill via email on how to offset the funding if they wanted to proceed.

April 2 wrap-up

The April 2 budget work session was described as a wrap-up session.

“The items that are open for discussion that we’re looking for answers on is closing out the review of the Vibrant Community Fund process and how Council is looking to utilize your Strategic Initiatives fund,” Sanders said.

The Vibrant Community Fund process had been covered at the March 12 work session. This is how nonprofit organizations seek funding from Charlottesville. The full report can be seen here.

Mayor Wade wanted to make sure everyone was on the same page regarding the penny increase on the real estate tax rate.

“We had initially looked at a two cent tax increase, but we saw options where we could do one,” Wade said. “And I just want to make sure if you, if we have that information we can bring them make sure everyone’s on the same page with that. And if I can get a head nod or yes from everyone as we go down the line, make sure we are all okay with that.”

As the meeting began, Council had a $228,000 gap to fill if they wanted to go with a penny increase. Hammill displayed the math on a spreadsheet, a spreadsheet made available to the public after I asked for it.

The real public hearings on April 6

After multiple budget work sessions, Charlottesville City Council held the final set of public hearings on April 6 for the budget for Fiscal Year 2027 as well as the real property tax rate.

The only speaker for the tax rate hearing was Richard Spurzem of the development company Neighborhood Properties who urged caution when increasing taxes.

“Many communities have a history of reducing the tax rates when assessments go up,” Spurzem said. “For instance in Waynesboro in 2023 they reduced their tax rate from 90 cents to 77 cents.”

Spurzem said Charlottesville is increasing the tax burden for business and he said that might lead to investors deciding to go somewhere else. He said the Development Code has so far led to no approvals for major buildings and the current student housing projects of the Verve and the Blume might be the last.

“I don’t know who’s going to build hotels that are going to compete with the brand new hotels that UVA has built on Ivy Road and out at Darden,” Spurzem said.

After the public hearing for the tax rate, budget director Krisy Hammill explained that the amended budget is for just over $280 million, higher than what had been recommended by City Manager Sam Sanders on March 6.

In addition to including higher revenue forecasts, staff found several line items in the budget that will not be spent down in FY2026 so that money will be added to the FY2027 at around $910,000 in available revenue.

“It includes a few accounts that generally we carry over from year to year, including Historic Resources, Sister City Funds, the citywide reserve, the Council Strategic Initiatives account, money or donations that have been received and unspent for the Grand Illumination, the Councilor discretionary funds, the Minority Business Fund and also the job fair,” Hammill said.

Two people spoke during the public hearing on the budget including former Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker. She said people are beginning to feel the effects of an increased tax burden and said the city is not expanding the Charlottesville Homeowner Assistance Program fast enough to provide relief.

“A lot of low income families are being pushed out and middle income families are struggling,” Walker said. “There are a lot of wealthy people in Charlottesville. We know that they can afford the increase, but because you all are not expanding it at the rate that you need to be, it is not as it was intended to work.”

Walker also called on more accountability for Charlottesville City Schools.

A second person wanted to know why health care for employees has increased 15 percent and why funding for public transportation is going up 17 percent.

“And yet when I see the buses pass here, there, and everywhere, there’s not many people riding the buses,” said Richard Finley, a recent Charlottesville resident. “Before you increase so dramatically, do you do an audit or an evaluation of the ridership on the buses?”

Finley also asked if the city had ever tried to require the University of Virginia to make a payment in lieu of taxes to cover the cost to use municipal infrastructure.

Councilor Lloyd Snook said under state law, a locality cannot compel such a payment but that an institution could make one voluntarily.

April 9 adoption

Council held a special meeting on April 9 at 6:30 p.m. to formally adopt the tax rates and the budget for FY2027. The deadline under Charlottesville charter is April 15.

While there were no surprises, the meeting gives a glimpse into some of the details of how taxation works in Virginia. Changes in Richmond can affect what happens in localities for years to come, such as when a former governor campaigned on elimination of the “car tax.”

“The City gets about $3.5 million from the state every year,” said Charlottesville Commissioner of Revenue Todd Divers. “That’s kind of what’s left over from Governor [Jim] Gilmore’s attempt to eliminate personal property tax. They tried it for a while, ran out of money, and then they sort of froze the amounts to all the localities, and that’s the amount we get.”

The city uses that $3.5 million to offset a percentage of everyone’s personal property taxes. Council has to agreed to that number and this year it has been set at 31 percent.

“Essentially, if your vehicle qualifies, if it’s a personal use vehicle, 31 percent of your tax bill will be paid by the state,” Divers said.

Council voted unanimously to approve that number.

Next was a resolution to adopt the FY2027 budget and tax levy. City Manager Sam Sanders had some remarks and said that this has been another challenging budget year as he seeks ways to fund spending desired by the City Council.

“I continue to talk about Charlottesville as a place that punches above its weight class,” Sanders said. “Every budget cycle is a reminder of that, because we are dedicated to the idea that we are that community and that we want to try to do as many things as we possibly can.”

Sanders said the idea of a tax rate increase is hard for many and it weighs on him to have brought one forward.

“My goal is always to help you not go but so far in any pursuit that you have as you change that rate, because it does go into the pockets of individuals who have difficulties in our community,” Sanders said.

The advertised budget was for a two cent increase, but Council moved that down to one penny throughout the course of their work sessions.

Then there was the vote.

“We have a budget,” Wade said. “Thank you so much. So, do you like take a month’s vacation?”

“About an hour,” Hammill said.

This reporter knows the feeling.

Shout-out / PSA #2: Gretchen Walsh to speak at Emily Couric Leadership Forum on April 27

This year’s recipient of the Emily Couric Leadership Forum’s leadership award is Olympic swimming champion Gretchen Walsh. She will be the speaker at a luncheon to be held at the Omni Hotel Charlottesville on Monday, April 27th at noon. Walsh, a 2025 UVA alum, is one of the most accomplished swimmers of her generation, holding 13 world records across long-course and short-course competition. Online ticket sales for the luncheon begin on Monday, March 23rd. For more information, visit, Emily Couric Leadership Forum dot Org

A rudimentary week ahead to fill a two minute gap in audio

This week’s edition is a little short so that’s a good a time as any to look ahead to what’s coming up the week of April 13. Monday the 13th!

Let’s start with the University of Virginia Board of Visitors who meet the evening of April 15 for a reception and again on April 16 for business. Committees that will convene include the Finance group and the Audit, Risk, and Compliance panel.

In Albemarle, the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee on Monday will hold a community meeting for a proposed rezoning that would allow for 15 townhouses on a one-acre parcel.

On Tuesday, the Albemarle Planning Commission will discuss changes to the county’s rule on importing fill dirt and will hold a public hearing on a special use permit for a 400-person religious assembly hall right at Interstate 64’s Exit 107 in Crozet.

On Wednesday, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will hear what “big moves” staff wants to make to implement a new Comprehensive Plan. Will lighting reform to protect the Dark Sky be on the list?

In the evening, there will be a public hearing on increases of Development Fees as well as the tax rates for the current calendar year. A reminder that this includes a proposed 15 cent increase in the personal property tax rate. Then a public hearing on the budget, but Supervisors will wait a week before finally adopting the document.

On Thursday, Albemarle County will hold a public meeting on the future of a pocket park on Hillsdale Drive

In Charlottesville, the Economic Development Authority meets on Tuesday and continue to do so off camera with no recording. Later on the Planning Commission meets and will have a public hearing on Community Development Block Grant funding. The Planning Commission will also take action on a special exception and get a report on a study of student housing fees.

Next week the Housing Advisory Committee and the Board of Zoning Appeals will meet.

More details in the Week Ahead newsletter that will go out on Sunday.

Hello anyone who made it to this line!

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The term “prevailing wisdom” can only apply if such experience exists, and there is still no certainty about the best time to post the audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m Sean Tubbs, still dreaming that every newsletter edition could still be sonic but this one is ready to go with eight stories where you can hear the voices of local government.

In this edition:

Downtown Mall crossings will be closed this spring for repairs (read the story)
City Council gets a briefing on action to get the Downtown Mall ready for its 50th anniversary (read the story)
Business leaders talk the future of the Downtown Mall at a Charlottesville Business Innovation Council (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors recognize April as Child Abuse Prevention month (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors approve a zoning amendment to allow 40 additional units at Hollymead Town Center Area C (read the story)
Work to begin this year on Crozet park and ride lot (read the story)
The Charlottesville Planning Commission gets transportation update including info on Rose Hill restriping project (read the story)
Charlottesville staff recommends no amendments to city’s homestay rules for now (read the story)

PSA #1

The Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards are hosting their 2026 Spring Tree Sale at the Virginia Department of Forestry, 900 Natural Resources Drive, Saturday, April 11th, from 10:00am ‘til Noon. The Stewards maintain their own volunteer-run tree nursery, planting saplings and nurturing them until they’re large enough to be planted out, concentrating on hard-to-find native trees. Spring is a great time to plant, and by purchasing directly from C - A -T - S, you help their mission of supporting forests for present and future generations. Plan to get there early as they sell out fast!

PSA #2

The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library Spring Book Sale runs from Saturday, April 4th through Sunday, April 12th from 10:00am to 7:00pm each day at Albemarle Square Shopping Center. The members’ preview sale is Friday, April 3rd from 5:00 to 7:00pm, and you can join or renew online or at the door. Additionally, April 11th and 12th are ½-price days. Choose from thousands of books, DVDs, CDs, LPs, games and puzzles, with restocking occurring throughout the sale. Proceeds benefit our regional public library system. Visit jmrlfriends DOT org for more information.

Thoughts at the end of #1027A

Mondays and Fridays are the days where I seem to have the most to do and I would like to try to get the podcast out on this day. I’m much happier with the audio set-up than I have been in the past and even experimented today with doing a live-stream of some of the production work.

In any case, this was a busy week but I still lament that I did not get to everything. Much remains and with this podcast out of the way, I can spend my Friday night figuring out how to proceed in the first full week of April.

While this may not seem like fun to most, any moment I am working is one in which I am honoring my end of the bargain. I produce stories that you won’t get anywhere else and you can decide if you want to pay me. That come in the form of a paid subscription on Substack or a charitable contribution.

Don’t want to pay but want to help out? Share this post, please! Tell a friend or neighbor! Invite me to a panel discussion! All kinds of things are possible.

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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What has happened in the last week? There are many different organizations that document current events and affairs through the telling of stories and then packaging a look back. This is a journalistic tradition that dates back many years and Charlottesville Community Engagement seeks to continue with this Monday morning look and listen for people to catch up.

Most people read the material while others look forward to every installment of the podcast edition which offers a chance to hear what people sound like. I’m Sean Tubbs and here are five stories you may have missed:

Charlottesville City Council briefed on low-barrier shelter might work groups that provide the programming (read the story)
City Council agrees to hire consultant to develop public arts commission for Charlottesville (read the story)
One of Albemarle County’s community advisory committees weighs in on what they’d like to discuss at this year’s meetings (read the story)
Albemarle County Executive Jeffrey Richardson shares data points on Albemarle services with Supervisors (read the story)
The director of the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority gives an update on Long Bridge and expansion of service to Christiansburg (read the story)

You can help get more information out to more people by sharing the links above or sharing the newsletter!

Thoughts at the end of CCE-1023A

I really enjoy doing this work. I’m producing this into the evening of March 29, way past when I would usually be working but I need to at least make sure the script is ready to go. I want to make sure this goes out in the early morning of March 30.

I know that most people will not listen to the audio when presented as an optional thing to print. You can read the stories so much faster, but there’s something to hearing people’s voices that I feel is important. I like producing long audio versions because I like to use a skill I began to learn a long time ago. One day maybe others will help me with the editing and such.

Now it’s the morning of March 30 and it’s taken me an hour or so this morning to put this together, but that’s mostly because I got caught in a research problem related to a new interface the Virginia Department of Elections has for their historical database.

In any case, there are no shout-outs in this post because I don’t have anyone underwriting them. That’s in part because I’ve not had time to spend connecting with those who might be interested. I’m more of a journalist than a person who runs a company. You can support the work through a paid subscription through Substack or making a charitable contribution via the Tiny News Collective.

There will be another edition later today as well. I have two stories written and will aim to get another two written as well. Thanks for being part of this experiment!

Very quick look at the Week Ahead:

I am going to memorialize this here as an example of how this gets made. This segment was done to fill a one minute hole in the version for WTJU that aired on March 28. At the time I publish it, I’ve already written a fleshed out version but this served as an initial glimpse that then allowed me to do that work faster.

This is from the script for the radio show. Sometimes if I don’t write it down, I’ll go way over length. Improvisation is fun and all, but I mostly have to get the work done.

Finally today, a look ahead to what’s happening in local governments next week:

In Albemarle County there will be two more town hall meetings related to the FY2027 budget with one on at 6 p.m. on Monday at Lakeside Middle School and one on Thursday at 6 p.m. at Albemarle High School.
On Wednesday the Board of Supervisors will meet at 1 p.m. and will get an update on transportation before having another budget work session. In the evening session at 6 p.m. there will be a public hearing on the Great Eastern Management Company’s request to add more homes at North Pointe and reduce the amount of commercial space.
Charlottesville City Council will have a budget work session on Thursday at which they’ll wrap up discussions in anticipation for adoption in the middle of the month.
Fluvanna County Supervisors will have a budget public hearing on April 1

And that’s that! Please share with others!

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

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In a democracy, local governments play a vital role in providing services to the people who live there and the budget process is a glimpse into the priorities of a locality. There are many complexities for decision-makers to consider, knowing their time in office only continues if they have support of the electorate. This podcast edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement is a snapshot of the budgets in Albemarle County and Charlottesville just before the equinox.

Here are links to stories as they appear on Information Charlottesville.

In this edition:

No major comments at Charlottesville City Council’s first public hearing on two-cent tax rate increase for FY2027 budget (read the story)
Albemarle County Supervisors make adjustments to their proposed budget for FY27 and opt to advertise an increase in the personal property tax rate to dedicate additional revenue to an affordable housing fund (read the story)

Comments on CCE-1019A

It is entirely there may not be a regular newsletter today. I need to write a story for C-Ville Weekly and I know what it will be so I may go find a place to get a bite to eat and work on that as opposed to working at home. I’ve not been doing that as much because money is getting tighter even as more revenues come in to Town Crier Productions.

There is a loose energy in the interstitial moments of the podcast. I began work on this at 5 a.m. because I wanted to get it done so I could move on to the next set of stories. I have so many from this week to get to and I’m looking forward to doing what I can.

A reason I don’t work outside the home a lot is that my productivity drops to near zero if I’m in a place where I am likely to see people. In any case, I’m going to repeat the social media info from the other day.

I created a BlueSky account because I missed Twitter but I don’t do much except post links to Information Charlottesville stories. I’m not interested in live-posting anything, but I do miss interaction sometimes. I may experiment.
There are 437 followers of the Town Crier Productions Facebook page which is currently solely used to let people know when a story has been posted to Information Charlottesville. That website is the archive for stories that go out first in this newsletter. There is almost no engagement because that websites’ algorithms prioritize conflict and I’m not trying to manipulate anyone’s emotions.
There are slightly more followers on Instagram, but not many as posts are not quite optimized. I spent time trying to make some fancy images on Sunday but I got the formatting wrong. I’m going to keep trying to experiment because there’s a business owner in Waynesboro who one day I hope to actually impress.
There is Substack notes which I post status updates about newsletters. I don’t really know how people find these. I deleted the Substack app ages ago.
I post a version of the Week Ahead on Reddit each Sunday which is a little shorter. This is intended to attract people to the newsletter and many of you got here from there. But there is no official page and you have to know my username. Maybe I’ll change that in the future?
There is no TikTok page nor anything else with video because I do not know how to do that very well. One day I’d like to experiment, but I also don’t like being seen.
There is no new content on the Charlottesville Podcasting Networkbut it predates this newsletter by 15 years. I had a good idea and all I wanted to do was use to to tell stories about the community. Here I am still, hoping to get more people involved.

So that’s that. Please do follow some of the above and help me share some of the content when you see it. That will help me grow the audience which in turn will hopefully allow me to bring in more revenue. Paid subscriptions are nice, as are charitable contributions!

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Sometimes I have big ideas to spend the weekend writing all of the stories I have not yet written.

Other times, I send out the WTJU version as the podcast because I want to get the next week started and that work is already done.

Which is it this week? You’ll have to just listen or catch-up with the following stories:

Budget preparation is underway in Albemarle County and speakers at a first public hearing asked for more funding for affordable housing while others want to renegotiate a revenue-sharing agreement (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors briefed on next steps for zoning changes (read the story)
Rezoning request for 153 units on Rio Road sails past Albemarle Planning Commission (Read at C-Ville Weekly)
The Albemarle Planning Commission also recommends more homes at the North Pointe development near the airport (story not published yet)
City Council briefed on CRHA’s plans for a new generation of Westhaven housing (Read at C-Ville Weekly)
Albemarle supes delay vote on $3.5 million in housing funds to get more details on process (Read at C-Ville Weekly)

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Another week is upon us with the prospect of many more stories about all of the usual topics covered by Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m Sean Tubbs, the president and publisher of Town Crier Productions, an entity created in the summer of 2020 to help me try to bring in revenue so I can share my research into what happens in local, regional and Virginia government. This is an audio version that is largely based on what aired on WTJU on Saturday morning. This podcast edition adds a few other stories, and even contains one that has not yet been in print form.

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Manager Sam Sanders details the need for a two cent increase on the real property tax rate (read the story
Sanders also announces that Charlottesville’s pre-K center will be at Walker Upper Elementary School, not Oak Lawn (read the story)
Charlottesville has installed equipment at garages to allow customers to pay without a phone (read the story)
The city’s Board of Architectural Review takes a preliminary look at two development projects (read the story)
The University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors met this week and the Buildings and Grounds committee learned of a new building on Ivy Road as well as a future road connection between Millmont and Copely Road. (stories not printed yet)

A word about shout-outs and the podcast in general

The sixth anniversary of the lockdown declared due to the COVID-19 pandemic is this week. That’s also the sixth anniversary of my return to journalism when I decided on March 15 to just put out a podcast covering local and state response.

What would become the Charlottesville Quarantine Report began because I had audio production skills that had atrophied, as well as journalistic ones that had nowhere to go. The audience was miniscule for the dozens of episodes I produced, but I knew that research and reporting was how I wanted to spend my time.

So I left a job to take a leap of faith to create this newsletter, experiment with Information Charlottesville, and create a business called Town Crier Productionsto try to raise enough revenue to cover my bills.

Since then I’ve sent out well over a thousand newsletters and written hundreds of stories. For the first four years, all of the newsletters were also podcasts. About two years ago, I stopped that practice when I began producing a radio version for WTJU as a volunteer. I quickly learned I needed to increase attention to detail in the audio.

The audience for the podcast is much, much smaller than the print editions. As a result, I’ve tapered back audio production. Beginning in late January, I’ve begun to have equipment failure and these setbacks have made me less interested in producing the audio. Time spent away from the house was also less than ideal.

Yet, I do love producing the audio and I love the challenge of trying to balance stories across the newsletter, the website, C-Ville Weekly, the radio version, and the podcast. It will likely always be an experiment and my hopes to get it out at a regular time have been dashed.

In any case, this edition includes the public service announcements that aired on WTJU. I’m not going to report the print versions because in 2026 I am trying to transition the shout-outs to something more like formal underwriting. What you see now is a hodge-podge of a lot of different approaches and I have been moving to clean all of that up.

I’m also exploring the possibility of a different platform for this newsletter and will be experimenting first with Fifth District Community Engagement. That’s an experiment that has been on hiatus but I’m going to play around with it a little more.

There is also a new way for people to contribute. I’ve entered into a contract with the Tiny News Collective to allow people to make a charitable gift. Contact me if interested or visit this page.

And now, on to the next set of stories! But first, the obligatory picture posted here so there’s a good picture when it goes out to subscribers.

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Can anyone prove that February 10, 2026 was the last time there was an audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement? Turns out it is not that difficult as there is clearly a link and the day in question was a Tuesday. This podcast version consists of some stories from recent weeks and links to them if you’ve not read them yet.

The next actual newsletter may or may not be out this afternoon depending on how well a new month’s energy sustains itself throughout the pre-spring day.

In this edition:

Greene Supervisors appoint former member to fill vacancy (learn more)
Albemarle Planning Commission wants to see another design for Windy Knoll (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors take action on Boulders Road project (need to produce)
Charlottesville PC looks ahead to next set of zoning changes (need to produce)
No tax rate increases included in proposed $724M Albemarle budget for FY2027 (read the story)

First shout-out: WTJU Puzzle Hunt returns on March 14

In today’s first shout-out: Cville Puzzle Hunt is back! Organized by WTJU 91.1 FM and designed by Puzzled Bee, the event is a citywide cerebral puzzle for teens and adults of all ages. The Cville Puzzle Hunt works like an escape room, but all of downtown Charlottesville is the “room.”

This year’s event takes place Saturday, March 14, 2:30 - 6 p.m. The Puzzle Hunt starts and ends at IX Art Park, with puzzles to solve at various downtown locations. Those participating will have a wild afternoon running around trying to untangle five diabolical, large-scale puzzles inserted into the urban landscape.

Advance registration is requested at CvillePuzzleHunt.com. The event is free and a $10 a person donation is suggested or $20 if you want to sponsor someone else.

Thoughts at the end of CCE-1007A

Things have been off since the end of January culminating in a trip away from the place where I am best set up to be productive. But there were other odd things I’d like to mention to those who make their way to the ends of this newsletters.

It felt off to make a transition from #999 to #1000. I have a hard time believing I’ve actually been doing this for five and a half years.
The WTJU fundraiser pre-empted me for a week which threw off the rhythm.
Something happened to my recording equipment. For one, the audio gain in my headphones was off so I couldn’t hear myself doing narrations. For another, something about the microphone isn’t processing certain frequencies. Today I have to fix that, hence this podcast edition.
I’ve taken the first steps toward a new way people can support the work. I don’t have any sort of campaign planned to promote this, but I’m dropping the link.
I learned I had to go away three days before the trip, which led to me taking some time off to get ready
Being the sole proprietor and sole employee means there are a lot of levers that have to be pushed and it’s just me with arms that can do the work. I was sick for a couple of days and that means some work got displaced.
I do two stories a week for C-Ville Weeklywhich has a harder deadline than audio work that is consumed by far fewer people. Today I’m making myself do this before I write this week’s stories. Friday was my last day with the family and I needed space.

A reality is that if the audio is to continue, I need to have help doing the work. One day I will have a plan to train people who would like to learn, but managing people takes up the most time of all for a former extrovert turned full-on introvert. Still, maybe one day.

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There is a theory that both the next podcast edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement as well as the next written version might be delayed out of some sort of concern about whether the internal numbering system is equipped to deal with the impending approach of the 1,000th edition. At least, that is one possible explanation of why it has taken so long to produce these older stories from the last week. There was a slight disruption in the routine which sometimes results in delays. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I look forward to sorting it all out.

Audio versions of stories previously sent out in the newsletter:

Charlottesville City Council agrees to reallocate funding intended to run low-barrier shelter (read the story)
Charlottesville’s finance director presents more details on city’s $8.5 million surplus (read the story)
The 700 block of Charlottesville’s West Main Street is now known as “Mel’s Walk” (read the story)
Albemarle’s Economic Development Authority agrees to spend $500K on Boulders Road Extension (read the story)
Supervisor Mike Pruitt shares information on CARTA with fellow elected officials (read the story)
The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission will try again for federal funding for design of Rivanna pedestrian bridge (read the story)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Today’s shout-out: Cville Village seeks volunteers!

Can you drive a neighbor to a doctor’s appointment? Change an overhead lightbulb, plant a flower, walk a dog for someone who is sick, visit someone who is lonely? If so, Cville Village needs you!

Cville Village is a local 501c3 nonprofit organization loosely affiliated with a national network of Villages whose goals are to help seniors stay in their own homes as long as possible, and to build connections among them that diminish social isolation. Volunteers do small chores for, and have gatherings of, professors and schoolteachers, nurses and lawyers, aides and housekeepers. Time and chance come to all – a fall, an order not to drive, failing eyesight, a sudden stroke. They assist folks continue living at home, with a little help from their friends.

Cville Village volunteers consult software that shows them who has requested a service and where they are located. Volunteers accept only the requests that fit their schedule and their skills.

Volunteering for Cville Village can expand your circle of friends and shower you with thanks.

End notes for #998-A

My thoughts were well-intentioned. As I was producing stories last week, I did produce the audio but I did not post them to the Information Charlottesville website. Somehow I forgot that finished audio segments had been made and it felt like a slog to have to do the audio again.

This is because the radio version did not air last week and so I didn’t feel the same pressure to follow all of the steps. This week there will be a radio show and I have enough material that I am considering slowing down a little this week to focus on business and administration things.

Also, it is going to be in the fifties later and I want to go for a walk and watch the ice and snow melt. So I am going to aim to have the next newsletter out tomorrow. That will be #999 and after that will be #1000. No comma. I think that’s how I’ll get through adding a fourth digit.

Another reason things were difficult this week is that my copy of Adobe Audition reset and a lot of my bookmarks disappeared. Because I could not see the recent links to session files, I assumed I had not produced them.

I’m writing this as I produce the podcast and also missing are my links to various sound files I use as punctuation in between stories. Youngers versions of me used to love playing around with audio production. I still do, but these days the need to produce takes the capacity away from being creative.

Which is why this may be a week I listen to my brain and take a slight reset. All I know is that I’m very glad to have this edition done and to have a few hours off away from writing. There are many stories to tell, but there are also days I need to do a little more.

Oh! Another reason this week is weird. For some reason, the gain on the headphones for my recording set-up is really low so I can’t really hear myself while narrating. This is an annoyance but also causes issues. Perhaps I’ll spend the rest of the day setting up a new place to work!

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There is an inkling of a legend that one day scientists will perfect a regular orbit for the audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Or at least, in the current day and age, this podcast edition happens as a secondary or perhaps tertiary by-product of the creation of many stories. The optimal time for this to come is Monday morning but the mini Ice Age has taken its toll on normal routines. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I do hope you’ll take a listen whenever you can.

In this edition:

City Council took a look at national financial picture at recent retreat (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council briefed on FY27 budget; assessments up an average of 3.72 percent in 2026 (read the story)
Charlottesville’s FY25 surplus totals $8.5 million (read the story)
The Charlottesville-Albemarle Regional Transit Authority meets for the first time in 2026 (read the story)
Albemarle County seeking changes to form-based code at Rio / 29 (read the story)
Council confirms willingness to let group build bridge to Vietnam memorial, accept the infrastructure (read the story)
City Manager Sanders goes through his work plan; Ashley Marshall leaving city government (read the story)

First shout-out: Camp Albemarle!

Today’s subscriber-supported public service announcement goes out to Camp Albemarle, which has for over eighty years been a “wholesome rural, rustic and restful site for youth activities, church groups, civic events and occasional private programs.”

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Rebuilt in the early 1980’s, a legacy of 4-H programming thrives along with a wide range of additional activities. Educational initiatives from schools across the region spark environmental learning moments at every turn.

Second shout-out: WTJU Folk Marathon running this week

WTJU’s volunteer hosts are curating a Folk music mecca, running February 2 – 9, all to raise money for the non-commercial radio station as it continues to find its footing after federal funding cuts. Check out the schedule on the website here!

Keep your dial set to 91.1 FM (or stream from their player) for a week of Folk sounds, including old-time, honky tonk, global music, roots, and mind-bending psych folk. There will be deep dives into the work of singular artists, including Brandi Carlile, John Prine, Jesse Welles, Martin Carthy, and many more. There will be tributes to some of the musicians we lost in 2025, including Raul Malo, Danny Thompson, Joe Ely, Michael Hurley, and Todd Snider.The Marathon will boast eight live concerts, open to the public, and broadcast on air, online, and on the WTJU YouTube channel. Stop by to see Mama Tried, Scuffletown, the Buzzard Hollow Boys, Red and the Romantics, Ramona and the Holy Smokes, and others! Every hour of the seven days and nights broadcasts directly from WTJU; even the overnight programming is populated with archived concerts from our very own stage! We have also invited some of our favorite local musicians in to present special programming, including Banjo Hall of Fame member Bill Evans, singer/songwriter extraordinaire Terri Allard, and band leader Waverly Minor. Where else but WTJU can you find such support from the community?

End notes on #995-A

People who listen to the audio of this one may notice some interesting errors. More than usual, I’m popping my p’s and otherwise hitting plosives. That’s because something weird is happening with my recording set-up that I can’t hear proper gain on my voice when I’m recording. If I can’t hear them when I’m narrating a script, then they end up in the final mix because there’s no choice.

I’ll figure it out, but I left it in for this one because this may have been one of the hardest audio editions to have done for a while. I barely took a breather in January and sometimes when I do too much work I don’t process all of the stories properly.

So yesterday I took off from writing new stories to get caught up with what I’ve already done. I usually do this work on Saturdays but I wanted to look at the General Assembly.

This particular audio version also includes brand new interstitials. Those are the bits of sound in between the audio segments. One of the original ideas was that I would continue to make new ones but I’ve been using the same 20 stings over and over. So, today I made an effort to make new ones from existing weird things I’ve made over the years.

Speaking of which, I’ve had an idea. In the coming weeks I’ll be announcing a new way people can support my work, and that also involves changing the Patreon away from reporting and to something more artistic and creative. Probably not at all even close to the mainstream and it may not work, but I don’t want to close the account.

In any case, there may or may not be a regular newsletter today. I have to attend to the business of it all and this is a day where I may need to give myself over to that.

Then again, maybe I won’t.

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If there’s anything I have learned in my thirty years of reporting, it is that there is always more to be learned. One reason to do journalism is to document potential solutions to problems over time. At least, there’s the point of Charlottesville Community Engagement and this edition is a collection of audio stories from the past week. For those of you who do not want to listen, there are also links to this newsletter’s archive at Information Charlottesville.

In this edition:

Charlottesville Planning Commission briefed on tax abatement, student housing review (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors begin 2026 with a transportation update (read the story)
Albemarle assessments have increased by 6.17 percent in 2026 (read the story)
Spanberger signed ten first executive orders on first day in office (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council weighs in on student housing changes

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

First shout-out: Plant Virginia Natives

The year is now 2026 and time is running out for me to plan for what my yard could look like if I were to get it ready for spring! The invasive plants won again and I’ve got maybe a month until they begin to come back to life. Is this the year I get ahead of the creeper and vine that thrive in the humidity and the hot sun? What else could I plant instead?

One resource I could consult is Plant Virginia Natives to figure my way out of my predicament. Plant Virginia Natives is part of a partnership with ten regional campaigns for ten different ecosystems across Virginia, from the Northern Piedmont to the Eastern Shore. Take a look at the full map below for the campaign for native species where you are in the Commonwealth. For the Charlottesville area, download a free copy of the handbook: Piedmont Native Plants: A Guide for Landscapes and Gardens.

A glimpse of the story spreadsheet

Second shout-out: Charlottesville Scholarship Program

Today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out goes to the Charlottesville Scholarship Program. Started in 2001 by an initial investment by Charlottesville City Council, the Charlottesville Scholarship Program has grown their endowment to over $1.3 million, and has awarded 201 scholarships totaling more than $1.1 million.

The goal of the program has remained constant: to assist low- and moderate-income City residents and City employees who wish to improve their lives through post-secondary education. Many of these students are the first in their family to attend college.

Income-eligible Charlottesville Public School System high school seniors, City residents who are Charlottesville Public School System graduates or GED recipients, and City municipal and City School System employees, no matter where they reside, are all eligible for CSP scholarships. In a typical year, CSP awards eleven new, renewable scholarships. Ten of these are designated for eligible high school seniors, and the 11th scholarship is designated for an eligible adult applicant.

To learn more about the program, sign up for their newsletter, or make a donation, visit their website.

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Today’s edition is sponsored by the Ragged Mountain Running and Walking Shop

When was the last time you played a musical instrument? When was the last time you recorded a song you wanted to write either for yourself or for others? In an attempt to change the tone of these introductory paragraphs of Charlottesville Community Engagement, I decide to look instead at this day in music.

Two sources report that on January 22, 1959, Buddy Holly hit record on a machine and captured his final performances on a tape recorder, recordings that would later be posthumously produced professionally after his death in an aircraft crash on a snowy night. I’m Sean Tubbs, and more on that rabbit hole at the end of this edition.

In this edition:

There is a vacancy on the Greene County Board of Supervisors as Francis McGuigan resigns
Albemarle and Charlottesville officials are preparing for a weekend storm expected this
The Charlottesville Albemarle Regional Transit Authority will meet today the first time in 2026
Albemarle County promotes Amy Smith to be the next Parks and Recreation Director

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

First shout-out: Cville Village seeks volunteers

Can you drive a neighbor to a doctor’s appointment? Change an overhead lightbulb, plant a flower, walk a dog for someone who is sick, visit someone who is lonely? If so, Cville Village needs you!

Cville Village volunteers consult software that shows them who has requested a service and where they are located. Volunteers accept only the requests that fit their schedule and their skills.

Volunteering for Cville Village can expand your circle of friends and shower you with thanks.

McGuigan resigns from the Greene County Board of Supervisors

The Greene County Board of Supervisors will once again need to fill a vacancy now that one of its members has resigned while in office.

Francis McGuigan turned in his resignation as the at-large Supervisor today, just over two years after being elected in November 2023.

“We would like to thank Supervisor McGuigan for his commitment to the community,” said Board Chairman Steve Catalano in an information release.

On January 13, McGuigan had voted for Catalano to be chair during the annual organization meeting. Midway Representative Matt Hartung was not present for the vote but joined the meeting later.

The release states Supervisors will discuss how to move forward with a replacement at their next meeting on January 27.

In the fall of October 2023, former Supervisor Abby Heflin resigned as the Stanardsville representative and the Board accepted applications for a replacement. The person appointed was Steve Catalano.

For more on this story, take a look at this story on the Piedmont Journal-Recorder.

Area preparing for heavy winter storm

A large winter storm is heading for the east coast this weekend and that’s expected to leave a heavy accumulation of snow and ice. Preparations are underway by first responders and the Virginia Department of Transportation.

Albemarle’s Deputy County Executive, Trevor Henry, briefed the Board of Supervisors Wednesday night about what was known at that time.

“We have through our emergency manager a process by which we spin up our planning efforts,” Henry said. “And so I wanted to just assure the board but also use this as a reminder to the community that they should be paying attention to this weekend.”

Henry said any snow and ice that falls may continue to be a problem as the forecast is for temperatures to remain below freezing through the end of next week. He added public safety will be ready.

“Police and fire are really looking at a Saturday morning to at least initially through Monday night,” Henry said. “That may be a longer operational period where there’s going to be additional resources.”

Henry said the county is asking residents to be prepared to be without power for up to three days. To that effect, the county set out a message this afternoon with information including a checklist for an emergency kit created by the Virginia Department of Emergency Management.

Soon afterward, the City of Charlottesville announced it has activated the Snow Operations Team with a description of their duty.

“The City is responsible for winter operations across approximately 165 centerline miles of roadway, 49 miles of sidewalks (including Safe Routes to School and City-owned properties), more than 45 municipal and school parking lots, City parks facilities, and the Downtown Pedestrian Mall,” reads the message.

The city has over 165 people working on snow operations as well as a sizable inventory of equipment including “25 dedicated snowplow trucks equipped with salt spreaders and brine tanks.”

Roads will be pretreated with brine and crews will begin clearing snow when necessary.

“Snow response follows a priority plan,” reads the message from the city. “Crews will begin with primary routes, including major corridors and roads critical for emergency response and transit service.”

Emergency snow routes will also be in effect as of 9 a.m. Saturday. Anyone who parks along these corridors must move their vehicle or it may be towed.

Designated Emergency Snow Routes include:

Market Street (Old Preston Avenue to 9th Street NE)
High Street (Preston Avenue to 9th Street NE)
Water Street (Ridge Street to 10th Street NE)
2nd Street West (Market Street to Water Street)
4th Street East (Market Street to Water Street)
West Main Street (Ridge Street to JPA)
University Avenue (JPA to Rugby Road)

There will be free parking in the two municipal parking garages Friday, January 23 at 6:00 PM through Tuesday, January 27 at 8:00 AM.

For the city’s full list, click here.

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Charlottesville Albemarle Regional Transit Authority to meet today

In late 2025, an entity known as the Regional Transit Partnership ended and transferred many of its duties to a recently created authority intended to promote greater cooperation and coordination between the area’s multiple transit agencies.

Today the Board of Directors of the Charlottesville Albemarle Regional Transit Authority will meet for the first time in 2026 at the Water Street Center. (CARTA website)

The agenda for today’s meeting looks much like an RTP agenda with opportunities for Jaunt, Charlottesville Area Transit, and University Transit Service representatives to tell what they’re doing and how they fit into the bigger picture. So far, though, the only two voting members are Albemarle and Charlottesville.

Scottsville Supervisor Michael Pruitt will be joined by newcomer Jack Jouett Supervisor Sally Duncan, and Charlottesville City Councilor Natalie Oschrin will be joined by newcomer Jen Fleisher. Fleisher has attended multiple meetings of the RTP as an alternative representing the Blue Ridge Health District.

There are details on both Jaunt and the University Transit Service in the packet, but nothing from Charlottesville Area Transit.

One of the main tasks for CARTA this year will be to conduct something called the “Regional Transit Service Prioritization and Implementation Feasibility Study” which builds off of the 2022 Regional Transit Vision Plan and the Regional Transit Governance Study from 2023.

Not on the agenda is a discussion of how CARTA might be able to help increase funding for CAT’s mission to hire a total of 108 drivers. That’s the amount CAT Director Garland Williams says is needed to restore full service and make long-awaited route changes.

Here’s a story about that from December 2025 as well as a story from August in which a representative from IMPACT said the organization is watching.

Patreon-fueled shout-out: Design Develop

Visit their website for an introductory video that captures the 3D point cloud scanning of the Downtown Transit Center and a booklet that will explain more!

Albemarle promotes Smith to Parks and Recreation Director

After a nationwide search, Albemarle County has named a veteran of the Parks and Recreation Department to lead the office after the retirement of former director Bob Crickenberger.

“Our own Amy Smith, who has been the deputy director and, and has enjoyed a wonderful career serving Albemarle county, was our top candidate,” said County Executive Jeffrey Richardson.

Smith will lead a department with a $5,584,028 budget for fiscal year 2026 and 27 full-time employees. Two objectives in the county’s strategic plan address how parks can help reach Quality of Life Goals.

These are:

4.4 — Integrate parks planning with multi-modal transportation planning across the County
4.5 — Enhance overall access to parks and recreational opportunities with an emphasis on urban neighborhoods.

The FY26 budget also includes $1.5 million for work to pursue the latter objective through creation of a new urban pocket park on Hillsdale Drive as well as new amenities at Humphris Park.

Soon after being announced, Smith explained her philosophy toward parks and recreation.

“Our parks protect natural beauty, promote health and wellness, provide spaces for connection, and ensure that residents of all ages and abilities can enjoy the outdoors. I’m truly inspired by Albemarle’s commitment to quality of life,” Smith said. “I plan to build upon the same foundation through increasing innovation, strategic management of resources, and furthering, uniting and empowering our dedicated Parks and Rec staff and our amazing community partners.”

Smith began working for the county in 1993. Jack Jouett Supervisor Sally Duncan just joined the Board and said she was impressed by the time Smith has spent working for Albemarle.

“I just think it’s really great when we can retain people and have people, you know, build their careers here and have longevity,” Duncan said.

Supervisor Ann Mallek is in her fifth term representing the White Hall District and said Smith has helped oversee and manage many of the parks that have come on line in the past two decades and will now work to bring many more that are planned into reality.

“So many things on your plate with the blueways and Buck Island and the Brook Hill ramp and such a long, long list because there’s so many places that you already manage,” Mallek said.

The blueways are a series of amenities allowing people to use area rivers and streams for recreational purposes. As part of this effort, the county opened Brook Hill River Park on Rio Mills Road in the summer of 2019 and there are plans to develop a park at Buck Island 17 miles down the Rivanna River.

Smith helped lead a parks and recreation needs assessment for Albemarle in 2018 and creation of a parks strategic plan. Much of that is now within the Parks and Recreation Chapter of AC44, the name the county called their Comprehensive Plan. This link will take you right there.

There’s also the recreation side of the department which provides many ways for people to interact with each other. Richardson said the intent is to overcome obstacles as they pop up.

“When our middle school volleyball league registrations opened across Albemarle County, there was a rush of families signing up their students for this program,” Richardson said. “Henley was, was completely full within three minutes. Lakeside was full within 30 minutes.”

Richardson said there were many calls from people who were disappointed they missed out but the department showed flexibility in the name of customer service.

“So what the Parks and Rec department did was step back, reformatted the league and they expanded capacity, ultimately registering 400 participants across all the schools,” Richardson said. “And that eliminated the wait list.”

For more on how to provide feedback on the new Hillsdale pocket park as well as Humprhis Park, visit engagealbemarle.org.

Articles by other journalists you are encouraged to read next:

When Virginia GOP senator’s solar farm stalled, the Youngkin admin got involved, Ben Paviour, Virginia Mercury, January 13, 2026
ICE detains 5-year-old Minnesota boy; school leader says agents used him as ‘bait’, Elizabeth Shockman, MPR News, January 21, 2026
Va. lawmakers want voters to take a 180-degree turn on redistricting; some reform advocates are wary, David Poole, Virginia Mercury, January 22, 2026
Winter road salting is a growing source of pollution [and] Virginia officials want alternatives, Katherine Hafner, WHRO, January 22, 2026

#989 is an echo from the past

A thing I keep to myself is a long history of relaxing through challenging myself to recording improvisational music. At one point I wanted to be in a band, but I’ve always been way too guarded to do such things. Or at least, not willing to put in the time.

Yet I’ve recorded many hours of my attempts at songs over the years and I find the experience of expressing myself through musical creation helps me fill out a lot of the rough spots in my life. I made a decision a long time ago to keep all of that to myself, but I’m also aware of my mortality more than usual.

So I had this idea to begin to put some of my sound recordings on Patreon as part of that system. After all, my hope is to soon have a mechanism people can use to make tax-deductible contributions for the reporting.

This is still just an idea crafted at a time where I’m paying a lot of attention to where I was at this time in 2011. I was not quite four years into my time at Charlottesville Tomorrow and I was very uncertain about what I wanted to do. I am interested in what I was singing at that time for reasons I’ll explore over on Patreon if I decide to go ahead with this side project.

Oh yeah, also somehow this edition is a podcast, too. Not sure how that happened.

And now, probably the weirdest video I’ve posted yet which is still germane somehow.

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Today’s edition is sponsored by the Ragged Mountain Running and Walking Shop

There are very few editions of Charlottesville Community Engagement that are sent out on a Saturday but there’s enough new information to tell you so here we are. Today is the first day of the administration of Governor Abigail Spanberger and there have already been some big changes. I’m Sean Tubbs and it’s January 17, 2026.

In this edition:

Abigail Spanberger is now Virginia’s 75th Governor
There are several media reports that at least three members of the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors has resigned at Spanberger’s request
The Virginia General Assembly has set the stage for a Constitutional amendment this spring for a Congressional redistricting with debate in both the House of Delegates and the Virginia Senate

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Corrections to start:

In the January 16, 2026 edition, I misidentified Charlottesville’s delegation to the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. They are Jen Fleisher and Michael Payne.

First-shout: Charlottesville Community Bikes seeing volunteers for the Charlottesville Ten Miler

The Charlottesville Ten Miler is fast-approaching so there’s plenty of time to get training. Or so I keep telling myself. Or perhaps you’d like to help out on March 28 and witness thousands of people moving through the streets of our community as they raise money for local groups?

Charlottesville Community Bikes is one of the beneficiaries of this year’s Ten Miler and their level of support depends on how many people they can get to volunteer for any number of duties. If you’d like to learn more, visit the Ten Miler website and sign up if you’d like to get involved. Volunteers are encouraged to select “Anywhere You Need Me” for the greatest impact.

Spanberger takes office as Virginia’s 75th governor

The first woman to serve as the Governor of Virginia took the oath of office at the State Capitol this afternoon after winning the election last November.

Democrat Abigail Spanberger defeated Republican Winsome Earle-Sears with over 57 percent of the vote.

“Neighbors, friends, and our fellow Virginians. It is my honor to be with all of you today,” said Governor Spanberger. “An inauguration ceremony like this one, with all its tradition and pageantry, represents something profound and in its origin, something uniquely American, the peaceful transfer of power.”

Spanberger said the tradition began when George Washington, a Virginian, opted to step down after two terms as President. She thanked former Governor Glenn Youngkin for his service, as well as the time that former Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears and former Attorney General Jason Miyares put in while in office.

Spanberger also thanked generations that came before her that worked to ensure that women have the right not only to vote but also to hold office.

“But who could only dream of a day like today?” Spanberger asked. “I stand before those who made it possible for a woman to also participate in that peaceful transfer of power and take that oath.”

Spanberger noted that this is the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, drawing attention to Thomas Jefferson’s role as Virginia’s second governor. The first was Patrick Henry, who was sworn in in 1776.

“Governor Henry is best known for his call against tyranny at St. John’s Church, just up the road, words that helped launch the American Revolution,” Spanberger said. “But in his final public speech delivered in Virginia Years later in 1799, he made an appeal to his fellow citizens, warning against the divisions that were threatening our young country. His appeal remains timeless. He said, united we stand, divided we fall, Let us not split into factions which must destroy that union upon which our existence hangs.”

Spanberger noted that the steps of the Virginia capitol were used by suffragists to lobby for the right for women to vote, a request denied for many years until 1920 when the U.S. Constitution was amended. She also noted that Virginia did not ratify the 19th Amendment until 1952.

The new governor also noted that Virginia decided to call itself a Commonwealth upon independence and not just a state.

“What’s the difference?,” Spanberger said. “We, kids, pay attention. Someone may ask you this eventually. There’s no difference. There is no difference in how we operate or function as a state. The difference lies in the intentions of our forefathers and the choice to indicate that here our government should serve the common good. That the voices of everyday Virginians, not kings, not aristocrats, not oligarchs, should. That the voices of everyday Virginian should drive us forward and that our prosperity depends on that union.”

Turning to policy and the future, Spanberger said she would help guide Virginia during a time when the federal government is seeking to end support for rural hospitals, support for health care, and other outcomes sought by the current administration.

“I know that some who are here today or watching from home may disagree with the litany in of challenges and the hardships that I laid out,” Spanberger said. “Your perspective may differ from mine, but that does not preclude us from working together where we may find common cause.”

Spanberger said she looks forward to working with the General Assembly over the next four years and thanked her Cabinet for being willing to serve.

“As we mark 250 years since the dawn of American freedom, what will our children, our grandchildren and their descendants write about this time in our Commonwealth’s history? This chapter, 50, 100, 250 years from now, will they say that we let divisions fester or challenges overwhelm us? Or will they say that we stood up for what is right, fixed what is broken, and served the common good?”

You can watch the entire inauguration ceremony on VPM or read the remarks on the website of the 75th Governor.

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Several members of the Board of Visitors have resigned at Spanberger’s request

The Cavalier Daily is reporting that four members of the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors have resigned following a request from Governor Abigail Spanberger before she was sworn in.

Shortly after Spanberger was elected, she asked the Board of Visitors to suspend a search for a new president following the resignation of Jim Ryan in June 2025. Former Governor Glenn Youngkin told her to stop interfering and the Board hired Scott Beardsley on December 19. Beardsley resigned as Dean of the Darden School of Business to take the job.

The Board was already down to 12 appointees, all named by Youngkin, following the failure of five new nominees to get confirmed by the General Assembly.

Rector Rachel Sheridan, Vice Rector Porter Wilkinson, and member Paul Manning all resigned on Friday. The New York Times reportsthat Doug Wetmore resigned today and their earlier reporting Spanberger has also asked Stephen Long to resign.

The Cavalier Daily obtained a copy of Sheridan’s resignation letter to Youngkin that blamed “political warfare” for the Board’s inability to stabilize a University community where several groups expressed concern that Beardsley was appointed without their input. On Thursday, the Faculty Senate adopted a resolution calling for Spanberger to act.

“The Faculty Senate calls upon Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger to exercise her statutory authority, review the actions of current Board members,remove those whose conduct has fallen short of the responsibilities of Visitors, and appoint qualified individuals to fill all vacancies on the Board,” reads one part of the resolution.

The resolution also asks the new Board of Visitors to review the search process to determine if there need to be changes.

As of publication, the Board of Visitors website has not yet been updated to reflect any resignations. However, Deputy Spokeswoman Bethanie Glover confirmed the four resignations.

“President Beardsley and University leaders thank them for their service to UVA,” reads a brief statement sent in response to a query.

The University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors is next scheduled to meet on March 5. This is a developing story.

Soon after being sworn in, Spanberger signed ten executive orders. One of them seeks reform of the way that members of governing bodies of state institutions of higher learning are appointed. For more details, visit the Virginia Political Newsletter.

Second shout-out: Alliance Française de Charlottesville

The Alliance Française de Charlottesville promotes the French language and francophone culture through educational and cultural programs. Visit the Alliance Française website to learn more about group classes, private lessons, cultural events, and social activities for both kids and adults.

Special election on redistricting highly likely this spring on new Congressional maps in Virginia

The Virginia General Assembly has set the stage for a special election this spring in which voters will be asked whether they would allow the state legislature to redraw the Commonwealth’s Congressional districts in order to elect more Democrats.

The move is a response to efforts by President Donald Trump to urge Republican-led legislatures across the nation to redraw boundaries for the House of Representatives to guarantee members of his party win.

So far, both Texas and California have moved ahead with new maps.

This week both the Virginia Senate and the House of Delegates kicked the 2026 legislative session off by passing a second reference of a Constitutional amendment to set up that ballot question. Under Virginia’s Constitution, the legislature must agree to the amendment twice with a House of Delegates election in between before it goes to voters.

Democrats took advantage of a special session from 2024 that had never ended to convene last October to hold the first reference in the House of Delegates and the Senate. Democrats then picked up an additional 13 seats in the House of Delegates.

The House of Delegates passed the second reference on January 14 after about 20 minutes of debate. Delegate Rodney Willett (D-58) is the chief patron of House Joint Resolution 4 which will allow for a one-time redistricting outside of the decennial reapportionment process.

“This keeps Virginia’s options open,” Willett said. “This would enable us to preserve flexibility. If the people approve it and then we implement it, we could make redistricting decisions but there’s no mandate here to do so.”

Willett said the Virginia Redistricting Commission would do the work of redrawing Congressional lines in 2031 after the next Census.

Delegate Terry Kilgore (R-45) said the General Assembly should not overturn the will of voters who approved a Constitutional amendment in 2020 to give the power to draw Congressional districts to the bipartisan Virginia Redistricting Committee.

“We shouldn’t care about what other states are doing,” Kilgore said. “We should care about what Virginia is doing, what message we’re sending to our constituents.”

Kilgore urged his colleagues to follow the lead of Indiana where a redistricting push failed in December. In both the Indiana House and the Senate, some Republicans joined with Democrats to vote against an effort to redraw lines. (learn more on Wikipedia)

Delegate Wren Williams (R-47) rose to ask a question of Willett.

“In 2020, nearly two-thirds of Virginia told us they wanted politics out of our map making,” Williams said. “Why would we reverse course now even under what is alleged to be a carve out for extraordinary emergencies?”

Willett said this is a measure in response to a president who has demanded state institutions make changes for his benefit.

“Our hand was forced here by the extraordinary actions coming from Washington by a president who contacted not one, not two, but multiple states and directed them to redistrict and change the election picture and essentially disenfranchise Virginia voters and other states that would vote Democratic,” Willett said. “We couldn’t stand for that. When a bully punches you, sometimes you have to punch back.”

Delegate Tom Garrett (R-56) argued that it would be Virginia Republicans who would be disenfranchised if lines are drawn to give Democrats an advantage. He ran through a list of states that are pursuing redistricting.

“California, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, Utah, South Carolina, Virginia, Washington, Florida, Maryland, Alabama, Louisiana, New York, North Dakota have all either done this or are looking at doing it,” Garrett said. “You know what makes Virginia different? We are the only state on the list that I named that had a constitutional amendment that passed in 99 out of 100 House of Delegates districts five short years ago.”

Delegate Mark Sickles (D-17) reminded his colleagues that the Virginia Redistricting Commission failed to complete their job in October 2021.

“That commission did not work like we hoped it would,” Sickles said. “And having a bipartisan thing, a group of Democrats and Republicans and citizens come up with these districts, it did not work. The court drew these seats. So I don’t know how much reverence we have for that. But this is an emergency. If this is not an emergency for American democracy, I don’t know what is.”

Delegate Mark Simon (D-13) noted that if Virginia voters don’t want to change the districts, they can vote accordingly.

“You know what happens after this resolution passes?” Simon asked. “There’s a referendum. We get to go back to the voters again and they’re the ones who get to decide what we do going forward.”

The vote was 62 in favor, 33 against, one abstention, and four not voting.

A look at what other states are up to:

Before we go over to the Senate, let’s go through some of what can be known about other states listed by Delegate Garrett.

In November, voters in California approved Proposition 50 with 64.42 percent of the vote that redrew lines to target several Republican incumbents. (learn more on Wikipedia)
In Missouri, the legislature approved a new map for Congressional boundaries last September intended to reduce Democratic representation but a citizens group called People not Politicians are trying to force a referendum. Take a look at this January 9, 2026 story in the Missouri Independent for more information.
The North Carolina legislature approved a map in October 2025 designed to make it more difficult for one Democratic incumbent to get re-elected. Learn more in this Associated Press article from then. The situation in Utah is different as there were already legal clouds over redistricting related to an attempt to create an independent commission in 2018. According to an article by Katie McKeller in the Utah News Dispatch, a judge ordered a new map that would likely lead to one Democratic seat. Republicans are challenging.
The Texas legislature adopted a map last August intended to give Republicans five additional seats and this was briefly thrown out by a federal court. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled voted 6-3 to allow the new map to proceed. (learn more on Wikipedia)
The Ohio Redistricting Commission adopted a new map last October that gives Republicans an advantage. They did so before the legislature was set to do it themselves, reports Jeremy Pelzer for cleveland.com.
Some Democrats in Washington want to redraw the maps, but Scott Greenstone of KUOW reports there are obstacles to getting that done in 2026.
The situation in Louisiana is more complicated and I refer you to Ballotpedia.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul is exploring the idea of redistricting, reports Kate Lisa for Spectrum News.
North Dakota only has one Congressional District making redistricting irrelevant. Learn more on Ballotpedia.

Senate Debate

The Virginia Senate took about 40 minutes on January 16 to go through the debate with Senator Christopher Head (R-3) introducing several amendments to House Joint Resolution 4. He made many of the same arguments as his colleagues in the House, arguing that voters had agreed to place the power of redistricting to a commission after the General Assembly gave them that choice in 2020.

“Some of you weren’t here then, but if you voted for it then and you thought that was a good idea because it was your ethics and your beliefs and they were foundational and fundamental,” Head said. “But now, because you hate the man that’s in the White House, and that’s really the only thing that’s behind this, is that you hate the man that’s in the White House and you want to blunt his power, then we’re going to politically gerrymander and take away the rights of the people to have representation that represents them.”

Senator Scott Surovell (D-34) said that Head’s amendments should have been made on first reference. He said he did not support the creation of the Virginia Redistricting Commission but he could understand how those who did might change their mind now.

“They didn’t imagine that we’re going to have a hyper-partisan fascist ideologue telling state legislatures around the country to basically redesign their districts to maximize his own personal political power,” Surovell said. “And to the extent anybody even thought about that, I think most people thought that there were people of principle in the Republican party that would stand up to it because they cared about the rule of law or system of government preserving democracy.”

Head did not receive enough votes for his amendments.

Surovell said he wished he did not have to support this move but felt there was no other choice.

“When other states manipulate their maps to gain unfair advantage, we don’t just harm,” Surovell said. “They don’t just harm their own voters. They also harm Virginia’s ability to have its fair representation in Congress. We’re simply seeking to level the playing field in Congress which has already been. Which is being tilted against us and our state.

Senator Mark Peake (R-22) wanted to know what would happen if voters approve the redistricting.

“Do we come back into special session after the citizens have voted to draw the new congressional districts?” Peake asked.

Surovell said there are still remaining questions to be answered but the maps would be available for the public to review before the referendum.

Peake said if this passes, Democrats will do what they can to hold on to power.

“You’re going to do away with bipartisan redistricting,” Peake said. “You’re going to try and put us in a 10 to 1 Democrat to Republican congressional districts, and then you’re going to again resume gerrymandering the entire Commonwealth.”

Senator Ryan McDougle (R-26) urged Democrats in Virginia to follow what some of the Republicans did in the Indiana legislature when they stopped a gerrymander.

“Republicans in Indiana stood up to political pressure and said we’re not going to play these political games,” McDougle said.

In the Indiana House, 57 Republicans voted for the redistricting and 12 voted against, joining 29 Democrats. In the Senate, 21 Republicans joined 10 Democrats against the redistricting, and 19 Republicans voted for it.

Senator Bill Stanley (R-7) pointed out that President Trump is unpopular, citing Democrats picking up 13 seats in the Virginia House of Delegates this past November.

“It seems to me what this kerfuffle is all about is because the current president has encouraged some states to change their congressional makeups and the lines,” Stanley said. “The last time I checked, when he was elected in 2016. In 2018, Madam President, the Democrats picked up, I think 41 seats in Congress.”

That appears to be accurate per Wikipedia.

Senator Schuyler VanValkenburg (D-16) agreed that Trump is unpopular and said that is why is is seeking to redraw lines across the country.

“As is so often true over the last 10 years of politics, every accusation is a confession,” VanValkenburg said. “The other side mistakes their inability to. To push back against the craziness of our current president for how we will act or are acting.”

The vote in the senate was 21 to 18 with one abstention.

What questions do you have?

(image) The current Congressional lines in Virginia. Image by Wikipedia user Twotwofourtsix.

Let’s say a few things about #986

I had not intended to do a second podcast today but I feel it is important for Virginians to hear the voices of people in our government. I also got caught up in the moment. I remember attending the inauguration of Governor Mark Warner as a reporter back when that happened.

At the time I really thought I would have a career in public radio, but my desire for longer and longer stories met up against their need for shorter and shorter ones. When it was clear I was not going to get a job in the field, I tried to create my own. After fits and starts, here we are.

I’m not going to any gala or celebration today. I’m going to keep working as that’s what I want to do more. I’ve got to get the Week Ahead out tomorrow, write two stories for C-Ville Weekly and finish up a cover story article that I am procrastinating on. Never underestimate the power of procrastination, dear reader!

But I need some music to get me through and the DJs from Buenos Aires strike again!

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The month of January 2026 is halfway through and the pace of the previous year appears to have continued with no days off in a period of transition and tumult. I’m Sean Tubbs, and Charlottesville Community Engagement is a newsletter with stories about a part of the world I’ve been covering for a long time with a focus on growth, development, housing, and whatever else comes together.

In this edition:

Albemarle Planning Commission recommends approval of a rezoning near junction of I-64 and U.S. 29 (read this story over at C-Ville Weekly)
Sanders welcomes new staff to Charlottesville (read the story)
Council names two to Charlottesville Planning Commission (read the story)
Developer named for UVA student housing on Emmet / Ivy (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council gives direction on affordable housing spending (need to produce)
Alternatives coming for payment at Charlottesville’s municipal garages (read the story)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Today’s shout-out: Town Crier Productions

When I was a kid decades ago, I dreamed of creating my own newspaper or having my own radio show. I lived on a cul-de-sac in a neighborhood in a community that was not the most exciting, but my imagination put me on the pathway to now when I’ve somehow managed to cobble together a newsletter with over 4,600 subscribers.

This week I’m trying to clear out the backlog from 2025 which includes at least a couple of newsletters of regular content before there will be a series of editions that look back on the specifics of the year.

My upbringing as a first generation American fueled me with a passion to understand a country so different from where my parents had grown up. For an entire career now I’ve been powered by a desire to know what’s going on, and to share what I know with people who also are curious, thoughtful, and independent.

What I am not is a business person, and the growth of Town Crier Productions has been slow and steady because my focus is on putting forward as much information as possible while pointing people to the places where they can contribute should they want to do so. Here are some current options:

Take out a paid subscription to Substack with the yearly option being the most beneficial
Consider a Patreon contribution to support more than just this newsletter
Send a check to Town Crier Productions, PO Box 1754, Charlottesville, VA 22902
Consider becoming an experimental sponsor of both this newsletter and Information Charlottesville.

I’m still dreaming of what this could all be, knowing I’ve got a lot of growth to do in terms of being a business person. I believe there is value in what I do each and every day, and I am able to pay my bills because there are enough of you who agree.

If you’re not sure, please keep reading and listening to the content. Share with friends. Share links to social media. Leave a comment!

The goal of this work is intended to advance conversation about complex topics in a country experiencing a lot of soul-searching as the 21st century steam-rolls on.

Thoughts at the end of CCE-985A

A behind the scenes fact! I work alone and so I have a lot of inside jokes to amuse myself. I name each of the podcast. This one is CCE-984A-stunted-moats for some reason. I’m an odd person.

I also created a couple of new audio bumpers that separate the stories. These also amuse me. The ad-lib shout-outs also amuse me.

Are these still worth doing? I think so. As I said in one of the pieces of continuity, the podcast marks the end of one week and the transition to another.

This particular edition begins with a story that is actually a C-Ville Weekly story that I did not produce a CCE version and now will not. I produced that story for them about a month ago but it got lost somewhere along the way.

I’m only putting in this section today because I need to put an image at the top.

Now, on to CCE-986 which will not have a name because it is not audio. There are rules to this madness, after all.

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What will the podcast edition be like in 2026? This particular edition features a set of stories of things that happened between December 15 and January 7, stories that have already gone out in Charlottesville Community Engagement but not yet in sonic form! This edition has already aired on WTJU at 6 a.m. on January 10. The idea was to send this out yesterday, but there are eddies in the space-time continuum.

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council says goodbye to Councilor Pinkston (read the story)
Council elects Wade as Mayor through 2027; Oschrin to be Vice Mayor (read the story)
Ned Gallaway to serve as Chair of Albemarle Board of Supervisors in 2026 (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors appoint Puckett as new fire chief
Regional tourism body endorses creation of new tourism region (read the story)
Louisa endorses support for new Virginia Piedmont tourism district (read the story)
Louisa Supervisors want General Assembly to pay for redistricting special election if held (read the story)
BAR denies approval required for current plans for Fifeville apartment complex (read the story)

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December 29 is upon us and this is perhaps the final sonic edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement for the year. This certainly is the antepenultimate day of 2025, a year in which there is still much to say in the coming week or so before 2026 begins to find its identity. In any case, today there are four editions of stories that have already gone out in newsletter form but are now assembled with soundbites, actualities, and the occasional double-breath.

I’m Sean Tubbs, and I’m glad for those who take a listen.

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council briefed on potential new areas of spending on housing (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council agrees to sell cul-de-sac to Jefferson Scholars Foundation (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors get a briefed on the Annual Comprehensive Financial Report, also known as the annual audit (read the story)
Charlottesville’s Annual Comprehensive Financial Report to be published by December 31 (read the story)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Today’s shout-out: Town Crier Productions

Take out a paid subscription to Substack with the yearly option being the most beneficial
Consider a Patreon contribution to support more than just this newsletter
Send a check to Town Crier Productions, PO Box 1754, Charlottesville, VA 22902
Consider becoming an experimental sponsor of both this newsletter and Information Charlottesville.

If you’re not sure, please keep reading and listening to the content. Share with friends. Share links to social media. Leave a comment!

The goal of this work is intended to advance conversation about complex topics in a country experiencing a lot of soul-searching as the 21st century steam-rolls on.

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December 22, 2025 has arrived and so has this sonic edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Many of the longer versions of stories are produced as if they are going to air on the radio, and for this edition two have already done so! The other two have not, but will be among the stories that may be chosen for the December 27 edition that will air on WTJU at 6 a.m. Between now and then the goal is to spend the holiday period combing through a backlog of potential topics. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I’m glad that this is what I do.

In this edition:

Charlottesville Planning Commission seeks some changes to city’s five year CIP (read the story)
Charlottesville ends use of Flock system (read the story)
Charlottesville transitions parking garages to AI-powered access management (read the story)
The Albemarle Planning Commission takes a look at a new tool to be used to measure how the county’s growth area land is being used (read the story)

Not quite in this edition but recently written all the same:

Board of Visitors names Darden Dean as next UVA president
Charlottesville City Council makes appointments (link to Substack)
Rezoning sought for between 22 and 110 more units in Hollymead in Albemarle

Shout-out to Patreon-fueled shout-outs!

Since the beginning of this newsletter, several organizations and one business have been supporters of Town Crier Productions with a $25 monthly contribution funded through Patreon or some other financial method! That system is slowly giving away to something different but I thought I would take this special Monday morning slot to thank the following for still sticking to it:

Alliance Francaise
Camp Albemarle
Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards
Charlottesville E-Bike Lending Library
Cville Jazz Society
Design Develop
Plant Virginia Natives
Re-Leaf
Rivanna Conservation Alliance
WTJU

If you have a moment, take a look at any of the ones that sound interesting to you. Learn something new!

A new system of shout-outs will come into place in 2026 and if you are interested in sponsorship opportunities, please drop me a line. I’m a one-person information outlet and for that number to go up, I have to continue to grow revenue.

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Why not start a week off with a podcast edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement? There are likely many answers why not with a primary one being that it is atypical for such a program to be sent out through this feed on a Monday morning. Perhaps a better question is why produce audio versions of this newsletter at all? The answer to that is simply just to take a listen and hear for yourself.

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council is briefed on transportation happenings, including plans to hire at least ten bus drivers a year until there’s a total of 108 (read the story)
The Virginia Department of Transportation says Charlottesville is making progress towards delivering transportation projects, but the city is still deficient (read the story)
A future UVA Engineering Building gets boost from use of strategic funds (read the story)
The UVA Buildings and Grounds gets updates on various projects and adds repairs to Steele Wing to the Major Capital Plan (read the story)
Charlottesville Planning Commission gets updates on UVA projects (read the story)

Shout-out to Patreon-fueled shout-outs!

Alliance Francaise
Camp Albemarle
Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards
Charlottesville E-Bike Lending Library
Cville Jazz Society
Design Develop
Plant Virginia Natives
Re-Leaf
Rivanna Conservation Alliance
WTJU

If you have a moment, take a look at any of the ones that sound interesting to you. Learn something new!

A new system of shout-outs will come into place in 2026 and if you’re interested in sponsorship opportunities, please drop me a line. I’m a one-person information outlet and for that number to go up, I have to continue to grow revenue.

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This week, WTJU is holding their Classical Marathon which means that there will be no radio version of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Yet, the production of the newsletter often depends on harvesting audio recordings of meetings. I’m Sean Tubbs, publisher and president of Town Crier Productions, and I’ve been chopping up sound into stories for over thirty years now. This podcast version for December 10, 2025 includes three sonic articles from the past week so I can make room for the next set.

There will be another regular newsletter later on this evening.

Here are the highlights:

Former Congressman Tom Perriello enters the race for the Democratic nomination to represent Virginia’s Fifth District in the U.S. House of Representatives (read the story)
Two special elections scheduled in Virginia on January 6 (read the story)
Virginia transportation panel briefed on $20 million for Boulders Road project (read the story)
Albemarle Schools seek funding for fourth high school while Supervisors want more data on need (read the story)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Today’s only shout-out: Enjoy the WTJU Classical Marathon through the new app!

WTJU is pleased to announce our brand new mobile app! You can download a version from either the Apple App Store or Google Play Store. Here are the links to both:

iPhone version
Android version

The WTJU app is the place to tune in and listen live to WTJU, WXTJ, and Charlottesville Classical. Aside from the live stream, listen to archived shows, view recent songs, playlists, and program schedules, check out videos of live performances, stay up-to-date on WTJU’s most recent news and articles, and more!Live chat with your favorite hosts, share stories with your friends, and tune into your community all in the palm of your hand.

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What does it mean that there is a Friday podcast edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement? In case anyone asks, an explanation: This newsletter began in July 2020 as a podcast as a next phase of work I began at the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020. In the spring of 2024, I began producing a radio program for WTJU and decided to separate that production into a separate process.

Now it is December 5, 2025 and there is enough information to get out a podcast before the next radio show. See below for some introspection about why I hope to increase the amount of audio in the future.

In this edition:

Virginia’s elections are certified; Catalano holds on to Stanardsville seat on Greene Board (read the story)
Charlottesville PC takes first look at draft Capital Improvement Program (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors ask local legislators for help on transportation funding (read the story)
Charlottesville moves step closer to construction of Barracks-Emmet Streetscape (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council fixes an underpayment to the area ’s tourism agency (read the story)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Today’s shout-out: Town Crier Productions!

This newsletter as well as Information Charlottesvilleare the two main platforms for Town Crier Productions. That’s the name for the business entity I created in 2020 when I decided to launch a new chapter in journalism.

I’ve been able to sustain this work and cover many stories over the past five years because of the many ways people can support the business. One way is to go for a paid subscription here on Substack which goes a long way to support all of the research and reporting.

Other ways? Well, you can always consider taking out a sponsorship or advertisement or whatever it is called when you want to get a message out to draw attention to your business, organization, event, or anything that might fit in with this particular audience. Drop me a line if you want to see the fledgling media kit and help me experiment.

But also, thanks to all of you who read this each time it is published. A publication like this may not be for everyone, but it has found an audience. We’re all in this together, and I’m grateful for any support so I can keep paying attention and sharing what I find.

So the real shout-out here - is to all of you! After all, isn’t that what a Town Crier does?

Thoughts about why this edition:

Before I launched this newsletter in July 2020, I had created a website that I was going to call This is Charlottesville. If you look closely, that’s the first domain I registered sometime after I left my last journalism job.

This particular edition is going to be reposted to the Charlottesville Podcasting Network, a moribund website that a longtime steward fixed this week for me. I created the website in the spring of 2005 when I realized I could post longer versions of my freelance stories to a place on the Internet I could control.

Twenty years ago was an epoch ago. Social media was in its infancy but in Charlottesville, we had cvillenews.com which was an early gathering point for those who were online early when you needed a computer to get to all of it.

I had no idea how to make money off of the podcast site, and a first version of my business ended up being about taking whatever revenue I could with not a lot of thought about what it was I was doing. There were some really big failures and I was grateful when I had the opportunity to join Charlottesville Tomorrow.

I spent eleven years there and took a break from journalism. But from the beginning of the interregnum, I wanted to have a place to experiment with getting information out to people. When the pandemic hit, I took a leap of faith to start what was intended to be a simple newscast. But that grew and grew until I’m at this point where I’ve got to fix a lot of things if I’m going to stay in the air.

There are many flaws with aspects of my current way of producing things. There are so many dumb errors that go out to thousands of people because I don’t have a second set of eyes.

Until the spring of 2024, all of the newsletter were podcasts but I broke the production into separate processes when I began doing the radio version for WTJU.

Doing so lost an editorial check. It’s very hard to read copy from a script with errors in it. I’m prone to silly errors and I can be hasty trying to get information out to people.

But when I read the copy, I have to fix it. One solution would be to at least produce the narration for every version before I hit send.

Next week there is no radio show as WTJU holds their Classical Marathon from December 8 to December 14. That may mean I take a fresh approach to audio production.

In any case, this is the introspection about audio. I hope you enjoy the day.

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This time the podcast is the same file as the radio show that airs on WTJU, complete with public service announcements and continuity befitting a program that goes out over broadcast signal at a specific time. For the sake of the holiday, I have made this the November 29, 2025 edition.

This is the 333rd day of the year, a fact that may or may not have any significance but sounds like a good thing to say. I’m Sean Tubbs, the publisher of Town Crier Productions and the writer behind Information Charlottesville at infocville.com. Most Saturday mornings I present you with several recent stories in audio form, and this week is not one of the exceptions. Though, this edition begins a process of looking back at this year.

In this edition:

Legislators have filed the first bills for General Assembly 2026 (learn more)
A new era for public transportation could be underway with the formation of the Charlottesville Albemarle Regional Transit Authority (learn more)
The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority finds out how much a pump station failure cost to repair (learn more)
Charlottesville rooting out invasive species on city parkland (learn more)

Archive stories:

This being Thanksgiving week, there aren’t as many fresh stories, so this is a good time to begin the process of looking back. One of the first important stories of 2026 will be when assessments begin to come out. Here’s how that sounded in January 2025 when they went up 5.1 percent.
Meanwhile, property assessments in Charlottesville went up 7.74 percent for 2025. In January, Albemarle Supervisors filled a key vacancy. Here’s that story.
Charlottesville had a surplus for FY2024 in excess of $22.4 million and some of that funding would eventually go to pay for things such as an office building intended to be converted to a low-barrier shelter for the homeless. Let’s go back to January to hear more about that surplus.
There are a lot of quirks to the area and one of them is the 45 acres or so of land in Albemarle County in the Woolen Mills that can only be accessed via the City of Charlottesville. One more story from January.

Meta-information for November 29, 2025

I did not work on Thanksgiving and I so wanted that streak to continue into the following day. I had a better time than I thought I would, and made a choice to stay in one place rather than be itinerant.

I drove back at sunrise and traveled on U.S. 250 approaching Charlottesville from the west. The roads were empty as the sunlight slowly drifted over the horizon. I thought about the many times I’ve driven that road and how many stories I have written about places that have been built over the last twenty years.

When I first moved to this community, I worked on Ednam Drive near the Boar’s Head. I would travel there from northern Albemarle by the airport. The house I lived in was torn down to make way for the North Pointe development. Nothing up there looks the same anymore.

I wrote stories about the roundabout at U.S. 250 and Route 151. I was part of a collaboration with the Daily Progress where four of us were assigned a stretch of the roadway as it goes from Nelson to Zion Crossroads. All of these forgotten stories flashed through my mind including different places I’ve been to as a catering server or a friend.

There was no traffic but me so I was able to drive slow and go at my own pace. The fight over the Restore-n-Station. The storage unit at the corner with Old Trail. The people who died at the Harris Teeter. The landscaper who had to fight the county to use property just outside the growth area as a business. The construction of another roundabout now underway. That place where my friends used to live off of Gillums Ridge Road. That woman’s house in Ivy who hired me to do transcription for a documentary she was making. The fact that I’ve never been to Duner’s and probably never will.

The recovery hospital UVA built that I wrote about at a time when I had no idea what happened in places like that. Now I am older and have spent a lot of time with my parents in similar spots.

And then an explosion of thoughts as I drove past the Boar’s Head where I spent a year and a half in my first real production job. My entire life changed working at that spot. It was too dark to see the renovations at Birdwood. I thought about stopping at the Bellair Market but it may not have been open. I remembered being a volunteer for the Charlottesville Track Club picking up supplies left in Ednam Forest for an organized marathon training.

But once I got east of the bypass, suddenly so much change. I remembered the medical building torn down to build another medical building. New buildings on one side of the road constructed close to traffic with a new sidewalk. And then the cinderblock stairwell towers that will make up the Blume, followed quickly by a great expansion of the University of Virginia. The Karsh Institute of Democracy is coming along and the new student housing buildings are coming out of the ground. The Virginia Guesthouse will open up for the first guests next year and UVA awaits funding for the arts center approved earlier this year.

Thanksgiving was two days ago, but I want to thank you all again for reading this newsletter and especially thank those who are paying me to keep writing stories. I’m grateful to be able to do this work.

I could reminisce all day but I have new stories to write.

For this edition, I did begin the process of looking back at 2025. In December I will produce a series of editions from stories from this year. I do this as a way of seeing what loose ends I have to tie up and what I have to look forward to in the next year.

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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Written editions of Charlottesville Community Engagement often begin with a historical anecdote to mark the day and tie stories to a greater sense of the world. But what about this newsletter’s history?

The first November 22 edition came out in 2021 as you can see and hear here.
The November 22 version from 2023 was the only one made that week. Go look!
Last year? November 22 rounded out a full week of newsletters!

This edition is a podcast version where 92.3 percent of the material has already gone out in print form but now the stories can be heard as if you were listening to public radio.

What’s in this edition?

Albemarle’s Economic Development Authority gets an update on AstraZeneca’s investment at Rivanna Futures (learn more)
Officials celebrate one transportation project while another gets underway
Jaunt CEO Mike Murphy briefs Charlottesville City Council (learn more)
With one quarter down, Charlottesville currently projected for $921K surplus for FY2026 (learn more)
Albemarle Supervisors take a look at the five-year financial plan as budget planning accelerates for fiscal year 2027 (learn more)

Sponsorship demonstration: Westwind Flowers

Fall is in full bloom at Westwind Flowers! With the crisp autumn air settling in, they’re celebrating the season with fresh, local blooms perfect for every occasion.

And as the holidays approach, let Westwind Flowers bring local beauty to your celebrations. Dress up your Thanksgiving table with seasonal blooms, gift your host or hostess with a gorgeous indoor plant, or join us for one of our Holiday Wreath Workshops on November 29th or December 6th. Create your own festive wreath, from the base to the finishing touch, with expert guidance and fresh, locally grown greenery.

Westwind Flowers offers sustainably grown, thoughtfully curated cut flowers, perfectly suited to the season and the special moments in your life. They believe the blooms in your vase should be just as fresh, and just as local, as the food on your table. Visit their website to learn more!

Thoughts at the end of #960-A

This is the first podcast edition in two weeks. The reason there was none last week? Last Saturday I published a text edition instead based on differing accounts of the forced resignation of University of Virginia President Jim Ryan.

For a while I was posting these on Mondays, but the gravity of my workflow means they come out best on Saturday mornings. I’ve been an audio producer for most of my journalism career dating back to 1995 and an internship at WVTF Public Radio. Recording audio is how I’ve always conducted interviews, though I've not done that for a while.

I would like to do so, though. Since beginning this newsletter in the summer of 2020, I’ve mostly relied on harvesting government meetings and information releases. For me that is efficient approach because it can be much more time consuming to process those interviews and turn them into finished pieces. The nature of my business plan is to be as prolific as possible.

I’m a journalist first. Being a business person ranks lower, though I’ve added a lot of over the past five and a half years. I’m excited to look ahead to 2026 and trying out some new things as I can. Maybe I’ll finally finish that media kit! Let me know if you want to see a preview.

For now it is time to finish this up and move on with the day. Below is an image from one of the stories this week.

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Time again for another sonic edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that seeks to capture at least some of what happens in local and regional government. The timestamp for this one is the 312th day of the year 2025, otherwise known as

November 8. I’m Sean Tubbs, glad to bring you another set of stories that went out this morning on WTJU. Why not send them out again to all of you?

In this edition:

A round-up of elections at the state and local level
Charlottesville is planning to launch a public art program and City Council gets an update (4:30) (read the story)
Charlottesville is holding a Community Walk this Sunday through the Venable neighborhood (read the story)
A divided City Council appears willing to sell Clarke Court to the Jefferson Scholars Foundation (read the story)
Albemarle County prepares to celebrate Veterans Day with a ceremony
A very quick preview of the Week Ahead!

This edition is an audio version which is on the same feed as the newsletter. The links above go to stories that have already gone out. The next new edition is tomorrow!

Sponsorship demonstration: Westwind Flowers

Fall is in full bloom at Westwind Flowers! With the crisp autumn air settling in, they’re celebrating the season with fresh, local blooms perfect for every occasion.

Sponsorship demonstration?

Every edition of this newsletter allows me to continue to experiment with getting messages out to people who are paying for that for one reason or another. This all began in 2020 when I was considering a launch and created a Patreon account. Many of the shout-outs you see and hear are because I created a system where people or entities that paid a certain amount could get some sort of a benefit.

Over the years, I’ve offered more opportunities for people to qualify for shout-outs but the vast majority of people who are eligible for that system don’t take advantage of it. And as the audience grows, so does the value of reaching people.

In addition to this newsletter, there’s also Information Charlottesville, a companion website that provides a more robust archive than what my current service provides. Traffic there is light but the potential is there for that to serve as a community archive.

I’m not ready to broadcast the media kit I’ve put together yet because it’s not quite ready. I’ve still got a lot to learn and I’m looking for people and entities that would like to help support the business while assisting me with my experimenting.

I am a one-person operation and I put the reporting first. But as I continue this experiment I find myself intrigued with a part of the business I’ve never really been part of except for my attempts to sell ads in the early 1990’s for a college newspaper.

Drop me a line if you’d like to learn more.

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When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one newsletter to produce an audio version, than this shall be what happens. As in, this a stand-alone audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter produced by Town Crier Productions with information about growth, development, government, and the occasional attempt at humor. I’m Sean Tubbs, encouraging readers to become listeners, listeners to become readers, and glad you’re here either way.

On this edition of the program:

The Virginia Senate follows the Virginia House of Delegates in advancing a Constitutional amendment to allow for a one-time redrawing of Congressional districts (House story) (Senate story below)
A preview of two readings coming up this month from the poet and author MaKshya Tolbert (story below)
Charlottesville design panel approves design for fence at Downtown Mall business, though Council must approve special exception (read the story)
Work continues to prepare candidate projects for VDOT’s next Smart Scale Round (read the story)
Greene Supervisors briefed on innovation corridor planning (read the story)
Council signs off on revenue-sharing application for sidewalk in Meadows neighborhood (learn more)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

First shout-out: Westwind Flowers

Fall is in full bloom at Westwind Flowers! With the crisp autumn air settling in, they’re celebrating the season with fresh, local blooms perfect for every occasion.

Virginia Senate passes first reference of Constitutional amendment to allow mid-Census redistricting

The Virginia General Assembly has taken the first step towards amending the state constitution in order to allow for a one-time redrawing of Congressional boundaries to counter similar moves being made elsewhere.

Democrats hold the majority in both the House of Delegates and the Virginia Senate, and Republicans in both chambers objected to the process, arguing there was not sufficient notice to voters and that at least a million people have already cast their ballots in early voting. A lawsuit has been filed and the first hearing is on November 5, a day after the election.

Article XII of the Virginia Constitution describes how that document can be changed. Section 1 explains that both houses of the General Assembly must first adopt a resolution. Then an election has to take place in the House of Delegates. Then the General Assembly has to vote on the resolution a second time before it goes to the voters in a referendum.

Amendments to the Virginia Constitution are fairly common with the last one approved by voters in 2024. Over 92 percent of the electorate approved a proposal to extend tax exemptions to spouses of soldiers killed in the line of duty.

In 2020, two-thirds of the electorate voted to establish an eight member Virginia Redistricting Commission which would take over the process of establishing legislative districts from the General Assembly.

In the final week of October 2025, Republicans argued in committee meetings and from the House and Senate floor that this amendment counters the will of the people. Democrats argued the step is necessary to counter a presidency that is acting beyond its power by asking other states to change their rules.

This story covers the Virginia Senate debate on October 31.

For more background, go back and read these two stories:

Virginia General Assembly has begun consideration of Congressional redistricting during special session, October 29, 2025
Constitutional amendment for Virginia redistricting passes House, awaits action in Senate, October 31, 2025

The Senate took up House Joint Resolution 6007 the Friday morning of Halloween. The day before, the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee approved the amendment on an 8 to 6 vote.

Before the full debate, there were three requests to amend the resolution including one from Senator Christoper Head that would have required the mid-Census boundary change to go through the Virginia Redistricting Commission. Those failed on partisan lines, and three Republican members were not present.

A long debate over the resolution kicked off when Senator Aaron Rouse (D-22) made a motion for its adoption. He said the amendment would give Virginians a chance to weigh in with their vote on whether the lines should be redrawn.

“We do see evidence that the system is being rigged by a wannabee dictator out of Washington,” Rouse said. “During this Republican shutdown we’ve seen this dictator be enabled by a coequal but separate branch of government. Virginians may have something to say about that.”

Senator Schuyler VanValkenburg (D-16) was one of the patrons for the Constitutional amendment that set up the Virginia Redistricting Commission. He said Republican claims that the amendment would eliminate the body are false.

“That’s not what this is and that’s not what we’re doing,” VanValkenburg said. “Today we are taking a truly proportional response to an extreme situation. The current outbreak of opportunistic mid-decade redistricting means that we are in a truly unprecedented, Constitutional norm breaking time.”

Senator Glen Sturtevant (R-12) said the resolution is a betrayal of voters in part because over a million people had already voted.

“That’s not reform, that’s reversal,” Sturtevant said. “It’s not transparency, it’s a power grab. It’s been rushed. It’s been secretive. And it is purposely timed to avoid accountability in this election.”

Senator J.D. “Danny” Diggs (R-24) said the Constitution is intended to be updated every ten years to accommodate for population shifts.

“This amendment is being proposed not to protect our citizens or to make our government better,” Diggs said. “This amendment is about increasing the political power of the Democrat party. It has an expiration date so that if the political winds change, the Republican party can’t do the same thing in a few years.”

Senator Luther Cifers (R-10), elected earlier this in a special election to replace John McGuire, took issue with Democrats advancing the process in late October, over a month after early voting had begun. Some voters might have changed vote if they had known the General Assembly would take this action.

“It appears to be well-established that the intent of the intervening election in the Constitutional amendment process is so that voters can respond at the ballot box between the two passages of an amending resolution,” Cifers said.

Senator Christie New Craig (R-19) said the resolution is intended to advance national interests rather than those of Virginia’s.

“The timing of H.J. 6007, positioned as an urgent matter, was not authored based on constituent demands,” New Craig said. “It was authored based on instructions from national leadership.”

Senator Mark Peake (R-22) echoed comments made by Delegate Lee Ware (R-72) during debate in the House of Delegates.

“Texas embarking on a mid-decade redistricting was probably not a good idea but because they have embarked on that endeavor doesn’t mean we have to engage in the endeavor,” Peake said.

One argument made by Republicans is that the resolution does not pass legal muster because it doesn’t follow language in state code that requires court clerks to post a public notice of a pending Constitutional amendment 90 days before an election. Senator Head said that has not been followed.

“There’s no way we can do this,” Head said. “I mean you can do this today. You’re going to do this today. We know that you’re going to do this today. It’s going to get the 21 votes. You’re going to pass it because you’re not paying attention to what people are screaming about out there or any of the arguments that are valid that any of us are going to have made.”

Senator Mamie Locke (D-23) said Republicans making arguments about her party taking national direction were hypocritical and they would be doing something similar if they controlled the General Assembly.

“Be assured if the proverbial shoe was on the other foot, a directive from D.C. to the Governor would have been adhered to, quick, fast, and in a hurry to undo the Constitutional amendment in Virginia mid-stream and not one of you would be talking about the sanctity of the bipartisan redistricting commission or the needs of the voters or respect for the will of the people,” Locke said.

Locke said the federal government has been transformed by executive orders from the White House which have been followed by Virginia’s executive branch.

Senator Barbara Favola (D-40) called the resolution one of hope that would give Virginia voters another opportunity to weigh in on a presidency that is bending the rules of the U.S. Constitution.

“That’s what this is,” Favola said. “We’re not redrawing anything today. We’re not doing anything magical. We’re saying to voters, if this goes through the process we’ve laid out, and we’ve explained that multiple times, should the Constitutional amendment go to the voters, they will have the final say. We are in no way undermining the principles that all of us have stood for.”

Senator Scott Surovell (D-34) said the resolution is necessary to combat an unprecedented attempt to change Congressional boundaries to keep Republicans in power no matter what.

“This is a coordinated national strategy to grab power,” Surovell said. “The fundamental power problem that we are giving ourselves the option to address is that Virginia cannot fight with one hand tied behind its back.”

Surovell said a mid-census redistricting is not ideal but is necessary to have as an option as more Republican-controlled states adjust their boundaries.

“What do you do when one side refuses to play by the rules?” Surovell asked. “Do you maintain principles and accept defeat? Or do you recognize that preserving democracy sometimes requires tools you find distasteful to prevent permanent entrenchment of minority rule? We owe it to our constituents to have this conversation. We owe it to democracy to consider all of the options.”

Soon after, the resolution was adopted 21 to 16. The Senate adjourned about an hour later.

Now what? There’s an election on Tuesday. There’s always something to pay attention to.

MaKshya Tolbert reads two poems from Shade is a Place

There are more stories about the mechanics of government coming up later in this edition of the program. But first, let’s take a quick break to hear a poem from MaKshya Tolbert. They’re the 2025 Art in Library Spaces Artist-in-Residence at the University of Virginia as well as a former Chair of other.

Tolbert has two events coming up as part of the launch of their National Poetry Series-winning debut poetry collection It’s called SHADE IS A PLACE and it is on sale November 4 from Penguin Books

Here’s Ways to Measure Trees, originally published in Poem-a-Day on February 11, 2025, by the Academy of American Poets.

Tolbert will lead a public shade walk on the Downtown Mall at 4:45 p.m. with New City Arts on November 4 with a reception and artist talk at 6 p.m. followed by a book signing at the Welcome Gallery at 114 3rd St. NE. The shade walk begins at the Free Expression Monument. (learn more)

On November 15, Tolbert will discuss SHADE IS A PLACE, in conversation with Lisa Russ Spaar, from 7:00pm-8:00pm, New Dominion Bookshop. (learn more).

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Today’s sponsor is Piedmont Master Gardeners: Now accepting applications for their 2026 training class. Apply by December 1, 2025

No study of American history or macroeconomics would leave out the impact played by the Great Crash of the New York Stock Exchange of 1929 which culminated on Black Tuesday, 96 years ago today. Stock prices had continued to increase throughout the Roaring Twenties but would generally decline until 1932, marking the era of the Great Depression. This edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement does not have the time or resources to delve into the causes of a financial panic that transformed the United States. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I think people should look back on their own time.

In this edition:

Earlier this year, President Trump asked officials in Texas to redraw the Congressional maps to give the Republican Party an advantage in the 2026 midterms
Other states with Democratic majorities such as California have countered with redistricting proposals of their own
This week, the Virginia General Assembly is meeting in a special session to take a first step to amend the state’s constitution to allow for a mid-Census redistricting
The podcast version features an audio version of yesterday’s story on 530 East Main Street (read the story)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is the work of one person and that one person sometimes neglects the marketing. You can help fill the gap by sharing with friends!

First-shout: The new WTJU mobile app is here!

WTJU is pleased to announce our brand new mobile app! You can download a version from either the Apple App Store or Google Play Store. Here are the links to both:

iPhone version
Android version

Virginia General Assembly takes up redistricting amendment during special session

The second presidency of Donald Trump has introduced many novel approaches to governance in the United States, including pressure on legislators in Texas to break from precedent to redraw Congressional districts in advance of the 2026 mid-term elections.

Traditionally redistricting happens every ten years as mandated in Article 1, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution. States can determine the method of how they draw districts but for many years Southern states were required to submit boundaries for review to ensure compliance with civil rights legislation such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The Republican Party currently holds a narrow majority in the U.S. House of Representatives with 219 members to 213 Democrats with three vacancies. One of those vacancies has been filled in a special election in Arizona won on September 23 by Democrat Adelita Grijalva but Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has so far refused to swear her in until he calls the full House of Representatives back into session.

According to the Texas Tribune, redistricting in Texas is expected to create five additional safe seats for Republicans. The state’s delegation of 38 Representatives consists of 25 Republicans, 12 Democrats, and one vacancy. Governor Greg Abbott signed the new Congressional map on August 29 with no need for voters to approve the measure.

In response, California Governor Gavin Newsome, a Democrat, suggested legislation called the “Election Rigging Response Act” in direct response to the new maps in Texas, and a voter initiative to redraw maps in the nation’s largest state mentions efforts underway by Republicans to redistrict in Florida, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, New Hampshire, Nebraska, and South Carolina. Proposition 50 is on the ballot on November 4.

Last week, the Virginia Political Newsletterreported that Democrats who control a narrow majority in the General Assembly are seeking to follow California’s lead. On Monday, the House of Delegates agreed to take up House Joint Resolution 6007 which would amend the Virginia Constitution to allow the General Assembly to make a one-time adjustment.

The General Assembly is able to meet because a special session from 2024 was never technically adjourned. To allow consideration of the Constitutional amendment, the joint resolution that sets the rules for the special session had to be changed and agreed to by both the House of Delegates and the Virginia Senate.

One adopted on February 22 of this year lists six items of acceptable business including memorials and resolutions commending people or businesses. A seventh was added to House Joint Resolution 6006 which was introduced by Delegate Charniele Herring (D-4) on October 24. This would allow a “joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of Virginia related to reapportionment or redistricting.”

Both the House of Delegates and the Virginia Senate convened on Monday, October 27.

As the debate in the House of Delegates began, Delegate Bobby Orrock (R-66) made a parliamentary inquiry.

“My first inquiry would be given that special sessions have by their very nature only occurred for specific reasons. Ergo, we have resolutions controlling what can be considered during them. And subsequently, to my knowledge and experience here, they’ve never extended for more than a one year period.”

Orrock said the 2024 Special Session was continued to allow progress toward adopting a budget that year. He said that had taken place and the stated reason for the special session was moot.

The amendment itself was not made available until Tuesday afternoon. More on that later.

Delegate Jay Leftwich (R-90) read from §30-13 of the Virginia Code which lays out what steps the Clerk of the House of Delegates has to take when publishing proposed amendments to the Constitution.

“It goes on to say, Mr. Speaker, the Clerk of the House of Delegates shall have published all proposed amendments to the constitution for the distribution from his office and to the clerk of the circuit court of each county and the city two copies of the proposed amendments, one of which shall be posted at the front door of the courthouse and the other shall be made available for public inspection,” Leftwich said.

Delegate Herring countered that that section of code predates the Virginia Constitution of 1971 which does not have those requirements. Leftwich continued to press on this note but Speaker of the House Don Scott ruled that his questions were not germane to the procedural issue.

Delegate Lee Ware (R-72) said the move across the United States to redraw districts mid-Census to gain partisan advantage was a bad idea no matter what party was proposing it.

“Just because a bad idea was proposed and even taken up by a few of our sister states such as North Carolina or California, is not a reason for Virginia to follow suit,” Ware said. “ For nearly two and a half centuries, the states have redistricted following the decennial census, responding to the population shifts both in our country and in the states.”

A motion to amend HJ6006 passed 50 to 42.

The House of Delegates currently only has 99 members due to the resignation of Todd Gilbert. Gilbert had been named as the U.S. Attorney for Western Virginia but lasted for less than a month. Former Albemarle Commonwealth’s Attorney Robert Tracci was appointed to the position on an interim basis.

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Second-shout out: Cville Village seeks volunteers

Can you drive a neighbor to a doctor’s appointment? Change an overhead lightbulb, plant a flower, walk a dog for someone who is sick, visit someone who is lonely? If so, Cville Village needs you!

Cville Village volunteers consult software that shows them who has requested a service and where they are located. Volunteers accept only the requests that fit their schedule and their skills.

Volunteering for Cville Village can expand your circle of friends and shower you with thanks.

Virginia Senators pre-debate the amendment on Tuesday

The Virginia Senate took up the matter on Monday as well. Democrats have a 21 to 19 majority and were unable that day to suspend the rules to immediately consider an amendment to HJ6006. They had a second reading on Tuesday.

The initial discussion of the Constitutional amendment took place during a portion of the meeting where Senators got to speak on matters of personal privilege. As with the House of Delegates, many inquiries from Republican legislators happened because the document itself was not yet available for review.

Senator Bill Stanley (R–20) rose to remind his colleagues that the General Assembly passed a bipartisan Constitutional amendment to require that redistricting be conducted by a nonpartisan committee.

“We listened to Virginians who were tired of the gerrymandering,” Stanley said. “In 2019, polls showed 70 percent of Virginians supported redistricting reform. Not 51 percent, not 55 percent, [but] 70 percent. The Mason Dixon poll showed 72% support. And crucially, over 60 percent of Republicans and Democrats alike supported this amendment. Equally when it came to a vote in the Commonwealth. This was not partisan.”

Senator Mamie Locke (D-2) served on the bipartisan redistricting committee and reminded her colleagues that the process broke down in October 2021, as I reported at the time. The Virginia Supreme Court ended up appointing two special masters to draw the current boundaries.

“There was constant gridlock and partisan roadblocks,” Locke said. “[Those] Were the reasons why the Supreme Court ended up drawing the lines because the commission ended up discussing things as tedious as which university could be trusted to provide unbiased data.”

Locke said the proposal in Virginia would still have a bipartisan commission draw new maps after the 2030 Census and that voters in Virginia would still have to approve the amendment.

Senator Scott Surovell (D-34) said the amendment is intended to step in when other branches of government are not exercising their Constitutional authority to provide checks and balances. He echoed Locke’s comment that the redistricting commission would continue to exist.

“There’s no maps that have been drawn,” Surovell said. “There’s no repeal of the constitutional amendment. The only thing that’s on the table or will be on the table later this week is giving the General assembly the option to take further action in January to then give Virginia voters the option of protecting our country.”

Senator Richard Stuart (R-25) said he thinks President Trump is doing a job of bringing manufacturing back to the country and dismissed Surovell’s notion that democracy is at threat.

“I’m not seeing any threat to democracy,” Stuart said. “I heard the word king, and I would remind the Senator that if he was a king, he would be beheaded for what he just said. But in this country, we enjoy free speech. We get to say what we want to say, and that is a valued right and privilege.”

Senator Barbara Favola (D-40) said many of her constituents are concerned about cuts to federal programs due to the recent passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill including threats to Medicaid. She explained why she supports her Democratic colleagues in Congress in the current state of things.

“We are in a shutdown situation because the Democrats are standing up and saying we must extend the tax credits that are available on the health marketplace so individuals can afford their insurance,” Favola said. “Health insurance. This is not going unnoticed by the Virginians we represent.”

Senator Mark Peake (R-22) said Republicans were entitled to govern how they want because they are in control of the federal government.

“The current president won an overwhelming majority in the Electoral College and he won the popular vote by over 4 million or 5 million votes,” Peake said. “That is called democracy. That is what we have. And the Republicans won the Senate and they won the House of Congress. We will have another election next year and it will be time for the citizens to vote. But we are going under a democracy right now, and that’s where we stand.”

The points of personal privilege continued. Senator Schuyler VanValkenburg (D-72) said elections are a chance for citizens to weigh in on a presidency that started the process of mid-Census redistricting.

“The key point is this,” VanValkenburg said. “The president’s ideas are unpopular. He knows it. He’s going to his ideological friends, he’s asking them to carve up maps, and now the other side is upset because they’re going to get called on it in elections.”

The Senate adjourned soon afterward and will take up a third reading of HJ6006 today.

Democrats file Constitutional Amendment for first reference

Early discussions about a potential constitutional amendment in the House of Delegates and the Virginia Senate this week did not include a lot of details about how a mid-Census Congressional redistricting would take place.

House Joint Resolution 6007 was filed with the Virginia Legislative Information System on Tuesday, October 28. As of this publication it is in the House Privileges and Elections Committee because the Senate has not yet given itself permission to take up the matter.

The amendment would amend Article II, Section 6, of the Virginia Constitution to insert language into the second paragraph.

Here is the full text, with italicized words indicating new language.

The Commonwealth shall be reapportioned into electoral districts in accordance with this section and Section 6-A in the year 2021 and every ten years thereafter, except that the General Assembly shall be authorized to modify one or more congressional districts at any point following the adoption of a decennial reapportionment law, but prior to the next decennial census, in the event that any State of the United States of America conducts a redistricting of such state’s congressional districts at any point following that state’s adoption of a decennial reapportionment law for any purpose other than (i) the completion of the state’s decennial redistricting in response to a federal census and reapportionment mandated by the Constitution of the United States and established in federal law or (ii) as ordered by any state or federal court to remedy an unlawful or unconstitutional district map.

Take a look at the whole text here. I’ll continue to provide updates.

Stories you might also read for October 29, 2025

Charlottesville Ale Trail brings people to craft beverage makers, Jackson Shock, October 27, 2025
U.Va. leaders defend Justice Department deal in letter to Charlottesville legislators, Cecilia Mould and Ford McCracken, Cavalier Daily, October 28, 2025
Council agrees to purchase $6.2 million office building for low-barrier shelter, Sean Tubbs, C-Ville Weekly, October 29, 2025
Republican legislators slam Virginia redistricting proposal, Colby Johnson, WDBJ-7, October 27, 2025
Democrat Abigail Spanberger backs Virginia legislature’s redistricting push, Steve People and Olivia Diaz, Associated Press, October 27, 2025
Va. Democrats roll out redistricting amendment to counter GOP map changes in other states, Markus Schmidt, October 28, 2025
Virginia Republicans Sue to Block Democratic Redistricting Push, Jen Rice, Democracy Docket, October 28, 2025
Redistricting session to resume Wednesday, WWBT, October 29, 2025

Back to local again shortly after #947

This is a unique version based on me wanting to go through the General Assembly recordings myself. I have a lot of local stories to get back to in the near future and I’m working extra this week to make sure I get back to them.

They include:

Coverage of the discussion of 204 7th Street at the October 21, 2025 Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review
Coverage of last night’s Albemarle Planning Commission public hearing on Attain on Fifth Street
Coverage of two discussions at last night’s Greene County Board of Supervisors

As expected, I work longer hours when I’m out of town on family business because I don’t have the usual places to go. This is okay. Summer is over and it’s time to hunker down and get to work.

Today’s end video is The Streets:

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For this October 24, 2025 podcast edition, there are two anecdotes from sporting history worth noting. For one, Sheffield F.C. began operations on this day in 1857. Though they are in the eighth league from the top of English football, they’re the oldest professional club still in operation. Flash forward to 1992 when the Toronto Blue Jays became the first Canadian team to win the world series? Will they do so again this time around? A reminder, Charlottesville Community Engagement is not a sportscast. I’m Sean Tubbs, still wanting to see relegation in baseball.

In the latest sonic edition:

Charlottesville agrees to settle zoning lawsuit while others call for reform (read the story)
Civil rights pioneer Eugene Williams dies at the age of 97 (read the story)
Vacancy on Charlottesville Planning Commission after Stolzenberg resignation (read the story)
Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board can once again meet quorum (read the story)
Sanders updates Council on work plan, potential of subsidizing rents at Kindlewood (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors adopt Comprehensive Plan update (read the story)

Shout-out: JackFest takes place this Sunday!

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out:Looking for a free fall event for your family that will help raise money for cancer treatments for patients at UVA’s Children’s Hospital? Mark your calendar for October 26 and JackFest at Foxfield in Albemarle County.

The free event is named for Jack Callahan, a boy who beat back metastatic cancer after a 13-month course of intensive treatments in 2019 and 2020. JackFest raises funds for Ronald McDonald House to support families who need assistance while other treatments are underway as well as. Events include:

Kids’ running races and family relays including a Superhero Dash, Cross Country races for Elementary and Middle Schoolers and a Child-Parent Relay Race
Family activities such as an inflatable obstacle course, bounce house, and slides; a petting zoo, and a truck touch with emergency vehicles
Adult and kid food options - including food trucks - and local beer & wine

The running races require registration and a fee. People can sign up for races at the JackFest website.

Second shout-out: Piedmont Master Gardeners

Do you enjoy sharing your passion for gardening with others?

The Piedmont Master Gardeners are now accepting applications for the 2026 training class for Master Gardeners serving Charlottesville and Albemarle County. Applications are due by December 1, 2025.

The in-person class will meet weekly from February through April. Learn more and find the application at the Piedmont Master Gardeners’ website.

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Many stories on Charlottesville Community Engagement are made because they are a result of listening to a public meeting and chopping what is said into a narrative intended to let people know what took place. This newsletter began as an attempt at a radio newscast on July 13, 2020 and has gone through many iterations. This is the second podcast this week and steps are being taken behind the scenes to integrate audio production into the overall process. I’m Sean Tubbs, and a thank you to the subscriber this week who contributed paid $50 a year because of the podcast!

Here’s what is in this edition:

Interim UVA President Mahoney declines to sign White House “Compact for Academic Excellence” (read the story)
Charlottesville seeks settlement lawsuit against city’s zoning code (read the story)
Albemarle and Charlottesville economic development groups briefed on Innovation Corridor Roadmap (read the story)
Albemarle Executive Richardson sheds more details on AstraZeneca (learn more)
An update on transportation projects in Albemarle County including a ribbon-cutting for U.S. 29 pedestrian bridge set for November 13 (read the story)
Greene County awarded AA and Aa2 bond-ratings (read the story)
A very rudimentary look at next week’s meetings

First shout-out: Piedmont Master Gardeners

Do you enjoy sharing your passion for gardening with others?

The Piedmont Master Gardeners are now accepting applications for the 2026 training class for Master Gardeners serving Charlottesville and Albemarle County. Applications are due by December 1, 2025.

The in-person class will meet weekly from February through April. Learn more and find the application at the Piedmont Master Gardeners’ website.

Second shout-out: JackFest coming up on October 26

In today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out:Looking for a free fall event for your family that will help raise money for cancer treatments for patients at UVA’s Children’s Hospital? Mark your calendar for October 26 and JackFest at Foxfield in Albemarle County.

Kids’ running races and family relays including a Superhero Dash, Cross Country races and a Child-Parent Relay Race
Family activities such as an inflatable obstacle course, bounce house, and slides; a petting zoo, and a truck touch with emergency vehicles
Adult and kid food options - including food trucks - and local beer & wine

The running races require registration and a fee. People can sign up for races at the JackFest website.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Is there a method to the madness that is Charlottesville Community Engagement? Like a complex solar system with bodies dancing to a gravity not fully understood, there is sometimes a need to break programming and produce an audio version mid-week. This October 15, 2025 edition is required because at least one of the stories will be obsolete at the end of this day. So, here he goes:

Albemarle Supervisors set to adopt AC44 on Wednesday night after public hearing (read the story)
There’s also an update on transportation projects in Albemarle County (read the story)
Charlottesville and Staunton area officials briefed on ten years of regional transportation planning (read the story)
Transit agency gearing up for update of Virginia’s State Rail Plan (read the story)

Sponsored message: Learn to Pitch with Denise Stewart Coaching on October 18

Are you a professional who wants to sharpen your message, elevate your delivery, and have your audience walk away with a clear, powerful version of a pitch/speech/story? TedX coach Denise Stewart is holding a one-day, hands-on speaking intensive called Pitch! - Master the Speech that Matters! This will be at Studio IX on October 18.

And readers of Charlottesville Community Engagement get a discounted price of $199 down from $250. There’s also a Buy One Get One Free offer if you have someone you’d like attend with. Enter the promo code CCE when you sign up at EventBrite! (sign up)

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The calendar now reads 10-10, which is CB Code for Standing By. That’s how Charlottesville Community Engagement remains most of the time, waiting to report whatever it is that a one-person information outlet can put together for a growing number of subscribers. The goal is to produce one audio version a week, and this is that. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I began my professional career in public radio thirty-years ago and somehow I’m still doing this thanks to over 800 paid subscribers. Join them so I can plan for the next thirty years!

In this installment:

Albemarle’s next Comprehensive Plan passes through Planning Commission (read the story)
AstraZeneca will invest $4.5 billion in next-generation pharmaceutical plant at Albemarle County’s Rivanna Futures site (read the story)
Council holds first reading on use of $7.95 million in surplus funds (read the story)
Charlottesville City Council briefed on financial headwinds at annual retreat (read the story)
City Council agrees to two leases for agricultural use (read the story)
Deputy City Manager Freas addresses pedestrian fatality on Emmet Street (read the story)
City Manager Sanders hires an assistant (read the story) NEED TO PRODUCE

Sponsored message: Learn to Pitch with Denise Stewart Coaching on October 18

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Today’s edition is sponsored by the Ragged Mountain Running and Walking Shop

September 30 is the final day of the federal fiscal New Year and one version of today’s Charlottesville Community Engagement could perhaps have been about how this region might be affected by a federal shutdown. Each edition of this newsletter could be a lot of different things, but what gets selected is usually a matter of what is available for me to write.

I’m Sean Tubbs and for a story on the looming shutdown, I refer you to the Virginia Political Newsletter by my colleague Brandon Jarvis.

In today’s installment:

Albemarle Supervisors have endorsed their legislative priorities for the 2026 General Assembly while Charlottesville City Council is still working on theirs
Jaunt turns 50 this year and is seeking stories from riders
Albemarle Supervisors get a progress report on climate action initiatives including where $522K in spending will go this fiscal year

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

First shout-out: A Week Without Driving

How different would your life be if you didn’t have a car? From Monday, September 29 to Sunday October 5, Livable Cville invites you to join the local Week Without Driving experience. The goal is to learn more about barriers and challenges that nondrivers face in our community and to reflect on the challenges you would face as a full-time non-driver.

There are many reasons why people do not drive, including people with disabilities, youth, seniors and those who can’t afford vehicles or gas. A third of people living in the United States do not have a driver’s license, but are forced to navigate a mobility system designed almost exclusively for drivers.

Livable Cville expects the Week Without Driving experience will help participants better appreciate the challenges and barriers they face. For more information and to register your participation, please visit: https://livablecville.org/weekwithoutdriving

Local elected officials preparing for 2026 General Assembly

There are over a hundred days left until the 2026 session of the Virginia General Assembly and less than two months until legislators can begin to pre-file bills.

Across Virginia, localities are determining what priorities they would like to see turned into legislation.

At their meeting on September 15, Charlottesville City Council went through a long list of suggestions from the Planning Commission, the Human Rights Commission, and the Office of Sustainability.

“Energy prices are going up,” said Kristel Riddervold, the city’s sustainability director. “Legislative priorities related to expanding distributed energy, meaning solar, all over the place in different ways.”

Riddervold said city priorities are for the Virginia General Assembly to maintain the 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act, full funding for the Virginia Clean Energy Innovation Bank, and reform of rules for construction of data centers. You can see the full list here.

The Human Rights Commission submitted a three page list including a request for legislation for expanded rights for those who rent, a request for localities to have right of first refusal to purchase supported housing units, and a $60 million state fund for housing assistance to support 5,000 families. Another legislative request is to require all Virginia localities to maintain a public homeless shelter. You can view this list here.

Vice Mayor Brian Pinkston said many of those ideas seem very aspirational and may not take into account political realities.

“The one that says here, ‘require that each county and city in Virginia maintain a public overnight homeless shelter or fund a private equivalent,’” Pinkston said. “I mean, that would be lovely because we’re, we’re doing this. I have a sense for neighboring counties and communities, the work that we’re doing here. But does that have any hope of being passed?””

City Councilor Michael Payne said many of the Human Rights Commission’s requests are part of statewide efforts and many of the aspirations could get through depending on who holds the majority in 2026.

“There definitely [are] some that potentially I think really could get passed this year, including like the 5,000 family funds or first right of refusal, but for example, the homeless shelter one you mentioned. I mean, I would feel. I think we could all feel confident saying there’s no chance that passes this year.”

The Planning Commission submitted a list of 15 potential pieces of legislation. The first addresses the section of state code that is at the heart of the lawsuit against the city’s zoning code. Number six is a reintroduction of failed legislation that would allow localities to tax land and improvements at different rates. (view the list)

Council will have a further discussion on October 6 before adopting their legislative agenda on October 20.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors is a little further ahead and had the third of three work sessions at their meeting on September 17. Albemarle has four legislative priorities, three of which would involve legislation and the fourth being a budget amendment.

“First, we’re seeking as a priority enabling localities to enforce the Virginia Landlord Tenant Act,” said County Attorney Andy Herrick. “We’re also carrying over from past years expanding the authority to use photo speed monitoring devices.

Currently those are limited to road construction work zones and school zones and Albemarle wants to be able to use them on rural roads. Albemarle also wants the General Assembly to try again on legislation to allow localities to hold a referendum on whether to levy a one cent sales tax to fund school construction.

“This is an initiative that has been sought in prior years, that’s passed the Assembly and been vetoed by the Governor in the past two years,” Herrick said.

The budget amendment relates to another item Governor Glenn Youngkin vetoed this year. The legislature’s version of the budget had funding for a connector trail to connect Biscuit Run Park with the Monacon Indian Nation Tribute.

Supervisors adopted their legislative priorities and the next step is to schedule a meeting with area legislators.

To learn more about some of the statewide issues, read this story in the Virginia Mercury from Charlotte Rene Woods.

Jaunt turns 50 this year and seeks travel stories

As the Week Without Driving continues, one way people participating might get around is public transit. In addition to Charlottesville Area Transit, the region is served by Jaunt, a public service corporation that formed in 1975.

To celebrate, Jaunt is asking people to submit their stories of using the service.

“As we look back on 50 years of service, we know the most important part of Jaunt’s story is the people we serve,” said Mike Murphy, Jaunt’s Chief Executive Officer. “Our mission has always been rooted in community, care, and connection—and this anniversary is about celebrating the ways Jaunt has supported essential regional needs for mobility across generations.”

Jaunt was created as Jefferson Area United Transportation but the acronym became the official name in 1983.

Have a story from that time? Tell Jaunt at the website they’ve created.

Second shout-out: Five Things ReLeaf has done recently!

Time for a subscriber-supported shout-out, this time for ReLeaf Cville!

On April 21, ReLeaf Cville celebrated Arbor Day 2025 by talking with 40 fourth grade students at Greenbrier Elementary about the importance of urban tree canopy, and then planting a tree on the preschool playground
On April 25, the Van Yahres Tree Company donated time and energy to provide tree care to 45 trees ReLeaf planted in the Rose Hill Neighborhood, Fall 2023
On May 10 at RiverFest, Green Team members Moos and Antony joined Keith Pitchford, Board vice-chair, and Cathy Boyd, Executive Director, in providing information about ReLeaf Cville and playing Tree Bingo
In May, C-Ville Weekly profiled ReLeaf Cville’s efforts to help homeowners turn their yards into leafy oases - and cool their neighborhoods.
The fourth annual Green Team session took place this week and was designed to equip rising 9th-12th graders in tree knowledge and tree care skills, this year’s schedule includes sessions co-led by the Rivanna Conservation Alliance, Van Yahres Tree Company, Master Naturalists, Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards, Community Climate Collaborative, and Steve Gaines, Charlottesville’s Urban Forester.

Albemarle Supervisors briefed on Climate Action programs, $522K in FY2026 spending

For the past eight years, the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors has been in support of efforts to monitor greenhouse gas emissions as part of an international bid to keep global temperatures from rising. For six years, though, a different set of elected officials opted out of the program.

On September 17, 2025, the six elected officials got a briefing from staff on county and regional efforts to reduce emissions and adapt to a world of higher temperatures and more volatile storms. They were also briefed on how staff plans to use $300,000 the Board dedicated to the issue at the end of the FY2026 budget process as I reported at the time.

Resources:

44-page progress report from Albemarle staff
Slide presentation from the briefing

But first, some recent history.

Recent history

In June 1998, local leaders signed a document called the Sustainability Accords, a series of statements intended to solidify the work of several environmental groups working in the area. While climate action itself was not mentioned, the document called for the development of “attractive and economical transportation alternatives to single occupancy vehicle use” and called for the promotion of “conserv[e]ation and efficient use of energy resources.”

In December 2007, Albemarle Supervisors voted to adopt a goal of reducing carbon emissions by 80 percent by the year 2050. At the time, Supervisor Ken Boyd voted for the “Cool Counties” initiative though he expressed concern about the potential impacts. (read a story I wrote then)

In the years that followed, a group called the Jefferson Area Tea Party raised concerns about both the resolution and the county’s membership in the International Council for Sustainability. The ICLEI group provided resources to measure greenhouse gas reductions and Boyd sought to end participation

“We are being infiltrated in local government by an agenda that is set by this international organization,” Boyd said in early May 2011 as I reported at the time. “I think it’s now a cancer that is infiltrating our local government here.”

By that time, two other Republicans had joined the Board of Supervisors giving Boyd votes he needed to change direction. Democrat Lindsay Dorrier Jr. was a swing vote.

Lane Auditorium was packed on the night of June 8, 2011 with some in the crowd defending sustainability efforts and continued participation in efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Members of the Tea Party claimed that civil liberties were being threatened.

At the end of the meeting, Supervisors voted 4-2 to end participation in ICLEI as I reported at the time. Three months later, they ended participation in Cool Counties as reported in the Charlottesville Daily Progress.

However, the Republican majority would come to an end in 2013 after Democratic candidates defeated Duane Snow in the Samuel Miller District and Rodney Thomas in the Rio District.

Back on the job

In September 2017, Supervisors voted to adopt a resolution to “support local actions to reduce climate pollution.”

“In October 2019, the Board adopted greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets in line with the Paris Agreement,” said Jamie Powers, a county employee since 2023 who is now Albemarle’s Climate Program Manager. “The next year, October 2020, the board adopted the Climate Action Plan and stood up the Climate Action Program to implement that plan and help get the community’s emissions down in line with the board’s targets.”

The targets now call for a 45 percent in emissions reductions from 2008 levels by 2030 and to be carbon-free by 2050.

Powers said emissions continue to climb across the world and the effects of climate change are here now as a present crisis rather than one for the future to deal with.

“The impacts are generally going to be worse over time and increasingly unpredictable unless we can get global emissions under control,” Powers said. “And we do have a role to play locally.”

Albemarle’s reduction targets are in line with the Paris Agreement which set a framework to reduce emissions so that the increase in global warming could be kept below 2 degrees Celsius. The increase is now at 1.5 degrees.

Powers said climate change itself is not the underlying problem.

“It is a symptom of a set of problems,” Powers said. “This socioeconomic system that we have, it works exactly as designed and it brings us to a climate crisis and a biodiversity crisis and all these sorts of things. So if we are going to effectively address the climate crisis, we need to take a look at our systems and address things appropriately.”

The models used by Albemarle and other local governments are complex and conform to the Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories. These are put together by ICLEI and emissions come from many source sectors.

“The major sectors of emissions are transportation, stationary energy, and that includes solar,” said Greg Harper, Albemarle’s chief of environmental services. “That would be kind of like reducing that stationary energy. Ag force and land use is a smaller contributor and then waste as well.”

Albemarle resumed doing inventories in 2018 and Harper said emission levels dropped during COVID but increased for 2022. Data is about two years behind. Harper said reductions can be decreased many ways, such as if many groups can work together to reduce a metric known as “vehicle miles traveled.”

“We don’t want to stop activity in the county, obviously, but we want to shift people from driving a car by themselves to taking mass transportation, getting on their bicycle for smaller commutes,” Harper said.

Powers said Albemarle has been active in many ways to encourage reductions such as supporting home energy improvements, providing “climate action activity kits” through a nonprofit, installing electric vehicle chargers, and creation of the Energy Resource Hub.

Albemarle also provided several grants including $20,000 for the International Rescue Committee’s New Roots farming program to allow them to electrify equipment and improve their agricultural practices.

“If we break down some of the things that they were doing from their composting practice, we calculated that about 25 tons of carbon dioxide is sequestered by them using the composting practices,” Powers said. “About 5 tons of avoided emissions by removing synthetic fertilizers from their operations.”

All told, Powers said about 38 tons of carbon dioxide emissions were prevented.

Albemarle County is also collaborating with the City of Charlottesville and the University of Virginia on the Resilient Together initiative which seeks to create a resilience plan to adapt to a different weather pattern. That will come before the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors in early 2026.

FY2026 funding

Powers also outlined a recommendation of how Albemarle might put that $300,000 to use, as well as another $222,000 in carry over funds for climate action.

“The Board made it clear we wanted to emphasize projects that are going to get the most value in terms of emission reductions in FY26,” Powers said.

The Residential Energy Improvements line item is intended to assist property owners with lower incomes and that $237,000 does not include another $150,000 the county received through the federal Community Development Block Grant program.

“A lot of times, especially in low income households, energy is going out the window, literally,” Powers said. “And so how can we help those folks tighten up their envelopes so when they’re turning the AC or the heat on, it’s still staying in the home instead of heading out the window.”

The Local Energy Alliance Partnership (LEAP) and the Albemarle Housing Improvement Program (AHIP) are partners on that project. Powers said the goal will be to reach up to 50 homes, decreasing emissions classified as “stationary” energy. He estimates the return on investment will be about $3,000 per ton of emissions prevented.

Another $100,000 will be spent on energy efficiency in county-owned buildings.

“Most likely implementation looks like LED installation, LED fixture installation, likely at two different buildings,” Powers said. “If we transition the equivalent of the space of Northside Library to those fixtures, we would reduce again in that stationary energy category, one of those four categories by 0.03 at $700 per ton and annually that’d be a 143 ton reduction.”

Albemarle funded the Energy Resource Hub in FY2025 at the $100,000 level and an additional $63,000 for this year. This is a program that helps homeowners find rebates and other incentives.

Partners have not yet been found for the Climate Action Collaboration initiative.

For previous coverage on climate action issues, visit Information Charlottesville.

Reading material for September 30, 2025

Whistleblowers accuse HUD of ‘systematically undermining’ fair housing laws, Ryan Kushner, Multifamily Dive, September 25, 2025
HUD cuts multifamily mortgage insurance premiums, Julie Strupp, Multifamily Dive, September 26, 2025
Albemarle County to consider delay on data center ordinance, Jenette Hastings, WVIR 29NBC, September 28, 2025
Watershed mapping project shows rapid loss of forests, offers new view of Va.’s changing landscapes, Evan Visconti, September 29, 2025
Charlottesville’s schools are old. Local officials are trying to change that, Brandon Kile, Cavalier Daily, September 29, 2025
Afton Scientific breaks ground on $200 million expansion in Albemarle, Kate Nuechterlein, September 29, 2025

What’s the ending, #929?

Today I could not get moving. Something is off but my job is to bring people information. I picked up four new paid subscribers since posting the May 2025 transactions, and it is important to get out what I can.

The story I wanted to tell today was an accounting of yesterday’s traffic congestion caused by a truck hitting a bridge under construction that carries Old Ivy Road over the U.S. 250. I lack the resources to get such a story together but I have questions about whether such an incident is covered by emergency management officials in the area.

There are so many stories I want to tell, and sometimes the best I can do is link to other people’s coverage. Here’s a story from VPM. Here’s one from 29NBC News. Here’s another from CBS19. How about Cville Right Now?

There is a lot of rhetoric about climate action and moving people out of automobiles. Is any of it having any effect? Are fewer people driving alone? How many people are paying attention to this issue? What is the community supposed to do when a major highway is shuttered for hours? Are we all so endless trapped in a news cycle that solutions remain elusive, situations remain intractable?

I don’t have the answer but I know I want to be part of an information ecosystem that seeks to do better than what we have at the moment with a series of wicked problems that are difficult to solve in this era of fragmentation.

So what’s today’s ending? A note that David Bowie’s Diamond Dogs helped me think this morning and this 1973 special seems important.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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We have reached the end of another week here at Charlottesville Community Engagement and all that is left to do is put together an audio version using the stories already told. Listening might become habit-forming if you have an interest in discussions about the future, and if you want to spot the mistakes. Is this the one where I leave in the curse words? Tune in!

If not, this edition also serves as a way to remind you of some of the stories this week.

In this edition:

Albemarle Planning Commission takes a look at the county’s draft Comprehensive Plan (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors discuss 2025 build-out analysis (read the story)
Albemarle PC recommends approval of new rule to allow taller buildings in industrial districts (read the story)
Manning Institute of Biotechnology director outlines hope for creating new medicine (read the story on C-Ville Weekly)
Charlottesville poised to appropriate fourth state grant for flood preparation (learn more)

Sponsored message: Westwind Flowers

At Westwind Flowers the Dahlia fields are in full bloom with a stunning array of colors and varieties that only this season can offer.

You’re invited to experience it for yourself on September 27th and October 4th during their Dahlia U-Pick events at their farm, located on the historic grounds of James Madison’s Montpelier. It’s a chance to stroll through the fields, cut your own flowers, and soak in the beauty of the season—a flower lover’s dream come true!

Can’t make it to their Dahlia U-Pick event? They can bring the season to you! Order your locally grown, freshly harvested bouquets today, available for pickup at their Gordonsville floral studio or delivered straight to your home, your office, or someone special.

To register for a Dahlia U-Pick, order seasonal flowers, or learn more, visit westwindflowers.com.

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“National Public Radio will serve the individual: it will promote personal growth; it will regard the individual differences among men with respect and joy rather than derision and hate.” Thus begins a document written by Bill Siemering in 1969 when the federal government was investing in public broadcasting. Charlottesville Community Engagement is a newsletter and podcast that is not public media but aspires to all of the principles in that document. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I’ll be bringing up that paper again. Now it’s time for these things from this week in 2025:

Charlottesville City Manager Sanders tells Council work continues to find site for a low-barrier homeless shelter (read the story)
UVA committee briefed on new public safety agreement with Albemarle and Charlottesville (read the story)
UVA’s Board of Visitors signs off on lease and possible sale of Oak Lawn to Charlottesville City Schools, and Charlottesville City Manager Sam Sanders details some next steps (read the story)
C-Ville Sabroso to hold 13th event this Saturday at the Ting Pavilion (read the story)
Loop De Ville coming up on September 27 (read the story)
Riverbend to rework rezoning proposal for land near U.S. 29 / I-64 intersection (learn more)

Sponsored message!

At Westwind Flowers the Dahlia fields are in full bloom with a stunning array of colors and varieties that only this season can offer.

To register for a Dahlia U-Pick, order seasonal flowers, or learn more, visit westwindflowers.com.

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Generally the audio version of Charlottesville Community Engagement comes out on a Friday or a Saturday, but due to a series of factors, this time around non-radio listeners can hear it on a Monday. We’re in a time when so much is happening all at once, but this particular week there needed to be a break, an eddy in the space-time continuum. I’m Sean Tubbs, and here are the items you’re going to hear today:

In this edition:

UVA fundraising surpassed $885 million in FY2025 (read the story)
FEI property now known as Sycamore Hill (read the story)
The UVA Buildings and Grounds Committee has approved the schematic design for the future Center for the Arts (read the story)
Albemarle Supervisors get update on Shenandoah National Park (read the story)
Greene Supervisors approve financing package for White Run Reservoir, other projects (read the story)
TJPDC legislative liaison briefs Greene Supervisors on upcoming General Assembly session (read the story)
Two Supervisor seats on the ballot in Greene this November, one of them contested (read the story)
Charlottesville hires Block by Block firm to perform services of “Clean Team” (read the story)
Democrat holds onto Virginia’s 11th Congressional District (read the story)
Virginia Court of Appeals sends Albemarle’s “missing middle” case back to Circuit Court (read the story)

Sponsor: Westwind Flowers

It’s that time of year we’ve all been waiting for… Dahlia season!

Westwind Flowers in Orange, Virginia believes the blooms in your vase should be just as fresh, and just as local, as the food on your table.

Join them in September at their Gordonsville floral studio for their Dahlias & Desserts Workshop—sweet treats, stunning flowers, and serious fun.

Then in October, grab your shears and sign up for their Dahlia U-Pick events at their farm… a flower lover’s dream come true!

But why wait? Order your locally grown, freshly harvested Dahlia bouquets today, delivered straight to your home, your office, or to someone special.

Westwind Flowers offers sustainably grown, thoughtfully curated cut flowers, perfectly suited to the season, and the special moments in your life.

Learn more at westwindflowers.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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There is a different gravity to holidays weeks as the routine is challenged in exchange for the illusion of a day off. Or at least, that’s definitely the case with this edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement produced at the end of a truncated week in which a lot seems to have happened. I’m Sean Tubbs, and if you’re a skeptic of the audio, I still recommend listening to the first story today.

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council ends consideration of anti-camping ordinance after pushback from homeless advocates (read the story)
Charlottesville City Attorney explains why Gentry Locke still represents city in case against zoning code (read the story)
An update on some residential projects under review in Charlottesville
Ridership on Charlottesville Area Transit up five percent in FY2025 (read the story)
Rivanna River pedestrian bridge once again misses out on federal funding (read the story)
5K race planned Sunday to raise money for prostate cancer research (read the story)
Albemarle’s deputy fire chief is now Charlottesville’s emergency management coordinator (read the story)

Sponsor: Westwind Flowers

It’s that time of year we’ve all been waiting for… Dahlia season!

Westwind Flowers in Orange, Virginia believes the blooms in your vase should be just as fresh, and just as local, as the food on your table.

Join them in September at their Gordonsville floral studio for their Dahlias & Desserts Workshop—sweet treats, stunning flowers, and serious fun.

Then in October, grab your shears and sign up for their Dahlia U-Pick events at their farm… a flower lover’s dream come true!

But why wait? Order your locally grown, freshly harvested Dahlia bouquets today, delivered straight to your home, your office, or to someone special.

Westwind Flowers offers sustainably grown, thoughtfully curated cut flowers, perfectly suited to the season, and the special moments in your life.

Learn more at westwindflowers.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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There are perhaps more than two ways to experience Charlottesville Community Engagement, but the audio edition is one of the ones that I know about. I’m Sean Tubbs, a journalist who got his professional start as an intern at a public radio station in Roanoke thirty years ago. Before that I spent a couple of years at a student newspaper at Virginia Tech. Somehow all of that led to this time in 2025 when I’m able to produce radio and print stories for an audience that pays me to do the work. Thank you and here’s what’s coming up in this edition.

Case against Charlottesville’s zoning to proceed to trial after Judge Worrell changes position on default (learn more)
A round up of other stories not quite yet ready for a full story (see below for the briefs)
Albemarle Supervisors are briefed on strategic plan report (learn more)
On September 5, groups will mark the 75th anniversary of federal ruling that allowed a Black man to attend UVA law (learn more)
Albemarle Supervisors approve special use permit for private school on Dudley Mountain Road (learn more)

Sponsor: Westwind Flowers

It’s that time of year we’ve all been waiting for… Dahlia season!

Westwind Flowers in Orange, Virginia believes the blooms in your vase should be just as fresh, and just as local, as the food on your table.

Join them in September at their Gordonsville floral studio for their Dahlias & Desserts Workshop—sweet treats, stunning flowers, and serious fun.

Then in October, grab your shears and sign up for their Dahlia U-Pick events at their farm… a flower lover’s dream come true!

But why wait? Order your locally grown, freshly harvested Dahlia bouquets today, delivered straight to your home, your office, or to someone special.

Westwind Flowers offers sustainably grown, thoughtfully curated cut flowers, perfectly suited to the season, and the special moments in your life.

Learn more at westwindflowers.com.

A note of difference with this edition:

This particular podcast edition comes at a time when there have been a few developments here and there. Perhaps it would be useful to have a segment of quick stories. This functions as the script for those who likely won’t take a listen and longer versions may be in the next regular edition.

City Council to consider ban overnight camping ban in Charlottesville public’s spaces

The Labor Day holiday means City Council will meet on Tuesday rather than Monday, and the final item on their regular agenda is an ordinance to ban camping and personal storage on city property.

“The City Manager shall be guided by City of Charlottesville’s interpretation of applicable federal and state law, the safety and dignity of those impacted, and the need to protect public and private property in the City of Charlottesville,” reads the final line of the draft rules.

Charlottesville City Police Chief Michael Kochis has proposed the new rules which are being considered less than two months after the White House has issued an executive order that calls for imprisonment of people who cannot find a home.

For more information on this story, check out my story on C-Ville Weekly’s website but also be sure to read the source materials.

Resources:

Staff report for the ordinance
Draft protocol for how the ordinance is to be implemented
The ordinance to prohibit “unpermitted camping on city property”
White House Executive Order titled Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets

White House withdraws $39 million from Norfolk project for off-shore wind logistics

Since taking office, President Donald Trump has used the power of the federal government to shift away from the use of alternatives to fossil fuel. For instance, on July 7, 2025, the administration issued an executive order titled “Ending Market Distorting Subsidies for Unreliable, Foreign-Controlled Energy Sources.”

On Friday, August 29, U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy followed through with the termination or withdrawal of $679 million in projects for offshore wind projects. Duffy called such projects a scam.

In late October 2023, the Port of Virginia provided an update on its efforts to become the primary logistics center for the Mid-Atlantic to assist Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project. This is taking place at the Portsmouth Marine Terminal.

Duffy’s announcement includes $39.265 million for the Norfolk Offshore Wind Logistics Port. This was to support the Dominion project which is to consist of the construction of 176 offshore wind turbines situated on a lease site 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach. (view the project on Dominion’s site)

What does this mean to the overall project? Stay tuned.

Virginia Senate committee denies confirmation of more UVA Board members

When the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors next meets on September 11, there may not be as many members around the table at the Rotunda.

On August 28, the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee declined to confirm 14 appointees to governing bodies of Virginia’s public universities including four to the UVA Board of Visitors. All eight Democrats voted to decline to advance the nominations while all six Republicans voted to do so.

The action comes at a time when the Virginia Supreme Court is taking up a lawsuit over a similar denial on June 9 when the committee declined to confirm the appointment of former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli. Current Attorney General Jason Miyares had advised fellow Republicans and University Rectors that the Senate committee action was not valid.

The Senate Democrats on the panel sued and Fairfax County Circuit Court Jonathan D. Frieden agreed to a preliminary injunction barring Cuccinelli from serving as a member of the BOV. He did not attend a meeting in early August and his name is not listed on the BOV website.

In late June, Youngkin appointed four more to the Board of Visitors and the newcomers did attend that August meeting. However, their names have also been removed from the BOV website.

The Privileges and Elections Committee meeting on August 28 was swift but Republicans on the panel argued that a confirmation vote should wait until after the Virginia Supreme Court weighs in.

“Traditionally, if we have something in front of the courts, we allow the court to rule and give them the opportunity to do their job,” said Senator Bill DeSteph (R-8). “And I think that before we vote on this, we should allow the Supreme Court the opportunity to rule on this.”

DeSteph said a vote to deny the nominees could be construed as an attempt to influence the Virginia Supreme Court’s decision.

Senator Adam Ebbins (D-39) noted that none of the people up for appointment were part of the pending lawsuit.

Senator Tara Durant (R-27) said she felt the nomination process was becoming politicized.

“This is really kind of unprecedented,” Durant said. “We have a long list of people who have got quite a wealth of experience. And I think the broader question it begs is what will happen in the future to dissuade those who are willing to serve the Commonwealth in this capacity?”

Committee Chair Aaron Rouse (D-22) responded briefly without much explanation.

“We have a job to do as this committee, not only to protect our colleges, universities, but make sure that appointees or potential appointees are upholding the values and principles set forth by members of the Commonwealth, members of this body,” Rouse said.

Stay tuned for more on this and other stories.

And make sure to check out the Cavalier Daily’s coverage as well.

The end of 915-A

I don’t usually post end-notes for the podcast version but this is a hybrid. I wanted to get a newsletter out with the three stories that are reported in this edition, and I’ll flesh each out in editions to come.

Today could have been a day off, but I know when I chose this career decades ago that such things were not for me. I chose a profession where there’s always the potential for something to happen. I call the business Town Crier Productions as a way of explaining the basic function of what I want my journalism to be.

I want you to know things and the context in which decisions are made. I want you to consider possibilities you may not have done so before. I believe in this so strongly that I’ve dedicated my life in the pursuit of this craft. Sure, I make typos. Sure, I make the occasional error. Sure, I maybe don’t know when to shut up in these blurbs sometimes.

As soon as I hit send and as soon as Leeds v. Newcastle is over, I’m going to lace up my boots and walk somewhere. I don’t know where yet but everywhere I walk I will see the examples of previous decisions I’ve covered in my 20 years here.

Whenever I get to where I’m going, I’ll keep working. It might be correspondence. It might be thanking subscribers. I may get the second version out of the Town Crier Productions media kit. I may begin writing the Week Ahead. I may write a note to the people doing the Virginia Local News Ecosystem Study to ask why the Cavalier Daily isn’t included in their geographic scope.

Or maybe I’ll just keep trying to make up new sounds for future podcasts.

Or maybe I’ll just chat with friends?

Who knows? All I know is I pledge to always be ready to get to work when I am able.

Anyway, Everton looked good today until the end. Wolves were attacking at the end. Here’s a review for the two people who read to this point.

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Once more into the breach we go, though we’re not headed for battle but for another bout of audio stories collected and packaged as the Charlottesville Community Engagement podcast. This is an element of Town Crier Productions, a one-person information outlet created in 2020 to provide me, Sean Tubbs, with a way to do what I love best: Write stories that may seem obscure until you realize I’m writing about growth, economic development, and living in a changing community.

In this edition:

One person is dead and another injured following house explosion in Keswick (story)
Judge Worrell is set to make a decision related to the granting of default judgment in the legal case against the city’s zoning code but it had not come in at press time (story #1) (story #2)
Albemarle Fire Chief Dan Eggleston will retire in October and a brief look back at his career as well as a listen back to a March story about why fire and police both asked for more money in the FY2026 budget (story)
Charlottesville City Council briefed on regional tourism efforts (story)
Albemarle County Supervisors adopt economic development strategic plan (story)

Sponsor: Westwind Flowers

It’s that time of year we’ve all been waiting for… Dahlia season!

Westwind Flowers in Orange, Virginia believes the blooms in your vase should be just as fresh, and just as local, as the food on your table.

Join them in September at their Gordonsville floral studio for their Dahlias & Desserts Workshop—sweet treats, stunning flowers, and serious fun.

Then in October, grab your shears and sign up for their Dahlia U-Pick events at their farm… a flower lover’s dream come true!

But why wait? Order your locally grown, freshly harvested Dahlia bouquets today, delivered straight to your home, your office, or to someone special.

Westwind Flowers offers sustainably grown, thoughtfully curated cut flowers, perfectly suited to the season, and the special moments in your life.

Learn more at westwindflowers.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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A glimpse behind the scenes as this audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement begins. These introductory paragraphs are often nothing more than text that serves to begin a program that sounds a lot like public radio but isn’t public radio. Instead, they are audio versions of some of the stories you might have read complete with the voices of the people quoted! If you’ve not heard one of these before, consider starting with this one. And, check to see if this written paragraph actually served as a script!

Judge Worrell wants Charlottesville to provide more info on transportation before issuing written opinion in default judgment that voided zoning code (learn more)
IMPACT takes transit frequency message to CARTA (learn more)
Albemarle Supervisors approve plan to keep Free Bridge Lane car-free (learn more)
CRHA asks City Council for direct funding each year to support public housing maintenance, resident services (learn more)

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

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The time has come for another audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Or at least it is time for me to produce one. I’m Sean Tubbs, the publisher at Town Crier Productions, an extravagant name for a company that describes the kind of journalism I produce as often as I can. I got my start in public radio and use audio from meetings to fuel my reporting.

In this edition:

UVA Board of Visitors appoints law professor as interim president (learn more)
Community walk planned for Greenbrier neighborhood this Sunday (learn more)
Albemarle County expanding school zone speed camera locations while Charlottesville to start (learn more)
A handful of Fifeville residents want Charlottesville to crack down on illegal fireworks (coming soon)
Weldon Cooper Center releases new population projections (learn more)
Another motion is filed in the legal case against the city’s zoning code in advance of an August 13 hearing (learn more)
Albemarle Supervisor Michael Pruitt outlines steps he will take if elected to Congress (learn more)
Albemarle and Charlottesville recognize Soul of Cville with proclamations (learn more)

Commercial sponsor:

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Program note: Every Saturday at 6 a.m., an audio version of this newsletter airs on WTJU. The copy for this newsletter is the for the one that aired today

Good morning and welcome to another archive edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement for August 2, 2025. I’m Sean Tubbs, the publisher at Town Crier Productions. For the past five years, I’ve been writing stories about the community from a close-up perspective, documenting all manner of stories.

Today’s edition is going to feature several of those about economic development. Albemarle County is updating their strategic plan for attracting business to the community, and the Board of Supervisors may adopt the plan later this month.

Here are the stories:

In January, the Albemarle Economic Development Authority got a briefing on the Broadway Blueprint (learn more)
In June, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors denied an application to fill in the flood plain for an industrial building in the Broadway Blueprint (learn more)
Later in June, the Board of Supervisors got an update on the economic development strategic plan (learn more)
On July 8, the Albemarle Planning Commission got a briefing on the implementation chapter of the Comprehensive Plan, but heard from members of the public concerned about the economic development strategic plan (learn more)

Continuity copy

Albemarle County has dramatically increased efforts to boost business in the area over the past 15 years with the creation of an economic deve nlopment office and adoption of a strategic plan called Project Enable.

Efforts to update the plan got underway this January with the opening of a survey to “better understand the perception of Albemarle County’s past economic development efforts and to identify future opportunities that should be considered in the strategic planning process.”

In recent years, Albemarle County has bet heavily on expanding the defense and intelligence and in May 2023 the Board of Supervisors approved the purchase of several hundred acres of land around the Rivanna Stations for $58 million. The goal is to build a campus for those industries and they’re seeking to get it ready for development.

There are other places where the county is seeking to focus development. Here’s one story from February 2025.

(Broadway Story)

However, just because there’s a strategic plan doesn’t mean that Albemarle Supervisors won’t make decisions. Here’s a story from early June.

(Flood Plain Denial)

Later this month, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will have a joint work session with the Economic Development Authority about that economic development strategic plan. The Board had a briefing in June.

(EDSP Briefing)

Ad-lib

(Planning Commission AC44 implementation)

The draft EDSP can be viewed here and feedback is being taken through August 8.

The end of #901A

I’ve spent a lot of time with my parents this week helping them be together for their 62nd anniversary. That’s meant I’ve not been able to spend much reporting, but I’m a person with many deadlines. I’m very fortunate I’m able to work when I can and these times of eldercare have forced me to become more efficient.

Today I’ll be working on the next Week Ahead as well as the next Fifth District Community Engagement. This next week should see a return of “normal” newsletters, but at any point I may have to put all of this aside.

In any case, thanks for your patience this week.

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At long last, another sonic edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. It’s summertime and the podcasting isn’t as easy due to a combination of travel, heat, and other factors but this edition will tide you over until the next version which may be in two weeks. Or perhaps on time? I’m Sean Tubbs, and if you’ve never heard one of these before, take a listen!

In this edition:

Charlottesville City Council refers Development Code back to Planning Commission (learn more)
Charlottesville files motion asking Judge Worrell to reconsider default judgment (learn more)
Charlottesville Planning Commission reviews design for apartment building on Seminole Trail (learn more)
City Council briefed on budget scenarios for expanded service (learn more)
Albemarle Planning Commission discuss Comprehensive Plan’s implementation chapter (learn more)
The Albemarle Board of Supervisors followed suit eight days later and some members want AC44 to speak to social belonging (learn more)

Commercial shout-out:

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What is the purpose of journalism? What is the purpose of the government? What makes up society? How did we get here? All the questions David Byrne asked in Once in a Lifetime? This is the audio edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a podcast that features audio versions of stories that have gone out in the written version. To add to the confusion, there’s also Information Charlottesvillewhich is intended to capture all of these stories in one place for future people to look back toward.

Now, what’s up this time?

Speakers seek answers on next steps for zoning in Charlottesville (learn more)
City Manager Sanders provides status report on various initiatives (learn more)
Charlottesville City Council gets update on ANCHOR program (learn more)
Applications being taken for Charlottesville Boards and Commissions (learn more)
Speakers tell Charlottesville City Council of what they say are threats to U.S. Constitution (must produce)
Albemarle Planning Commission recommends approval of more residential units at Brookhill (need to produce)

Today’s experimental sponsor is Westwind Flowers. You can hear a more detailed description in the audio above, just after the show’s billboard.

Why experimental? If you’re interested, respond to this email and I can share some information.

An explanation of #895-A

This is coming out much earlier than usual, just as the Week Ahead for the period beginning July 14 will also be out earlier. I’m taking a road trip which means making adjustments. However, as a one-person operation, that doesn’t mean the work will stop. Hundreds of you are paying me to do this work, and so I do! I’m absolutely grateful.

Sunday is also the fifth anniversary of the newsletter. I’ve not done anything too terribly special for it except decide to go on a road trip which will keep me away from the screen for most of the day. Instead I’ll see a good chunk of the country as I help out a friend.

In any case, do take a listen if you’ve not heard one of these before. I got my professional start in public radio and realized fairly on that no public radio station in their right mind would hire me because in the early 2000’s I was quite critical of the shrinking amount of time available for local stories.

So, stubborn old me created the Charlottesville Podcasting Network in 2005, a website I still maintain but won’t send you a link because I’ve not figured out how to fix something. And then I created a podcast called the Charlottesville Quarantine Reportin March 2020 out of a desperate need to return to journalism.

The podcast gets about a tenth of the audience, but I believe it’s the best version of the work I do. I love being able to mix in people’s voices, and there’s so much more to be done. However, I’m a one-person operation with many ideas to unfurl.

Thanks to paid subscribers for helping to keep this thing sailing along and let’s hope I find the map.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

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There are now 364 days to go until the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, a historic document that remains relevant as we approach the semiquincentennial. Eight days have passed since the executive branch of the federal government demanded the resignation of University of Virginia President Jim Ryan. There’s a lot happening, and Charlottesville Community Engagement is intended to document as much as possible. I’m Sean Tubbs.

In this edition:

Five people were shot in the city’s Fifeville neighborhood late Friday night including two children
A Charlottesville Circuit Court judge has thrown the city’s zoning ordinance out after a legal deadline was not met (learn more) (learn even more)
President Jim Ryan has resigned from the University of Virginia and the path is known for his replacement (learn more) (learn even more)
Former Attorney Ken Cuccinelli continues to serve on the UVA Board of Visitors despite his confirmation being rejected by a Virginia Senate committee, prompting a legal case
Seventy-four new Americans were sworn in as citizens on the morning of July 4 at Monticello (not yet in print)
Hundreds of people were on hand for a protest at UVA just a few hours later to demand steps to prevent the public institution from more federal interference (not yet in print)
Greene Supervisors vote to move forward with smaller water supply (learn more)

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement ! This post is public so feel free to share it.

A note before we begin

This edition should have gone out yesterday as soon as I finished the version for WTJU, but I chose to attend a social event instead. I’m glad I went but do wish I had stayed to complete the work.

You will also note that this edition has written versions for three stories including the one about the shooting. I didn’t have a lot of audio to work with this week, and I wanted to document in audio the zoning code and the Ryan resignation. The headlines are sparse because those are slugs.

The protest story and the naturalization story will be posted to Information Charlottesville before going out in Monday’s newsletter.

No written shout-outs in this one because I want to get this posted, but I’m going to be experimenting as I go.

Five people shot in Fifeville Friday night

An Independence Day celebration in Fifeville turned tragic late Friday night when gunfire erupted, sending five people to the hospital including three children.

A series of firework displays had begun after dark across the neighborhood causing many people to be outside to see and hear the explosions.

According to an information release from Charlottesville Police Department, officers responded to multiple calls of a shooting on Orangedale around 11:23 p.m. The first officers arrived a couple of minutes later and found five people who had been shot.

The victims were a 10-year-old girl, an 11-year-old boy, a 17-year-old male, an 18-year-old female, and a 52-year-old male.

“Due to heavy foot and vehicle traffic, emergency medical units were initially unable to access the scene,” reads the release. “Officers and medics worked together to transport the victims on foot and in patrol vehicles, applying pressure to their wounds until additional EMS personnel arrived.”

Everyone shot was reported to be in stable condition as of the release sent out at 11:13 a.m. this morning. The Criminal Investigations Division and Forensics Unit are investigating and police want to see video footage.

The Fifeville Neighborhood Association is holding a community gathering at 6 p.m. at Abundant Life at 782 Prospect Avenue.

Copy for UVA RYAN:

Facing pressure from the United States Department of Justice, University of Virginia President Jim Ryan resigned from his position on June 27.

The Cavalier Daily reports that the Civil Rights Division under the control of President Donald Trump sent seven letters to UVA between April 11 and June 17 insisting that not enough had been done to demonstrate that programs to encourage and promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion had not been sufficiently dismantled.

In a statement, Ryan said he did not want to put federal grant funding at risk to save his job, a job he planned to leave in 2026. So he resigned and Executive Vice President J.J. Davis will serve as acting president.

Many groups have condemned the pressure from the federal government including the Faculty Senate. The Virginia Conference of the American Association of University Professors sent a letter on June 30.

Later on in the program we’ll have audio from a protest held at the University Avenue side of the Rotunda on July 4.

The Board of Visitors had been scheduled to meet on July 1 for a personnel matter but canceled the virtual event before it began. The claim is that the meeting wasn’t needed, but on that same day former Rector Robert Hardie was served with a lawsuit arguing that one of the members of the Board of Visitors continued to sit in the position unlawfully.

On June 9, the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee failed to confirm Ken Cuccinelli for the seat. Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares advised Hardie and others to ignore that out of a claim that the entire General Assembly had not taken a vote. Members of the committee have sued in Fairfax County Court and are seeking an injunction.

See also:

Toward a TDM plan for Charlottesville, June 9, 2021

A quick plug for Michael Clem

Finally today, local singer songwriter Michael Clem is looking for subscribers to his YouTube channel. Take a look at his trailer!

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Today we have a 404, as in the 404th edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Hopefully this online-only information content is what you’re expecting, whether it’s your first time reading or listening or if you’re a regular by now. I’m your host Sean Tubbs, always scouring the internet to bring you more on what’s happening. Thanks for reading or listening!

There are nearly 1,450 email subscribers to this newsletter, and I’ve for you to be the next one. It’s free, but Ting will match your initial payment to help the newsletters flow

On today’s show:

In six days, you’ll have a choice of when to take a daily train to Roanoke or the District of Columbia

The University of Virginia to establish a “sustainable lab” at Morven Farm

Governor Youngkin appoints four to the UVA Board of Visitors

The Board of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority gets an update on finances

And the New Hill Development Corporation gets a state grant to help launch a commercial kitchen to incubate new businesses

First shout–out: JMRL to kick off the Summer Reading Challenge

In today’s first subscriber-supported public service announcement, the Summer Reading Challenge put forth by Jefferson Madison Regional Library continues! You and members of your family can earn points for prizes in a variety of ways, such as reading for 30 minutes a day, reading with a friend, creating something yourself, or visiting the library! You can also get two points just by telling someone about the Summer Reading Challenge, so I guess I just added two more! Visit JMRL.org to learn more about this all ages opportunity to dive into oceans of possibilities!

Second daily train between Roanoke and DC to start July 11

A deal between the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority and Norfolk Southern closed on June 30, which means additional passenger rail service will begin next Monday. According to a release, the state entity will now own 28 miles of track between Christiansburg and Salem that will allow for the expansion of passenger rail to the New River Valley in a few years.

“We have reached an agreement that expands access for passengers and preserves an important link in the supply chain for businesses that rely on freight rail to ship base materials and finished products,” said Norfolk Southern Senior Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer Mike McClellan. “The partnership of our government leaders was critical to making this plan a reality and we appreciate their commitment to the people and economy of Virginia’s Blue Ridge.”

The first daily service on the Northeast Regional began in 2009 and ridership was triple what had been forecast. This train was extended to Roanoke in 2017 and this year has seen a return to pre-pandemic boarding levels.

The second train will begin on July 11, according to the release. It will stop in Alexandria, Manassas, Culpeper, Charlottesville, Lynchburg, and Roanoke.

“Amtrak will now offer morning and afternoon options in both directions between Roanoke, Washington, D.C., and to the Northeast,” said Amtrak spokeswoman Kimberly Woods.

To learn more and to book tickets, check out Amtrak’s press release.

A study is underway to determine if Bedford would be a viable stop.

UVA estate at Morven to become Sustainability Lab

A nearly 3,000 acre farm gifted to the University of Virginia in 2001 will now officially be used by the institution as a “Sustainability Lab.” UVA Today reported last week that the Morven Farm property now owned by the University of Virginia Foundation will be used as a place to study environmental resilience and sustainability.

Morven is currently used for meeting space and is the home of the Morven Kitchen Garden, which has been run by a student group for several years. According to the article, that use will continue and space can still be rented out by educational groups and for nonprofit events.

At a bureaucratic level, authority over Morven will remain within the Provost’s office, but will now be transitioned to the Academic Outreach division from Global Affairs. Acting director of programs Rebecca Deeds will become the full time director.

“Morven’s remarkable cultural landscape will contribute to a rich program that will address social, economic and environmental sustainability challenges facing society,” Deeds is quoted in the story. “We are excited to activate it as a living laboratory while we pursue new practices and programs that support and elevate UVA sustainability goals, and engage students, faculty and community members.”

Morven is located on the other side of Carter’s Mountain in between Trump Winery and Highland.

Four new members appointed to UVA’s Board of Visitors

Governor Glenn Youngkin has made his first appointments to the University of Virginia with terms that took effect this past Friday. They are:

Bert Ellis of Hilton Head South Carolina is CEO and Chairman of Ellis Capital, Chairman and CEO of Ellis Communication, and president of Titan Broadcast Management

Stephen Long of Richmond is president of Commonwealth Spine and Pain Specialists

Amanda Pillion is an audiologist with Abingdon Hearing Care and Abingdon ENT Associates, and a member of the Town Council in Abingdon, Virginia

Doug Wetmore of Glen Allen is senior vice president of Centauri Health Solutions

The Board of Visitors next meets at a retreat on August 21 and August 22, followed by a regular meeting on September 15 and September 16. Both events are in Charlottesville.

Previous meetings can be viewed on YouTube. I’m hoping to dig back into the June meeting for a future segment here on Charlottesville Community Engagement. Intrigued? Drop me a line via email and I’ll give you a preview.

Today’s second shout-out: Frances Brand and Cvillepedia 101

And, if you’d like to help conduct community research into who some of the portraits are, cvillepedia is looking for volunteers! I will be leading four Cvillepedia 101 training sessions at the Center every Monday beginning July 11 at 2 p.m. Sign up at the Center’s website.

Charlottesville public housing board gets update on finances

We’re still just days into Virginia’s fiscal year, but the fiscal year of the city’s public housing agency is now entering its second quarter. The finance director of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority

“Overall against budget we are on target,” said Mary Lou Hoffman, CRHA’s finance director.

At the end of the fiscal year, one issue was a backlog of unpaid rent by tenants. CRHA staff continue to find sources of revenue to cover arrears though state rent relief programs and reaching out to local resources. .

“Around March, we were at $229,000 but we’re currently at $126,000,” said John Sales, CHRA’s executive director. “And so they’re constantly talking about the tenant accounts which is a big focus that we have to have. It was one of the areas that the [U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development] dinged us on years ago for our accounts being so high compared to the amount we are collecting.”

Sales said one issue has been getting into contact with residents to get them set up with rent relief payment arrangements.

HUD classifies CRHA as a “troubled” agency due to a pattern of issues over the years. Sales said getting the finances correct alone will not change that status.

“The only issue that we have so far in our audits is the physical conditions and so we’re working to address those issues,” Sales said. “We had our physical audit in March and all of the emergency work orders were addressed.”

Another issue is tenant damage, which can also affect the HUD status in the audits. Sales said a maintenance plan will address this category.

Redevelopment is underway and two sites have been transferred to a new ownership structure in which the CRHA owns the ground and a Limited Liability Company has been set up to own the buildings for a certain period of time. An entity controlled by CRHA known as the Community Development Corporation Commission controls the LLCs. This allows the projects to be financed through Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) as well as other sources.

“Technically, they are still our responsibility,” Sales said “We own the land. We own the management agreement. We have several loans attached to each development that will eventually either get paid back or get forgiven when we get the property back, get ownership of the property back in 16 years.”

HUD oversight of the public housing projects will continue, but it will be different because there are different kinds of subsidized units.

“We’ll have public housing units so one office will be inspecting them, and then another office will get inspections from LIHTC and gert inspections from HUD,” Sales said.

The LIHTC units would be inspected by Virginia Housing, which issues the credits in the Commonwealth.

Late this month, Virginia Housing’s Board of Commissioners approved low income housing tax credits for this year. Staff recommendations had been not to recommend credits for the first phase of redevelopment for Phase 1 of Sixth Street SE and additional credits for a second phase at South First Street.

There are three vacancies on the CRHA Board of Commissioners and Charlottesville is taking applications through August 5. The terms of Commissioners Maddy Green and Laura Goldblatt expired at the end of June, and Green is not seeking reappointment after filling an unexpired term. Council will make the final appointments.

New Hill Development Corporation gets $189K state grant for commercial kitchen incubator

A Charlottesville nonprofit created to increase wealth building opportunities for Black community members has been awarded a state grant to develop a place for culinary entrepreneurs to grow businesses.

“The New Hill Development Corporation will stabilize and grow food and beverage manufacturing activity in the region by opening an 11,500-square-foot shared commercial kitchen incubator in order to provide food entrepreneurs with a cost-effective space to produce, package, store and distribute tradable manufactured products,” reads a press release for the latest Growing Opportunities grants from the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.

The BEACON’s Kitchen project is the only recipient in this area. According to the release, the project will create 90 new jobs, 28 new businesses, and at least 30 new tradeable food products. New Hill is offering a Food Business Boot Camp on August 3 and August 4. (learn more)

The New Hill Development Corporation was created in 2018 and received $500,000 from City Council late that year to create a small area plan for the Starr Hill neighborhood, the site of the razed Vinegar Hill neighborhood. The plan envisioned what a redeveloped City Yard might look like, but was converted into a “vision plan” by the city’s Neighborhood Development Services Department.

Other GO Virginia grant recipients in June include:

Accelerating Advanced Manufacturing Workforce - $530,000 for Laurel Ridge Community College “to build a strong workforce pipeline for Region 8 manufacturers by offering an advanced manufacturing sector-focused career pathway training program.”

Technology Academies for Fauquier and Rappahannock Counties - $402,075 for school systems in those two localities to “develop college-level courses in robotics and drones to high school students and adult learners through a workforce development program.”

Talent Supply Connector - $391,528 for Virginia Career Works Piedmont Region to create “a Career Pathway Guide for employers and developing a region-wide database of relevant training offerings” in an area that includes Greene, Louisa, and Nelson counties.

Workforce and Entrepreneurship Initiatives in a Regional Makerspace - $324,000 for a company called Vector Space to “facilitate the implementation of expanded programming and equipment centered around workforce development and entrepreneurship for underserved populations” in Bedford and Campbell counties as well as the city of Lynchburg.

Read the press release for more.

Like the newsletter? Consider support!

This is episode 404 of this program and it took me about six hours to produce. That’s because there are fewer segments in this one. I am hoping to get this on a regular schedule, but that’s going to take more personnel. For now, I hope to get each one out as soon as I can. All of this is supported by readers and listeners through either a paid subscription to this newsletter or through Patreon support for Town Crier Productions.

Around a third of the audience has opted to contribute something financially. It’s similar to older times when you would subscribe to a newspaper. I subscribe to several, myself!

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For those who follow government budgets in Virginia, Happy 2023! Fiscal year 2023, that is. To my knowledge, there is no celebration but there likely will be a few hiccups here and there as new laws take effect and some cheering as municipal and state employees receive pay increases with the new budget. But for a massive celebration, you’ll have to head north to the border where it’s Canada Day.

I’m Sean Tubbs, and I strive to make as many days as possible have a new installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement and so far I’m one for one for the fiscal year.

On today’s program:

A brief look at new laws that go into effect today

The Virginia Department of Health announces a dashboard to track firearm injuries in the Commonwealth

Charlottesville City Schools expect the bus driver shortage to worsen and are encouraging parents and guardians to think about alternative methods of transport

Charlottesville Area Transit looks at several different kinds of new bus shelters

Piedmont Housing Alliance gets another $2 million from the federal government to help subsidize Friendship Court and Southwood Apartments

RCA seeks volunteers for clean-up of invasive vines

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out, the Rivanna Conservation Alliance wants you to know about some upcoming opportunities to volunteer. For the mornings of both July 7 and July 9, RCA is seeking people to help clean up invasive vines in the Dunlora neighborhood near a recent buffer planting. Clearing out the vines will help protect newly planted trees and is part of natural forest regeneration project conducted by the Virginia Department of Forestry. RCA will provide gloves and some cutting equipment, or you can bring your own but leave the chainsaws at home! Visit rivannariver.org to learn more!

Fiscal Year 2023 begins: Some of what’s new

It’s the first day of the Fiscal Year 2023, and July 1 brings with it several changes in rules, regulations and rates.

A whole host of new legislation has gone into effect, according to a status report put together by David Blount of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. (view his latest update)

Another 37 miles of the middle portion of the James River are now considered scenic, as are another 23.2 miles of the Maury River. Also, an 8.8 mile section of the Shenandoah River.

There is now a Forest Sustainability Fund to promote public education about outdoor recreation and forest conservation

The Town of St. Charles in Lee County in no longer exists (updated!)

It is now a Class 6 felony to steal a catalytic converter

There can now be seven judges in Virginia’s 31st Judicial Circuit, which covers the area around Manassas in northern Virginia

Localities must report potential cybersecurity threats to the Virginia Fusion Intelligence Center

Localities smaller than 40,000 people can now opt out the Marcus Alert System

If you’re hunting with a dog, the dog needs to wear an identification tag

For more on new state laws, read this Associated Press article.

The elimination of the 1.5 percent state sales tax on groceries does not go into effect until January 1.

At the local level, Albemarle County’s food and beverage tax rate increases to six percent of the total bill and the transient occupancy rate increases to eight percent. Charlottesville’s meals tax rate increases a half-percentage point to six and a half percent. The one penny increase in the real estate property tax rate is already in effect, as that rate goes by the calendar year.

State agency launches dashboard to track firearms injuries in Virginia

The number of firearm injuries in Virginia that resulted in emergency room visits increased by nine percent from 2020 to 2021. That’s according to a new dashboard unveiled yesterday by the Virginia Department of Health that tracks the information by age, sex, race, and ethnicity.

The data is tracked by counting up the number of times key phrases are used when a patient gives a reason for a visit. The terms include: gun with wound, gunshot, buckshot, revolver, rifle, shotgun, firearm, pistol, handgun, been shot, I was shot, I got shot, or graze with bullet.

A press release points out that:

Emergency room visits for firearms injuries have increased 72 percent from 2018 to 2021

Since the data set begins in January 2016, 86 percent of visits for firearm injuries are males

In 2021, 65 percent of patients were Black

In 2021, 31 percent were between the ages of 18 and 24

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there have been 294 visits to emergency rooms for firearm injuries since 2016.

The work is covered by a grant to the VDH from the Centers for Disease Control to help improve public health surveillance of firearm injuries, according to a release. For acronym fans, the CDC program is known as Firearm Injury Surveillance Through Emergency Rooms, or FASTER.

The dashboard does not yet extend to hospitalizations and deaths, but that’s expected later this year. Those who are going to take a look at the data are reminded to review a list of limitations with what’s known as syndromic surveillance.

Pandemic update: Still on the plateau

It’s another holiday weekend during the era of COVID-19 and Virginia remains on a plateau of a high number of cases. The seven day percent positivity for testing is 20.5 percent, up from 17.4 percent on June 23. Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,393 new cases. That’s based on PCR tests and does not include at-home tests.

“There is still a fair amount of disease in the community,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiologist at the University of Virginia Health System. “We’re certainly seeing that with our staff. In fact, there are a fair number of people that are out right now because they have COVID and its frustrating.”

Dr. Sifri said many have already had COVID and are vaccinated, but COVID-19 continues to mutate with new strains. However, vaccination has led to less severe cases.

“What we are not seeing is people getting critically ill like they were before so the fact that folks are vaccinated has made a huge difference in how the disease presents,” said Dr. Reid Adams, chief medical officer for UVA Health.

According to the VDH, nearly 83 percent of the adult population is fully vaccinated. There is a seven-day average of 3,000 doses administered a day.

Dr. Sifri said this is a good time to get a booster if you have not done so. He also said a panel of the Food and Drug Administration is encouraging to continue vaccine manufacturers to continue development of new versions that can combat the latest variant of the Omicron strain. Dr. Sifri said people should not wait.

“I would advocate if you are eligible for a booster and its been a long time since your body has seen the spike protein, it’s a good time now to get it to prevent infection,” Dr. Sifri said.

Visit vaccinate.virginia.gov to schedule an appointment.

Piedmont Housing Alliance gets $2 million in additional federal funding

The U.S. Treasury Department has awarded $2 million to the Piedmont Housing Alliance through its Community Development Financial Institutions fund. Senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine made the announcement in late June. The funding comes specifically from the Treasury Department’s Capital Magnet Fund.

In a release, Piedmont Housing Alliance said the funding would provide gap funding for the second phase of Friendship Court as well as the 206 apartments the agency is building at Southwood to satisfy the terms of funding Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville received from the Albemarle County and the Albemarle Economic Development Authority.

“High development and construction costs, high land and acquisition costs, and limited subsidy resources translate to significant funding gaps for affordable housing developments,” reads the release. “Without adequate subsidies, it is virtually impossible to build affordable housing.”

In the fiscal year that begins today, the city of Charlottesville is providing an additional $2.5 million to Piedmont Housing Alliance for the second phase of Friendship Court. Another $10.25 million in city funding for Friendship Court in FY24 through FY27.

The adopted capital improvement program for Charlottesville also shows nearly $5 million in city subsidies for two other affordable housing projects, both located on Park Street and rezoned by City Council earlier this year.

Today’s second shout-out: Frances Brand and Cvillepedia 101

Charlottesville schools preparing for “worse” situation for bus drivers this fall

There are 54 days until Charlottesville City Schools begin for the next academic year. The school system is seeking assistance and input on alternative methods of getting students to school as an ongoing transportation crisis continues.

“As we look to fall 2022, our school bus challenges appear to be worse, not better,” reads a website set up to provide information in advance.

The website states the city’s efforts to incentivize new drivers by increasing pay and offering bonuses are not working out. As such, the city wants to get parents ready for potential alternatives.

Supporting walking in expanded walk zones

Encouraging use of public transportation

Collaborating with community partners to support biking

Adding mini-school buses (hopefully electric)

The first of several listening sessions will be held next Wednesday at Westhaven, with others scheduled later in the month at Friendship Court and Hearthwood Apartments.

Charlottesville Area Transit designing new bus shelters

As it seeks to find new drivers, Charlottesville Area Transit is also working to redesign its bus shelters. The agency has hired the firm Wendel Companies to come up with a customized template, and the Regional Transit Partnership got a briefing on the work last month.

“We’re really looking at how to look at transit holistically, how to encourage people to take transit,” said Jeana Stright of Wendel Companies. “Part of what makes people want to take public transportation is having a place to wait for the bus, having amenities while you are there, or having a system for what reflects their needs.”

Three concepts for the future shelters have been designed, one of which mimics the design of the Downtown Transit Station on Water Street. Stright recommends benches be present in all shelters, as well as space for wheelchairs. She also suggests one modular design with easy to replace parts due to the possibility of vandalism.

“We are also looking at a way to incorporate local artists or local communities into the stops to be able to help yourself as you’re riding along on the bus as well, as you’re passing these different shelters, seeing different art, seeing different color schemes perhaps as part of that art panel, so that you can say ‘I’ve driven by that really cool fruit graphic,” Stright said.

The partnership was asked to provide feedback. There was no specific information provided about how much each would cost, or how much of a budget CAT has to install the shelters. However, Stright said they have researched costs and all three options would be in the same basic price range.

One member of the partnership said she was concerned about the practicality of some of the shelters.

“I love all the designs but once again it’s a question of taxpayer’s dollars,” said Albemarle Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley. “And the artwork I think is great if we can afford it. But I like simple.”

Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel said she has been working with CAT Director Garland Williams on the idea of incorporating artwork into some bus shelters.

“That artwork would need to be funded privately by neighborhoods,” McKeel said. “We wouldn’t be using [tax] dollars. You know, the murals that got put up on Georgetown, and Barracks, and Hydraulic? Those were all privately funded so that’s what we’d be talking about.”

McKeel said it was crucial that the shelters provide relief from the sun and rain.

See also: Next steps outlined for Charlottesville Area Transit route changes at partnership meetings, June 24, 2022

Watch the partnership meeting:

Support the program!

This is episode 403 of this program and it contains stories you’re simply not going to see anywhere else. At least, a style you won’t find except here and Information Charlottesville. Town Crier Productions is not a nonprofit organization, but around a third of the audience has opted to contribute something financially. It’s similar to the old days when you would subscribe to a newspaper. I subscribe to several, myself!

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Halfway through the year? Today’s the 181st out of a scheduled 365, so we’re technically 49.5 percent of the way through 2022 though the fiscal calendar resets at the clock strikes midnight! This is Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that has sought to keep track of these things for nearly two years. Thanks to readers and listeners for helping keep the beads of the abacus in motion.

This work is free, but it does cost me to put the time in. Sign up for a paid subscription, and Ting will match your initial payment!

On today’s program:

Albemarle Supervisors hire Staunton’s former city manager as the new county attorney

An update on a federal lawsuit to force a House of Delegates race this fall

Charlottesville City Council is briefed on the properties it owns inside and outside city limits and learns there has not been one central location

Council ponders giving up a “paper street” and denies a request to give up a small sliver of land in North Downtown

First shout–out: JMRL to kick off the Summer Reading Challenge

Legal drama continues in second suit to force 2022 House of Delegates election

There are 131 days until the general election and a new lawsuit to force a Virginia House of Delegates race is still alive. Richmond resident Jeffrey Thomas Jr. filed a suit against the Board of Elections in the Eastern District of Virginia earlier this month that picked up a dismissed complaint that the legislative boundaries in place for the 2021 race were unconstitutional.

As I reported earlier this month, Judge David Novak had set up a schedule for how information related to the case was to be filed. That schedule has not been followed.

Thomas filed an amended complaint on June 16 that added two additional plaintiffs from two other legislative districts, one of whom is the former president of the Loudoun County NAACP. Both are appearing pro se, or without a lawyer. The motion also added the Department of Elections as a defendant.

“Plaintiffs and all other voters and residents in [House District 71], [House District 32], and [House District 10] have had their voting strength and political representation unconstitutionally diluted or weakened by the failure of Defendants to conduct, enact, or oversee decennial constitutional reapportionment, redistricting, or elections,” reads paragraph 54 of the amended complaint.

The state responded in a motion objecting to the addition of the new plaintiffs and sought a new schedule. Judge Novak responded by granting an extension to July 1 for the defendants to file a motion to dismiss the case.

A joint stipulation of facts was filed on June 24, but the next day, Thomas filed a motion requesting sanctions against the state for not agreeing to 47 facts that were in previous stipulations. Many of these relate to the population imbalances across the old districts with the most populated being at 130,192 residents and the least having 67,404 people. The plaintiffs allege this is a violation of the Equal Prot

Novak denied this motion on Tuesday, and we wait to see if a motion to dismiss is filed by Friday.

Former Staunton City Manager to serve as Albemarle County Attorney

After a months-long search, the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors has hired the former City Manager of Staunton as its next county attorney. Steven Rosenberg will start work on July 27.

“The Board has taken a lot of time to find somebody that not only possesses the skills and the abilities that we seek in a county attorney but also is the person that joins our organization at the right point in the progression that we are attempting to achieve as an organization,” said Supervisor Ned Gallaway who headed up the search.

Rosenberg became Staunton’s Deputy City Manager in May 2013 and was promoted to the top job in July 2019. He left the position in January 2022, according to his LinkedIn profile. Prior to that, he was associate general counsel of the University of Virginia for five and a half years. He was also Augusta County attorney from May 2003 to December 2007.

Rosenberg did not make comments at the end of a closed meeting yesterday but is quoted in a press release.

"During my nearly two decades as a neighbor of Albemarle County, I’ve become familiar with the county, most notably its quality of life and the strength of its organization—one committed to excellence and a culture of service. I am excited to join the Board and staff in such a positive environment and to work with them to serve the Albemarle County community,” shared Rosenberg.

Albemarle closing Mint Springs beach until further ntice

Today could be the last day to swim at Mint Springs near Crozet this summer. Albemarle County has announced the outdoor swimming area will be closed until further notice, but the beaches at Chris Greene Lake and Walnut Creek will remain open Thursday through Sunday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Those two places will also be open on July 4. The reason is a lack of staff, according to an Albemarle County’s director of communications and public engagement.

Charlottesville continues to operate only one outdoor pool a day to combat their shortage of lifeguards. Washington Park is open Sunday through Wednesday with Onesty Pool only open on Sundays.

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Charlottesville Council briefed on city-owned property

The city of Charlottesville owns 170 pieces of property and another 18 in conjunction with Albemarle County. Does it need all that land and space? That was one of the undercurrents of a discussion and briefing Council had at a work session on June 21.

“The approximate acreage of city-owned properties within the city is 798 acres and over 2,800 acres of city-owned properties located within [Albemarle] County,” said Brenda Kelley, the city’s redevelopment manager based in the Office of Community Solutions.

Kelly said at the outset what would not be in her presentation. (view the presentation)

“This discussion will not include a discussion on streets, alleys, paper streets and paper alleys which are basically unimproved streets and alleys,” Kelly said.

More on one of those later in this installment. City-owned properties include the fire stations, City Hall, the schools, parks, and other properties. Lesser known properties include an L-shaped half-acre parking lot on West Main Street that leads to the half-acre Starr Hill Park and a quarter-acre parking lot on Estes Street in the Fifeville neighborhood. In 2019, the city purchased just over an acre of land adjacent to Jordan Park for $270,000.

“And the previous property owners had already platted these six lots so this is another city-owned property that at some point we probably need to look at the possible development of affordable housing,” Kelly said. “That’s one of the discussions we had early on when the city first approved the approval of the purchase of this property.”

In the county, the city of Charlottesville owns 67.56 acres on Avon Street Extended with some of that property being used by Charlottesville Area Transit. The city also owns 1,023 acres at the Sugar Hollow Reservoir and ten acres at the Albemarle Lake subdivision, both purchased originally for water supply. All of this land takes management.

“We do have some challenges when we talk about city-owned properties,” Kelly said. “We need to develop a better consistent process when we have requests to dispose of the properties or acquire the properties. Maintaining these properties. Are there departments currently maintaining these properties? We think a lot of them are being maintained. And are any of these properties developable?”

As with city leases, no one has been coordinating all of the information over the years. Now Council has a chance to act on policies for what to do next.

“And there [are] a lot of properties that are adjacent to right of ways and is that something the City Council wants to look at,” Kelly said. “Do we want to approach adjacent property owners and see if there is an interest in putting those on the tax rolls.”

Kelly said staff will come back to Council with another summary of city agreements not tied with leases that may not be coordinated in one central office.

“We have now the information we need to start addressing the concept even of consistent policies and a consistent point person to work all of this out so we will be coming back to you,” said interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers.

Rogers said there is an opportunity for Council to determine what it would like to do going forward.

City Councilor Michael Payne said he wanted to know if this might help resume discussions of creating a city-owned land bank to acquire property for public purposes.

“We’re land-locked, ten and a half square miles,” Payne said. “Our single most valuable asset is the land we own and I think land acquisition in particular is the single most important action we can take, both for economic development and affordable housing.”

Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders said there could be a future conversation about a land bank ordinance, but the research is meant to get Council to a point where they would have enough useful information.

“This all is a centralizing effort at this time so we can get our arms around what we have but really it is this conversation that is going to feed us on what next steps we want to take,” Sanders said.

Councilor Magill seeks policy on conveying of “paper” streets to landowners

Later on in the meeting, Council had several items related to land use. One of them was a request from the owners of a lot on 6th Street SW in Fifeville for the city to convey to them a strip of property. (staff report)

“And this property is a platted 20 foot right of way that is labeled Oak Street,” said Lisa Robertson, the city attorney.

That section of Oak Street has never been built and it what’s known as a “paper” street. Council closed a 77-foot section of that same paper street in 2010 between 6 and 6 ½ Streets. In that case, one half of that former city property went to straddling property owners.

No one initially spoke at the public hearing, but City Councilor thought she and her colleagues should put a pause on the conveyance.

“Until we figure out holistically what we’re going to do with the paper streets, the piecemealing of people who know to be able to come to City Council or to come to get the street closed, I don’t feel it’s a fair overall process,” Magill said.

Magill said until the process is more clear, she would like Council to stop granting them until the policy is more clear.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade said he’s handled many paper streets when he was a planner. He said he was okay with deciding them on a case by case basis because every property may have unique conditions.

“I think it would maybe be hard to come up with an overall city policy because each one might be different,” Wade said.

The two property owners did want to speak at the public hearing, but had not been recognized but later did have the chance to have their say.

“Currently the actual alley isn’t in great condition,” said Vignesh Kuppusamy. “There’s a tree that fell over in a recent storm that’s dead and kind of rotting there so we were also thinking that if we were to do this and be granted the land together with the owners of 313 we could clean the area up and make it look nicer.”

Wade supported the idea of developing a policy, but said he would feel comfortable granting this conveyance. So did Councilors Brian Pinkston and Michael Payne.

“To be honest I haven’t thought about it too much but my initial reaction is that shouldn’t hold us up on doing some on a case by case basis,” Payne said.

The matter will come back up for a second reading at Council’s next meeting on July 18.

Council denies request to give up 0.02 acres of land on 9th Street NE

In a similar matter, Council denied a request from a landowner to be given a 0.02 acre vacant lot at the corner of East Jefferson Street and 9th Street for free. Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook said there are two chestnut trees on the property. (staff report)

“The trees are huge and they’re beautiful and they’re worth more to the city I suspect then they would be to the neighbor,” Snook said. “My own feeling about is that we should not be in the habit of giving away real estate especially if it’s on a road where we may decide we want to have a bike lane or a wider sidewalk.”

The property is within the jurisdiction of the East High Streetscape project.

The owner of the adjacent property, Thomas Gierin, said those trees are infested with ivy and he said the city is not equipped to take care of the maintenance. He said he could take better care of the property.

“I have worked with the city arborist office to have them come out and perform maintenance,” Giren said. “They did come in I believe in February to do some maintenance and I spoke with them about doing the things it would to make those trees healthy and thriving and they said ‘we’re just here to keep the branches away from the street.”

Gieren said he would be paying property taxes if he owned the land, and that he would grant an easement for any future transportation project.

Councilor Magill said she would prefer the city to retain ownership.

“One of the most expensive things about doing sidewalks and doing everything else is the getting the right of way and by giving up land that we have the right of way to, we limit ourselves and potentially cost us significantly more in the future.”

Snook said he felt there could be a negotiation with Gierin to work out a deal.

“I’m certainly not prepared to say yes but I’m also not prepared to say, no, never,” Snook said.

Council voted 4-1 on a motion to deny the request with Wade dissenting.

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Today is the antepenultimate day of Fiscal Year 2022, and we’re counting down the hours to when the metaphorical ball will drop in Richmond marking the beginning of FY2023. Are you prepared? Feel free to review previous installments of Charlottesville Community Engagement to revisit the hundreds of stories written in the tinfopast 12 fiscal months. Or head on over to Information Charlottesvilleto see I’ve been able to cover at least. The “I” here is Sean Tubbs and thanks for reading.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council gets details on a water infrastructure project in advance of a vote today by the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority

Many people had an opinion about whether the name of the regional library system but it’s up to elected officials to decide on a change

How much trash was processed in Virginia last year? The Department of Environmental Quality has a new report.

And about two hundred people attended an open house on the forthcoming update of the city’s zoning code

Today’s first shout-out goes to WTJU

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out: Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. Tune in and support freeform community radio on WTJU Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

Around 200 people turn up at Pavilion to get details on the city’s zoning process

When the Cville Plans Together Initiative began in early 2020, there were plans to engage people at a series of meetings while the work of crafting an affordable housing plan and the Comprehensive Plan update was conducted. However, the pandemic forced all of that public engagement work to go online.

Council adopted the Affordable Housing Plan in March 2021 and the Comprehensive Plan last November. Both call for additional residential density across the city and an update of the zoning code is the next step.

This time around, people can meet in large numbers, and an open house was held yesterday at the Ting Pavilion where attendees could get a look at the new Diagnostics and Approach Report for the zoning rewrite. People could go through the entire process to date and ask questions of consultants, city staff and each other. I dropped by briefly and spoke with James Freas, the city’s Director of Neighborhood Development Services since last September. (read the Zoning Diagnostic and Approach report)

“We’ve just released the report about two weeks ago and what we’re really looking for is where can we answer clarifying questions, where can we answer questions about what we’ve already shared and what’s in there, and what else should we be considering?” Freas said.

Freas said even half an hour into the event, he could see how community engagement will be different for this phase of the Cville Plans Together initiative.

“If you look around, people are having conversations,” Freas said. “You can’t do this on a Zoom environment. So it’s really exciting to be back in person talking to people face to face, introducing ourselves, having a conversation, and even if we don’t agree, because we’ve met and talked face to face, we’re able to walk away in a move civil environment.”

Freas said the city will collect comments through August, and he will be visiting various neighborhood associations to explain the idea. Then the diagnostics report will be finalized in September for the Planning Commission and Council to review, followed by the actual rewrite.

DEQ releases solid waste report

More than 22.7 million tons of solid waste were sent to processing facilities in Virginia last year, with nearly 5.4 million coming from out of state. That’s according to the annual solid waste report for 2021, released yesterday by the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.

“The total amount of solid waste received increased by one percent or 225,524.95 tons compared to 2020,” reads the report.

However, the amount that came from another jurisdiction dropped by 5.28 percent. About 44 percent of out-of-state came from Maryland, 18.7 percent came from New York State, and 14 percent came from Washington D.C.

Around 11.8 percent of the waste was incinerated and 73 percent went into landfills. Another 8.24 percent was recycled. All but one of Virginia’s 204 permitted solid waste facilities submitted reports.

Locally, the landfill operated by Louisa County buried 23.1 tons of solid waste and has 10.2 years left of capacity. Two transfer stations included in the reporting are the Ivy Materials Utilization Center in Albemarle County as well as the Nelson County transfer station.

Speakers express multiple views on renaming of library system

The Board of Trustees of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library met yesterday at the Northside Library on Rio Road for the usual things such as a five year plan and a budget. But the main item throughout the meeting was whether the system’s name should be changed.

“I don’t expect that we will have a vote on the issue of the library’s name change today,” said Thomas Unsworth, the chair of the JMRL Board. “In fact the Board would be able to call a public hearing if need be to collect further feedback from commentary on that issue.”

The public comment period came at the beginning of the meeting before comments on the topic from JMRL Director David Plunkett. The topic came up at the last trustee meeting in May when Myra Anderson asked for the change because Thomas Jefferson and James Madison owned people as enslaved workers. We’ll hear from Anderson again in a minute.

The first speaker identified himself as Nickolaus Cabrera and said he was a rising senior at the University of Virginia as well as president of the school’s chapter of Young Americans for Freedom.

“We lose our future when we burn our past,” Cabrerra said. “What you all are considering today is a direct burning of our past. Why is this discussion happening? On what basis?”

Cabrerra said the name change would do nothing more than promote a “woke agenda” and this would be an example of censorship. The next several speakers sided with this view. Others did not, including Gloria Beard of Charlottesville.

“It’s time for a change for all people and I hope you all consider what we’re trying to bring across to you,” Beard said. “It’s time to change so all people feel like this community is for everybody.”

Others felt Jefferson and Madison’s legacy was too important not to honor.

“Without Jefferson we would not have the freedoms we have so that is just so important for people to research, come to libraries that are full of books,” said Ann McLean of Richmond. “Yes, he loved books.”

McLean said the Declaration of Independence was more important than the works of Shakespeare, the Magna Carta, and the writings of Cicero.

“Without the principles set forth in the Declaration of Independence, we would have no rights and no liberties and be completely at the mercy of the government,” McLean continued. “Which we do not want to be!”

Myra Anderson described herself as the president of the Reclaimed Roots Descendants Alliance and a descendant of enslaved laborers.

“Six of my ancestors were sold on the auction block in 1829 at the second estate sale of Thomas Jefferson,” Anderson said. “At the time the Declaration of Independence was written and it was declared that all men are created equal, my sixth great grandfather and grandmother were enslaved at the time at Monticello.”

Anderson said libraries should be inclusive spaces and the name should change to reflect the updated values of the system. She said to her, the name Jefferson does not just conjure up greatness.

“It represents the trauma, the oppression, the pain, and the part of Jefferson that most white people want to gloss over when they talk about his greatness, but unfortunately that’s the part that put Black people on a trajectory of struggle,” Anderson said.

Anderson said the precedent for such a change was set locally when the health district dropped his name last year.

Director’s report

After the public comment period was over, Plunkett gave his report on how the name is currently codified and how it might be changed. He said state law for regional library boards deal with how trustees are appointed and the rules for spending money. There’s no mention of who gets to name them.

Plunkett said the current name has informally been in place since 1972 when the regional system was created to pool resources across a wider area.

“The big reason though that Charlottesville, Albemarle, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson joined forces to create JMRL was because of state aid funding which was amplified in the 70’s,” Plunkett said. “Basically the state incentivized localities to get together and share their resources in order to provide library services.”

The original agreement from 1972 did not yet include Greene County, and Plunkett said it was originally called the Thomas Jefferson Regional Library.

“The library board heard a comment from a library board member who made a plea to them to change the name from the Thomas Jefferson Regional Library to the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library,” Plunkett said.

Plunkett said that board member wanted to recognize the “special friendship” between Madison and Jefferson. He noted Madison did not live in the service area now operated by JMRL.

Greene County joined in 1974 and the name was officially changed in an amended agreement. Plunkett said he’s sought legal advice about who gets to change the name.

“The legal counsel that the library board has received is that the authority for changing the library name rests with member jurisdictions, with Charlottesville, Albemarle, Louisa, Greene, and Nelson,” Plunkett said.

Plunkett said the agreement is overdue for its mandatory five-year review and a five-member committee with one appointed by each jurisdiction should begin that work and consider a new name as part of that process.

“If there were changes made to the regional agreement at that point, they would need to take them back to their Boards of Supervisors or City Councils to vote on before that could come back as an amended regional agreement,” Plunkett said.

Plunkett said the Blue Ridge Health District did not have to ask for permission to make a change and it was made administratively. He added Albemarle County Public Schools have a policy in place regarding school names (learn more). The University of Virginia has a Namings & Memorials committee.

Board discussion

During the Board discussion, Trustee Lisa Woolfork of Charlottesville noted the library was not named to honor the two former presidents, but their friendship.

“It wasn’t about ‘Oh, look what they did for the Bill of Rights and the Declaration and et cetera,” Woolfork said. “It was, ‘these guys are friends!”’

Woolfork noted that Charlottesville’s Unitarian church recently dropped Jefferson’s name from its official name.

“I really do believe that we are in a moment where our democracy is being challenged in a variety of ways and I feel as though we have the opportunity to make some true progress to reflect some of the growth that Charlottesville has made,” Woolfork said.

One of Albemarle’s trustees, Michael Powers, said at issue is that different people view as the primary legacy of Jefferson.

“I think it’s clear to me that many people primarily associated Jefferson and Madison with their practice of slavery, but it’s also clear that whatever the origin of the name was at the time, over the last 50 years many people have come also to primarily associate these figures with powerful and fundamental American values, principles and ideals,” Powers said.

Powers said the JMRL Board has to take both considerations into account and he spent some time defending how others have sought to defend Jefferson’s legacy. He cited the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution as the main legal tool used in the Civil Rights movement.

“So we hear in the 14th amendment, equal protection for life, liberty, they are very familiar echoes of Jefferson’s ‘All men are created equal’ and ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” Powers continued.

JMRL Chair Thomas Unsworth said while the JMRL can’t directly change the name, they can make recommendations or suggestions to local officials as part of the agreement review.

Woolfork was clear that she feels the name must change and she resisted framing the issue as one of two equal sides.

“It seems to me that that true energy of what a library does and brings and provides should be robust enough and substantial enough that we can serve our services areas and provide the things we continue to provide and not being called Jefferson Madison will not impede our ability to do that,” Woolfork said.

The trustee from Louisa County pointed out that two of the five localities have already voted on resolutions opposing a name change. Neither resolution in either Greene or Louisa specified any further action. (Louisa Supervisors unanimously oppose name change, June 9, 2022)

The trustee from Nelson County said she was concerned about the resolutions.

“They put that out before even hearing what the other people in the area,” said Aleta Childs.

The Board had a long discussion of the matter and in the end opted to pick up the conversation at its next meeting in July. By then, Tony Townsend of Albemarle will be the chair.

“My agenda here is to make sure that the area’s most inclusive, diverse, and free resource doesn’t get sidetracked or handicapped by this discussion,” Townsend said. “I think it’s a good discussion. I think it needs to happen. I think we can probably come up with a plan that will allow everyone to have at least input.”

Townsend said the process is just beginning.

Woolfork said she wanted to know if Louisa and Greene would leave the regional system as a result.

“Are they that committed to their adulation of Jefferson and Madison that they will just say ‘we don’t want to have a library with you anymore, thanks, and nice knowing you,’” Woolfork asked.

The JMRL Board of Trustees next meets on July 25 at 3 p.m.

Second shout-out is for LEAP’s new Thermalize Virginia program

RWSA to vote today on Central Water Line project

Today the Board of Directors for the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority will meet to select an alignment for a five mile pipeline that the organization says is necessary to help secure drinking water infrastructure. Last week, Charlottesville City Council got a briefing on the project. (view the presentation)

“So we call it the Central Water Line project because it was recommended to be located in the central portion of the city to provide the greatest water benefit to our regional water supply system,” said Bill Mawyer, the executive director of the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority.

Mawyer said planning dates back to a drought in 2002 that led to a long discussion about how to expand the community water supply plan. That involved expansion of the Ragged Mountain Reservoir by building a new earthen dam, as well as an upgrade of the Observatory Water Treatment plan.

This Central Water Line is to transfer water to a location in Pantops.

“We realized later, it was not part of the original Community Water Supply plan, that we needed to have a large pipe coming away from the Observatory Treatment Plant so that we can distribute that water to all parts of the city and the county, the urban water area as we call it,” Mawyer said.

The current cost share is a 52 to 48 percent split with the Albemarle County Service Authority picking up the larger share. Various versions of this pipeline have been considered in the past to increase capacity, and a report released last year called the Urban Finished Water Master Plan recommended this central pipe through the city.

“If we expand the water treatment plant and we replace the raw waterline to get it to the treatment plant, it has no benefit if we can't put that water out into the system,” Mawyer said.

Mawyer said the work would be done in segments of several hundred feet at a time with most of the work underneath city streets.

“We expect the schedule to be from 2024 through 2028,” Mawyer said.

Mawyer said the RWSA has presented to six neighborhood associations along the route and mailed out information to every parcel on the way. He said that led to another visitation of the five alignments and other alternatives that had been examined. One of the alignments would have used the Route 250 bypass but that would have taken eight years.

“Work on the bypass was going to be quite a challenge [and] that likely would have to be completed at night due to the impacts on traffic,” Mawyer said.

Other alignments included Preston Avenue, West Main, and along Harris Street and Fifth Street Extended. Mawyer said the latter got further attention during the neighborhood meeting phase.

“Now, when we had our neighborhood meetings, they said, well what about going down Harris Street all the way to Fifth Street and come up Fifth Street ,” Mawyer said. “So we took a careful look at that and found that there were two disadvantages. One, it was going to be about $8 million more expensive because it’s a much longer route.”

Mawyer also said Fifth Street carries heavy traffic including emergency vehicles. Another potential alternative was to go underneath Shamrock Road which would have been shorter and cheaper, but other problems were identified.

“But Shamrock is such a narrow street, with no shoulder on one side, with on street parking, very congested, [and] you have the railroad track and the vertical curve,” Mawyer said.

The Cherry Avenue alignment was deemed to have the least amount of traffic and to take the least amount of time to complete.

“We think this southern Cherry Avenue [alignment] when all things are considered provides the greatest benefit and opportunity for us,” Mawyer said. “We recognize that there will be impacts along the way.”

The RWSA’s chief engineer said she ran models on all of the various ways to connect the water line.

“The connectivity that we get from the… Central Water Line that ties in all of these mains and provides this main corridor that goes east-west through the city in a relatively straight line really did provide the greatest hydraulic benefits to the system under the most number of conditions,” said Jennifer Whitaker.

Councilor Michael Payne acknowledged he is not an engineer but he said he had concerns about the preferred alternative along Cherry Avenue in part because he felt RWSA’s assessment of impact to neighborhoods had been subjective.

“Is that really the best route in terms of objective criteria and how much that decision has been made via subjective criteria,” Payne said.

Payne said the Northern route would be cheaper with a price tag of $28 million. That alternative would also require moving ahead with an $11 million upgrade of the Emmet Street water main that was not otherwise required until the 2030’s.

“It raises my eyebrow that a project that at least on my understanding while adding some redundancy to the whole system is primarily benefiting the Pantops area is being routed through the southern part of the city, particularly public housing and low income communities,” Payne said.

Councilor Brian Pinkston has been on the RWSA Board of Directors since January. He supported the Cherry route and said it would have benefits for the southern portion of the city.

“One of the extra benefits of doing it this way is that you get larger transmission lines on the southern side of the city,” Pinkston said. “That’s not something that’s been brought up tonight but its an important reason why I think this is the most reasonable route.”

Pinkston also noted that much of the opposition is based on an idea somehow this would all be done for the benefit of people in Albemarle’s growth area.

“I don’t know why it’s a problem that we would to help people in the county, particularly when they’re paying 52 percent of it,” Pinkston said.

Council did not take a vote on how to direct Pinkston and the city’s two other RWSA members.

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It’s the final Friday of June, unless something can be done to add another day to the month. I am unaware of any campaign to do so, but perhaps there need to be changes.

So, welcome to this 24th day of the fifth interval of what we’ve come to call the two thousand and twenty-second year. This is Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast about the built environment that celebrates 400 editions with this installment that arrives 711 days later. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s edition of the program:

Charlottesville’s budget surplus is increasing with revenues higher than originally budgeted

Charlottesville City Council will make appointments to the Planning Commission in July

You can count on one hand the number of Albemarle residents who voted in the Republican Primary for the 7th Congressional District

Changes to Charlottesville Area Transit routes could soon occur as soon as more drivers can be hired

First shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

Since the very beginning of this newsletter, one long-time Patreon supporter has used his shout-out to draw your attention to the work of the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign but today let’s talk about National Pollinator Week, which runs through June 26! There will be many events designed to draw your attention to the crucial role that bees and other creatures play in making sure plants reproduce.

On Saturday at 10 a.m., Scottsville’s Center for the Arts and Natural Environment will host

Allison Wickham from Siller Pollinator Company will lead an introduction to bees and beekeeping. If you're thinking about starting a backyard beehive or are just curious about what's involved with keeping bees, then this is a great introductory class for you. There will even be a honey competition judged by Allison Wickham! For the tuition rate and to register, visit svilleartsandnature.org for a list of all of the upcoming classes.

Charlottesville’s FY22 surplus likely to increase

There’s less than a week until the fiscal new year for Virginia and its local governments. On Tuesday, Charlottesville City Council got an update from interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers on what can be expected in terms of “one-time money” in the form of a financial report. (read the report)

“And we see that there’s a projected $14 million surplus for revenue,” Rogers said.

That’s higher than the $13 million projected in April.

However, Rogers said that number could change as the city’s expenditures have also been down due to various reasons including COVID.

“We have a lot of vacancies in our budget, the market has had an impact on our ability to hire as rapidly as we need to,” Rogers said. “While 92 percent of the budget year has passed, we’ve only spent about 85 percent of our budget expenditures. That’s going to release in a surplus.”

However, Rogers said the actual surplus will not be known until later in the year after the city’s books are closed and reconciled.

One of the reasons why there will be a surplus is due to tax rates increases and assessment rises for personal property and real estate.

Earlier this year, Council voted to increase the real estate tax rate to $0.96 per $100 of assessed value. That penny increase applied to the entire calendar year of 2022.

Council also opted to keep the personal property rate at $4.20 per $100 of assessed value, also contributing to the surplus. That was over the recommendation of Commissioner of Revenue Todd Divers who suggested reducing it due to a sharp increase in the value of used vehicles.

The city also will not bring in as much revenue from Parks and Recreation as originally believed.

“During the budget process we budgeted for the idea that we thought we would be fully operational but as you know we’re not and so therefore we are not going to make those marks,” said Krisy Hammill, the city’s senior budget performance analyst.

The city has also closed on its latest sale of municipal bonds which are used to finance capital projects. The cost of doing so will increase as interest rates go up.

“We closed with about $28 million at a rate at about 3.07 percent, which is about double of what we got last year but it is indicative of the market and still a very good rate,” Hammill said.

Council makes appointments, but not yet to Planning Commission

On Tuesday, City Council appointed Laura Knott and Sally Duncan to the city’s Historic Resources Committee and Dashad Cooper to the Police Civilian Oversight Board. Other appointments included members of the Sister Cities Commission, the Region 10 Board, and the Retirement Commission.

However, they did not fill all the open positions.

“Appointments to the Planning Commission have been postponed until the July 18 Council meeting,” said Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook. “There were a few people we needed to interview and didn’t have time to do it today and at least one person was not available.”

Council will not meet the first week of July.

The window to apply for the Planning Commission has closed. There were at least 28 applications for the five seats, including those of sitting Commissioners Karim Habbab, Hosea Mitchell, and Rory Stolzenberg. There will be at least two newcomers because Commissioners Taneia Dowell and Jody Lahendro are not eligible for another term.

There are three at-large vacancies on the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. Applications for those positions are due on August 5, 2022. That entity’s next public meeting is June 27, 2022 and there’s no information yet available on their website. In fact, there’s not been a meeting listed on the CRHA website since January 2021. (apply here)

City still seeking to fill key vacancies crucial to approval of new buildings

Earlier this month, interim Charlottesville City Manager Michael C. Rogers told Council of a shortage of building inspectors. On Tuesday, he said positions are being readvertised and other solutions are being explored.

“I have executed an agreement with the University of Virginia’s building official to provide staff capacity to assist us in the permitting and inspections process and they began last week,” Rogers said.

Rogers said the agreement will carry into the fall.

Albemarle Republicans choose Anderson in 7th Congressional District

Voters in Albemarle’s “Small Sliver” within Virginia’s new 7th Congressional District went to the polls Tuesday in the Republican primary. Eight people in all voted in the six way race and half selected Derrick Anderson, the candidate who came in second-place overall.

There were two votes for State Senator Bryce Reeves who came in third and two votes for the winner. Yesli Vega received 10,878 votes and will face incumbent Democrat Abigail Spanberger in November.

Albemarle County is otherwise entirely within the new Fifth District.

I’ve begun reporting on the Fifth District with a new newsletter if you want to join my journey in learning more about the localities within.

In today’s two other shout-outs: Code for Charlottesville and local media!
You’re listening to Charlottesville. Community Engagement and it’s time for two quick shout-outs.

Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects with the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department, and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. Visit codeforcville.org to learn about those projects.

The final comes from another Patreon supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, the Crozet Gazette, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

Next steps for Charlottesville Area Transit route changes outlined at partnership meeting

Before the pandemic, Charlottesville Area Transit hired the firm Nelson Nygaard to take a look at its routes to suggest changes to optimize service. The study was done but nothing has been implemented so far. The Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership got an update at their meeting yesterday.

“CAT planned on implementing that system optimization plan last year but they’ve been dealing with driver shortages like every other transit agency in the country so that’s been postponed,” said Jim Baker of Nelson Nygaard.

CAT director Garland Williams directed Nelson Nygaard to revisit the route changes to identify how it might be phased into service over time rather than be done all at once. This would include restoring service to pre-COVID levels, expanding service areas in both Charlottesville and Albemarle, and expanding Saturday and Sunday service. Since the pandemic, CAT has run no service on Sundays.

“We felt like that’s a pressing need to get some level of Sunday service back on the streets,” Baker said. “So we’re proposing to get the trolley back online, the Route 12 which ran pre-pandemic up the U.S. 29 corridor, and to get service down into Avon Street past the CAT garage for Sunday service.

Baker said three routes would see changes as part of the first phase.

The Center at Belvedere would finally be served by the northbound journey of Route 11. To make up for the time, there will no longer be service on a loop that runs through the Locust Grove neighborhood.

Route 2 would be split into two services with 2A serving Fifth Street Station and the Willoughby Shopping Center and 2B serving Mill Creek in Albemarle County for the first time on its way to Piedmont Virginia Community College. This would also serve Monticello High School. 2A would run for some of Sunday

A second bus would be added to the current Route 6 to improve frequency to 30 minutes

The second phase would make changes to services along the U.S. 29 corridor.

Route 7 would be expanded to the Wal-Mart and would travel bi-directionally along Hillsdale Drive and through Seminole Square Shopping Center. Baker said the goal here is to link downtown Charlottesville with Wal-Mart, which is a major shopping destination.

Route 5 would no longer travel to the Wal-Mart but would instead have a northern terminus at Fashion Square Mall. Its new southern terminus would be the UVA Hospital.

The Sunday-only Route 12 would be eliminated in favor of Route 7 going seven days a week

The third phase will implement the rest of the changes. Here are some of them:

Saturday service would be introduced to Route 1

Route 3 would be broken into two routes with one traveling solely between downtown and Willoughby Shopping Center

A new route, tentatively known as Route 3E, would travel around Belmont and downtown

Route 6 would no longer serve the University of Virginia Hospital via Prospect Avenue. It would also be routed along South First Street as it travels between downtown and the Willoughby Shopping Center. This would add additional service to Crescent Hall.

Route 8 serves Stonefield and would be altered to travel south to the University of Virginia Hospital and down to Willoughby Shopping Center via Prospect Avenue. This service would no longer travel downtown.

Route 9 would also no longer serve the UVA Hospital and would instead travel to Fashion Square Mall

Route 10 would be altered to no longer travel on Stony Point Road and instead would travel bidirectionally through the Pantops Shopping Center on its way between Downtown Charlottesville and Sentara Martha Jefferson

When will the phases be implemented? According to the presentation, that’s all going to depend on drivers.

Six more drivers are needed for phase one, a total of 12 are needed for phase two, and a total of 27 are needed for phase 3. There’s an additional “phase three plus” that’s perhaps not worth detailing because it would need a total of 46 additional drivers. That’s a much higher number than six.

“Assuming we can get the pay scale to be comparable to Jaunt and [University Transit System], and we can get six more drivers, that should not be [beyond the reach] and then we can begin phase 1,” Williams said. “The jump, though, is getting authorization from the city and the county to fund us to make the additional resources.”

The Regional Transit Partnership meeting was held a couple of hours before a public meeting on the Regional Transit Vision Plan. which is $350,000 in the making. The following illustrates confusion that can come from having planning processes not tied to actual logistics.

City Councilor Brian Pinkston asked what the proposed CAT changes had to do with that study.

“Is this sort of like a first step towards that larger vision?”

Williams said these changes have nothing to do with the Regional Transit Vision Plan.

“They didn’t even copy these routes,” Williams said. “They took a whole new approach and said the slate was clean.”

I’ll have more from the Regional Transit Partnership and more on the Regional Transit Vision plan in future installments of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Support the program!

There’s a lot of information in this installment of this program, which is the 397th edition of the program. About a quarter of you are paying something to help keep Town Crier Productions in business. I have never been a very good salesperson, and won’t overly pitch.

But, if you are benefiting from this newsletter and the information in it, please consider some form of support. I am not a nonprofit organization and most of my time is spent in putting the newsletter together, which includes producing the podcast.

Supporting the program through a Substack contribution or through Patreon makes it very easy for me to get paid and every single dollar that I get makes me want to work that much harder to serve the community. In just under two years, I’ve produced hundreds of stories that seek to give you information about how decisions are made in our community and in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Do you have milk? Do you have the grain? Grab a pot and find a stove, and it’s time to celebrate National Porridge Day! Each and every day there are so many things to celebrate, such as today’s honoring of Women in Engineering Day. However, this 399th edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement is not being faithful to National Typewriter Day as it is composed on an abacus.

On today’s program:

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District takes the Regional Transit Vision to Fluvanna and Greene counties

Albemarle County reports on an eviction diversion program

And a brief update on the ongoing COVID-19 situation

First shout-out is for LEAP’s new Thermalize Virginia program

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out: Have you been thinking of converting your fossil-fuel appliances and furnaces into something that will help the community reduce its greenhouse gas emissions? Your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, has launched a new program to guide you through the steps toward electrifying your home. Thermalize Virginia will help you understand electrification and connect you with vetted contractors to get the work done and help you find any rebates or discounts. Visit thermalizeva.org to learn more and to sign up!

COVID-19 update

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,085 cases of COVID-19 with a seven-day positive result percentage of 17.4. The trends for both metrics are heading down, but Dr. Costi Sifri of the University of Virginia Health System said that could change.

“I actually think we’re sort of at a plateau where we’re seeing continued transmission in the community,” Dr. Sifri said. “My sense is that it’s not increasing but it is has been at a fairly consistent level now for the last several weeks or maybe even up to a month.”

The big news in the past week has been federal approval of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines for children under the age of five but older than six months.

“The doses that are used for these young pediatric vaccines is dose-reduced so when Pfizer and Moderna trialed these vaccines they made sure to use a lower dose for the reasons of wanting to make sure it was safe,” Dr. Sifri said.

New versions of the mRNA vaccines are being developed to address newer strains.

“That is being looked at right now this month by the [Food and Drug Advisory Committee],” Dr. Sifri said. “So at the heart of the question is do we need a reformulation or a coformulation of the COVID vaccines to account for Omicron?”

The Blue Ridge Health District will begin their administration of the vaccines to children at a clinic from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Charlottesville/Albemarle Health Department at 1138 Rose Hill Drive. They’ll also be on site at Tonsler Park on Cherry Avenue from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m. check the Blue Ridge Health District’s website.

Albemarle and LAJC have teamed up to prevent evictions

Albemarle County and the Legal Aid Justice Center helped prevent 158 evictions in a pilot program that ran from December to this May. Albemarle County sent out a press release this morning announcing the results.

"Many rent-relief programs are phasing out, yet there remain many Albemarle families still deeply affected by the COVID-19 pandemic,” Supervisor Chair Donna Price is quoted in the release. “Low-income households have not recovered as quickly, and programs such as this provide additional stability for households continuing to face financial hardships, using federal relief dollars to fund legal services and to provide wrap-around support.”

Albemarle committed $200,000 from its share of the American Rescue Act Plan to the project. The Legal Aid Justice Center is being paid for legal counsel for households that qualify.

“The program requires consideration for the impacts of contesting evictions on landlords who own less than three units and prioritizes mitigation efforts to secure outstanding funds for landlords while keeping families housed,” the release continues.

The program will continue through June 2023.

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Public meeting tonight for Regional Transit Vision plan

The final public meeting for the development of a Regional Transit Vision will be held tonight in an online format. The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is overseeing the study, which seeks to come up with an aspirational document for enhanced public transportation throughout the entire Charlottesville area including Buckingham County.

The draft document has gone before the Charlottesville City Council and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors, as I’ve reported. But the Regional Transit Vision also has been to the outlying counties. Last week, Boards of Supervisors in both Fluvanna County and Greene County had a briefing.

“It started in the summer of 2021 with assessing the situation,” said Lucinda Shannon, a planner with the TJPDC. The $350,000 study was conducted by the firms AECOM and Jarrett Walker + Associates.

“So they looked at the existing systems, they looked at the land use planning, and the transit market potential for the entire region and kind of assessed where would be good places for transit to be,” Shannon said. “They also worked with the public and identified goals and visions for the region plan and priorities for what this community wants to see in a vision plan.”

All of that engagement was done online, as the study got underway during the pandemic. Tonight’s meeting is also virtual. The work has resulted in a constrained plan that would be paid for through new tax powers granted to a Regional Transportation Authority, as well as an unconstrained plan that did not factor how the expanded transit service would be paid for.

For a sense of scale, the constrained plan would have an annual cost estimate of $26 million whereas the unconstrained plan would be $70 million a year. The unconstrained plan would mean buses operating at full service, seven days a week, including fixed-route service between Ruckersville between Charlottesville.

“All day fixed-route service from Ruckersville to Charlottesville would add services to three percent of residents and it would also reach 11 percent more jobs in the county,” Shannon said.

One Supervisor asked if the plan includes one item he would like to see.

“Does it include light rail? Does it include those kinds of things?” asked Steve Bowman of the Monroe District. “Because I’ve always thought that down U.S. 29 would be an ideal place to put a light rail all the way down.”

The TJDPC previously studied light rail in a 2004 report that looked at the future of passenger rail service in Virginia. By the time a few years later when there was discussion of a Regional Transit Authority, that vision had been reduced to something called bus rapid transit. Shannon said the consultants in the new vision have included that in their recommendation.

“I think that what they want to is propose things that the community will accept and can be funded so right now they are proposing a Bus Rapid Transit up and down Route 29 so there would be service up to the airport so from Charlottesville on U.S. 29 on up to the airport with 15 minute service,” Shannon said.

Greene Supervisors did not have a long discussion of the matter.

The next day, Shannon made the trip to Palmyra to speak to the Fluvanna Board of Supervisors about the plan.

“So this is a collaborative effort to evaluate and establish a clear long term vision for transit in our region, and not just the city,” Shannon said. “And it’s kind of like all of the things we’d like to buy and then the next study that we’re hoping to do is a transit governance study that would start in July.”

Shannon gave more details on what the “unconstrained” vision means.

“The unconstrained vision we wanted to be ambitious and creative and come up with what we could do if there was no budget and there was no fund limit on funding for that concept,” Shannon said.

As stated above, that would mean 60-minute fixed-route service to Charlottesville from surrounding population clusters.

“These routes would go to Scottsville, Crozet, Lovingston, Palmyra, Louisa, and Ruckersville seven days a week,” Shannon said.

One Supervisor said that would be an improvement for Fluvanna residents who currently use the public transit that’s available.

“Right now people going to the city on Jaunt to the doctor’s office have to stay all day until Jaunt comes back to pick them up,” said Supervisor Mozelle Booker of the Fork Union District.

Supervisor Tony O’Brien of the Rivanna District supported the concept of expanded transit.

“I love the idea of expanding rural transportation,” O’Brien said. “So critical not just for the environment but also for those who are constrained by their finances and or ability to drive. So anything we can do to make it better for people to be able to access other areas of Central Virginia I think is wonderful.”

Shannon said the details of how to implement the vision will come during the governance study.

“We will be engaging you again once the governance study starts and our objective for the governance study is to really work with all the counties and be inclusive and come up with a plan for the funding of the services that works for all the counties, both urban and rural together,” Shannon said.

Tonight is your chance to weigh in at a meeting that begins at 6:30 p.m. tonight. Details of both visions and a link to the meeting are availale

You can also take a survey on the topic. Have you done so yet? Let me know in the comments. (take the survey)

Comments will be taken through July 15.

Previous coverage:

Regional transit vision may suggest resumption of Regional Transit Authority foundation, December 14, 2021

Regional transit vision update, May 20, 2022

Partnership briefed on potential vision for regional transit, June 1, 2022

Albemarle and Charlottesville officials weigh in on regional transit, June 14, 2022

Support the program!

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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We’re now one day past the summer solstice, and one day closer to the next one. There’s a rhythm to our existence on this planet that never stops so it makes a lot of sense to take a lot of snapshots. Here’s another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement capturing a few observations about June 22, 2022, the first full day of summer. I’m Sean Tubbs, ready to adjust to days that shed light as I shed light on more buildings and food.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Ting will match your initial payment!

On today’s program:

Details on how Charlottesville’s future zoning will match Future Land Use Map vision for more density all across the city

Lights will soon be installed at the McIntire skate park in Charlottesville

The Albemarle Planning Commission takes up a rezoning for 525 units on Old Ivy Road and the developer asks for more time to retool the application

First Shout-out is for the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, have you ever wanted to learn as much as you can about how to preserve and protect trees? The Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards are opening up registration for their fall series of online training sessions and field activities running from August 9 through November 19. Full tuition details are at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org and if you want to get a feel for what you may learn, there’s a public tree identification walk through the grand trees spanning the front areas of the University of Virginia on Sunday, June 26. Attendance is limited, so register today!

June 27 meeting scheduled to review Charlottesville zoning report

Two of the three components of Charlottesville’s update of its overarching land use policies are complete, and the work towards the third is moving along. Last week, the city released what’s being called the Diagnostics and Approach Report which provides a pathway forward for how the city’s zoning ordinance will be rewritten. (read the draft)

“This zoning rewrite project is not about adding more plans, goals, or objectives – this work is entirely focused on implementing the Affordable Housing Plan and the Comprehensive Plan,” writes James Freas, the city’s director of Neighborhood Development Services.

All of this work has been done and will be done done under the auspices of the Cville Plans Together initiative. A public meeting will be held on Monday, June 27 at the Ting Pavilion about the document.

“At the core of the entire Cville Plans Together process there has been a commitment to addressing issues of racial equity and affordable housing and that core commitment remains as we work through the zoning rewrite. Meeting this commitment requires that our zoning allow people to build more housing units throughout the city, that it establishes incentives to include affordable units in new multi-family development, and that it is sensitive to the potential for displacement.”

The draft report calls for several steps to make the zoning ordinance more predictable. This would include restricting the usage of the special use permit process to uses rather than bulk and massing. It would also discourage further rezonings.

The future zoning map is to facilitate the vision of the Future Land Use Map, which calls for all single-family residential lots to be able to build three units with a fourth available if it is rented or sold at city-defined affordability levels. In fact, much of the additional density in higher-intensity zones would require that same affordability for “bonus” units.

In a separate but related process, HR&A Advisors are working with Code Studio and the city on an inclusionary zoning ordinance to codify the details. This will also include the Sensitive Communities areas which are intended to stop further displacement in neighborhoods such as Fifeville and Tenth and Page. Several properties in those areas have recently sold for high amounts.

Other useful information and recommendations in the draft:

A description of housing types begins on page 33 if you want to know the difference between a carriage house and a triplex and a twelveplex.

There is a recommendation to create zoning districts based on building form to reflect the different designations in the Future Land Use Map. There would be a “house-scale district” and a “medium-scale district.”

Smaller lots would be permitted more “lot coverage” than larger ones.

Other recommendations include reducing parking requirements and the modification of existing setback requirements to provide flexibility to place more units on lots. There are pages of diagrams that depict how this might be achieved for different lot sizes and shapes.

There is a focus on urban form rather than density, allowing density to be regulated by building codes and fire codes.

Building heights would be expressed in both feet and stories

Some of the many existing mixed use corridor districts with similar building heights and an urban form could be combined into a single district.

The word “family” would be replaced with “household” or “unit”

There should be more use of manufactured homes particularly for “tiny” homes

The Entrance Corridor Review Board should be eliminated by building standards into the zoning code

The work is not yet complete. Some but not all of the existing zoning categories have been taken through the process but Appendix B shows the ones that have. There will certainly be more information about this process in the next few months. Please stay tuned to this newsletter which seeks to bring as much information as possible.

Fundraising goal met to light up McIntire Skate Park

A public-private partnership to relocate a skate park removed for road construction resulted in a new facility in McIntire Park opening in 2019. But until now, there have been no lights due to budget cuts to the project made to get it completed.

This morning the city announced a fundraising goal has been met and lights will be installed by mid-September. When in place, the park will stay open until 10 p.m.

“The lights are LED fixtures from MUSCO Lighting, chosen for their low-light pollution, energy use, heat emission, and longevity,” reads a press release.

The funding for the lights comes entirely from private donations with contributions from the Bama Works Fund, the Perry Foundation, the Rock The Lights Campaign by Duane Brown, Upper-level Screen Printing, Freestyle, Hatcher Consulting, and Anonymous Local Foundation.

Second shout-out: SCAN holding a Beekeeping 101 class

Since the very beginning of this newsletter, one long-time Patreon supporter has used his shout-out to draw your attention to the work of the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign but today let’s talk about National Pollinator Week, which runs through June 26! There will be many events designed to draw your attention to the crucial role that bees and other creatures play in making sure plants reproduce.

On Saturday at 10 a.m., Scottsville’s Center for the Arts and Natural Environment will host Allison Wickham from Siller Pollinator Company will lead an introduction to bees and beekeeping. If you're thinking about starting a backyard beehive or are just curious about what's involved with keeping bees, then this is a great introductory class for you. There will even be a honey competition judged by Allison Wickham! For the tuition rate and to register, visit svilleartsandnature.org for a list of all of the upcoming classes.

There are plenty more pollinating resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

Greystar asks for more time on Old Ivy Residences rezoning after Planning Commission public hearing

The Albemarle County Planning Commission had a long public hearing on June 14 on Greystar Development’s rezoning request for up to 525 units on about 35 acres on Old Ivy Road.

The five parcels of property are nearby University Village, Huntington Village, Ivy Gardens, and several office spaces mostly owned by the UVA Foundation.

“And then to the north of course is the Darden Business School at UVA, North Grounds including the law school and other nearby UVA destinations,” said Rebecca Ragsdale, a planning manager with the county.

There are three different zoning types across the property, with R-1, R-10, and R-15. The higher intensity zoning parcels have legally-binding conditions on them called proffers.

“And one of those proffers is that the R-15 properties are limited to R-1 density until transportation proffers are deemed satisfied by the Board of Supervisors,” Ragsdale said.

Some of the land had been owned by the Virginia Department of Transportation for usage for the now-defunct Western Bypass.

The Rivanna Trail runs through the site and portions of it will be rerouted as part of the development.

There are discrepancies between what county staff in terms of affordable housing and what the developer had offered. Ragsdale said the developer’s interpretation assumed that the R-15 properties are already rezoned and should not trigger the county’s policy. As such, they’re offering 14 of the units to be designated as affordable rentals. Staff disagrees.

But the major concerns related to transportation impacts.

Planning Manager Kevin McDermott said a traffic study commissioned by the developer found that intersections on the western end of Old Ivy Road particularly at the U.S. 250 interchange are already overburdened.

“Existing conditions at those are currently failing for many movements and poor all around,” McDermott said.

McDermott said the county and the Virginia Department of Transportation are working on potential options but the work is not complete.

“If they are determined as feasible, we would need to identify funding for that,” McDermott said.

The eastern end of Old Ivy Road has a narrow railroad underpass, which McDermott said was also being studied but nothing is shovel-ready.

McDermott also said the traffic study also showed that Old Ivy Residences would cause further delays. He said there have been some improvements to upgrade the road such as installation of curb and gutter and a thirty-foot road width. However, he said nothing has been done to realign the roadway at the underpass and there’s a partial sidewalk on the south side of Old Ivy Road.

Greystar argues development is consistent with comp plan

John Clarkson is the managing director of Greystar, which is based in Charleston, South Carolina.

“We think we have a project here that is very appropriate for what is defined by the zoning,” Clarkson said. “We intend to build a very thoughtful and well-designed project that meets the housing demand.”

Greystar hired the law firm Williams Mullen to help them through the land use process in Albemarle. Attorney Valerie Long said there have been enough improvements on Old Ivy Road since the proffer was adopted in the rezoning in 1985.

“Most significantly, the University’s construction of Leonard Sandridge Drive which obviously took a tremendous amount of traffic off of Old Ivy,” Long said. “Really the outstanding one is the railroad trestle. We certainly understand and agree that is a problem and we are comforted and encouraged by Mr. McDermott’s comments about how closely they are working with VDOT and the University representatives to address that issue.”

Long said Greystar will make contributions to a solution when it is identified. She said the issue before the county is whether to approve dense housing inside of the designated growth area where the units would be close to where people want to be.

There is currently no transit along Old Ivy Road, but Long said they would build a bus stop. They’re also asking for a reduction in the parking requirements.

Long also addressed the concern about the developer’s interpretation of the county’s housing policy. The Bivins that Long refers to is Commissioner Julian Bivins, who represents the Jack Jouett district where this development would be built.

“The land is zoned R-15, not all of it it, but the vast majority as Mr. Bivins indicated, about 27 acres, are zoned R-15,” Long said. “So we’re not asking for an increase in those parcels in terms of units.”

Rents would be between $1,850 and $3,600. Bivins suggested that Greystar offer more than just 14 units.

“Affordable units is not about poverty,” Bivins said. “Affordable units is about jobs and because our community morphing into more of a service industry, those jobs don’t pay as much as some of the other jobs used to be. So I think if this goes forward, when it goes forward, it would be a really strong signal that [you] really want to be responsive to the community if [you’re] not saying [you’re] only giving 14 units.”

Public hearing

Over two dozen people people spoke at the public hearing, most of them opposed. One of them was Joel Loving who lives in the Bel Air neighborhood.

“There’s no question that adding as many as 1,500 residents and a thousand vehicles to this small area will have a substantial impact on pedestrian and vehicular traffic, stormwater, the local school system, and I’m sure there’s plenty more that will be discussed this evening,” Loving said.

Elizabeth Kutchai recently moved into University Village after living in Charlottesville for decades. She said 525 units are too many.

“The University of Virginia has already erected many new buildings on Old Ivy Road,” Kutchai said. “They also own Ivy Gardens Apartments and have plans to redevelop that property, increasing its density by 150 percent.

See also:

UVA making plans for Ivy Gardens redevelopment, June 9, 2021

UVA committee briefed on new capital projects, June 4, 2022
Many other residents from University Village asked for the Commission to consider specific topics, such as a concern fire and rescue access would be limited.

“No fire department no matter how good they are is going to be able to cope with a fire in a development of this size when you have people packed in there like sardines,” said resident Daniel Avery.

One of the final speakers from University Village was Sally Thomas, who served 16 years on the Board of Supervisors. In 2001, She voted to adopt the Neighborhood Model District zoning to fulfill the Comprehensive Plan goal of compact development in the designated growth areas.

“This Old Ivy apartments complex is not what the county hoped for in smart growth,” Thomas said. “Why not? It’s certainly dense and within the growth area. But it’s also like too many other projects that seemed to be desirable developments. It overloads the present facilities and its interconnectivity just hasn’t quite been developed in a way that will work for both the residents and the neighborhood.”

Only three people spoke in-person at the public hearing in favor of the rezoning. One was the lawyer for the property owner who will sell it to Greystar. Another was John Matthews whose company produced a report for the development.

The other was Ivo Romenesko. He’s a Farmington resident who was also part of the Development Initiative Steering Committee which helped develop the Neighborhood Model.

“The clock is ticking on the growth area,” Romenesko said. “I think that the double digit percentages that are occurring with population in Albemarle and the Planning District put pressure on Albemarle County and I would like to see the growth area accommodate as much reasonably good, well-designed development as it can so that we can preserve the beautiful areas of Albemarle County as long as we can.”

In her rebuttal after the public hearing, Long acknowledged there is work to be done to increase connectivity for both pedestrians and motor vehicles. She said Greystar is offering funds toward improvements.

“Greystar is committed to continuing to negotiate with all of its neighbors,” Long said. “They want to improve the safety and the traffic issues and they’re continuing to make those contributions and as somebody said, make the connections. We’ve spent a lot of time talking to Mr. McDermott and VDOT and other folks. We’ve had our traffic engineer putting suggestions together, our civil engineer drawing plans, submitting them to various off-site owners with engineered plans for paths, for connections, for road improvements. We just can’t do it unilaterally.”

Commissioners had concerns

At-Large Commissioner Luis Carrazana likened the 1985 proffer restricting development until transportation improvements as a gate.

“That is a concept that I believe is very useful particularly as we consider amendments to our Comprehensive Plan,” Carrazana said.

Carrazana said the Commission hears again and again about overburdened roads and overcrowded schools. He also said he did not think the conditions of the proffer have been met.

“In terms of the failing road, and that road is not getting any better,” Carrazana said. “It is dangerous.”

Commissioner Karen Firehock said another constraint is the presence of the railroad, which has been owned by CSX for many years but will soon be owned by the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority. She said the underpass is hazardous after heavy rainfall.

“I have seen cars floating, very surprised UVA students in fact not realizing that wasn’t just a puddle and having cars being towed out and totaled because they were underwater,” Firehock said.

However, Firehock said she felt this was a good area to develop if the connections can be made.

Commissioner Corey Clayborne said he felt the density could be appropriate but traffic concerns are a show-stopper.

“I don’t believe that the transportation piece has been satisfied according to the Board’s stipulation on that,” Clayborne said. “That hasn’t been proven to me tonight.”

Clayborne said he did understand how the developers came up with the number 14 for affordable housing units.

“But nothing prevents you from doing above what the policy asks either and there’s just no way that I could vote for 525 units and… 14?” Clayborne said.

Bivins suggested that Greystar could get permission to connect to Leonard Sandridge Road, which leads out to eastbound U.S. 250.

“I don’t know you do that,” Bivins said. “You all are sophisticated enough and you all have the various buttons that you can push in that administration. I would encourage you do to that and I would particularly encourage you to do that before you meet with the Supervisors.”

Bivins made a motion to recommend denial of the rezoning, but Long approached and asked for a deferral so some of the issues could be worked out. The Planning Commission granted that and Firehock has the final word in this story.

“I will just say that I very much look forward to seeing how the applicant works on all of these things because I think we do believe that density in the urban ring is a good thing,” Firehock said.

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It’s Friday once more and there’s no time like this moment to begin to tell you about information that’s been waiting for you to read or listen to. The purpose of Charlottesville Community Engagement is to bring you as many stories and articles about the community as possible, on as frequent a level as possible. I’m the host Sean Tubbs, and I want to make sure you know no Sean Tubbs were harmed in the creation of this episode.

This work is free to read or listen to, but needs financial support. If you subscribe through Substack, Ting will match your initial payment!

On today’s show:

Former Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney files suit against the city alleging she was fired for trying to reform what she calls a racist department

The General Assembly meets today to act on Governor Glenn Youngkin’s amendments to the state budget

A quarantine on moving some materials around parts of Virginia to stop the spread of the Spotted Lanternfly will soon be extended to Albemarle and Charlottesville

Charlottesville’s Board of Zoning Appeals upholds a determination related to a future Wawa

The Albemarle County Service Authority reports it’s ready to guard against “forever chemicals” in their drinking water supply

First Shout-out is for the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, have you ever wanted to learn as much as you can about how to preserve and protect trees? The Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards are opening up registration for their fall series of online training sessions and field activities running from August 9 through November 19. Full tuition details are at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org and if you want to get a feel for what you may learn, there’s a public tree identification walk through the grand trees spanning the front areas of the University of Virginia on Sunday, June 26. Attendance is limited, so register today!

General Assembly to consider Governor Youngkin’s budget amendments

The House of Delegates and the Senate convene this afternoon in Richmond to finalize budget amendments recommended by Governor Glenn Youngkin.

“I approve the general purpose of this bill, but I am returning it without my signature with the request that thirty-five amendments be adopted,” Youngkin wrote in his recommendations for HB30.

(the paragraph below was edited to make a correction)

One of the largest amendments is a three month suspension on the state tax on gasoline and diesel beginning July 1. Legislation to accomplish this goal did not pass the General Assembly in the Special Session in April. A bill introduced by Youngkin did not make it out of either the House of Delegates Appropriations Committee or the Senate Finance Committee.

Another amendment would make it a class 6 felony to picket at the residence of a judge, juror, witness, or court officer.

The amendments cover both the current fiscal year and the next one that begins in two weeks, so financial amounts listed below are split over the biennium. These include:

Two full time positions to support the Lieutenant Governor

An additional $300,000 in salary increases for staff in the Office of the Attorney General

$300,000 in state funds to the Virginia Department of Agricultural and Consumer Services to add staff to expand inspections for new meat processing facilities

An additional $3 million for the Virginia Economic Development Partnership Authority

An additional $4 million to expand the Early Reading Specialists program to schools that rank lowest in performance

The redirecting of $5 million in financial aid assistance to students at Norfolk State University and Virginia State University

Two million in additional funding for an Innovation Center to be built an a historically Black College of University as well as another four million over two years for increased security at all of the Commonwealth’s HBCU’s.

Four million in funds would be redirected to support the University of Virginia’s Program on Constitutionalism and Democracy

There’s $160,000 going to the Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs at Virginia Commonwealth University to “research ways to increase opportunities for K-12 students”

Two million over two years for the Hampton Roads Proton Beam Therapy Institute at Hampton University

$2.35 million in each year to hire 36 security guards at state-operated mental health treatment centers

Another $200,000 would go to the families of the security officers killed at Bridgewater College earlier this year

an appropriation of $50,000 would be made to prepare more prison beds for those arrested for picketing at a judge’s house

There are also new policies that have been introduced into the budget.

All public universities will have to demonstrate an “official commitment and set of policies and practices to support freedom of expression and inquiry, free speech, academic freedom, and diversity of thought.”

The University of Virginia at Wise is authorized to offer graduate programs

All state funding for any abortion-related service would be prohibited unless required by federal law

Bail would be waived for certain criminal offenses

Participation in the new Community Lab School program would be expanded

Youngkin made three amendments to HB29 which is known as the caboose bill as it looks back at previous budgets including the current fiscal year. These include a $26.5 million increase in revenue for FY22 and a $15 million for site preparation work in Richmond in an account called the Property Analytics Firm Infrastructure Fund.

VDACS to expand Spotted Lanternfly quarantine to Charlottesville area

The state entity that oversees management of invasive species will expand a quarantine on the movement of certain products to help slow the spread of the Spotted Lanternfly. The Virginia Department of Consumer and Agricultural Services has sent a letter to localities including Albemarle and Charlottesville notifying them of the new rules.

“The Spotted Lanternfly Quarantine requires a permit to ensure that businesses are taking steps to guarantee regulated articles are free from spotted lanternfly,” reads a June 15 letter from David Gianino, the program manager for the Office of Plant Industry Services. “To obtain a spotted lanternfly permit, completion of an online training course is required and businesses must then apply for the permit with VDACS.”

According to the letter, the spotted lanternfly is known to feed on “grapes, peaches, apples, maples, walnuts, hops, cucumbers, and basil.” The insect was spotted in Frederick County in January 2018 and a quarantine has been in place there, Clarke County, Warren County, and the city of Winchester. However, surveys conducted by VDACS indicate the bugs have been found in the cities of Buena Vista, Charlottesville, Harrisonburg, Lexington, Lynchburg, Manassas, Staunton, Waynesboro and the counties of Albemarle, Augusta, Carroll, Page, Prince William, Rockingham, Rockbridge, Shenandoah, and Wythe.

A wide range of materials are regulated including live or dead trees, lumber, vegetation, shipping containers, outdoor construction materials, equipment trucks, recreational vehicles, and more. A complete list is available in that letter. Information on how to get a permit is available on the VDACS website.

Albemarle County Supervisors were briefed on the spotted lanternfly back in February, as reported here.

Board of Zoning Appeals upholds city zoning in Wawa

Officials with Tiger Fuel attempted yesterday to overturn a decision by the city’s zoning administrator that affects the future layout of a proposed Wawa on Fifth Street Extended. This one gets a little technical.

“The applicant contends that the prescribed front setback for gas stations in Section 34-931(h) of the zoning ordinance are more lenient than the front setbacks for structures in the Highway Zoning district,” said Genevieve Keller, the chair of the Board of Zoning Appeals.

Keller said that Tiger Fuel believed Zoning Administrator Read Brodhead should have used Section 34-738 instead. Tiger operates a convenience store immediately to the south. The details are way above most people.

“It’s a little complicated, I know,” Brodhead said.

Gordon Sutton, president of Tiger Fuel, tried to simplify the argument.

“We are asking you to determine which of the two standards is more restrictive,” Sutton said. “The Highway Commercial regulations or the gas station regulations.”

Sutton said the highway commercial zonings should apply, and he said his company has had to work under those rules in the past.

Attorney Valerie Long with Williams Mullen represented the property owner, RBD Bent Creek LLC.

“Virginia code specifically provides that the Board is to presume that Mr. Brodhead’s determination is correct and that the appellant, Tiger Fuel, has the burden of proof of proving otherwise,” Long said.

Long said their scope of review was solely whether Brodhead was correct.

“This is not the appropriate venue for a business owner to be attempting to stifle competition from a prospective business owner or property owner,” Long said.

Long said the zoning rules for gas stations are written specifically to safely govern such a use, and that Tiger Fuel’s interpretation was not germane.

After a public hearing and brief discussion, the BZA voted unanimously to uphold Brodhead’s determination.

Albemarle County Service Authority officials: No PFAS in municipal drinking water

On Wednesday, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued non-binding health advisories on the presence of certain chemicals that do not break down. Yesterday, the environmental compliance specialist for the Albemarle County Service Authority told that entity’s Board of Directors that the municipal water supply is set up to filter out per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances.

But first, Tim Brown explained there are thousands of different chemical combinations that were created to make products that are water-resistant, heat-resistant, and grease-resistant.

“Every chemical is distinct by the fact that the element fluorine is a component of the chemical, and the carbon-fluorine chemical bond is a very very strong one,” Brown said. “What does that mean? It means this chemicals do not break down in the environment.”

Brown said health risks include liver failure, hormone imbalances, cancers, and suppression of immune systems.

“A lot of nasties in there potentially,” Brown said.

The EPA is currently promulgating new regulations to require monitoring and to seek to lower the acceptable level of PFAS compounds to near zero.

“It was almost borderline startling information,” Brown said.

Brown said the current acceptable standard is around 70 parts per trillion for PFAS and the new regulations could take that down.

“Now going down into the fractions of parts per trillion which is in essence at the parts per quadrillion level,” Brown said.

Brown said one issue will be that current test equipment may not be able to detect those levels. He said he felt the EPA advisories are intended to signal water producers across the country to take the issue seriously. He said the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority have been testing for PFAS twice a year since 2019.

“Eighteen PFAS compounds were tested at all six of our treatment plants, both in the raw water and in the finished or treated water,” Brown said. “There were zero detections.”

Brown said the new standards will be announced in September to be effective in the fall of 2023. He said the ACSA and the RWSA will continue to monitor the situation.

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Brackney sues the city of Charlottesville, other parties

Former Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney has filed a lawsuit in federal court against multiple parties alleging that, among other things, the city of Charlottesville acted unlawfully when former City Manager Chip Boyles fired her last September 1. She’s seeking ten million dollar in damages. (read the suit and its exhibits)

In addition to Boyles, Brackney’s complaint in the Western District of Virginia also includes: former city Communications Director Brian Wheeler; city attorney Lisa Robertson; acting police chief Latroy “Tito” Durrette; former assistant police chief James Mooney; current Councilors Sena Magill and Lloyd Snook, former Councilor Heather Hill, and former Police Civilian Review Board chair Bellamy Brown.

She also named Mike Wells of the Police Benevolent Association as a defendant.

The suit builds on a claim filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission soon after she was fired by Boyles. In a series of facts, the complaint seeks to establish that Brackney was hired in June 2018 to “bring empathy, community-oriented training, and years of law enforcement methodology to the table” following distrust after two specific incidents in the summer of 2017.

“As Chief of Police, Dr. Brackney’s priority was to stabilize [Charlottesville Police Department] by building rapport with its employees, whilst simultaneously empowering them to challenge their personal assumptions, regarding policing in the 21st Century,” reads paragraph 31.

As part of that work, Brackney collected data on all divisions of the Police Department and according to the complaint concluded that members of several of them including the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team were not up to the task.

“Assignments were not based on strengths, but decades-old, archaic practices such as nepotism, favoritism, genderism, and racism,” reads paragraph 36.

The complaint describes Brackney’s attempts to reform, such as converting four positions to civilians rather than sworn in officers. One of these was the public information officer. More trainings sessions were to be held, as well as taking minutes at department meetings.

“These actions angered those who resented having a Black female at the helm of a police department, particularly one in the South with a conservative undercurrent,” reads paragraph 47.

On June 3, 2021, Brackney received an email and video from a community member claiming police conduct by a specific officer and she took action on the complaint. That action included dismantling the SWAT team and firing or suspending officers she found to be involved through a subsequent investigation.

In paragraph 61, the complaint states that Bellamy Brown and Mike Wells in early August put together a survey for Charlottesville police officers that Brackney claims was “intentionally negatively worded and targeting Plaintiff as a result of the investigation and disciplinary actions described above.”

Paragraph 66 alleges a conspiracy between Brown, Hill, Wells, Snook, Boyles, Mooney and Magill to out Brackney as chief. The next one states that Boyles expressed confidence in Brackney’s leadership on August 26, 2021, as evidenced in a secret audio recording she made of their meeting.

Brackney was fired on September 1 and paragraph 76 of the complaint quotes Boyle’s September 3 press release in the first of many iterations used to advance her complaint.

“In order to dismantle systemic racism and eliminate police violence and misconduct in Charlottesville, we need a leader who is not only knowledgeable in that work, but is also effective in building collaborative relationships with the community, the department, and the team at City Hall… and [w]hile very good work and progress has been made, I ultimately decided new leadership was required to continue the City’s progress towards building a new climate and culture within the department,” Boyles wrote.

The complaint continues to list specific incidents that Brackney considers libel. Paragraph 89 accuses Roberston and Boyles of falsifying documents, and offers that Brackney has secret recordings.

Brackney seeks a trial by jury for all of the counts, including one alleging “tortious interference with employment contract.” Another claims unlawful retaliation and another claims that Brackney acted as a whistleblower and another alleges defamation and another claiming business conspiracy that involves Wells, Brown, and the named City Councilors.

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We are now half of the way through a month that some may consider half way through the year. Many of these observations are arbitrary, but it is definitively June 15, 2022 and this is the equivalent installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. What shall we learn today? Stay tuned and let me know if you did.

On today’s program:

The Charlottesville Economic Development Authority learns more about the city’s lease for space the S&P Global building downtown

A key document for the third phase of the Cville Plans Together initiative will be released tomorrow

A major toy manufacturer is set to open a factory in Chesterfield providing over 1,700 jobs

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issues a warning on “forever chemicals” in drinking water

And the Charlottesville Planning Commission recommends a special use permit for 11 homes in the section of the Belmont neighborhood inside a mixed-use urban zoning district

First shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

It’s getting very close to the technical end of springtime, and one Patreon subscriber wants you to know the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign is a grassroots initiative of motivated citizens, volunteers, partner organizations, and local governments who want to promote the use of native plants.

Did you know that National Pollinator Week is June 20th-26th this year? There are many ways to celebrate and learn more about our native pollinators, and here's a great one to start with:

Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden is hosting an in-person/virtual Pollinator Power Symposium on June 23rd, and there is an excellent line up of speakers scheduled for the day!

There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

City details terms of S&P Global’s lease for downtown building

Charlottesville’s Office of Community Solutions continues to review leases the city has with third parties who rent space. Council held a work session on the topic in May and learned that until now there was no central place in city government entrusted with keeping track of leases for about 145,275 square feet of floor space and about 50 acres under ground lease. (view the presentation)

One of those buildings is a five-story structure currently occupied by a branch of S&P Global, an international company that does research into economic and business issues. According to the May presentation, the city’s Economic Development Authority takes in $240,000 annually in rent but the property’s market value could be as high as $1.58 million.

“The S&P Global building started its life as the National Ground Intelligence Center,” said Chris Engel, the city’s economic development director. “Essentially it was built in the 60’s by the federal government and occupied by the Army.”

In the 1990’s, NGIC moved to a larger and more secure location at the Rivanna Station in northern Albemarle County.

“At that time the city was concerned about the loss of activity that building created and went and petitioned the federal government and the General Services Administration to have them gift the building to the city,” Engel said.

The city entered into a lease with the Economic Development Authority and the EDA offered a 30-year lease to a company that used to be called SNL Financial, which then took the space to consolidate its offices into one place rather than be scattered across multiple locations. A company that would later be renamed S&P Global purchased the company in July 2015 for $2.2 billion.

Engel said the EDA’s lease with S&P Global is about two thirds of the way through.

“The way the lease is structured is that all the burden is on them to manage the facility and maintain the facility, everything,” Engel said. “We essentially do nothing from a physical standpoint.”

Engel said S&P Global has earned upfit credits for about $9 million worth of investments put into the building at the beginning of the lease.

“Those credits are nearly running out,” Engel said. “Those credits are nearly running out. They’re not quite all the way run out. They have actually just qualified for about $3.5 million in additional rent credits. They replaced the boilers. They replaced the roof, the chiling system, the elevator system. They added fire protection.”

When the credits do run out, Engel said S&P Global will pay closer to market rate. Council will have a further discussion on city-managed leases.

Charlottesville’s zoning rewrite is about to enter next phase

On Thursday, the city will publish a document intended to set the stage for the final portion of the Cville Plans Together initiative.

“So this is the diagnostic and approach report,” said James Freas, the city’s director of neighborhood development services.

Freas briefed the Charlottesville Planning Commission at the beginning of their meeting on Tuesday.

An open house to explain the event will be held on June 27 at the Charlottesville Pavilion, an event for which Freas said the city would validate parking.

“We look forward to a lot of conversations with the community, with all of you, and whoever else chooses to show up at that meeting,” Freas said.

The new zoning code is expected to make it easier for more dense development in the city. That’s a major goal of the new Comprehensive Plan adopted by Council last November. The zoning rewrite may also offer more guidance for rules and regulations about housing affordability. Direction for that comes from the Affordable Housing Plan adopted by Council in March 2021.

“This first report kicks off our three-step process for the zoning rewrite,” Freas said. “As I’ve referred to it before, this is kind of the conceptual plan of the new zoning ordinance and it lays out the ideas. It talks about what we need to do to change our zoning ordinance in order to advance implementation of the affordable housing plan.”

A joint meeting of the City Council and the Planning Commission will be held in September to confirm the next steps in writing up the new ordinance. A first draft will be the second step, followed by a review of a final draft next spring.

In May, Planning Commissioner Hosea Mitchell got a preview at the closed-door meeting of the Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee that consists of top planning staff from Albemarle, Charlottesville, and the University of Virginia.

“The rewrite of our code is not form-based code but as Mr. Freas mentioned a couple of times, it does contain form-based elements,” Mitchell said.

In general, form-based code refers to a series of rules and regulations to govern building envelopes. We’ll hear much more about these details as the conversation continues.

Meanwhile, there is an active lawsuit in Charlottesville Circuit Court against the City Council for adopting the Comprehensive Plan. Among other things, that suit argues that the city failed to provide a transportation plan. There’s a hearing on July 15 on a motion to force the plaintiffs to identify themselves, followed by another hearing on August 26.

See also:

Anonymous group of city property owners files suit against Comprehensive Plan adoption, January 12, 2022

Charlottesville served with suit against the Comprehensive Plan, March 20, 2022

City responds to Comprehensive Plan lawsuit, April 12, 2022

Charlottesville zoning info slightly delayed, May 13, 2022

Environmental Protection Agency sounds warning about PFAS in drinking water

The United States Environmental Protection Agency today has issued four advisories on the potential for “forever chemicals” in water supplies. The term PFAS covers per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances which are used in the manufacture of many products people use every day such as non-stick cookware, food packaging, electronics, and more. These substances do not break down and can accumulate in the human body and blood over many years and have been linked to cancer and diseases that affect the immune system.

The four advisories are for specific substances.

“The updated advisory levels [for PFOA and PFOS], which are based on new science and consider lifetime exposure, indicate that some negative health effects may occur with concentrations of PFOA or PFOS in water that are near zero and below EPA’s ability to detect at this time,” reads a press release announcing the steps. “The lower the level of PFOA and PFOS, the lower the risk to public health.”

This fall, the EPA will issue new regulations on drinking water related to PFAS. There’s also $1 billion in funding for states and localities to install equipment in drinking water supplies to filter out the substances. The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority has applied for a $21 million grant to remove the contaminants by upgrading filtration systems, according to the May agenda.

Youngkin announces LEGO factory in Chesterfield

Will everything be awesome in Chesterfield County’s near future?

Governor Glenn Youngkin has announced that the LEGO Group will open a 1.7 million square foot manufacturing plant in Chesterfield County’s Meadowville Technology Park.

“This transformational project will create more than 1,760 jobs and bolster Virginia's manufacturing industry, which continues its renaissance with major investments by high-caliber corporate partners like the LEGO Group,” Youngkin is quoted in a news release.

The $1 billion investment is spurred by $56 million from the state’s Major Employment and Investment Project grant program. Such a fund has been established by the General Assembly and that figure depends on LEGO providing every one of those jobs. There’s also another potential for $19 million in state funding for site development costs that will require approval by the legislature.

The LEGO Company was founded in 1932 and remains a family run company headquartered in Denmark. Their primary product is plastic construction blocks.

“These cherished play experiences are being made in factories across the world, keeping up with the continuously high demand and soon they’ll be manufactured right here in Virginia,” says the narrator of an announcement on a new website for people who’d like to work there

Applications for positions will be taken later this year and the Virginia Economic Development Partnership will use the Virginia Talent Accelerator Program to recruit potential applicants.

Second shout-out is for LEAP’s new Thermalize Virginia program

Planning Commission recommends approval of 11 units at 1000 Monticello Road

The Charlottesville Planning Commission has recommended approval of a special use permit for additional density at 1000 Monticello Road in the Belmont neighborhood that would allow for 11 units and a small commercial space on the ground floor.

A split City Council denied a similar permit in February 2021 with the majority expressing concern about adverse impacts on the neighborhood. At the time, five of the units were being proffered as affordable to households and individuals whose incomes at around 65 percent of the area’s median.

This time around, two additional units would be restricted to tenants at 80 percent of the area median income.

Neither is required by existing city code.

“This project does not trip the standard in Section 34-12 of our zoning ordinance, the requirement for affordable housing, so this condition is offered by the applicant above and beyond what is required under our code,” said city planner Brian Haluska.

The property in question already has an apartment building with 23 units that was purchased by Core Real Estate and Development in January 2018 and then sold to Piedmont Realty Holdings a year later. The special use permit is required for additional residential units on the 0.81 acre property. An existing curb cut into a parking lot would be removed.

“The proposed new building footprint, which will house 11 units and a small commercial tenant space, is proposed directly adjacent to the existing building fronting along Monticello Road,” said Kelsey Schlein with Shimp Engineering. (view the presentation)

Schlein said the project has been brought back because Council adopted both an Affordable Housing Plan and a Comprehensive Plan that calls for more housing.

“The purpose of the land use section of the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Plan states that ‘land use policies shape where housing is located, what housing looks like, and how much housing is built,’” Schlein said.

Schlein said in this case, the developer would not be seeking any city funds to help subsidize the development. She added the site is within walking distance to eight bus stops, is an example of infill development.

The length of the affordability period is at issue. The developer is offering the below market rates for ten years, but the city wants more.

“I think a 30 year period would be more in line with city policy and then also the lack of mention of a willingness to accept vouchers,” said Alex Ikefuna, the interim director of the Office of Community Solutions.

The last time this project was before Charlottesville officials, there were several speakers who argued the special use permit should be denied because the rents at 1000 Monticello Road were increased. Schein said the current owner should not be punished.

“There was a longtime owner, and then there was a short-term owner, and now we have this third owner in place who has been in place since 2018,” Schlein said. “During the short-term owner… I believe 11 of the units had already gone to a rental rate that somewhat more of a market rate.”

Schlein said there are six tenants left at 1000 Monticello Road who are renting below market rate. She said the project would take federal housing vouchers. She said she knows the city would like to see longer terms, but her interpretation of the Affordable Housing Plan is that those would be triggered by the acceptance of public funds.

“When an applicant utilizes city funds, there should be a standard by which they adhere to,” Schlein said. “In this case, ten years is what we can commit to on this project.”

Councilor Michael Payne voted against the proposal the first time and said he wanted it to be known that Piedmont Holding has displaced some of the former owners.

Only one person spoke at the public hearing. Brandon Collins worked for the Public Housing Association of Residents when this permit was last before the city. He now works for a government entity but last night he said he was speaking for himself.

“As it stands I’m going to ask you to deny this special use permit for this property,” Collins said. “A special use permit is going outside of your existing rules. The property is already outside of your existing rules and in order to do so you have to show that there’s a benefit to the community and that there’s not a negative impact on the community and I think it’s really crass to hear the development team talk about their commitment to affordable housing and affordable housing crisis when this exact property has contributed to the crisis in Charlottesville when it comes to affordability.”

However, the Commission recommended approval.

“I do think it is a good infill proposal,” said Commissioner Karim Habbab. “I do like the commercial. I think something creative can happen there to extend that Downtown Belmont feeling.”

“I’m of the opinion that this is a good project,” said Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg. “Certainly if you look at it in a vacuum ignoring the site its possibly the best possible project you can imagine. It’s replacing a redundant driveway and curb cut with 11 units of housing, seven of which are affordable.”

Stolzenberg pointed out that Council is not permitted by law to consider previous actions by previous owners, or the current one, as it considers the permit.

“If we’re denying those homes as punishment to the property owner, when does that punishment end?” Stolzenberg asked.

The Council recommended the special use permit on a 5-1 vote with Commissioner Jody Lahendro voting no and Commissioner Taneia Dowell not present.

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Flag Day. National Bourbon Day. World Blood Donor Day. Monkey Around Day? These are some of the potential ways to mark June 14, the 165th day of 2022. What you choose today is up to you, but I do hope you’ll take a look or a listen at this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a program that also wants you to make sure you know that some consider this is also National Pop Goes The Weasel Day. Now, where can I find some tupenny rice and some treacle?

Know people interested in transit issues? Send them this particular edition of the newsletter so they can find out about the Regional Transit Vision plans

On today’s program:

Details on the next steps for a second lawsuit to force a House of Delegates election this year

Albemarle and Charlottesville’s elected bodies each take a look at the Regional Transit Vision plans

Governor Youngkin announces a series of grants to help increase capacity fo small agricultural producers, such as a water-powered mill in Nelson County

And Albemarle County releases a report on climate vulnerability and risks

Today’s first shout-out: ACHS to provide update on Race and Sports project

In today’s first subscriber supported public service announcement, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society continues work gathering stories for their project Race and Sports: Athletics and Desegregation in Central Virginia. Tonight at 7 p.m. they will provide an update on Facebook Live and Zoom with two people who lived through the era. Garwin DeBerry graduated from Burley High School in 1965 and Steve Runkle graduated from Lane High School in 1960. They will be sharing how the families, neighborhoods, and communities in which they grew up shaped their experiences and of school desegregation. Tune in to the ACHS event on Race and Sports tonight at 7 p.m. (Zoom registration)

Status hearing held for new lawsuit seeking House of Delegates election this November

The state of Virginia has until June 24 to file a motion to dismiss a new lawsuit that seeks the Commonwealth to hold an election for the House of Delegates this year. Richmond resident Jeffrey Thomas Jr. filed a federal suit in the Eastern District of Virginia last week that picks up similar arguments made by Richmond attorney Paul Goldman for why some think the House districts currently in place are unconstitutional. Goldman’s suit was dismissed for lack of standing nearly a year after he filed.

Thomas and representatives from the Virginia Attorney General’s office were in court yesterday for a status update in the case. Judge David Novak issued an order requiring both parties to file a joint stipulation of facts by June 17.

Thomas will have eight days to respond to whatever the state of Virginia files. The state will have five days to respond. No date has been set for another hearing. For more information, read coverage in the Virginia Mercury.

Albemarle County releases climate vulnerability assessment

One item on tomorrow’s agenda for the Albemarle Board of Supervisors is a 176-page document that identifies how the county and its residents will be affected by shifting weather patterns. The Climate Vulnerability and Risk Assessment looks ahead to how extreme heat, drought, wildfires, and flooding may affect the area. There’s also the threat a changing climate will bring new pests that will affect crops. (read the document)

The assessment is a step toward developing a climate resilience plan.

“Some of the changes are unavoidable and even while we try to mitigate and reduce the severity of climate change, we also need to prepare for some of those impacts,” said Gabe Dayley, Albemarle’s climate protection coordinator.

Dayley said the climate action plan is intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to meet regional goals to be carbon neutral and fossil free by 2050. He made his comments on the Let’s Talk podcast produced by Albemarle’s communications and public engagement department.

“Our vulnerability and risk assessment looks at the kinds of specific local weather changes that we can expect,” Dayley said. “Things like increasingly intense and long heat waves or sudden and more severe rainstorms that lead to flash flooding.”

Visit the county’s website to hear more.

The report was put together with support and work from the Piedmont Environmental Council. In disclosure, that group is a sponsor of the Week Ahead newsletter.

Water-powered grain mill in Nelson gets support from AFID grant

This is Ag Week in Virginia, and Governor Glenn Youngkin has announced the latest recipients of the state Agriculture and Forestry Industry Development grant program. The program provides matching grants to small agricultural producers such as Potter’s Craft Cider which used a $50,000 grant as part of a package to move operations into Neve Hall off of U.S. 29 in 2019.

This time around the grants focus on infrastructure. Nelson County requested financial assistance for Deep Roots Milling to upgrade a water-powered grain mill built in the late 18th century. According to the press release, the $22,500 in state funds will help pay for a new sifting room and new bagging equipment.

Other recipients include $25,000 for Piedmont Processing of Gordonsville in Orange County to add more cooling space for its slaughterhouse, $25,000 for barge to serve a collective of oyster farms in Northampton County, and $9,000 for a commercial kitchen expansion in Bedford County. Read the press release for more information.

Today’s second goes to WTJU and the Radio Relics project

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: This year, WTJU 91.1 FM turns 65 and to mark the occasion, there’s a new micro-museum exhibition this summer!

Radio Relics traces WTJU’s storied history of broadcasting for our community. As part of our 65th anniversary celebrations, WTJU has curated photos, artifacts, and t-shirts – so many t-shirts! – spanning more than six decades.

The exhibition is free and will be open Monday-Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. from June 3 through July 29. The museum space is a renovated, vintage camper parked behind WTJU’s studios at 2244 Ivy Road in Charlottesville. WTJU’s Radio Relics exhibition shows off some of the artifacts collected over the years, many contributed by former WTJU General Manager Chuck Taylor. In fact, there’s even a new initiative to raise money through the Chuck Taylor Fund for WTJU History. Contact General Manager Nathan Moore to learn more. Or donate today!

Albemarle and Charlottesville officials weigh in on Regional Transit Vision

Consultants hired by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission are moving into the second phase of a community engagement effort for a $350,000 plan to create a regional transit vision to make public transportation a more attractive option.

They have developed both a constrained plan that would anticipate around $26 million funds that might be generated through becoming a regional transportation authority with taxation power, as well as one that assumed funding would be found to increase the frequency of service. That has an estimated $70 million price tag.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors had their review on June 1.

“These concepts are here to help you imagine and understand what kind of outcomes are available at two different levels of investment,” said Scudder Wagg of Jarret Walker + Associates.

This work will be completed before a second study will begin on how transit operations should be governed in the future.

“So this transit vision study really is identifying the potential improvements to the regional transit system and establishing that long term goal and plan vision and the governance study is really what are the steps to get to that vision that we’ve defined,” said Tim Brulle of AECOM. He’s the project manager for the vision plan.

The idea in both visions is to increase how often buses move through the community.

“Frequency means freedom effectively,” Wagg said. “The more frequent service is, the much shorter the wait is, the much likelier you are to get somewhere soon.”

Wagg said at the moment, around 60 percent of residents of urban Albemarle and Charlottesville are close to some transit service, but only about 15 percent are close to frequent service.

Both visions expand the number of areas covered by on-demand service where people can call for service on the same day. Currently, a ride on Jaunt has to be booked a day in advance. But in general, the plan without identified funding would increase service.

The unconstrained vision would seek to increase fixed-route service to seven days a week from morning into the evening.

“One of the key things that is likely to significantly improve access to opportunity, particularly for people who work in retail, service, and hospital jobs where many people have to work evenings and many people have to work Sundays,” Wagg said. “Those types of jobs where if you aren’t there for them on Sunday, they have to have a car and therefore have to incur the high costs of owning a car.”

Supervisor Ann Mallek is the sole elected official left from an effort in the late 2000’s to create a regional transit authority. She wanted to make clear the community tried once before for a sales tax to fund increased transit, but a referendum did not make it out of the General Assembly.

“Money doesn’t just appear when we don’t have the authority to raise it,” Mallek said.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said service along urban corridors in his district needs to be frequent to accommodate the new units that have been approved during his tenure, such as the Rio Point project that got the okay last December. He pointed out proponents argued transit could help mitigate traffic congestion.

“Over a thousand units, 1,300, 1,400 units that are going to build out there, and if they’re sitting on a sixty-minute transit line, that’s not going to work,” Gallaway said.

Gallaway said the on-demand transit pilot that Albemarle will begin next year will go a long way to helping determine what the county needs.

Supervisors Bea LaPisto-Kirtley and Diantha McKeel had already seen the presentation because the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership got a briefing in late May. McKeel wanted clarification on the role the University of Virginia Transit System would play in the vision.

“We tend to think about UVA as doing their own thing,” McKeel said. “That’s what they’ve done for years with their students and faculty and staff. Having said that, I know they are working really hard with us at the regional transit partnership about coming together on transit in this community.”

Wagg said that the unconstrained vision anticipates more involvement by UVA.

“There is an obvious and enormous transit demand within and around a university and the Grounds at UVA needs really a high frequency service within a pretty limited space so it is understandable they run their own service,” Wagg said.

Wagg said an idea in the unconstrained vision is to trade resources with UVA. For instance, a Bus Rapid Transit system similar to the Pulse in Richmond could travel down U.S. 29 and terminate somewhere on Emmet Street.

“And then the University could run a more community service that serves the Grounds as a primary focus but also serves the community at large,” Wagg said.

Charlottesville City Council had their review on June 6. The presentation was much the same as what Albemarle and the Regional Transit Partnership saw, but Wagg repeated why having to wait on a bus that comes once an hour is an obstacle.

“Relying on service every 60 minutes is extremely hard,” Wagg said. “You can think about relying on a 60 minute route is a little bit like if there was a gate at the end of your driveway that only opened once an hour. You had best be in your car with your coffee ready to go at 7 a.m. if you need to get out at 7 a.m. to get to work. And if you miss it, then you are not leaving until 8 a.m.”

Wagg reminded Council that many of the current CAT routes do not operate on Sunday.

City Councilor Brian Pinkston said the unconstrained vision is compelling and certainly appeared to be more attractive. But he expressed some skepticism.

“This would be a great system to enact but how do we change behavior such that people would use it?” PInkston said.

Wagg said if people have choices about how to get around, they’ll take transit.

“A major reason people don’t take transit today is because it’s very unlikely to be useful to the trip they want to make,” Wagg said.

For instance, Wagg said a trip from Pantops to the Piedmont Virginia Community College would take a very long time with multiple transfers.

“Changing that dynamic of ‘will someone choose to ride’ is making it far more likely that the trip that they look up will be reasonably competitive to take transit,” Wagg said.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade said he was concerned that outreach efforts have not been robust.

“I’m just afraid that you may get input from the same people and we kind of know what it is,” Wade said. “We’ve got to do a better job of getting input. I can tell you if this is all you’re going to do, I can assure you of what we’re going to get.”

Extra service will mean extra drivers, and Councilor Michael Payne said their needs must be taken into consideration up front.

“We can drop any plans or changes we want but if we don’t have sufficient drivers to run those routes, it won’t work,” Payne said. “I know we’re already seeing significant problems in being able to maintain frequency of our current routes because of a shortage of bus drivers.”

Payne is another member of the Regional Transit Partnership. He said the unconstrained vision should be a goal, but a realistic approach needs to be taken.

“How do we, once this is finalized, bring it back down to earth and figure out what are the level of investments we need to specifically plan for here in the city and what are the specific steps needed to start to get Jaunt, [Charlottesville Area Transit], and the University Transit Service working together to move to that Regional Transit Authority?” Payne said.

And that’s where the governance study would come in.

If there was to be a regional authority, that could also include surrounding counties. The Greene County Board of Supervisors gets their review of the plan tonight, and its the Fluvanna Board’s turn on Wednesday.

The next step is a virtual meeting on June 23 in which the consultants will present both the constrained and unconstrained visions. There’s also a community survey that seeks to gather input on the unconstrained and constrained visions.

What do you think? No use telling me. Fill out that survey!

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Today the year turns 161 days old, but don’t get too used to that number, for it will be replaced quite soon with another, and another, and so on. But 2022 is still not yet at the halfway point, and you’ve got three weeks left until that not-quite-august occasion on July 1. The occasion right now is this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and this person writing is Sean Tubbs.

There’s lot of information in every installment of this newsletter and podcast. Send it on to more people to help grow the audience!

On today’s program:

The University of Virginia is asking developers to send in qualifications to build two mixed-use communities as part of an affordable housing initiative

Two redevelopment projects being undertaken by the city’s public housing agency may not get financing through low-income housing tax credits this year

Charlottesville City Council officially kills the West Main Streetscape

Louisa County Supervisors discuss a referendum for a sports complex and whether it should include turf fields on existing athletic fields

And Charlottesville will only one outdoor pool at a time for the time being

First shout–out: JMRL to kick off the Summer Reading Challenge

In today’s first subscriber-supported public service announcement, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library wants you to read as much as you can this summer, and for encouragement and incentives, they’re holding another Summer Reading Challenge. There’s an Ocean of Possibilities this year and the Central Library will kick off the challenge this Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon at the Central Library. It will be a party with music, food, and fun! The Friends of the Library will pop up a mini-book sale and a Books on Bikes parade! You can learn more about the Summer Challenge and how you or your family members can win awards and receive prizes. Visit jmrl.org to learn more about the kickoff event, this Saturday!

University of Virginia issues first request for qualifications for affordable housing developer

The University of Virginia is moving forward with an initiative to use property owned by its real estate foundation to create units that will be reserved for people whose incomes are below the area median income.

The UVA Foundation issued a request this morning for qualifications from firms to develop two separate projects, including a two-acre site on Wertland Street. The other is a 12-acre site on Mimosa Drive known currently as Piedmont.

“UVA/UVAF intends to enter into a ground lease with one or more development team(s) best suited to satisfy UVA/UVAF’s requirements and desired features,” reads the request for proposals.

UVA announced a goal of building between 1,000 and 1,500 affordable housing units in March 2020, but momentum was stalled by the pandemic. These two sites as well as the North Fork Research Park were identified in December after initial work for the project was conducted by the firm Northern Urban Real Estate Ventures. A similar request for qualifications for a firm for North Fork will be made at a later date.

Under the arrangement, the UVA Foundation would continue to own both sites and the developer would own the structures and other improvements.

“UVA/UVAF seeks to maximize the amount of affordable and workforce housing at each site and as such, will provide the land as a part of the Project,” the request continues. “UVA/UVAF will not otherwise contribute funding to the Project.”

The developer will be responsible for preparing the plans and getting all of the necessary approvals, including archaeological studies. They’ll also have to have experience getting financing through Virginia Housing.

Other development requirements include:

Deliver a moderate to high-density mixed income housing community

Offer a maximum number of affordable housing units, with an emphasis on creating mixed-income communities that include, but are not limited to, units in the 30 percent to 60 percent area median income range

Coordinate with UVA/UVAF and local jurisdictions on the utilities and infrastructure that will serve the development, and coordinate on the design aesthetic that interacts with the surrounding community.

Demolish the existing improvements as needed to accommodate the Project, with the exception of historic structures (applicable only at Piedmont).

City officially cancels West Main Streetscape project

Charlottesville City Council has voted to officially cancel the $55 million West Main Streetscape project as well as other projects in an effort to get the city’s transportation house in order.

The Virginia Department of Transportation will now administer a project to extend a turn lane at Route 250 and Hydraulic Road. A project to coordinate traffic signals on Emmet Street has also been canceled, as has a Smart Scale funded project at the intersection of Preston and Grady.

The details were discussed at a work session with the Planning Commission on May 24. (read my story)

“While this is called cancellation of those projects, that’s in regards to the funding with VDOT, so as discussed, especially some of the safety projects, these are not going away forever, they’re just going away as Smart Scale projects,” said City Engineer Jack Dawson.

The West Main Streetscape began with a $350,000 study authorized by Council in February 2013 which also led to a rezoning for the street. Over the years, Council authorized more and more funding as a local match for VDOT funds to build the project which was to be split into four phases. The project lost support as a plan to renovate and expand Buford Middle School became a priority for the current City Council.

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook said the project has been on life support for at least a year.

“In a sense, this is almost a formality for us to recognize that which has already been made clear to us and decisions we have made ourselves over the last few years,” Snook said. “This is just finally pulling the plug on it.”

The Commonwealth Transportation Board next meets on June 21 and may take up the official resolution to defund the project.

Virginia Housing does not recommend funding for two CRHA projects

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority has appeared to have fallen short in its attempt to get financing for two planned redevelopment projects in a current funding cycle.

Virginia Housing, the entity that authorizes low-income housing tax credits in Virginia, has issued its final rankings for this year pending approval by their Board of Commissioners later this month.

Credits for 47 units in the Sixth Street Phase One project have not been recommended to be funded through what’s known as the Housing Authority pool. An application for additional credits for 113 units for the second phase of the redevelopment of South First Street also did not rank high enough to move forward. Virginia Housing granted credits for the second phase in 2020 and this second application was to fill in a funding gap caused by higher construction costs.

South First Street Phase One is currently under construction and is expected to be occupied earlier this year. That 62-unit project did receive low-income housing tax credits in 2021.

The only application recommended for funding from the Housing Authority pool this year is for new construction of 68 units in Norfolk by a company called Brinshore. In that project, 47 of the units would be supported through the credits.

CRHA executive director John Sales said is hopeful the Virginia Housing Board of Commissioners will reconsider the rankings at their next meeting in Richmond coming up later this month on June 21 and June 22.

“The Board in the past has fully funded Public Housing redevelopment efforts,” Sales said. “We are hoping the Board does the same thing this year when making final allocations.”

Sales said if Sixth Street’s request is not funded, CRHA will pursue another financing opportunity later this year or reapply in 2023. He said the South Street Phase Two project will move forward if another source can be found to fill in the funding gap.

You can download the full list of rankings from the Virginia Housing website.

Lifeguard shortage causes Charlottesville to limit outdoor pool hours

With summer just getting under way, the Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Department has made the decision to restrict hours at both Onesty Pool and Washington Pool so that only one of them will be open each day.

“The Department is actively recruiting lifeguards and if the staffing levels increase and are able to operate both pools concurrently, we will update the operating hours,” reads a press release that was sent out this morning.

For now, Onesty will be open Thursday through Saturday between 11 a.m. and 7 p.m. Washington Park Pool will be open those hours from Sunday to Wednesday. The indoor Smith Aquatic Center is now open every day after being closed for a couple of years. Outdoor spray grounds are also open.

Visit the city’s website for more information.

Second shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

It’s getting close to the end of springtime, and one Patreon subscriber wants you to know the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign is a grassroots initiative of motivated citizens, volunteers, partner organizations, and local governments who want to promote the use of native plants.

Did you know that National Pollinator Week is June 20th-26th this year? There are many ways to celebrate and learn more about our native pollinators, and here's a great one to start with:

Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden is hosting an in-person/virtual Pollinator Power Symposium on June 23rd, and there is an excellent line up of speakers scheduled for the day!

There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

Louisa County may seek a referendum for a sports complex

Discussion of a sports complex with new athletic fields in Albemarle County stalled at the end of the budget cycle, but Louisa County is considering a referendum on the issuance of $16.5 million in bonds for that purpose.

The Louisa County Board of Supervisors discusses a draft petition for the referendum at their meeting this past Monday. For a referendum to get on the ballot, a Circuit Court judge has to sign an order by August 18.

“This is for a bond issue of up to $16.5 million and it lists four baseball fields, four rectangular fields for sports, concessions, lighting, parking and related facilities, a field house at the high school football field and renovation of existing sports facilities,” said Louisa County Attorney Helen Phillips.

Phillips said the language in the ballot question has to be in plain English and not in legalese.

Supervisors discussed the proper wording, and whether the suggested wording was too broad.

There is a possibility of two different ballot questions. One would be for the complex, and one would be for the field house and other renovations.

“In the discussions we’ve had about going to referendum, I don’t recall anything other than just going to referendum to see if people would get behind building a sports complex,” said Mountain Road District Supervisor Tommy Barlow.

Supervisor Fitzgerald Barnes said he sees the need for a complex that would expand the county’s offerings, but that the existing school fields also need to be addressed.

“What we don’t have in this county is synthetic surfaces for girls’ softball where they could play in the rain,” Barnes said. “These fields would allow, number one, not having to water them, not having to fertilize them, not having to cut them. They would be maintenance free fields.”

Barnes said this could help the county increase revenue from lodging taxes.

Supervisor Toni Williams of the Jackson District said the ballot question as suggested appeared to assume that the county has already decided to proceed with the project.

“It appears that the cake is baked in this that the decision has been made to build them,” Williams said. “Maybe the real special election should ask, first of all, do you want these facilities in the county, and if you want them, do you authorize the Board to pay for them by bond?”

Supervisors gave direction to divide the referendum into separate questions. Final language will be discussed and approved at future meetings. The location for a future sports complex has also not yet been selected.

For more information on this and anything else happening in Louisa County, visit Engage Louisa by Tammy Purcell.

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Hello and welcome to another episode of Charlottesville Community Engagement for June 9, 2022. While I increasingly wonder if I am a cartoon character, I am certain I am not the subject of National Donald Duck Day and if you listened to the beginning of the podcast version, you would have proof. Additionally, my name is not Earl and I am not sure an entire day needs to be devoted to strawberry rhubarb pie. I am certain I’m Sean Tubbs, and that the show really begins now.

This ongoing compendium of information is supported by paid subscriptions, but you can get it for free. If you do pay, Ting will match your initial payment! Please support the work!

On today’s program:
Another federal lawsuit is filed to seek a House of Delegates race this year

The Louisa County Board of Supervisors goes on record unanimously opposing a change to the regional library system

The head of the area’s tourism bureau briefs Council on hotel occupancy and efforts to promote Black-owned destinations

Virginia to receive $76.4 million from the latest carbon allowance auction brokered by the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative

First shout-out is for LEAP’s new Thermalize Virginia program

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out: Have you been thinking of converting your fossil-fuel appliances and furnaces into something that will help the community reduce its greenhouse gas emissions? Your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, has launched a new program to guide you through the steps toward electrifying your home. Thermalize Virginia will help you understand electrification and connect you with vetted contractors to get the work done and help you find any rebates or discounts. Visit thermalizeva.org to learn more and to sign up!

Another lawsuit filed to force House of Delegates race this November

Another Richmond area resident has filed a federal lawsuit in the Eastern District of Virginia claiming that the House of Delegates boundaries in place for the November 2021 election are unconstitutional. The action comes two days after a three-judge panel ruled that Paul Goldman did not have the legal standing to make the claim that the Board of Elections erred in certifying elections for outdated legislative boundaries.

Jeffrey Thomas Jr. had filed to be added to a suit filed by Paul Goldman last October, but Monday’s opinion rendered that request to intervene moot. Yesterday Thomas filed a “petition of mandamus” that asks the court to consider his claim that he has suffered a legal injury because the 71st House District where he resides has a 2020 Census Count that contains more people than it should.

“Plaintiff and all other voters and residents in [House District] 71-2011 have had their voting strength and political representation unconstitutionally diluted or weakened by their failure of Defendants to conduct, enact, or oversee decennial constitutional reapportionment, redistricting, or elections,” reads paragraph 10 of the petition.

Paragraph 17 of the petition states that the smallest House District has a population of 71,122 and the largest has a population of 130,082 according to the 2020 Census. Thomas states his own district is ten percent over the ideal size and that the Virginia Constitution doesn’t permit a deviation above five percent. Paragraph 29 and 30 point out that Thomas is now within the new 78th House District, which has a population of 87,774 people.

Thomas seeks a repeat of 1982 when a federal court ordered elections for the House of Delegates for similar reasons in the Cosner v. Daltoncase.

“Conducting House of Delegates elections in 2022 under constitutional lines is a proper remedy under the Cosner precedent,” reads paragraph 58.

Thomas is requesting that attorneys for the Commonwealth of Virginia make a reply or file a motion to dismiss within 48 hours of their receipt of the petition.

Louisa Supervisors unanimously oppose name change for regional library

At their meeting this past Monday, the seven-member Board of Supervisors for Louisa County voted on a resolution to formally oppose any change of the name of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library system. A group requested that action at the most recent meeting of the JMRL’s Board of Trustees.

Supervisor Chair Duane Adams of the Mineral District asked for the resolution to be put on the agenda.

“I think about $392,000 of our tax money goes to funding the Jefferson Madison Regional Library [and] we have a right to say how our money is spent,” Adams said.

Adams said this resolution did not withhold the funding but simply stated opposition to a potential name change.

“If the library board changes their name I will put a motion and resolution on the [Louisa] Board’s agenda to withhold our $392,000 and bring it back to the county,” Adams said. “What that would mean is we would withdraw from the regional library system.”

Adams said the library would not close and service would continue.

For comparison, the Fluvanna public library is independent of JMRL and that county’s budget is $457,442 for fiscal year 2023. Adams also noted there is no outcry against the name of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission or that there is a tobacco leaf on the Louisa County seal.

“I think at some point we have to recognize that history and people is both good and bad,” Adams said. “Yes, the institution of slavery was evil, it was awful, it was despictable and I don’t think anyone would ever try to justify it.”

Cuckoo District Supervisor Willie Gentry said he wanted to know more information about what the new name might be.

“It’s kind of hard to say you oppose something when you don’t know what it’s going to,” Gentry said. “The second thing is, the name on the building is the Louisa County library.”

Gentry, Adams, and the rest of the board voted to oppose the name change.

The next meeting of the JMRL Board of Trustees will be held on June 27 at the Northside Library beginning at 3 p.m.

Virginia receives $76.4 million in June’s cap-and-trade auction

Virginia has now participated in six auctions brokered by the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, an interstate compact that seeks to incentivize investment in new sources of power generation that produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions. The Commonwealth joined the program in 2020 and legacy generators of electricity must purchase credits to exceed caps authorized by the General Assembly that year.

The latest auction was held earlier this month, and Virginia will receive $76,418,182.90. By the terms of the state code, Virginia will direct 45 percent to the Community Flood Preparedness Fund and 50 percent to support energy efficiency programs for low-income households.

Read more about the auction in this press release.

Governor Glenn Youngkin has pledged to withdraw Virginia from RGGI out of a concern that energy companies such as Dominion pass on the costs to consumers. Earlier this year he signed an executive order seeking that outcome, but that action would require action by the General Assembly. Legislation to withdraw did not pass but the issue is likely to come back.

At the local level, the city of Charlottesville will hold a virtual workshop tonight on the Climate Vulnerability Assessment, which the city will use to create a climate action plan. Top hazards identified are an increase in violent storms and periods of extreme heat. If you want to attend, you’ll have to register in advance. (register in advance)

Watch a tutorial on RGGI auctions:

Second shout-out is for a Charlottesville Jazz Society concert this Saturday:

In today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out. On Saturday June 11, the Charlottesville Jazz Society and WTJU present Michael Bisio in a solo acoustic bass performance. Bisio is touring in support of his new solo bass recording "Inimitable". Opening for Michael Bisio will be Richmond violinist/electronics artist Zakaria Kronemer. The concert at Visible Records on Broadway Avenue will begin at 8 pm. A suggested donation of $10 at the door is requested. For more information visit cvillejazz.org or call (434) 249-6191.

Council briefed on tourism group’s efforts to bring in more visitors

Hotel occupancy in Albemarle and Charlottesville continues to rebound with overnight stats in April of this year slightly above the previous year, but still below pre-pandemic levels.

“We’re recovering a bit,” said Courtney Cacatian, the executive director of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau. “Our hotel occupancy is still limited by our workforce here.”

Cacatian provided that information to City Council at a work session Monday that served as an introduction to the agency, which was created in 1979 to promote tourism in the area. She said the entity never stopped advertising during the pandemic, so there is pent-up demand reflected in the average daily rates. This April that figure was over $170 a day compared to around $100 in April 2021. (view the presentation)

“The mission is really to enhance the economy, specifically in the tourism industry, and to generate tax revenue for the city and the county,” Cacatian said. “And we reinvest that funding back into the tourism economy to start that funnel again.”

Cacatian has been in the position since August 2019, several months before the pandemic hit.

The agency’s main source of funding is through the transient occupancy tax levied by Albemarle and Charlottesville, in addition to grants. The CACVB’s budget lags two year behind collection, which explains why the FY23 budget of $1.72 million is lower than the FY22 budget of $2.053 million

Much of the funding goes into marketing.

“And that marketing includes advertising, public relations, and sales efforts,” Cacatian said. “We’re the storytellers for Charlottesville and Albemarle and we get to tell people who don’t live here what we want them to know about us so that they come to visit.”

CACVB also served as a pass-through agent for $680,000 in American Rescue Plan Act funding that originated from the Virginia Tourism Council, as well as $750,000 in ARPA funding from Albemarle County.

One of the marketing initiatives targeted to a national audience is called Discover Black Cville which went live on March 27. That began in August 2020 with listening sessions with Black businesses and attractions.

“It was really important to me that we were making sure that our community had buy in before we launched nationally and you could tell on launch day how much community buy in and positivity had been created by this effort,” Cacatian said.

The initial launch weekend led to several articles:

My Trip To Charlottesville, Virginia Taught Me The Importance Of Black Ownership In America, Marsha Badger

Charlottesville, VA, To Highlight Black-Owned Businesses Through Community-Led Initiative, Brunno Braga

Charlottesville Celebrates National Launch of Discover Black Cville, Mary Melnick

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade was on hand for the event.

“It was a room full of writers from different newspapers and I love meeting new people so it didn’t take much for me to get there and talk to them,” Wade said. “It was great. It was just a perfect weekend as far as the weather, the activity. It was smelling great outside with the different food so I hope they enjoyed it.”

Councilor Sena Magill said she really liked what CACVB is doing with Discover Black Cville, but she said she was concerned about any funds being used to pay for short-term rentals that may not be properly registered with the city.

“If the city is paying a large chunk of money and then we are providing advertising space for companies who are breaking our zoning laws and impinging on our affordable housing stock…” Magill said.

“And then typically not paying the taxes either,” said Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook.

“Yeah!” Magill said. “I have some issues with that.”

Cacatian said she would look into the matter.

The Board of Directors for the CACVB next meet on July 11. Check the public notices section of their website for more information.

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There are two weeks left before the next solstice, with fourteen more days of the sun springing above the horizon just a little bit higher each sunrise before the march to fall begins once more. I will not mention that other season for I know that may trouble some readers and listeners. It is June 7, 2022, and this is the matching installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m Sean Tubbs, planning for a summer of content.

Sign up for free, but if you opt to help support the work with a paid subscription, Ting will match your initial payment!

On today’s program:

A panel of federal judges has dismissed a lawsuit seeking an election for the House of Delegates this year

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority turns 50 today, and both Albemarle and Charlottesville have agreed to extend its existence

Various updates from Charlottesville City Manager Rogers, as well as an update on why consideration of a seven-story building on Jefferson Park Avenue has been delayed

First shout-out to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Federal judges dismiss Goldman’s lawsuit seeking 2022 House of Delegates election

There are 518 days until the next time voters will decide on who will sit in the Virginia House of Delegates. That’s a year later than the 154 days that Richmond attorney Paul Goldman had wanted, but a panel of three federal judges have ruled that he did not have standing to bring the lawsuit either as a voter or a potential candidate. (read the opinion)

In his original complaint filed June 28 of last year, Goldman alleged that the legislative boundaries at the time of the 2021 House of Delegates elections scheduled for that November would be in violation of the Equal Protection Clause in the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution. He argued the population of some districts were much larger than others due to the outdated districts.

The case made its way up to the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals before being sent back to the lower court this past March.

Attorneys for the state filed a motion to dismiss the case on April 1, 2022, and yesterday’s opinion granted their request.

“The current Motion to Dismiss follows a convoluted, months-long procedural history involving multiple complaints, motions to dismiss, motions to intervene, various hearings, as well as the appointment of a three-judge court and an interlocutory appeal to the Fourth Circuit of Appeals on sovereign immunity,” reads the introduction to the opinion.

The opinion is also a history of the delays experienced by the U.S. Census Bureau in delivering data from the 2020 count due to pandemic-related issues as well as the failure of the bipartisan Virginia Redistricting Commission to reach consensus last October.

The opinion notes that Goldman opted to not file paperwork to actually run in 2021, and notes Goldman resisted proving that he even voted that year. That means he could not prove he personally suffered an “injury” that would grant him the right to sue.

“Plaintiff bears the burden of proving that he has standing, but he has not properly supported his assertion that he voted in November 2021,” the opinion continues. “If Plaintiff did not vote in November 2021, he lacks standing, as he cannot claim injury to a right that he voluntarily failed to exercise.”

Goldman later did file an affidavit stating he did vote, but the opinion notes this was filed improperly. Still, the ruling goes on to state Goldman had not sufficiently explained why he was personally disadvantaged by voting in 2021 in the older district.

“Virginia has 100 House of Delegates districts, making the ideal district population 86,314,” Judge Novak writes in the opinion. “Plaintiff’s House of Delegates District, District 68, had an adjusted population of 85,344.”

The case is now closed, according to the order, with no possibility of appeal.

City Manager report: Utility disconnections, city leases, building permits, and more

One innovation to come with the tenure of interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers is a written report that is produced once a month to address items that come up at City Council. He also read from the report at the beginning of last night’s meeting and provided an update on the city’s current pause on issuing new building permits. No new inspections or permits will take place through June 13. (read the report)

“We have made multiple offers for a new building official and have to restart the process again with the most recent candidate changing their mind about relocating here at the last minute after we thought they accepted the position,” Rogers said. “We had previously contracted with a firm to help us with the inspections to offset our shortage. The two employees signed by that firm also left us recently so we are scrambling to catch up.”

In his written report, Rogers said the city is working with the University of Virginia on a solution.

Rogers also said an award should be made soon for a firm to help the city write a collective bargaining ordinance and that should be before Council in September with a draft ready in August.

The interim city manager also reported that the city has been once again awarded a AAA bond rating from both S&P and Moody’s. A $26 million sale of bonds to fund capital projects is expected to be made today.

Council also got an update on the city’s resumption in April of disconnecting utility customers for non-payment. A moratorium was in place for nearly two years due to the pandemic.

“The utility billing office notified 282 accounts of pending disconnections by hanging cards on their doors,” said Deputy City Manager Ashley Marshall. “To date, 246 of those accounts have made payment arrangements.”

The written report contains several other pieces of information that touch on previous stories:

The June 21 Council work session will resume the discussion of city-owned properties and whether the city is getting the most out of current arrangements

A request for proposals for $178,394 in remaining Community Development Block Grants will be released this week

Final design of a parking and pedestrian access for the Dogwood Memorial in McIntire Park has been reviewed and a budget and scope of work is being drafted, as well as a fundraising plan

Rogers’ employment by the city is through a contract with the Robert Bobb Group, and Council extended that contract until the end of this year.

Council action on seven-story building on Jefferson Park Avenue delayed

Charlottesville City Council had been expected to consider a special use permit for a seven-story building on Jefferson Park Avenue at their meeting last night, but the item was delayed until a further meeting. The Planning Commission voted 4-3 on May 10 to recommend approval, with some members expressing concerns about the massing and scale of the project. Mayor Lloyd Snook addressed the delay.

“There were a number of issues raised at the Planning Commission and the approval that the Planning Commission gave was in some ways was conditioned upon ‘you all go figure ways to moderate this, to mitigate some of the harmful effects of the way it was appearing to be so massive and so on,” Snook said.

Snook said the Department of Neighborhood Development Services requested more time to work on the proposal before it gets to City Council. The item will be rescheduled.

Second shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, Livable Cville wants you to know about an online presentation coming up on June 7. The Community Climate Collaborative and Livable Cville are presenting a talk on what they consider Climate-Smart Zoning. Executive Director Susan Kruse and Director of Climate Policy Caetano de Campos Lopes will be the presenters. This is happening on Tuesday, June 7, from 5:30 p.m to 6:30 p.m. Sign up for the free event on EventBrite.

Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority will get to turn 100

Fifty years ago today, the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority was incorporated as a public body, pursuant to what was known as the Virginia Water and Sewer Authorities Act. The body was created at the request of both Charlottesville and Albemarle County.

“That was for the purpose of managing our reservoirs and dams, our public drinking water, treating that and distributing it, and also treating our sewage,” said Lance Stewart, the director of Facilities and Environmental Services for Albemarle County.

Under the terms of the incorporation, a term limit of 50 years was imposed but extension could be granted if its member bodies pass resolutions to allow it to continue.

Bill Mawyer has been the RWSA’s executive director for the past five years and he appeared before both bodies in the past week to make the case for continued existence.

“Our staff works very hard to diligently, professionally, and economically provide water for the greater region of the city and the county, including Crozet, Scottsville, in Red Hill we have a small system,” Mawyer said. “We operate and manage six water supply reservoirs, five water treatment plants, and four wastewater plants.”

No one spoke at the public hearing in Albemarle and the resolution passed.

Last night, it was City Council’s turn, but before that public hearing, City Council Clerk Kyna Thomas read the consent agenda which included this item:

“Approving the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority northern area projects allocation agreement, one reading,” Thomas said.

Consent agenda items are resolutions that are not controversial for which a public conversation isn’t deemed necessary. Capital projects are paid for by ratepayers and each locality pays a share.

In this case, the agreement lays out that the Albemarle County Service Authority will pay the full costs of new service to increase capacity in the area north of Hollymead Town Center, with the exception of a future storage tank that will hold one million gallons. By the terms of the agreement, the city will pay ten percent of that project because it adds to the system’s overall capacity.

The city will pay 48 percent of the $2.425 million cost to decommission a water treatment plant on the North Fork of the Rivanna River.

After holding a public hearing on rates for water, wastewater, and natural gas, it was time for Council to adopt their resolution extending the existence of the RWSA.

“It’s been 50 years, it expires tomorrow, and so this action is placed here for renewal,” Rogers said.

No one spoke at City Council’s public hearing, either, and Council concurred with Supervisors to keep the RWSA in business. The RWSA next meets on June 28.

Did you learn something new? I learned something new writing it. Share this post with others to keep the learning going!

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The first Saturday in June has arrived, just as it did 364 days ago. This particular day goes by the name June 4, 2022, but it may also answer to Day 155. This particular episode of Charlottesville Community Engagement may be referred to as number 391, a fact whose significance is suspect. If this show were a mystery, I, Sean Tubbs, would be the suspect for host.

This newsletter and podcast is free, but Ting will match your initial payment to help keep this brand of community journalist in style!

On today’s show:

A third Democrat is seeking the nomination for the new 55th House of Delegates

The General Assembly takes the next step towards adoption of a Virginia budget for the next two fiscal years

The spring 2022 COVID surge continues

The University of Virginia’s land use committee reviews the $2.8 billion capital plan, including a 1,000 space parking garage and 440 units of student housing at Darden

First shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, Livable Cville wants you to know about an online presentation coming up on June 7. The Community Climate Collaborative and Livable Cville are presenting a talk on what they consider Climate-Smart Zoning. Executive Director Susan Kruse and Director of Climate Policy Caetano de Campos Lopes will be the presenters. This is happening on Tuesday, June 7, from 5:30 p.m to 6:30 p.m. Sign up for the free event on EventBrite.

Laufer seeking Democratic nomination for 55th District

A third Democrat has filed paperwork with the Virginia Department of Elections to be a candidate in the new 55th House District in the next election cycle, according to the Virginia Public Access Project.

Amy Laufer is the current chair of the Albemarle County Democratic Committee and was twice elected to the Charlottesville School Board in 2011 and 2015.

In 2017, Laufer was one of two Democrats on the ballot for Charlottesville City Council and placed a close third behind Independent Nikuyah Walker and Democrat Heather Hill.

In 2019, she resigned from the School Board when she moved to Albemarle County. Soon after, she ran in the 17th Virginia Senate District against Republican Bryce Reeves. Reeves won with 51.6 percent of the vote with Laufer receiving 48.1 percent.

Laufer joins Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price and emergency room nurse Kellen Squire in the nomination race, which could still take place this year pending a federal lawsuit. No new orders have been issued in the Goldman V. Brink case since May 5.

The incumbent, Republican Rob Bell, has not announced whether he will seek a new term in the new district, which now includes most of Albemarle County and parts of Nelson and Louisa Counties.

General Assembly moves forward with state budget

Both Houses of the General Assembly have adopted the conference reports that represent compromises in the state budget. It’s now up to Governor Glenn Youngkin to determine whether to sign the bills as presented or make further amendments. He has up until the end of the month to take action.

Delegate Barry Knight (R-81) served on the House Conference Committee for both HB29 and HB30, the bills that technically carried the budgets for the current biennium and for the next two years.

“It’s been a long haul but I believe the result is a fiscally sound, bi-partisan budget we can all be proud of,” Knight said.

Knight said a record growth in state revenue has enabled the General Assembly to invest in core government services.

“At the same time, the extraordinary revenue situation has enabled us to protect for the future by using one-time revenues to address long-lingering, one-time investment needs, prepay upcoming commitments, fund capital projects with cash and not bond, and remove the account gimmicks we used to balance our budget during the Great Recession,” Knight said.

Those investments include $400 million for public school system capital projects already constructed with each locality getting at least a million, as well as another $450 million for new school construction.

Knight said that includes a $750 million payment into the Virginia Retirement Services as well as an additional $250 million if the state hits a certain revenue target. Additional funds will go into the “rainy day fund” to have that balance hit what Knight said was a record-setting $3.4 billion. There’s another $2.5 billion from surpluses that will go to previously committed projects.

“In addition, the conference report reflects $4 billion in tax relief for Virginia’s families including an increase in the standard deduction including from $4,500 to $8,000 for individuals, double that for joint filers [and] the full elimination of the state’s sales tax on food,” Knight said.

There’s also to be a $250 tax rebate for individuals and $500 for households.

HB29 passed the House of Delegates on a 93 to 2 vote and the Senate on a 35 to 1 vote. There was no comment about HB29 in the House, but several Democrats had concerns about some of what was in HB30.

Delegate Dawn Adams (D-68) had three reasons why she voted no, but one was a lack of transparency during the conference process.

“I haven’t seen this lack of transparency in the process since I’ve been here and there’s a fair amount of policy being written through the budget that I think is really, really concerning and has not involved legislators which is so important in making good laws,” Adams said.

Delegate Danica Roem (D-13) said she was concerned that revenue cuts to transportation will take away dozens of millions that she said are required to maintain Virginia’s crumbling system.

Others were concerned about changes made to marijuana possession that were made in the budget. Others said there was not enough money being put toward affordable housing, with one Delegate citing a 2020 study by the Joint Legislative Audit Review Committee (JLARC).

“We have got billions in surplus revenue,” said Delegate Alfonso Lopez. “Now is the time for Virginia to be forward thinking, to invest in housing. Housing trust dollars are the critical layers of debt and equity needed to develop quality affordable housing.”

The vote on HB30 was 88 to 7, with dissenters coming from both parties. Republican Delegates Nick Freitas (R-30) and Phil Scott (R-88) joined Adams and four other Democrats in voting against.

The Virginia Senate approved HB30 on a 32 to 4 vote.

After the votes, Delegate Terry Kilgore explained the next steps.

“The Speaker [of the House Todd Gilbert] and the Lieutenant Governor [Winsome Earle-Sears] have three days to sign and enroll the bill or get it to the Governor,” Kilgore said. “The Governor then has seven days to act on any amendments and then we would need to come back prior to July 1 to act on those amendments so what we can make sure we have a budget for Virginians.”

Spring 2022 COVID surge continues

On Friday, the Virginia Department of Health reported 4,057 new cases as detected through PCR tests, the highest one day total in several weeks but consistent with a growing trend. The seven day average is 2,841, though the actual number of cases is likely much higher due to the number of home tests.

The Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association reports 87 patients in intensive care units with 30 COVID patients on ventilators.

The proliferation of the second Omicron strain has led to many people contracting COVID for a second time.

“We are seeing second infections occurring particularly in people that had infections in December and January and in early February and now we’re three months out from that and because of the strain differences and that time lag and difference, we are seeing breakthrough infections,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology for the University of Virginia Health System.

Dr. Sifri said at least some patients do have lingering symptoms associated with long COVID such as fatigue and brain fog. This is still an active area of investigation.

“There is still much to be understood about long COVID, what its pathophysiology is, what are the biologic mechanisms that lead to it,” Dr. Sifri said. “That’s still being an active area of investigation trying to understand that and perhaps at some point better be able to predict who may be more susceptible to it.”

Dr. Sifri said it can be expected that additional variants will emerge, but that the outlook is not bleak.

“What we’re also seeing is that as this occurs, the relative proportion of people that are needing medical care, that are coming into the hospital because of severe COVID, coming into our intensive care units, and importantly, the proportion of people that are dying of COVID, those are going down,” Dr. Sifri said.

However, Dr. Sifri said the public should be mindful of the potential for a more deadly strain to emerge.

On Thursday, the White House announced that authorization for vaccines for children under the age of five may come sometime this month. The Blue Ridge Health District said in their weekly newsletter they would be ready to distribute and administer the vaccines when the time comes.

Today’s second shout-also goes to WTJU

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: This year, WTJU 91.1 FM turns 65 and to mark the occasion, there’s a new micro-museum exhibition this summer!

UVA committee briefed on new capital projects

The Buildings and Grounds Committee of the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors met on Thursday and got an update on capital projects and the next master plan. Colette Sheehy is the executive vice president and chief operating officer at UVA.

“So this is the time of year when we ask for approval of the newly revised Major Capital Plan,” Sheehy said. “You’ll recall that we reviewed it with you in March.”

The last Major Capital Plan adopted last year was for $3.1 billion worth of projects and several of those have been completed since then such as the University Hospital Expansion, the orthopedic center on Ivy Road, and the student health and wellness center on Brandon Avenue.

“We have a lot going on,” Sheehy said. “Thirty-one percent of the value of the entire capital program represents projects under construction and we are going to have a very busy 24 months coming up as many of these projects reach conclusion.”

The landscaping and the infrastructure for the Emmet-Ivy Corridor should be completed by next spring. Renovations of Alderman Library and construction of the Contemplative Commons should be completed in the fall of 2023.

“The School of Data Science will follow on the heels in December of 2023 and then the following spring, late spring, early summer, the Brandon Avenue undergraduate residence hall,” Sheehy said.

Sheehy said the next plan will include several design studies as well as eight new projects, four of which were not on the list in March. One of them would be for student housing at the Darden School of Business.

“They are proposing to build about 440 beds that would house two-thirds of their residential MBA students,” Sheehy said. “It is something that competitor business schools do.”

There is no cost estimate for that project, which would offer a range of options for students and their families. (read a fact sheet)

Sheehy said another project is to construct a 1,000 space parking garage, but she did not elaborate on its location. A fact sheet states the cost estimate is $54 million and would replace parking in the existing Emmet Ivy Parking Garage that will be dedicated to uses such as the future hotel, the Karsh Institute of Democracy, and the School of Data Science.

“The current parking inventory displaced by the Ivy Corridor redevelopment must be met in a location that serves multiple constituencies and links effectively to transit,” reads the fact sheet.

Other new projects are renovations to the physics building as well as Pinn Hall.

After that presentation, UVA Architect Alice Raucher updated the committee on the creation of the 2030 Grounds Framework Plan, which updates a master plan adopted in 2008. The pandemic delayed the work slightly and the end of this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement will delay my reporting on it. I’ll cover that in a future edition. Sound permitting.

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What’s in a day? According to one source, it’s National Bubba Day but I’m not sure what all the hubbub is about. More realistically, it’s American Indian Citizenship Day, which marks the 98th anniversary of an act of Congress where the people who had lived here for millennia before colonization finally received some rights, if not universal recognition. Somehow it’s also National Rocky Road Day. Coincidence or something else? This episode of Charlottesville Community Engagement cannot provide the answers. But this and all of the nearly 400 installments to date are intended to encourage you to think.

If you’re not ready for a paid subscription, please send this on to people you think might be interested! The newsletter is made available for free thanks to the hundreds so far who are paying!

On today’s program:

The Virginia Supreme Court has ruled that Albemarle County was wrong to charge a developer for transit service that stops at the Hollymead Town Center

An update on one way how area transit agencies may address driver shortages

JABA gets some funding due to one hospital’s employee survey

And the Albemarle Planning Commission reviews a study that seeks to help the Rio Road corridor become more of a human-scale

First shout-out goes to a RoadDucks concert at Groovin’ in Greene

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, this Saturday in Stanardsville, Virginia’s house band, the RoadDucks, will take the stage at Greene Commons to headline an evening of music. The event kicks off at 4 p.m. with local music from Keith Samuels, Todd Sansom, Chad Aylor & Jon Kougher. That’s followed by singer-songwriter Jenny Marie McAdams.

Then, the RoadDucks will draw upon their 46 years to perform all kinds of music. Various members of the Greene Chamber of Commerce are sponsoring the event, with proceeds from beverage and drink sales going to Artistic Remedies for Creative Hearts. For more information on this latest in the Groovin’ in Greene series, visit their Facebook page.

Virginia Supreme Court rules against Albemarle in Jaunt proffer case

Albemarle County acted unconstitutionally when it demanded the developer of the Hollymead Town Center begin making $50,000 annual payments for a transit route operated by Jaunt. That’s according to a Virginia Supreme Court opinion issued this morning by Justice S. Bernard Goodwyn. (read the opinion)

“While a state, under its police power, may regulate land use to further legitimate state interests, it may not use this power as a cudgel to coerce concessions from a land-use applicant who seeks to repurpose her property,” reads the opinion.

The Board of Supervisors approved the Hollymead Town Center development in September 2007 and under one of the proffered conditions, a company called Octagon Partners agreed to pay $50,000 a year “within thirty days after demand by the County after public transportation service is provided to the Project.”

In November 2015, the Board voted 4-1 to work with Jaunt to develop a commuter route called Route 29 Express to serve the area with a stop at the Kohl’s.

By that point, the property had transferred to United Land through a subsidiary known as Route 29 LLC. Developer Wendell Wood had previously sought to change the proffer but was unsuccessful. He argued that the triggering of the proffer as presented was unreasonable, but he offered to pay a smaller amount.

At the time, Rio District Supervisor Brad Sheffield was executive director of Jaunt but he recused himself from the vote. He did not seek re-election to the Board in 2017. In late 2020, Jaunt’s Board of Directors asked him to resign for financial matters not related to this lawsuit.

Soon after the Route 29 Express service began in May 2016, the county sent two bills to Route 29 LLC demanding payment, and issued a zoning violation in the summer of 2018. Wood refused to pay.

Wood sued in January 2019 challenging that violation and both parties agreed to a certain set of facts. In May of that year, the county sought dismissal based on a claim that those facts admitted Wood’s acceptance that he needed to pay for the transit service. Albemarle Circuit Court Judge Cheryl Higgins denied that dismissal request and the case went to trial.

During the trial, the county also sought to dismiss testimony and evidence introduced by the plaintiff to support their argument that the commuter route did not have any benefits of reducing traffic on U.S. 29. Higgins did not grant a motion to strike and then ruled in favor of Route 29 LLC.

The county appealed, and now the Virginia Supreme Court affirmed Higgins was correct in not granting the county’s request to dismiss and to strike the evidence. The Court sided with Route29 LLC about the unreasonability of the proffer.

“In essence, the County contends that when a municipality conditions the grant of a land use permit on acceptance of a conditional proffer, voluntarily entered into, the payment required by the proffer need not possess an essential nexus, nor be roughly proportional, to the impact of the development allowed by the permit in order for the proffer to be legally enforceable,” reads the analysis on page 9 of the opinion.

“We disagree,” the opinion continues.

The ruling does not dismiss the transit proffer completely.

“The Owner acknowledges, and we agree, that a different public transportation service may trigger Transit Proffer payments that are enforceable at law,” the opinion continues. “However, the Commuter Route, as it is presently designed, does not.”

A spokeswoman for Jaunt said the organization had no comment on the ruling, but did say that the North 29 Express is still operating and led to several other commuter buses such as one that serves Crozet.

Albemarle County did not have a comment on the ruling.

See also:

Supervisors agree to use proffer to fund daily Hollymead commuter route, November 7, 2015

Hollymead developer seeks changes to transit proffer, April 23, 2016

Developer Wendell Wood keeping tabs on proffer-funded JAUNT route, July 5, 2016

County says developer Wendell Wood owes $150,000 for bus service, December 6, 2018

If you are interested in all of these stories about transportation, do consider a paid subscription to this newsletter.

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Albemarle Schools working on way to use public transportation for pupil transport

In April, transit officials from Vermont briefed the Regional Transit Partnership on efforts in the Green Mountain State to use public transportation to get students to their schools. (read the story)

That has led to further discussion on the matter in Albemarle County. Charmane White is the new director of the transportation division for Albemarle schools and she spoke at the partnership’s meeting on May 26.

“I am having conversations now with our my supervisors and the Superintendent to look at how we would roll this out and of course we would have to get our community ready for this and parents and the administrators because this is just a different approach to what we have taken,” White said.

White said the division continues to try to recruit new drivers with a series of job fairs. One possible way to alleviate the shortage is to purchase vehicles that don’t require a commercial driver’s license (CDL).

Garland Williams, director of Charlottesville Area Transit, said city schools are also looking at this approach.

“They are looking at the type A bus model themselves,” Williams said. “Fourteen [passengers] or less. They’re going to do to two at this point of time and see how the model works and then just scale up from there.”

The University Transit System also has issues with a driver shortage.

“One of the approaches we’re taking a looking at is that CDL license barrier and how can we sort of attack that in creative ways,” said Kendall Howell of UTS.

Howell said he would return to the partnership with some of those ideas later this summer.

Sentara employee survey leads to $65,000 grant for JABA

An organization that provides services and assistance to older community members will receive $65,000 from Sentara Martha Jefferson Hospital. According to a press release, the funding for JABA is the result of an employee satisfaction survey which had a question that asked respondents to name an organization that embodies the company’s values.

“JABA got one of the highest vote totals in the survey," says Johnsa Morris, Vice President of Patient Care & Chief Nurse Executive at Sentara Martha Jefferson Hospital.

JABA was created in 1975 as the Jefferson Area Board for Aging to serve as a “gateway” for resources for seniors and adults with disabilities. The $65,000 gift is unrestricted and can be used for any purpose by the organization.

If you or someone you know is interested in applying for a grant from Sentara, the window runs from June 15 to July 15.

Second Shout-out is for the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s second subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes this spring and summer to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. Coming up on June 7 is a tree identification course taught on Zoom by tree steward Elizabeth Ferguson followed by a separate hike on June 11 at the Department of Forestry’s headquarters near the Fontaine Research Park.

That’s followed by a tree identification walk at the University of Virginia on June 12 for the public. On June 14, Rachel Keen will give a lecture on Zoom on the Social Life of Trees. Do trees really communicate with one another? What is a 'mother tree'? Can a tree do anything to repel a pest? Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

Albemarle Planning Commission gets look at Rio Road Corridor

On Wednesday, the Board of Supervisors appointed Lonnie Murray to represent the White Hall District on the Planning Commission. Murray has been elected three times to serve as one of Albemarle’s representatives on the Thomas Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation District. He’s also a member of the Natural Heritage Committee.

At their most recent meeting, the Planning Commission minus Murray reviewed a transportation study intended to turn one of Albemarle’s major roadways into something with more of a human scale. The county hired Line + Grade to conduct a review of Rio Road from city limits at Melbourne Road up to near the intersection with U.S. 29. (read the draft plan)

“The goal of this project was to develop a community vision and plan that will guide the future design and improvements to the Rio Road Corridor,” said David Benish, development process manager for Albemarle.

Benish said the concepts in the plan are not intended to be final, but will be used in the future for candidates for funding through the Virginia Department of Transportation. A list of priorities will be reviewed during the Comprehensive Plan review that’s underway.

Dan Hyer of Line + Grade lists some of the intentions of the plan, which is split into two geographic phases.

“How to make it a safe corridor, how to improve environmental and public spaces along the corridor, keep traffic moving effectively and optimally,” Hyer said. “And try to make access equitable for all those who live and use the corridor.”

Hyer said to balance all of those goals, his team took both a qualitative and quantitative approach to craft a roadway for the county’s 21st century needs.

“At some point in the past, roadways were not just designed for their quantitative aspects but the quality of the experience was also important,” Hyer said. “And so we devised our own metrics on how to analyze both of these corridors from a qualitative standpoint. What’s it like to walk on the sidewalk? Is it hot? Are there trees? Are there crosswalks? Are their lights? Can you see the bus stops?”

Hyer said traffic growth is expected as the area builds out with more housing. New intersection approaches are suggested to avoid the backups that come with the four-way signals of the 20th century.

Two traffic signals at the Hillsdale / Old Brook / Northfield intersections would be replaced with a peanut-shaped roundabout to eliminate left-hand turn movements.

The Belvedere intersection would be converted into a continuous “Green T” intersection that would close off left-hand movements from the side road. Hyer said this would not preclude a future traffic signal.

Line + Grade has offered several different alternatives for the roundabout at John Warner Parkway, but he acknowledged VDOT’s selection will be the one that goes forward.

In the second phase, the Rio Road Corridor Study offers fewer specific intersection improvements but provides guidance such as lowering speed limits and laying out a way forward for creation of a shared-use path.

“What you have currently is you have a bunch of land widths that are inconsistent,” Hyer said. “You’ve got some that are 14 feet, some that are ten feet. You have a bus stop where you don’t need one. There’s a bunch of infrastructure that can be reallocated and that’s what you see here in our proposed plan.”

Hyer said one difficulty identified in the study was trying to figure out how to find a way to make it safe to walk on Rio Road between Stonehenge Road and the city limits. He said that might need a plan of its own.

“Very complicated there,” Hyer said. “The creek is eroding. It’s coming closer to eroding the roadbed. It’s just an entirely different conversation and not worth trying to build a sidewalk there right now. There’s other low-hanging fruit for us to pursue.”

Commission Chair Karen Firehock urged the inclusion of bioswales and other innovative ways to build in drainage that supports the ecology. She said the roundabouts might be a good place.

“Because there’s going to be a lot of grading going along to put in a roundabout in the first place and a lot of times in some lazy places they are just boring lawns and they’ve done nothing with that space,” Firehock said. “It’s an opportunity besides just having more turf grass which is the number one crop in the Chesapeake Bay drainage.”

The Board of Supervisors will be briefed on the plan at a later date, possibly in August.

Watch the presentation on YouTube:

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Fans of longer days in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States of America have three weeks to go until the world begins turning back to the other way. The solstice will mark the official start of summer, but many would argue it is already here. I’m not here to argue, and neither is Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that seeks to document as much as it can. The I mentioned above is me, Sean Tubbs.

Sign up for free to make sure you get every installment. But if you do pay to support the work, Ting will match your initial payment!

On today’s program:

Details on what’s in the compromise budget that the General Assembly will vote on today

Albemarle Supervisors have a full meeting including a vote for a new Planning Commissioner

Two plans for a future Regional Transit Authority are presented to area leaders and both have hefty price tags

First shout-out is for LEAP’s new Thermalize Virginia program

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out: Have you been thinking of converting your fossil-fuel appliances and furnaces into something that will help the community reduce its greenhouse gas emissions? Your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, has launched a new program to guide you through the steps toward electrifying your home. Thermalize Virginia will help you understand electrification and connect you with vetted contractors to get the work done and help you find any rebates or discounts. Visit thermalizeva.org to learn more and to sign up!

General Assembly returns today to consider conference report

Both chambers of the Virginia General Assembly will convene at 10 a.m. to finish work on several bills left over the regular session. The major item left waiting to be finalized is the state budget and conference reports were made public over the weekend.

There are 370 pages in the conference report for HB30, the technical name for the bill that carries the two year state budget that begins on July 1. A team of six Delegates and eight Senators were appointed to come up with compromises.

One running theme is the reduction of funding that is now required because of elimination of the sales tax on foods for human consumption and personal hygiene products. The standard deduction for Virginia income taxes has also been increased from $4,500 to $8,000 for single filers and $9,000 to $16,000 for married couples.

There’s a lot in it, and here are some highlights. Let’s start with education.

A $400 million competitive fund will be set up for local school boards to apply for funding for “construction, expansion, or modernization, of public school buildings.” The grants would cover up to 30 percent of the project cost.

There is a separate $400 million for the School Construction Grant program “for debt service payments on school projects that have been completed or initiated during the last ten years.”

School systems across Virginia will get $104.1 million in FY23 and $257.2 million in FY24 in “hold harmless” payments to represent the loss of revenue from the suspension of the grocery

A hundred million dollars will go into a College Partnership Laboratory Schools Fund which would be for the creation of “public, nonsectarian, nonreligious schools in the Commonwealth established by a baccalaureate public institution of higher education.”

The Secretary of Education is directed to study the practice of collecting student debts for public institutions of higher education.

The RISE Foundation of Waynesboro is allocated $250,000 for preventive services for at-risk youth.

Around $9.5 million over two years will go to support the implementation of the Virginia Literacy Act

Chesterfield County Public Schools would get $1.364 million over two years to help establish a recovery high school for students in “early stages of recovery from substance use disorder or dependency.”

Here are some economic development and tourism items:

There’s $66.7 million in funding over two years to support biotechnology in Virginia, including up to $18 million for the University of Virginia Institute of Biotechnology “to accelerate biotechnology commercialization, genomics and gene therapies, drug delivery technologies and biomanufacturing facilities in the Commonwealth over the next five fiscal years through incentives designed to attract 150 research scientists.”

The Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services will be allocated $125,000 to the Virginia Wine Board to breeding vinifera-style wine groups “with a specified focus on combining vinifera fruit quality with downy mildew resistance, with an objective of commercializing the resulting variety within 10 to 15 years.”

There’s $700,000 to hire seven inspectors for regulating hemp products and investigating possible violations. This is related to changes in the already adopted rules for hemp and marijuana.

Nine million would be spent over the next two years for the Governor’s Motion Picture Opportunity Fund.

The Frederick County Economic Development Authority will get $5 million to help develop sites that can “support the growth of small aerospace, avionics, and unmanned systems companies in Planning District 7.” Matching funds would need to be provided within a year.

Virginia Tech would receive $2.5 million to “create a unique, world-class future truck research and development center in Southwest Virginia.”

Nelson County would get $250,000 to support the planning of a Vietnam War and Foreign Conflicts Museum.

The Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library in Staunton would get a $250,000 grant for renovations.

Thirty million in funding for a new Solar Loan and Rebate program has been eliminated.

The Virginia Economic Development Partnership Authority would get $2.5 million in FY24 for a grant program to spur development in the offshore wind industry.

There’s $200,000 for a feasibility study whether a new inland port should be built in either southwest Virginia or the Lynchburg area.

There’s $2 million for an international sailing event called OpSail250.

Environmental items:

There’s $575,000 in new funding for an invasive species detection program.

The Department of Conservation and Recreation would get $350,000 for creation of an environmental literacy plan.

The Dam Safety, Flood Prevention and Protection Assistance Fund would get an additional $10 million, matching a $10 million appropriation from the state’s share of the American Rescue Plan Act.

DCR would also get $1 million to study of harmful algae blooms on Lake Anna.

The phased ban on polystyrene containers would be delayed five years until July 1, 2028

Another $320,000 would go to monitor groundwater for the presence of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).

The Department of Wildlife Resources gets $400,000 over two years for a program to restore freshwater mussels across Virginia.

Here are some land use items:

The Department of Housing and Community Development is directed to develop a model lease for manufactured home parks in collaboration with a wide variety of stakeholders, and to conduct a feasibility study of these parks as a “source of affordable housing for Virginians.”

Just over $11 million for planning for a Center for the Arts at the University of Virginia has been deferred.

For more on how we got to here, some other articles:

After months of wrangling, Virginia has a budget deal. What’s in it?, Virginia Mercury

Lawmakers to vote on budget, won’t take up stadium bill, Associated Press

Virginia budget proposal includes new marijuana crime, WUSA 9
Supervisors to appoint Planning Commissioner for White Hall District

Three candidates are awaiting to see if they will be the one selected to represent the White Hall District on the Albemarle Planning Commission. Jennie More resigned in April before the end of her second term.

Supervisors will meet today at 1 p.m. and will make their appointments at 6 p.m. after a closed session. They will also select a new non-voting member to represent the University of Virginia. The previous holder of that position, Luis Carazana, was elevated to be the at-large commissioner. Unlike the Board of the Supervisors, there are seven members of the Planning Commission.

The applicants for the White Hall seat are Marc McKenney, Lonnie Murray, and Elizabeth Wachtneister. Murray is an elected member of the Thomas Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation Board.

Second shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

Did you know that National Pollinator Week is June 20th-26th this year? There are many ways to celebrate and learn more about our native pollinators, and here's a great one to start with: Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden is hosting an in-person/virtual Pollinator Power Symposium on June 23rd, and there is an excellent line up of speakers scheduled for the day!

There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

Partnership briefed on potential vision for regional transit

Work is nearing completion on a conceptual study for how public transport might work better across the entirety of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. Today the Board of Supervisors will get an up close look at the $350,000 Regional Transit Vision.

Last week, an appointed body consisting of elected officials and transit officials got an update on the Regional Transit Vision.

“The project is a collaborative effort to evaluate and establish a clear long term vision for transit service in the region, and not just the urbanized area but also the rural areas surrounding Charlottesville and Albemarle County,” said Tim Brulle of AECOM is the project manager for the vision plan.

If you’re unfamiliar with planning, you should know that any plan needs a vision statement to provide an overarching purpose.

“To develop, design, and provide transit in the Charlottesville area in a manner that reflects a collaborative, inclusive, and equitable process representing needs in both rural and urban areas,” Brulle said.

The purpose is to reduce reliance on personal vehicles for multiple reasons and outcomes, and to provide a way to get around for people without access to one. But how to make that work?

Scudder Wagg with Jarrett Walker + Associates presented one vision concept that assumed the region had access to new revenues from a transportation authority similar to one in the Richmond area. This is known the “constrained “ vision.

“So basically if you applied a similar funding structure there to your region, how many dollars and if you put most of those dollars to transit, what could it produce?” Wagg asked. “It’s about $26 million a year.”

Such an authority would take enabling authority from the General Assembly and would build off of existing services.

Wagg also presented a vision that assumed no limits on transit funding. For instance, that would allow for expansion of demand responsive service to seven days a week, as well as fixed-route transit to places that currently don’t have it such as Scottsville, Ruckersville, Lovingston, and Palmyra. This “unconstrained” vision would come with a hefty price tag.

“So there’s no defined limit when we were designing a network that we collectively with staff and others at the table felt would help you achieve those goals and the total annual estimate of that network is about $70 million a year to give you some sense of scale,” Wagg said.

Most of that cost is in personnel with drivers and mechanics, as well as a additional vehicles. It takes people to run a transit system, and another way to measure one is through service hours. Wag said Charlottesville Area Transit has about 94,000 service hours a year, Jaunt operates 37,000 for a total of 131,000 service hours for the general public.

The unconstrained vision includes potential collaboration with the University of Virginia whereas the constrained vision does not their role into account.

The partnership isn’t in charge of the purse strings, so today’s conversation before the Board of Supervisors will yield more of a sense of whether there’s an appetite to pursue additional funding and if so, where to direct it.

Jarrett Walker + Associates helped redraw the bus system in the Greater Richmond area, and CAT Director Garland Williams was there at the time.

“The majority of the emphasis was actually put on frequency and our ridership jumped 22 percent,” Williams said. “Then the second piece was to look at once the frequent service is in, how can you readjust networks to adjust travel times.”

Williams said that the same model could be applied here.

A microtransit pilot in Albemarle is a year away from happening and depends on award of funding from the Commonwealth Transportation Board.

“It will be awarded and the starting of it will be acquisition, development of the program, software acquisition, things that have to happen before the actual buses are on the ground,” said Trevor Henry, the assistant county executive.

The regional transit study is separate from a $150,000 governance study about that will suggest how to actually move forward with setting up new structures to actually run the enhanced service, be they constrained or unconstrained visions.

Watch the Regional Transit Vision presentation here:

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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A cursory look at the traffic count for the only other Sunday edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement so far reveals that the audience for this one may be quite low. A cursory look at the backlog of stories indicate that there’s no time like the present for this May 29, 2022 edition of the program, packed with transportation information to avoid future frustration. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. Ting will generously match your initial payment if you sign up for a paid subscription! Free works, too. I just want you to know things.

On today’s program:

The city of Charlottesville warns of a slowdown in issuing new building permits due to staff shortage

A Charlottesville man has been charged with involuntary manslaughter in a May 15 crash on U.S. 29 that killed the driver of a second vehicle

Governor Youngkin vetoes several bills for which the General Assembly opted not take up his recommendations

Charlottesville City Council and the Planning Commission have been presented with recommendations to reboot transportation planning in the city after a series of long delays and cost over-runs

The debut of the audio-only Sunday Comic
Today’s first shout-out goes to WTJU

Driver charged in May 15 fatal crash on U.S. 29 near Greenbrier Drive

The Albemarle County Police Department has charged a Charlottesville on several counts related to a two-vehicle crash that killed one on the evening of May 15. Twenty-two-year-old Cristian Alexandro Salinas-Perez faces charges of aggravated involuntary manslaughter and driving after losing his license after previous convictions on driving while intoxicated.

The crash near the intersection of U.S. 29 and Greenbrier Drive killed 35-year old Justin Tilghman of Charlottesville. The ACPD’s Crash Reconstruction Team concluded that the vehicle driven by Salinas-Perez allegedly was being operated at an excessive speed when it collided with the one driven by Tilghman.

Salinas-Perez was arrested Friday and is being held without bond at Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail.
Charlottesville warns of slower turnaround time for building permits

Staff shortages are causing the city of Charlottesville’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services to put a pause on building and trade inspections between May 31 and June 13.

“The department acknowledges the inconvenience this may cause and appreciates everyone's patience and cooperation during this time,” reads a press release that went out Friday afternoon.

That means “major delays” in the issuance of new building permits and new inspections.

The release points to the Department of Neighborhood Development Service’s website for information about the city’s policy on third party inspections.

“The 3rd party inspection policy/program allows substitute inspectorsto perform the daily inspections normally completed by Charlottesville Building Inspectors after our approval,” reads that form.

There are several open positions on the city’s jobs board, including Building Code Official, which pays between $73,474 and $96,096 a year.

In the meantime, the release states that NDS will continue to process permits and inspections as quickly as possible.

Governor Youngkin signs 23 bills, vetoes seven others

Governor Glenn Youngkin has completed action on legislation that cleared both Houses of the General Assembly in this year’s regular session. Youngkin signed 23 bills to which his amendments had been reviewed by the legislature and vetoed seven others in which his recommendations were rejected in the House of the bill’s origin.

The vetoed bills are:

SB182 and HB339 would have allowed the City of Falls Church to allow anyone over the age of 18 to sit on a board or commission rather than a registered voter. Youngkin suggested adding a requirement the person be “legally present” in the United States. The Senate rejected that requirement and another more or less on party lines.

SB474 and HB 614 would have dropped a requirement that indigent parties post a bond to appeal on an unlawful detainer. Youngkin would have allowed a payment plan to pay off the bond over time. The Senate rejected that on party lines and the House of Delegates voted that recommendation down on a 35 to 65 vote.

SB508 would have moved the administration of the Virginia Community Flood Preparedness Fund from the Department of Conservation and Recreation to the Virginia Soil and Water Conservation Board. Youngkin’s recommendations related to membership and what would constitute a quorum.
“This legislation will have the unintended consequence of fragmenting our coastal resiliency efforts,” he stated in his veto explanation.

HB384 would have protected state and local employees from being penalized for speaking on policy matters at public hearings. The bill is related to the firing of a teacher in Loudoun County, and Youngkin said in his explanation that he supports the idea in theory.

“Despite the positive intentions, the legislation has practical implications for the effective management of state government that may lead to significant confusion when state employees comment during legislative or regulatory public comment periods,” he wrote.

HB891 would have removed the term “alien” from Virginia Code as it related to non-citizens.

For the full list of bills signed by the Governor, read the press release that went out Friday afternoon.

For the full rules of how this works, consult Article V, Section 6 of the Virginia Constitution.

No ruling yet in federal case seeking Virginia House of Delegates race in 2022

Sometimes, no news is still worth copy. It’s been over three weeks since the last motion was filed in the case of Goldman v. Brink. Richmond attorney Paul Goldman filed suit in federal court last year against the State Board of Elections arguing that House elections held last November would not be constitutional because they were based on the 2010 Census.

Flash forward to now, when we’re just over five months away from when a House of Delegates election would be held if this case went the same way as a similar case in 1981 that led to Delegate races in 1981, 1982, and 1983. Goldman has argued the same principle applies, but first he still has had to convince the court that he has the legal standing to bring the case.

On May 5, Judge David J. Novak warned Goldman to stop filing new motions after a request for the court to allow consideration of the leaked draft of a Supreme Court ruling that overturned constitutional protections for abortion was rejected.

Earlier this week there were rumors Goldman would file a motion to withdraw the suit.

Since then, there has been no action. As of this recording, the most recent document in the docket was Novak’s warning.

Today’s second shout-also goes to WTJU for the Radio Relics project

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: This year, WTJU 91.1 FM turns 65 and to mark the occasion, there’s a new micro-museum exhibition this summer!

Radio Relics traces WTJU’s storied history of broadcasting for our community. As part of our 65th anniversary celebrations, WTJU has curated photos, artifacts, and t-shirts – so many t-shirts! – spanning more than six decades.

The exhibition is free and will be open Monday-Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. from June 3 through July 29. The museum space is a renovated, vintage camper parked behind WTJU’s studios at 2244 Ivy Road in Charlottesville.
WTJU’s Radio Relics exhibition shows off some of the artifacts collected over the years, many contributed by former WTJU General Manager Chuck Taylor. In fact, there’s even a new initiative to raise money through the Chuck Taylor Fund for WTJU History. Contact General Manager Nathan Moore to learn more. Or donate today!

Special note: Today’s podcast version has a Sunday Comic. What is this? You’ll have to listen in to find out at about this spot!

Charlottesville City Council told of problems with implementing transportation projects

The city of Charlottesville has planned and built most of the transportation infrastructure projects within city limits since 2005. Soon after Deputy City Manager for Operations Sam Sanders took on the role last summer, he noticed there were some performance issues that require a total reboot of the way the city undertakes this work.

“Some initial assessments when I first arrived here was that the development review process within [the Department of Neighborhood Development Services] needed some attention,” Sanders said. “And in doing that work since I’ve been here I’ve discovered it was more than just that. It was also looking closely as the Public Works / Engineering side of the house.”

At a meeting of the Charlottesville City Council and the Planning Commission on May 24, Sanders said there was not a lot of institutional knowledge, and that there was a lot of work that needed to be done. First is to improve the city’s relationship with the Virginia Department of Transportation. (view the presentation)

“The second being evaluating our financial management of projects with our project managers as well as our budget and finance team, and as well as assessing project management capacity,” Sanders said.

The city has over $185 million in funds from VDOT that it has been awarded but not yet spent. These include four streetscape projects funded in the first two rounds of the Smart Scale process, five other projects funded in the second two, as well as projects funded through the VDOT revenue-sharing program. That figure also includes the $35.4 million Belmont Bridge project which is now under construction after over a decade of planning. The other projects still face delays.

Sanders said the recommendations would seek a “right-sizing” of what the city can handle. He said Charlottesville could lose projects and make it harder to receive additional funding in the future.

“A hatchet-approach would have been just to attempt to kill a projects and then try to go forward,” Sanders said. “Tonight’s approach is really a more surgical approach so we can not only get our arms around our challenges and reset budgets and timelines, we’re also attempting to position ourselves for a share of the massive pipeline of infrastructure dollars that are coming in the near future.”

City Engineer Jack Dawson detailed all the improvements included in that $185 million, and some of that money came from sources that no longer exist or can’t adequately be traced.

“Lots of our projects have been around for a long time and have sort of outlasted old grant programs, so very specifically the Belmont Bridge,” Dawson said. “That has a little bit of everything thrown in there. So some of the accounting does get trickier.”

Dawson described the division’s responsibilities, and I’ll briefly mention two of them.

Transportation planning involves making new designs comply with documents auch as the Streets That Work Plan, the Standards and Design Manual, and the Bike and Pedestrian Master Plan. Another overarching responsibility is for project management, and the list of duties for the Urban Construction Initiative process is extensive.

“Request for Proposal and selection of consultants and contractors, accounting, grant management, reimbursement processes, consultant oversight, right of way coordination and negotiations and construction management,” Dawson said. “All UCI on those projects.”

This paragraph corrected after further information:

The city currently has four project managers, and each of them has 8.25 projects under their belt. Seven projects are currently unassigned. A transportation planner has been created in the Department of Neighborhood Development Services and that and other positions in public works are being advertised. The goal is to get the average number of project to 3.3 per manager.

Institutional knowledge at the top level isn’t great which is perhaps understandable in a city with a lot of recent turnover at the executive level.

For example, Dawson pointed to a project that has the name “Cville Signals” which is currently classified as a revenue-sharing program with funds that came from a previous project. This project has a $3.375 million estimate, but there’s a shortfall of nearly $2.2 million.

“How do we get in such situations?” Dawson said. “That was used to conceive to use money from the leftover Solutions 29 money which, I, I don’t even know what that is, but that’s what they tell me.”

Route 29 Solutions refers to a series of $230 million in projects that were planned and constructed after the Commonwealth Transportation Board canceled a 6.2 mile western bypass of U.S. 29 that had been a priority of the administration of Governor Bob McDonnell.

An unfavorable ruling from the federal government as well as a change on the Albemarle Board of Supervisors effectively killed the project in early 2014 and all of the funding was planned through a process known as Route 29 Solutions. This resulted in the completion of:

Construction of a grade separated intersection at Rio Road and U.S. 29

The widening of U.S. 29 to six lanes between Polo Grounds Road and Ashwood Boulevard

Construction of Berkmar Drive Extended to Hollymead Town Center

Leftover funds were recommended for future projects, including one that originally had the title “adaptive traffic signal technology.” The funding was authorized for that purpose by the Commonwealth Transportation Board in June 2014, but Dawson said there’s not a recent analysis of what the project is intended to do.

Since the Route 29 Solutions planning work done in 2014, the city has been through five city managers. None of the City Councilors serving today were elected before 2019.

And then there’s West Main Street, which started off as a $350,000 study authorized by Council in February 2013 that somehow grew into a $55 million project that has been defunded but still exists.

Dawson said the current cost of construction is making it more likely that all of these projects will have cost overruns.

“Now is a horrible time to price these things because there [are] just some construction materials that cannot be found,” Dawson said.

As part of the right-sizing, Dawson recommends several projects be shelved and put on hold and used for future applications. These are:

All four phases of the West Main Streetscape

The aforementioned signals project

Monticello and Ridge improvements

Harris Road improvements

Elliot Street improvements

Preston / Grady project awarded $6.1 million in Smart Scale Round 4

“We took the tack that we want to demonstrate to VDOT that we can complete projects,” Dawson said.

Dawson said the purpose of the projects would continue to be evaluate The Monticello / Ridge project, for example, would be addressed during the Smart Scale project for Ridge Street. He said the Department of Neighborhood Development Services will conduct a small area plan for the area of Preston and Grady before reapplying for more funding.

See also: Council moves forward with application for Preston / Grady intersection, July 22, 2022

In all, Dawson said the city will return about $12 million in Smart Scale projects that would be redistributed to other projects in VDOT’s Culpeper District. Dawson said he hopes this funding will be returned back to the city to deal with about $10 million in cost overruns for existing Smart Scale projects. That decision is ultimately up to the Commonwealth Transportation Board.

The city will also turn over to VDOT administration of a turn lane on U.S. 250 that will be related to improvements for the interseection at Hydraulic Road and U.S. 29.

“We do as a city like to control our own projects so we can have input on the destiny on those projects and I do think this is a good one to ease the administrative burden on our staff,” Dawson said.

Keeping the pieces moving

Dawson is also suggesting combining the two existing Smart Scale projects on the Ridge / Fifth Street corridor into one, and adding the project that comes out the ongoing efforts to reformat the four-lane highway that is Fifth Street.

“While those have three different funding sources, we’re going to hope to combine them into one project and have a project manager that deals with those as one while we manage the finances in triplet to try and minimize overhead from a project management standpoint and maybe bid them all to one consultant,” Dawson said.

That’s the approach VDOT took with both the Route 29 solutions projects as well as a suite of Smart Scale projects that Albemarle County was awarded in the second round.

On Thursday, the city awarded bids for construction of two related projects on Rose Hill Drive and Rugby Avenue. Vess Excavating of Charlottesville bid $464,823 for the Rose Hill sidewalk project (UPC#108757) and Linco of Waynesboro will build intersection improvements at Rose Hill Drive and Rugby Avenue (UPC#108755). Linco bid $621,691.59.

Dawson’s boss is Stacy Smalls, the relatively new director of the Public Works Department. He said there needs to be more transparency from the city.

“We would like to present on VDOT project status to Council and the Planning Commission on a yearly basis,” Smalls said. “This incorporates accountability and transparency about our workload [and] the types of projects we are undertaking in what areas of the city we are improving with these particular projects.”

Smalls said the city will also move to create web pages for each project.

In the meantime, if you’re interested in volunteering for cvillepedia on that aspect, I’ll be more than happy to speak with you and get you moving. I’ve tried to keep track of these things for fifteen years now, and I hope that others will get involved so that more community members know how this process works.

Council will consider each of these steps officially at future meetings.

“VDOT is expecting us to move quickly,” Sanders said. “This is very coordinated with them to be able to get action taken by Council to be put in front of the leadership at VDOT so that we can move forward.”

The pieces will stay in motion, and continue reading and listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement to try to keep track of all the moving parts.

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How should we get around in the future? What should our transportation network look like? Those are some of the questions that feature heavily in today’s installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and this will be a focus in future versions as well. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs, and I’ve been writing about transportation planning for nearly thirty years. Even if you don’t think you’re interested, you probably might be if you have access to stories about these issues. That’s the point of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and I’m grateful to the hundreds of supporters who are helping me track all the pieces in motion.

Help this newsletter grow by signing up for a paid subscription. Ting will match your initial payment! Sign-up is free, but I need a roof over my head to keep paying attention to all of the things!

On today’s program:
Charlottesville officials weigh in on potential plans to address safety concerns on Fifth Street

The nation’s top court paves the way for the federal government to calculate the “social costs” of greenhouse gas emissions

An American Elm has been honored by a local non profit that does such things
face

First shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

It’s springtime, and one Patreon subscriber wants you to know the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign is a grassroots initiative of motivated citizens, volunteers, partner organizations, and local governments who want to promote the use of native plants. This spring the group is working with retailers across the region to encourage purchase of plants that belong here and are part of an ecosystem that depends on pollination. There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

U.S. Supreme Court clears way for federal study of greenhouse gas emissions

In a one-sentence order issued last night, the United States Supreme Court has cleared the way for the federal government to study the “social cost” of greenhouse gas emissions.

“It is essential that agencies capture the full costs of greenhouse gas emissions as accurately as possible, including by taking global damages into account,” reads Section 5 of an executive order issued by President Joe Biden on January 20, 2021.

That order set up an interagency working group to resume the work of calculating those costs, work that had been stopped by the previous administration. Ten states led by Republicans sued to stop the Biden administration from moving forward, and Judge James Cain of the Western District of Louisiana agreed with them in a February ruling granting an injunction. (read that ruling)

In March, the Fifth Circuit allowed the study to proceed and the matter was appealed to the high court. According to Courthouse News, the one-sentence concurrence allows the study to proceed pending further executive action.

Locally, work continues on efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and also to prepare for the effects of climate change. The city of Charlottesville will hold a community workshop on June 9 on the Climate Vulnerability Assessment. More info on the city’s website.

Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards honor their 15th landmark tree

At the corner of Elliot Avenue and Monticello Avenue stands an American Elm that a nonprofit group honored in late April as part of Arbor Day. Now, a plaque has been installed marking the Elm as the 15th Landmark tree. The Charlottesville Tree Stewards were on hand at Sojourner’s Church on Arbor Day this past April 29 to mark the occasion.

City transportation planners present ideas on Fifth Street Extended

In the next few installments of this program, there’s going to be a heavy focus on transportation. Today we look at one specific project in the heart of Charlottesville.

On Tuesday, Charlottesville’s elected officials met with the appointed Charlottesville Planning Commission to give feedback on a set of proposals to slow down traffic on Fifth Street Extended.

Several groups have called upon to Council to take action to increase safety conditions on the roadway following a string of fatal crashes in 2020.

“Our consultant team and staff have been working for the last couple of months to expedite a design plan to improve transportation safety,” said James Freas, the city’s director of Neighborhood Development Services.

The city is working toward an August 1 deadline to submit the projects to the Virginia Department of Transportation for funding through something called the Smart Scale program. Candidate projects from all across Virginia are scored according to how well they will achieve certain outcomes, such as increasing safety and reducing congestion.

For many years, Amanda Poncy was the city’s bike and pedestrian coordinator. She left that position last year to work for EPR PC.

“EPR was hired by the city in February to help with the development of that grant application which is due on August 1,” Poncy said. “The segment that we’re looking at is between old Ridge Street and Harris Road. Our scope of work really involved looking at the crash data, conducting a speed study, developing concepts for public review and ultimately arriving at a final feedback that we can really flesh out with cost estimates and better understanding of some of the engineering issues and things like that for the Smart Scale submittal.”

The roadway has been studied before, including a 2018 study conducted by EPR that resulted in two successful Smart Scale applications. These are for a turn lane on Cherry Avenue as well as multimodal improvements on Ridge Street. (read the 2018 study)

“A third project that involved pedestrian improvements at the Cherry / Ridge intersection was also funded by VDOT outside of that project study but is being lumped into these other two because there is some overlap there,” Poncy said.

Since that study, there have been a series of fatal crashes and EPR’s work concludes that many of those are related to intersections. All of the fatalities were related to speeding. Poncy said a survey was conducted this spring which yielded over 700 responses.

“Really the top thing we heard was concern about people’s driving behavior whether it is reckless driving or redlight running,” Poncy said.

There are several potential solutions, such as a roundabout, a restricted crossing U-turn, and guardrails to prevent people from hitting trees. Another option would be to remove the trees, which Poncy said would go against the spirit of the Streets that Work plan.

Restricted crossing U-turns have been used in Virginia. Poncy explains how one would work on Fifth Street.

“People coming from the side streets, so for example Bailey Road or Old Ridge, they would first make a right turn,” Poncy said. “The median openings that are currently there would be closed for through traffic and people coming out of the side streets would have to make a right hand turn and then go up to the next median opening to go in the direction they wanted to travel.”

Another potential solution is a roundabout at Bailey Road which is the entrance to the Orangedale section of the Fifeville neighborhood. That would likely mean the taking of some property to accommodate the geographic scope.

Another overarching concept is to put Fifth Street on a road diet, which would mean reducing travel lanee and giving that space over to wider sidewalks or shared-use paths. Bike lanes could be protected with a physical barrier, but those details have not yet been worked out.

In one of the scenarios, the road diet would include a dedicated bus-lane in each direction.
Second Shout-out: RCA working on restoration of Riverview Park

The first Patreon-fueled shout-out today is for the Rivanna Conservation Alliance and their work with the City of Charlottesville on the restoration of Riverview Park. The RCA aims to restore a 600-foot section of the Rivanna riverbank in an area that’s designated for public access to the waterway as well as a 200-foot section of a dangerously eroding stormwater channel nearby. Another community meeting will be held in the near future to get your feedback on the work should be prioritized. Visit rivannariver.org to learn more about the project, which seeks to help Riverview Park continue to be a welcoming place to exercise, cool off, paddle, fish, play, explore, observe nature, and escape from the day-to-day stresses of life.

Skepticism of bus lanes, support for roundabout, more data needed on road diet details

After the overview, Commissioners and Councilors had the chance to provide feedback. During their discussion, they appeared to want more detail about what a road diet would entail, expressed support for the single-lane roundabout, and stated concerns about dedicated bus lanes.

Let’s begin with the Planning Commission’s non-voting representative from the University of Virginia wanted to know if the needs of the emergency health system had been taken into account.

“From the UVA perspective, this is a pretty major corridor for emergency vehicles coming to the hospital,” said Bill Palmer with the Office of the Architect.

Bill Wuensch of EPR said if the bus lanes were dedicated, they would be available for use by emergency vehicles.

“Whether it’s an ambulance, fire truck, police, whatever, they would still be able to use and access that bus lane in that single lane option,” Wuencsch said.

Palmer asked what the Future Land Use map designations were for the roadway and said whatever alternative is selected should anticipate future development. Much of the corridor is designated now as Medium Intensity Residential with other portions as Higher Intensity Residential.

During the conversation, at least three Councilors were skeptical about reducing capacity by eliminating travel lanes.

“In plumbing, you’ve got to be careful of going from big to little,” said City Councilor Sena Magill said.

Magill added she would support some form of a dedicated bus lane, but said she would be concerned it might be difficult for those vehicles to merge back into traffic on either end.

“Refining some of those details about the transitions is kind of the next step,” said Jeannie Alexander, another EPR employee who used to work for the city. “Getting into those design details. Yes, you’re right, it’s very important and will be the make or break for many things.”

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook said he was skeptical about the bus lane concept. The Route 2, Route 3, and Route 6 operated by Charlottesville Area Transit regularly use the corridor.

“And we’re devoting the largest share of asphalt to something that only takes… 30 vehicles a day,” Snook said. “That strikes me as being a very difficult thing to justify.”

Snook said he was concerned that constricting Fifth Street would route more vehicles through Bailey Road up to Prospect Avenue, or onto Harris Street through the Fry’s Spring neighborhood.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade used to work as a transportation planner for Albemarle County. He echoed Snook’s concern.

“I know what’s going to happen,” Wade said. “They’re going to filter through the neighborhoods and then we’re going to get calls about complaints of cars speeding in front of Jackson-Via [Elementary School] and in front of Buford [Middle] School because that’s where they’re going to go if they get off of I-64 and see the traffic.”

Planning Commissioner Jody Lahendro said he was skeptical of many of the options.

“The conclusion I’m coming to is that this is very difficult to come up with one static solution for a road that has various issues,” said Commissioner Jody Lahendro.

Commissioner Hosea Mitchell was also concerned about the road diet and the potential for congestion.

“I’m not too geeked out about the two-lane roundabout either,” Mitchell said. “I’ve worked and lived in lots of big cities and those two-lane roundabouts can be confusing.

Mitchell said he could support a single-lane roundabout but wanted to know more information. He also said he supported the pursuit of low-cost measures such as guardrails and photo enforcement.

Planning Commissioner Karim Habbab said he would support some form of a road diet but only if it didn’t lead to too much congestion. He also said he could support a roundabout.

“I know those are great at reducing crashes or the severity of crashes at those intersections and I’m for a roundabout,” Habbab said.

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg supported the road diet because he said a change in design would stop the conditions that lead to the three fatal crashes in 2020.

“In off-hours, Fifth Street becomes a drag strip and it’s just a wide open road, a total straightaway, and people can speed recklessly,” Stolzenberg said. “Yes it’s a small minority of people but road design is how we stop that.”

Stolzenberg said the road concept needed to be fleshed out further.

City Councilor Brian Pinkston said he supported studying the road diet and doing a study. That would likely mean a delay in applying for the Smart Scale funds. The next round will be in 2024.

Magill said she wanted to know more about a road diet would work, and that she could support a single-lane roundabout but not a double one. She also said people need to understand Charlottesville’s geographic role.

“We cannot get away from the fact that we are the urban center for a large rural community and that’s something we have to plan with,” Magill said.

Councilor Michael Payne said he supported the roundabout at Bailey Road to break up the speed.

“You know I think I would lean toward the road diet but I do have concern of us doing with the level of information that we have now,” Payne said. “It does seem that more study and information is needed.”

Planning Commission Chair Lyle Solla-Yates said he wanted the city to pursue all of the options.

“In general we need to be thinking bigger and more systematically so we can get at these connections about these issues,” Solla-Yates said.

City traffic engineer Brennan Duncan said he heard the concern about a two-lane roundabout but said unless the number of lanes was reduced through a road diet, that would have to be the case.

“Just for a roundabout, in order to build one for the road we have today, it would have to be a two-lane roundabout,” Duncan said.

Council will return to this matter at their meeting on June 21.

There are other projects nearby.

Albemarle County and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission are working on a Smart Scale application for an area south of Harris Road (read those application details)

A TJPDC application for something called the Fifth Street Trail hub was successful in the last Smart Scale round and received nearly $10 million in funds (read the application)

The city was awarded $8.74 million in Smart Scale Round 4 for Ridge Street improvements (read the application)

The city was awarded $6.1 million for the Cherry Avenue turn lane improvements in Smart Scale Round 3 (read the application)

More transportation-related items in the next Charlottesville Community Engagement. Always in motion, we are!

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Five times five is 25, but two times two is not 22. Yet somewhere in this sentence are all the ingredients to tell you it is May 25 of the current year. Like most things in life, there are no easy solutions to intractable problems, and resources are often hard to find or arrange in the right way. But we must try to solve them anyway. This is Charlottesville Community Engagement and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Governor Youngkin orders flags at half-mast in memory of the 19 children and two adults murdered by a young adult with access to military-grade weaponry

A second daily train between Roanoke and D.C. could launch this July

Albemarle Planning Commission reviews a report about how well the county’s development areas are filling in
First shout-out is for LEAP’s new Thermalize program

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out: Have you been thinking of converting your fossil-fuel appliances and furnaces into something that will help the community reduce its greenhouse gas emissions? Your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, has launched a new program to guide you through the steps toward electrifying your home. Thermalize Virginia will help you understand electrification and connect you with vetted contractors to get the work done and help you find any rebates or discounts. Visit thermalizeva.org to learn more and to sign up!

Flags at half-mast to mourn the children killed in Uvalde, Texas

Governor Glenn Youngkin has ordered that flags at public buildings in Virginia be flown at half-staff from now until May 28 “in respect and memory of the victims of the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas.”

As of this reporting, nineteen elementary school students and two teachers stopped living after the fast-moving bullets tore through their unprotected bodies, rendering it impossible for them to sustain life. The lone gunman carried a handgun and an AR-15 style assault rifle. Earlier in the day, the assailant shot and wounded his grandmother.

Earlier this year, attempts were made in the General Assembly to repeal legislation that passed in 2020 to place some limits on firearms. Those successful efforts in 2020 included a bill that allowed localities to prohibit the carrying of firearms on public-owned land in buildings. Delegate Tim Anderson (R-83) introduced a bill this year to repeal that effort, but it did not make it out of the House Committee on Public Safety. (HB26)

Anderson also sought to lower the penalty for a second violation of carrying a concealed weapon without a permit from a Class 6 felony to a Class 2 misdemeanor. That passed the House of Delegates on a 53 to 46 vote but did not make it out of the Senate Public Safety Committee. (HB11)

Another bill that passed the House of Delegates would have shortened the time the Department of State Police would be required to complete a background check on a firearms transfer from five to three days.

“If a dealer who has otherwise fulfilled all requirements is told by the State Police that a response will not be available by the end of the dealer's third business day, the dealer may complete the sale or transfer without being deemed in violation,” read the summary of HB204.

The bill from Delegate Otto Wachsmann (R-75) passed the House on a 51 to 48 vote. The Senate Judiciary Committee passed the bill by indefinitely.

Another bill that passed in 2020 made it possible for an attorney or officer of the court to file an emergency order that if granted would prohibit an individual who posed “substantial risk” from possessing, purchasing, or transporting a firearm. A bill from Delegate Marie March (R-7) to eliminate this possibility passed the House of Delegates on a 52 to 47 vote but the Senate Judiciary Committee passed the bill by. (HB509)

There is one firearms related bill pending in the 2022 Special Session of the General Assembly. HB1306 introduced by Delegate Marcus Simon (D-53) would make it unlawful to remove or alter a serial number on a firearm. That passed the House of Delegates on a 94 to 3 vote with one abstention. The Senate passed the bill on a 31 to 9 vote. Three Senators and three Delegates are the conferees working to reconcile the two versions of the bill. The General Assembly returns on June 1.

The National Rifle Association is active in campaign finance in the Commonwealth, according to the Virginia Public Access Project. In 2021, the organization contributed $93,250 to candidates. All of them are Republicans.

Since 1997, the NRA has contributed $1.16 million to Republican candidates and groups, and $91,222 to Democratic groups and candidates. Another $4,750 went to Delegate Watkins Abbitt who served from 1986 until his retirement before the 2012 General Assembly. Abbitt was a Democrat until becoming an independent in 2001.

For more on the response to this latest mass-shooting in America from Virginia politicians, read Brandon Jarvis’ Virginia Political Newsletter.

Second passenger train may begin operating this July

It has been nearly a dozen years since Amtrak running daily service through Charlottesville and we are perhaps months away from when a long-awaited second train will begin work. This week, the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority’s Board of Directors met and got an update from executive director D.J. Stadtler, who said a deal with Norfolk Southern has to be closed. He expects that to happen next month or early in July. (meeting material)

“It’s only when that close takes place that we can start the new service,” Stadtler said. “There are three trains waiting for that close. One is the new Roanoke train which would be the second-round trip. One is the [third] Newport News train that was paused due to COVID/Amtrak staffings issues. And then the third one is the new Norfolk train.”

Construction of a new bridge to cross the Potomac River will not be needed before it begins, but Stadtler said VPRA is applying for $300 million in federal funding to help cover some of the $2 billion cost of Long Bridge expansion project.

Stadtler also said ridership is rebounding after the pandemic on all routes.

“If you look at the April ridership, we’re up over 25 percent over the previous month,” Stadtler said. “‘Normal’ times you would see an increase from March to April of about eight percent so this is a huge increase showing that folks are getting back on the train.”

Ridership on the Roanoke train in April 2019 was at just under 19,000 but plummeted to 1,116 in April 2020 and rebounded to 9,385 in April 2021. This year ridership was at 19,605 for the month.

Hat tip to WDBJ-7 for the original reporting that prompted this story.

Watch the full meeting here:

Shout-out to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Albemarle Planning Commission briefed on build-out analysis

For the past six months, Albemarle staff have been working behind-the-scenes on the update of the Comprehensive Plan, which will be conducted in four phases. Rachel Falkenstein is a planning manager with the county.

“And the first phase is Plan for Growth where we are evaluating the current growth management policy and we’re using the theoretical maximum build-out of the county’s development areas based on the current land use plan from our 2015 plan to determine what the maximum build-out could be of those development areas,” Falkenstein said.

Falkenstein said the question is whether there’s enough land to accommodate the population growth expected over the next 20 years. There is also an effort to look at whether there’s enough land to meet the county’s goals for economic development.

This is the first time the county has contracted out the build-out analysis to a third party.

Kimley-Horn was hired and Jessica Rossi is a planner with that firm. She explained some of the methodology.

“Our first step was to identify parcels that may have development or redevelopment potential,” Rossi said. “The way that we did this is we looked at a very high level the value of land and the value of improvements.”

If the land value was greater than the improvements, Rossi said that designated it as land with development potential. A second step was to factor in location, environmental constraints, size of the land, and who owned it. Another was to look at the list of projects that are in the development pipeline.

“We removed properties that were either approved or under review from our model and inputted what we know the yield of those projects, the maximum build-out yield of those projects are,” Rossi said. “One, to avoid double-counting of those projects but [also] to use the total build-outs that we know have been approved.”

Then forecasts were developed that take into account the past ten years of development activity, combined with real estate performance as well as three sets of population projections.

Rossi said the growth area currently has about 9,377 units that are approved but not yet built. They also looked at the number of units currently under review which totals 5,504.

“That led to a total buildable unit figure of over 14,800,” Rossi said.

Rossi said when you look at land that has not yet been through the rezoning process, there are an additional 9,265 units.

“When you put these two numbers together, that total exceeds 24,000 residential units,” Rossi said.

Between 2010 and 2021, the average number of units built is 646. The ten year forecast anticipates between 6,000 and 7,500 new units, and the twenty year forecast is between 11,500 and 13,500.

Rossi said not all development areas are the same. What’s known as Neighborhood 6 has no units pending for review whereas the Hollymead community has the potential of about 6,350 new units.

That figure of 9,265 units assumes that development comes in at the maximum allowed under the current Comprehensive Plan designation. Rezonings or special use permits would be required to make that happen, and those approvals are not always guaranteed.

“Looking at rezonings approved from 2016 through 2021, the total density approved was approximately 58 percent of the maximum density recommended per future land use designations,” said county planner Tori Kanellopoulos.

For instance, the Rio Point project approved by Supervisors last year could have had a maximum of 624 units but only 328 were approved. Old Trail in Crozet was approved in 2005 for between 1,600 and 2,200 units, but the final build-out will only be around 1,200 units.

Hunter Wood of the United Land Corporation said it is very difficult to get the maximum amount of units available under the Comprehensive Plan.

“Costs have gone through the roof and a lot of that cost is two years of rezoning to go through the county and to start off at 500 units and you get beaten and come in here and get whipped and beat and you walk out with 250,” Wood said.

Wood said he would love to be able to build those 6,000 units in Hollymead and his company still has a lot of undeveloped land there.

“I personally, probably a little biased, think the growth area needs to be expanded,” Wood said. “I have some property that water and sewer is away from me yet I have a road that has a boundary that no one wants to cross.”

Wood referred to Somerset Farms, a 1,900 unit development on Route 20 south of I-64 for which a growth area expansion was recommended to be voted down by the Planning Commission in October 2011.

Commissioners were asked one simple question: Does our current Growth Management Policy provide opportunities to meet housing and non-residential needs for growth over the next 20 years?

Commission Chair Karen Firehock said unit amounts are often reduced during the rezoning process because of concerns brought forward by other community members.

“A lot of times it has to do with schools and traffic and I really can’t answer this question without knowing what kind of traffic would that put on our roads, how many schools would be needed to realize X number,” Firehock said.

Commissioner Julian Bivins said one question is whether people who live in Albemarle really want density.

“Everybody comes out and talks about how they don’t want to walk their dog next to those people, or they don’t want to get run over when they cross that street,” Bivins said. “So the whole idea is that the community has got to get better with density. If that doesn’t happen, we have all we need.”

Bivins said he would like to see conversations about creating transition zones that are between rural and growth areas. He also certain projects could have been much taller to allow more units.

Commissioner Daniel Bailey suggested the county also needs to better understand how the lack of available land could be forcing people to live outside.

“I’ve employed many employees that live in Lake Monticello and drive in and would love to live in Charlottesville but it’s too expensive,” Bailey said. “I don’t know how we get to that understanding.”

Another growth management work session will be held with the Planning Commission next month.

Luis Carazanna and Corey Clayborne were not present at the meeting. There is a vacancy for a representative of the White Hall District.

Thank you for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. This post is public so feel free to share it.

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After today, 80 percent of May’s Tuesdays will have happened, leaving one more to go. While this one is with us, there are plenty of fake holidays to ponder including National Escargot Day, National Caterers Appreciation Day, Aviation Maintenance Technician Day, and National Scavenger Hunt Day. Can you find the clues in the May 24, 2022 edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement? If so, please let me know so I can also try to figure it all out. I’ll reveal who I am at the end of the program.

Send this newsletter and podcast on to someone else so we can grow the audience!

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council holds first of two readings on new mechanism to provide tax relief for city property owners

A public hearing is held for a segment of an east-west commuter trail

The candidates are in place for the 5th District Congressional race this November

The General Assembly will head back to Richmond on June 1

Details on a planned condominium complex in downtown Belmont
Shout-out to Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes this spring and summer to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. Coming up on June 7 is a tree identification course taught on Zoom by tree steward Elizabeth Ferguson followed by a separate hike on June 11 at the Department of Forestry’s headquarters near the Fontaine Research Park. That’s followed by a tree identification walk at the University of Virginia on June 12 for the public. On June 14, Rachel Keen will give a lecture on Zoom on the Social Life of Trees. Do trees really communicate with one another? What is a 'mother tree'? Can a tree do anything to repel a pest? Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

Republicans nominate Good for re-election to Fifth District

We are now three days into the general election stage for Virginia’s Fifth Congressional District now that both major parties have selected their nominees for the November 8 ballot. On Saturday, Republicans who attended a convention at Hampden-Sydney College in Prince Edward Category overwhelmingly selected incumbent Bob Good of Campbell County to seek a second term.

According to a raw vote count, incumbent Bob Good received 1,115 of the 1,303 votes cast. Of the 24 localities with Republican committees, challenger Dan Moy of Charlottesville performed best in Albemarle County where he got votes from 43 of 128 convention delegates and in Charlottesville where he received 15 out of 28 votes. However, the convention used a weighted system which gave Good 1,488 votes to Moy’s 271. (view the vote tally)

Democrat Josh Throneburg got straight to work with a press release pointing out that the number of votes cast in the convention were less than 0.02 percent of the population of the Fifth District. Throneburg became the nominee by default when all other candidates failed to qualify for the primary ballot.

Other resources:

5th District Republicans nominate Good to represent party in November, Lynchburg News & Advance

Good defeats challenger at convention, will be on November ballot, Chatham Star-Tribune News

Rep. Bob Good wins GOP nomination for 5th District, NBC29\

Virginia Public Access Project

Virginia legislators to return to General Assembly on June 1

A date has been set for the Virginia Senate and the Virginia House of Delegates to return to Richmond to complete the special session that convened on April 4. The two Chambers will convene at 10 a.m. according to the Legislative Information System.

One of the major pieces of business left to complete is the state budget and a slate of legislators from both Houses have been seeking to work out a compromise to reconcile both versions. There are also several bills that passed both Houses but also have to be reconciled before it can be sent to Governor Glenn Youngkin for action. These include a sales tax exemption for food and personal hygiene products, changes to the make-up of the State Board of Elections, and the establishment of a Virginia Football Stadium Authority.

City Council holds public hearing on trail connection

A new partnership has formed between the City of Charlottesville and an entity that secures open space easements in Virginia, and that will slightly increase the cost of land transactions.

“We have a property owner that we’ve been negotiating with and we have a granting agency in the Virginia Outdoors Foundation that’s providing the funding which has already been appropriated,” said Chris Gensic, a planner in the Parks and Recreation Department.

When complete, the transaction will trigger a $3 fee for recordation of most deeds to go toward a pool of money to allow the Virginia Outdoors Foundation to purchase more land. Gensic said most localities of Virginia already have this arrangement but the city has yet to record an open space easement within its borders.

The property in question would allow for the 250 Bypass Trail to continue on an already paved trail in the woods to the south of Charlottesville High School toward the Piedmont Family YMCA to the east

“The parks department has been working diligently over the past few decades to acquire pieces of property to stitch together a trail network per the Comprehensive Plan,” “We’ve been discussing this particular acquisition that’s on the western end of McIntire Park.”

The public hearing was held to move the transaction forward, but Council took no action. That will come when the deal is nearing completion.

Rex Linville of the Piedmont Environmental Council said the parcel in question was significant.

“It is a crucial link in the multiyear effort to create a shared-use path that will connect McIntire Park, the YMCA, and Charlottesville High School to Hydraulic Road,” Linville said. “This parcel is also a vital part of a larger four-mile loop that will connect these public resources to Michie Drive, the Greenbrier neighborhood, and the John Warner Parkway.”

No city funds will be directly used in the transaction, according to Linville.

Council approves action plan for federal HOME and CDBG funds

City Council has approved an action plan for federal funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for the next fiscal year. Staff had suggested making some changes to the process in order to meet HUD’s guidelines, but some groups pushed back on some of those proposals. (read the staff report)

“Staff will no longer request that the task force be changed to staff advisory,” said Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders. “Instead we’re going to focus on identifying income eligible participants to ensure that the diverse voice is always available.”

Sanders said the city cannot use federal funds to pay participants to sit on that task force, but local funding can be found for that purpose should Council want to ensure participation by low income individuals.

Charlottesville will also stop the process of designating a neighborhood to receive funds for three-year periods at a time. In recent years, projects in Belmont received those funds despite an influx of wealth.

“Instead we will continue to work to identify projects that prioritize investment in those areas for the targeted low-income population to benefit from,” Sanders said.

A project that had been recommended by the task force was $186,376.16 in funds for sidewalk improvements in the Ridge Street neighborhood, the current priority neighborhood. That will no longer be part of the action plan due to a concern that the project would not be completed in time to meet HUD’s deadline. Instead funds for project will be returned to the pool to allow for other proposals from the community to be funded for the Ridge Street neighborhood.

A second reading and vote on this year’s spending will be on Council’s agenda on June 6.

City changing mechanism for property tax relief

City Council will hold a work session with the Planning Commission this afternoon but before the joint session on transportation matters gets underway, there will be a second reading of an appropriation of $1.5 million in city funds to be used as grants to low- and middle-income property owners.

This would replace the long-running program Charlottesville Housing Affordability Program (CHAP) that the city had been using to provide tax relief. Todd Divers is Charlottesville’s Commissioner of Revenue.

“We’ve kind of scrambled to put together a program that I think is going to get us close to what we were doing,” Divers said.

Divers said the previous tax relief program had been justified by the City Charter, but now a second avenue to justify the program will be used instead.

“The Director of Social Services as the local Social Services board will be the official administrator of this program though I will be working in a cooperative agreement with her and we’ll still be effectively managing the program the way we always have,” Divers said.

The move also allows the city to increase the threshold for eligibility for participation to a home value of $420,000, which is the average assessed value of a residential parcel in the city. The income threshold will be increased to $60,000.

“This a grant program,” Divers said. “This is a grant for needy folks and the way that we are defining that is folks who make less than $60,000 a year and who own a home in the city of Charlottesville.”

Divers said he estimates an additional 100 people will be eligible. The second reading is being held today to speed up the process to allow the process moving forward for this year.

Shout-out for an ACHS program on the Fields of Honor

This year, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society has been working with a group called the Fields of Honor to identify soldiers who were killed in action in the Second World War. Since February, ACHS researchers have helped locate several photographs of the fallen, including that of Private Clarence Edward McCauley who was tracked down through high school records. There are 18 remaining photographs to be found, and on Thursday, May 26 at 7 p.m. the ACHS will host Debbie Holloman and Sebastian Vonk of the Fields of Honor Foundation to talk about how you can take part in their volunteer efforts honoring the service and sacrifice of US WWII service members buried or memorialized at US war cemeteries in Europe. That’s Thursday, May 26, at 7 p.m. via Zoom or Facebook Live.

Site plan meeting held for Belmont Condominiums project

Officials with Riverbend Development have offered details on a proposal to build dozens of condominiums on undeveloped land in Charlotteville’s Belmont neighborhood.

“I know on this site in particular I have been working with the neighborhood off and on for at least five years regarding this site and we’ve owned it for well over a decade now I believe,” said Ashley Davies with Riverbend Development.

A previous submission that looked more like neighboring City Walk Apartments had gone to a site plan review conference in 2018 but that version did not move forward.

“A lot of the feedback that we got from the neighborhood from that time is just that it felt like these two buildings were too big compared to what you see in the rest of the neighborhood,” Davies said.

This development would include 130 total units and it needs city approval on three applications. Both a major subdivision and a site plan can be approved by staff, but a third requires endorsement by elected officials.

“A critical slope waiver due to impacts to critical slopes requires a City Council action,” said city planner Matt Alfele said. “This means that application will go to the Planning Commission for a recommendation and then City Council for a final decision.”

No date has been set for that Planning Commission meeting and a public hearing is not required.

The six acres of property span many parcels which would be combined in the major subdivision. Since 2003, the zoning has been for Neighborhood Commercial Corridor which allows for mixed-use.

Most of the buildings would be constructed in a form known as a two-over-two.

“It looks like a townhouse style unit on the outside but once you go into the unit it actually has two units each two floors tall and there’s garages on the backside that have parking internal to those units,” Davies said.

Davies said Riverbend has built these types of units at Brookhill in Albemarle County and they have proven to be popular. Eight of the units would be designated as being sale to households and individuals at a certain income level.

The property is currently being used for automotive repair. One neighbor asked if the site needed to be remediated due to potential contaminants in the soil. Scott Collins is an engineer working on the project

“As far as contaminants, they’ll be testing the soil as well when the asphalt and concrete is removed and checking the consistency of the soils and making sure it’s not contaminated and if it is, there are remediative measures that have to be in place,” Collins said.

The site plan must be approved by staff if it meets all of the technical requirements. Staff has not yet completed the comment letter that will go to Riverbend. People still have until June 15 to make a comment about the site plan or to ask a question.

But Council will have to approve a critical slopes waiver and one Councilor who attended the May 18 site plan conference did not like what he saw in the current project, taking his cues from a speaker from the Piedmont Environmental Council. Michael Payne said he preferred the previous approach Riverbend had taken.

“I just would say that I’m pretty disappointed at where this has ended up,” said Michael Payne. “I feel like where this ended up is the worst of all worlds in terms of as Peter Krebs [of PEC] said the most impervious surfaces, the least compact and clustered development. And also the least affordable development. It seems like its the most sprawled version which will have the most expensive units and I think this project just would have been much better off to be more clustered and have more apartments similar to the Belmont Lofts project or City Walk for that matter.”

One neighbor suggested the city make a swap with the developer.

“Wouldn’t it be lovely if the city could do an exchange with the owners of Belmont Holdings and give them the existing Clark School which is a gorgeous building with high ceilings and let them turn that into condominiums and turn this site into either a school or a park?” commented Deb Jackson.

This is not likely to occur.

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This 141st day of 2022 also has the distinction of being National Waitstaff Day, and in this time of college and university graduations, my thoughts are with those people who bring food and drink to celebrations all over the globe. For most of my career in journalism, I supplemented that work by being attentive, detail-oriented, and as accurate as possible as I served customers and clients. That experience really wasn’t that much different from any of the work that goes into every single installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

This is episode 383, and to help us all eventually get to episode 838, consider becoming a paying subscriber!

On today’s program:

Time is running out to tell Albemarle County your thoughts on the growth management policy that some would say has limited sprawl, and others would say has limited development

Another land use lawsuit has been filed against the city of Charlottesville

Charlottesville seeks a firm to help hire a new police chief

And the spring COVID-19 surge continues with cases rising in Virginia and beyond

Shout-out to Town Crier Productions

In today’s writer-and-publisher supported shout-out, Town Crier Productions, is the umbrella organization responsible for this Charlottesville Community Engagement newsletter. I founded the company two years ago to support my interest in bringing the community as much information as possible about local government, land use, the environment, economic development, and so much more.

The company is still just getting started, and if you’d like to help, consider a subscription through Substsck, or support Town Crier Productions through Patreon. There are also other sponsorship opportunities available as the number of offerings increases. To learn more, visit the Information Charlottesville archive and click on the Support the Info button. My sincere thank you to the hundreds of subscribers who have signed on so far!

COVID-19 update

On Friday, the Virginia Department of Health reported another 3,847 cases bringing the seven-day average of new cases to 3,157. The seven-day percent positivity increased to 15.6 percent, up from 9.1 percent three weeks ago.

Nationwide, the trend is toward more cases and more hospitalizations according to the Centers for Disease Control’s COVID dashboard. That tool also shows a trend toward fewer deaths per day with 242 a day reported on Thursday night. That could change as death is a lagging indicator as explained by Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System.

“As we see the summer surge start to move out of the northeast which is a highly vaccinated and COVID-experienced population to other parts of the country, we have concerns in the public health community that maybe what we’ve seen so far may not hold as true as the surge moves to the southeast,” Dr. Sifri said.

This week, the Blue Ridge Health District discontinued its local dashboard for COVID data from within its boundaries. This follows the Virginia Department of Heath’s retirement of four dashboards.

“The CDC dashboard is considered the standard when it comes to cases by vaccination status, as the definition of vaccination status is rapidly changing nationwide,” reads a newsletter from the Blue Ridge Health District.

You can find local data on the VDH dashboard by selecting the appropriate geographic region on the cases tab.

Children between the age of 5 and 11 are now eligible for boosters of the Pfizer vaccine. Appointments in the Blue Ridge Health District can be made online. Read the release on the Centers for Disease Control website for more information.

There will be a community remembrance on Tuesday, May 24, at 7 p.m. at the outdoor ampitheater at Sentara Martha Jefferson Hospital for those who died from COVID-19 hosted by area health care providers. (Facebook event page)

Charlottesville opening up search for new police chief

Nearly ten months since former Charlottesville police chief RaShall Brackney was fired by former City Manager Chip Boyles, the city is seeking a permanent replacement. On Friday, the city issued a request for proposals for a firm to conduct an executive search.

“The City is seeking a consultant to assist the City Manager through the process of hiring a new Chief of Police who embodies the principles of 21st Century Policing and has an anti-racist focus,” reads the request for proposals.

As part of the work, the selected firm will also seek community input on what the “desired characteristics and qualifications” for such a person would be. The solicitation states this will include a survey and in-person meetings. The firm will also be responsible for conducting background checks on all of the finalists.

“The Chief of Police is hired by and reports to the City Manager, but upon hire will be officially confirmed by the City Council,” the request continues.

The department is currently being led by Acting Police Chief Latroy Durette.The city is being run by interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers.

The closing date for the executive search firm is June 15.

Lawsuit filed against City of Charlottesville for rezoning of 240 Stribling

A person who lives on property on Stribling Avenue has filed suit against the Charlottesville City Council seeking declaratory judgment that the rezoning of 240 Stribling Avenue in April was illegal. (read the complaint)

“During the Planning Commission and Council meetings, the large amount of tax revenue to be gained from increasing the density was discussed as the primary reason for backing this ordinance,” reads paragraph eight of the suit, which was filed on May 18 and served to the city a day later.

Charlottesville City Council approved the rezoning on April 18, which will allow up to 170 units on about 12 acres in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood. (read a story)

The plaintiff is Cabell Marshall, who is representing herself in the matter. The suit states that Marshall “occupies a house” across from 240 Stribling, but does not specify which one until the signature at the end of the document. Much of the complaint repeats testimony made by opponents of the project, such as increased exhaust fumes and additional traffic.

The suit filed on May 18 also argues that an agreement between the city and Southern Development to pay for the upfront costs of upgrading Stribling Avenue is also invalid.

“Many neighbors on Stribling Avenue felt overwhelmed by [Charlie Armstrong]’s seemingly unfair advantage in getting advance encouragement directly from the city,” reads paragraph 13. “Virginia Code Section 2.3-3103 prohibits a city employee or someone in an advisory agency from using for his own benefit or that another party confidential information that he has acquired by reason of his public position and which is not available to the public.”

The complaint also argues that the public hearing was invalid because it was held while Council meetings were still remote. There’s also an argument the city has not done enough to upgrade city streets, such as the intersection of Stribling Avenue and Jefferson Park Avenue.

One of the first legal questions will be whether Marshall has legal standing to bring the suit forward.

The owner of the house where she lives is John C. Marshall, who is not named as a part in the suit. He owns two other properties on Stribling Avenue as well as three other throughout city limits.

The final comes from another Patreon supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, Charlottesville Inclusive Media, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

Albemarle closing survey on growth management policy

Like many localities across Virginia’s Fifth District including Nelson County and Danville, Albemarle County is currently reviewing its Comprehensive Plan. State law requires localities to prepare such plans and update them on a periodic basis.

Albemarle is reviewing its plan in a four-phase process and the first phase will take a look at the county’s growth management policy. A survey for input closes on Sunday at midnight.

“The current Comp Plan directs new residential, commercial, retail, office, and industrial development into the Development Areas,” reads the first part of a StoryMap that seeks to explain the history of the growth management policy. “The Rural Area is intended to be used for agriculture, natural resource protection, and some residential homes.”

That’s roughly five percent of the county’s 726 square miles.

Albemarle’s first Comprehensive Plan in 1971, and originally envisioned a much larger development area. This was at a time when Charlottesville still had the ability to annex county land if it could prove to a judge that the city would be able to provide urban services more efficiently.

However, subsequent plans reduced that area due to concerns such as siltation at the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir, which opened in 1967 and soon began to fill in. Another issue was the high cost to build water and sewer infrastructure to remote areas. Several villages have been removed since, such as the ones in Earlysville, Ivy, North Garden, and Stony Point.

In the early 90’s, four areas were added including the Village of Rivanna, the North Fork Research Park, and what is now being developed as North Pointe.

For the full history, read part two of the StoryMap. It’s well worth a read as the county considers changes.

“With an evaluation of the County’s Growth Management Policy, perhaps one of the most important factors to consider is how the policy is impacting the well-being of County residents and whether the policy is leading to equitable outcomes across different geographies within the County, such as residents in the Rural Area compared to residents in Development Area, or across different demographic groups such as age and race,” reads another portion of part 2.

The survey closes Sunday night. (fill out the survey)

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There are 32 days left until the summer solstice which will mark the longest time this year that the rays of our star will soak our area of the planet with light and other forms of radiation. However, this is the first day of the year when temperature gauges on the Fahrenheit scale will come very close to triple digits. What will Charlottesville Community Engagement say about the matter in this May 20, 2022 edition of the program? Very little, but the host, Sean Tubbs, is sincere in wishing everyone well in the heat to come.

On today’s program:
A historical marker is unveiled at the Central Library in downtown Charlottesville to honor the legal battle to admit a Black man to the University of Virginia Law School

Charlottesville City Council is briefed on efforts to get a handle on what property the city leases out and whether all of the tenants are paying their fair share

Fifth District Republicans will meet tomorrow to select a nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives

And work on a Regional Transit Vision will culminate next week in a long presentation to regional officials about what could happen if the area found a new mechanism for more funding for expanded transit

Shout-out for an ACHS program on the Fields of Honor

This year, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society has been working with a group called the Fields of Honor to identify soldiers who were killed in action in the Second World War. Since February, ACHS researchers have helped locate several photographs of the fallen, including that of Private Clarence Edward McCauley who was tracked down through high school records. There are 18 remaining photographs to be found, and on Thursday, May 26 at 7 p.m. the ACHS will host Debbie Holloman and Sebastian Vonk of the Fields of Honor Foundation to talk about how you can take part in their volunteer efforts honoring the service and sacrifice of US WWII service members buried or memorialized at US war cemeteries in Europe. That’s Thursday, May 26, at 7 p.m. via Zoom or Facebook Live.

Historical Marker unveiled at Central Library for crucial desegregation case

A crowd assembled yesterday afternoon at the intersection of East Market Street and 3rd Street NW in downtown Charlottesville to watch the unveiling of a historic marker to commemorate an important moment in the desegregation of education in Virginia. In 1950, Gregory Swanson applied to attend the University of Virginia School of Law, but he was denied a space because he was Black. He sued in federal court citing 14th Amendment rights to equal protection, and a three-panel judge heard arguments on September 5 that year.

David Plunkett is the director of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library, and he noted the historic nature of the building that is the library system’s headquarters.

“This building is formerly a federal building and home to the courtroom where Gregory Swanson won his legal petition for entry into the University of Virginia law school,” Plunkett said.

Plunkett said Swanson’s case was part of the NAACP’s legal strategy to challenge the system of desegregation.

“While the law school had admitted Mr. Swanson on his merit, with the support of staff including Mortimer Caplin, the Board of University Board of Visitors subsequently denied his admittance based on his skin color,” Plunkett said. “The case tried here overturned that ruling and helped lead to the desegregation of higher education in the South.”

Risa Goluboff is the current Dean of the UVA Law School, and she said the marker celebrates Swanson’s bravery and persistence.

“He did all this for a belief, for a legal and constitutional principle, for his own growth as a lawyer and a person, for his race, and for the nation as a whole,” Goluboff said.

Swanson was represented by the law firm of Hill, Martin, & Robinson, with future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall serving as his legal counsel.

Goluboff said the denial back in 1950 must be remembered, as well as the University’s condoning of slavery and the continuance of Jim Crow era laws. She said Swanson’s case should be celebrated.

“And when he succeeded, he became the first Black student not only at the University of Virginia Law School, not only at the University of Virginia writ large, but at any state in the former Confederacy,” Goluboff said. “Telling his story both forces and enables us to remember those aspects of our history of exclusion and segregation that we must know in order to repudiate them.”

Also on hand at the ceremony was M. Rick Turner, a former president of the Albemarle-Charlottesville NAACP. He said Black students at UVA have always challenged the status quo of an institution founded to perpetuate racial and class inequalities.

“It is worth remembering that the [admittance] of Black students at UVA years ago was not a benevolent gesture on the part of the UVA administrators and state officials, but rather the presence of Gregory Swanson paved the way,” Turner said.

To hear the event in full, visit the Charlottesville Podcasting Network where the full audio is posted and is available.

Fifth District Republican convention tomorrow

Republicans across Virginia’s new Fifth Congressional District will gather tomorrow at Hampden-Sydney College in Prince Edward County to select a candidate for the November 8 election. Over 2,000 attendees are pre-filed for the event, according to the draft program.

Incumbent Bob Good of Campbell County faces challenger Dan Moy in the race, and the program states that each will give a speech before the votes are taken. There will also be remarks from outgoing Chair William Pace and incoming Chair Rick Buchannan.

The program contains multiple endorsements for Good from Republican leaders across the United States, as well as several Delegates and Senators of the General Assembly. Moy’s sole endorsement is from the group Chasing Freedom Virginia.

There are a total of 24 Republican committees in the fifth District. The convention will be called to order at 10 a.m. and will use a weighted voting system. The winner will face Democrat Joshua Throneburg in the November election.

Regional Transit Vision update

Consultants hired by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission to craft a vision for how public transportation might work better in the Charlottesville area will present more details next Thursday.

The firm AECOM is the lead consultant with Jarrett Walker and Associates serving as a subcontractor. The study may recommend the eventualtransition to a unified regional transit authority. (meeting info)

“There will be a 90 minute presentation from the consultants to go over what we’ve done so far, survey the results of the first round of public engagement, and then also what they found for the vision for the community,” said Lucinda Shannon, a transportation planner for the TJPDC.

Shannon told a technical committee of the Metropolitan Planning Organization that a three-day workshop was held with the transit providers to imagine new bus routes under a new scenario where there is $26 million in annual funding from a new transportation authority. The consultants modeled that scenario after a new authority in the Richmond area that was created in 2020.

“We looked at the Central Virginia [Transportation] Authority’s model of how they collect revenue to kind of calculate how much we could collect if we formed an authority to pay for the vision,” Shannon said.

Shannon said that for now, the JWA’s work is more about what the vision will be. A second round of public engagement will take place soon after next week’s partnership meeting.

Shannon said the firm AECOM may also be hired to conduct a governance study to recommend how to actually come up with that hypothetical $26 million. That work is contingent on approval by the Commonwealth Transportation Board at their meeting in June. Shannon said this study will be more about the funding than changing the structure of area transit.

“So it’s not going to be looking at how [Charlottesville Area Transit] or any of the service providers are governed or run or anything like that,” Shannon said. “It’s just bringing in money and putting it out for transit.”

Funding for these studies come from Albemarle County, Charlottesville, and the Department of Rail and Public Transportation. The budget for the vision plan is $350,000 and the budget for the governance plan is $150,000.

See also:

Regional Transit Partnership briefed on Regional Transit Vision, looming Charlottesville Area Transit route changes, April 1, 2021

Regional Transit Vision may suggest resumption of Regional Transit Authority foundation, December 14, 2021

Shout-out to Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

City seeking to know more about what property it rents

The City of Charlottesville could be pulling in more revenue from tenants who may be leasing city property at rates well below the market rate. That’s one of the takeaways from a report given to Council at their meeting on May 16.

As the City of Charlottesville government seeks to rebuild after a recent era of frequent leadership transitions, the current management is looking at aspects of the city administration that have gone unnoticed or unchecked.

Until now, there has not been one central source in city government that controls all of the various leases the city has for its properties as well as service agreements. That makes it hard to track who is responsible or where the public can get information.

“So what we’re trying to do at this moment is compile that but one of the first things we had to do was identify an individual who would have that as their job,” said Sam Sanders, the Deputy City Manager for operations.

That person will be Brenda Kelley, who has been the redevelopment manager for the city for the past several years. Her position has been elevated to the Office of Community Solutions, and she’ll be presenting a full report to Council this summer. In the meantime, she prepared a briefing for Council for their May 16 meeting which began with a basic definition of what she’ll cover.

“Leases or agreement-type leases where either the city is a party,” Kelley said. “This is where the city owns the property or the city is a tenant of a property owned by someone else.”

The city has about 155,000 square feet of building spaces that bring in about $580,000 a year in revenue for the city. That doesn’t include about 50 acres under ground lease. The oldest lease dates back to 1922 and allows the city’s utilities office to use space at a pump station at the University of Virginia. One of the biggest amounts of space the city leases is at the Water Street Parking Garage.

“The city doesn’t own the Water Street Parking Garage but we lease parking spaces,” Kelley said.

The city does own the Market Street Parking Garage, as well as the buildings on East Market Street that are currently occupied by the Lucky 7 and a Guadalajara restaurant. The City Council of January 2017 paid $2.85 million for an eventual parking garage at the location, but the City Council of March 2021 opted to go in a different direction. For now, the city gets rent from those businesses.

“The Lucky 7 and the Guadalajara and all of the Market Street Parking Garage retail spaces, those rent funds go into the Parking Enterprise Fund,” Kelley said.

Revenues from the Charlottesville Pavilion and the building where S&P Global operates go into the Charlottesville Economic Development Authority fund.

Kelley said further research needs to be done into intergovernmental leases with the courts, libraries, and other entities. She said that systems need to be in place to track the leases and make sure that any rent increases due to the city are at least known about for Council’s consideration.

Councilor Sena Magill said she appreciated being able to see a more complete picture of the city’s property portfolio, and the potential to get more out of its investment.

“When we look at a lot of these rents on a lot of these buildings, they are at about half of market rate,” Magill said.

Magill said if the city is charging below market, it should be as a way of helping small businesses who are just getting started. She wanted to see a presentation from the Charlottesville Economic Development Authority on the leases they currently manage.

Mayor Lloyd Snook said he wanted any lessees to know that the preliminary report is not intended to raise rates, but just to provide information.

“Until this report and this information is gathered, we on Council had no idea who we were subsidizing and we have no idea why we’re subsidizing them in some cases and we may want to make some conscious decisions to continue to subsidize in the form of the rent or we may not but at least we will be doing so from the basis of actual knowledge,” Snook said.

More to come as the summer heats up.

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The heat is on, on the street, and this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement is ready to get inside your head, on every beat. With apologies to Glenn Frey, this is not an 80’s music nostalgia newsletter and podcast, but the idea is to look back at some of what’s happened recently while anticipating the changes that will come this summer. It’s May 19, 2022, and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s show:
The annual median income in the Charlottesville area has increased 19 percent over last year

Albemarle Supervisors further discusses ways to incentivize developers to build housing for those with lower than that median income

The new CEO of Jaunt explains that a new page is turning toward cooperation with Charlottesville Area Transit

A Pittsylvania County group seeks a second referendum on sales tax increase for education
Shout-out: RCA seeks input on the restoration of Riverview Park

Spring COVID-19 surge continues

To begin today, a quick look at the latest COVID numbers from the Virginia Department of Health. Today the VDH reports another 3,836 positive COVID tests done through the PCR method, and a number that does not count at-home tests. The seven-day positivity rate for tests has increased to 15.2 percent. The seven-day average for new cases is now at 3,078.

This surge of cases has so far not resulted in fatalities anywhere near what was seen in previous ones before vaccines were easily available. The seven-day average for new daily deaths is at three per day.

According to the Virginia Healthcare and Hospital Association, there are 60 COVID patients in intensive care in Virginia, with 23 of them on ventilators.

Pittsylvania County group wants to try again on sales tax referendum

Last November, voters in Pittsylvania County on the south side of Virginia’s Fifth Congressional District had on their ballot a referendum on whether or not to approve a one percent sales tax increase to fund school improvement projects. The measure failed on a 23-vote margin according to election night results from the State Board of Elections.

This Tuesday, the seven-member Board of Supervisors got an update on a campaign to try hold the referendum again this year, based on enabling authority that passed the General Assembly in 2020. Martha Walker is the chair of Pittsylvanians for a Brighter Future, an advocacy group that seeks passage this time around.

“One cent, one penny, will generate $3.8 million each year for the 19 years that we will be allowed to have that one cent sales tax added,” Walker said.

Under the same enabling authority, Danville voters voted in favor of the referendum and the sales tax increase has gone into effect. Speaking directly to the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, Walker said her organization will be seeking to educate the public on what improvements would be funded.

“You know that ten elementary schools will be focused on safety and getting rid of those trailers by building those new classrooms,” Walker said.

Charlottesville asked the General Assembly to be allowed to hold a referendum for its school system. Legislation passed the Democrat-controlled Senate, but failed to get out of a committee in the Republican-controlled House of Delegates.

There is still no state budget, an issue of increasing concern to school systems throughout the Commonwealth.

Jaunt CEO talks transit with Charlottesville City Council

The relatively new CEO of the transit agency Jaunt introduced himself to the Charlottesville City Council Monday and also had the chance to re-introduce a public service organization plagued by recent controversy.

Ted Rieck started with fundamentals.

“Our basic goal is to enable people to live their lives independently and with dignity and we’ve been doing this for about 42 years,” Rieck said. (view his presentation)

Jaunt serves the six localities of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission as well as Buckingham County. The Americans with Disabilities Act requires equivalent service to fixed route transit for disabled individuals, and Rieck said Jaunt performs this role for CAT for those who live within three-fourths of a mile of a bus stop.

“We also provide in some of the outlying counties circulator or intra-county service,” Rieck said. “We also provide links from the counties to Charlottesville and then we also provide commuter services into Charlottesville and [the University of Virginia].”

Rieck was hired last October by Jaunt. The agency’s Board of Directors asked the previous CEO to resign after irregular transactions were reported. That continues to have an impact on Jaunt’s budget.

“We had our CEO make some judgment errors in terms of spending money,” Rieck said. “That triggered an audit and that discovered some issues that Jaunt wasn’t doing very well.”

Rieck said Jaunt was making progress in correcting the errors pointed out in the audit, including misapplication of funds intended for rural use for urban purposes. There were also questions about administrative costs.

“We overstated some of our statistics which allowed us to get more state funding and federal funding that we were entitled to,” Rieck said. “This was an error that the prior CEO basically hoarded the data and did not share that with anybody.”

Rieck said Jaunt had to pay Virginia back a over a million dollars and that has happened. Record-keeping has now been improved.

The previous CEO was Brad Sheffield, who also served one term on the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. During that time, he was hired on as Jaunt’s director. Rieck said other anomalies have been discovered and Jaunt is cooperating with the ongoing investigation. He said Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation officials will visit Jaunt’s headquarters next week for further discussions.
Better cooperation?

Rieck said as the legacy of the Sheffield era continues to play out, he wants to build a partnership with Charlottesville Area Transit, and he’s in close contact with CAT Director Garland Williams.

“We are working together,” Rieck said. “I don’t believe Jaunt and CAT have played very well together in the past. We are turning a new page on that I believe.”

That includes more frequent meetings to discuss common issues, such as driver shortages. Another issue is how to transition to a fleet that doesn’t run on fossil fuels to meet the community’s expectations on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Jaunt is also seeking members to join an Alternative Fuel Advisory Committee to oversee a study for which Kimley Horn has been hired to run. Applications are due May 27, and the process will build off of a study that Charlottesville Area Transit is also running for their fleet. (apply)

They are also building off of conversations that have been taking place at the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership. In April, that group heard from transit officials in Burlington, Vermont about how fixed-route transit can carry students to public schools. Those conversations are now occurring here, according to Rieck.

“Today we discussed opportunities where we could see CAT bus routes overlapping areas where Albemarle County students live,” Rieck said. “Many of these people could conceivably take a bus to the high school, other schools as well. If that works out, we could save five or six bus operators for the school district. Doesn’t sound like much, but it’s really huge.”

Other avenues of regional exploration include the creation of a Regional Transit Authority and development of an app to help people navigate public transportation.

Rieck said Jaunt could also play a role in addressing the need for service to Crescent Halls, a Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority property whose residents have demanded door-to-door service be restored when the building reopens. He said the current service by Route 6 sees a large bus trying to navigate a small access road for which it was not designed.

“And my understanding is that’s an awkward movement for a larger vehicle to do so the thought would be to have Jaunt provide that service instead of the main route,” Rieck said.

Details to come in the future as Rieck said detailed conversations had not yet occurred.

Council pressed Rieck on whether Jaunt’s troubles with the Virginia Department and Rail and Public Transportation were over.

“First of all, are there any more shoes about to drop, and second, do you have a sense of when you will be past the shoe-dropping phase?” asked Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook.

Rieck said the long-standing issue is a pattern of mixing rural and urban funds that dates further back into Jaunt’s recent history. He said he’s being transparent with city, county, and state officials, as well as his board of directors.

“So I don’t think that there’s any more shoes to drop and if there is, that’s the one,” Rieck said.

Second shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

Albemarle Supervisors discuss incentives for housing plan

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors continued a conversation earlier this month about how to incentivize developers to build units to be sold below market value. The six-member Board last discussed the matter in February and pushed back on the idea of creating an overlay district in the county’s zoning ordinance. (previous coverage)

“The main question today that we would like some feedback on after listening to the information that’s provided is [whether] an affordable dwelling unit program something the Board would be interested in and staff reviewing?” asked Stacy Pethia, the county’s Housing Policy Manager. (view her presentation)

The General Assembly has already granted Albemarle enabling authority to pursue such a program, which would allow the county to require a certain percentage of units be rented or sold at affordable prices to households at 80 percent or lower than the median income. This requirement would be triggered by a rezoning or a special use permit.

Supervisors adopted the Housing Albemarle plan last July but delayed much of the implementation until these details could be worked out.

Before they got too deep into the conversation, Pethia said the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has now released updated calculations for area median income for 2022.

“That is now $111,200 annually and to put that into perspective, that is a 19 percent increase over last year’s area median income increase,” Pethia said.

The median income for the Washington metropolitan area is $142,300 and the median income for the Lynchburg metro is $78,900. We’ll come back to this in future stories about housing. (find the calculations for your favorite metro area)

Pethia said after the work session in February, staff opted to come forward with the affordable dwelling unit program that is authorized under state code.

“And the enabling legislation really doesn’t place many restrictions on what the county can do and what that program looks like,” Pethia said. “It does require we provide density bonuses but beyond that we are pretty open in the percentage of the affordable unit set-asides that we may require, the depth of that unit affordability, the length of the affordability for those units, and we also have the opportunity to include additional incentives within that ordinance above and beyond the density increases.”

Pethia said there are about 500 such programs across the United States. Commonalities between them include:

An identification of how many units the locality needs to be affordable

standardized amount per unit for developers to pay into a fund rather than build units

The right for the locality or its designee to purchase or rent affordable units that are actually constructed.

Several localities in Virginia have such a program, such as Loudoun County.

“They adopted their ordinance in 1999 and do require 6.25 to 12.5 percent of the units in projects to be affordable housing,” Pethis said. “Those units need to be affordable for 15 to 20 years depending on whether they are for sale or rent.”

Pethia said around 2,500 units have been created under this policy in Loudoun. Fairfax County has a similar ordinance and has created nearly 3,000 units.

For Albemarle, Pethia said county staff are recommending density bonuses, requiring 20 percent of total new units to be affordable as per Housing Albemarle, allowing non-profits to purchase “affordable” units for which the developer can’t find a qualified buyer, and a cash-in-lieu fee is a developer doesn’t want to build the units.

Such a program is not yet ready and Pethia wanted feedback on whether they should proceed.

Supervisor Ann Mallek had this question.

“Is there a way that we can put a hold on new applications until we get this process adopted?” Mallek said. “I’m very concerned that another 5,000 units will come in in application that we will somehow be forced to accept the applications and then we will lose the opportunity to get a much better result.”

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley said she supported the idea of the creation of a waiting list of people and families who are eligible to rent or purchase affordable units due to their income level.

“The waiting list would be extremely important to have a waiting list otherwise I can see this whole project failing if we don’t have a waiting list of qualified income buyers,” LaPisto-Kirtley said.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said that he did not want to see a list of stiffly-written incentives that might preclude flexibility.

“I hope we don’t get caught in the trap of saying that even if we put an example of incentives our, or encouraged incentives, or whatever the wording is, that we’re saying that that’s it, and that we have a process in place that allows for consideration of other incentives,” Gallaway said. “Each project will be different. Each spreadsheet is different.”

Gallaway also supported the cash-in-lieu program in order to be able to pay more funds into the county’s affordable housing trust rather than rely on surpluses.

A more detailed plan will come before the Board of Supervisors for a work session in August followed by a public hearing in September.

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On this day in 1890, Idaho became the 43rd member of the United States of America, a fact that may not have resonance but could be the important piece of information you hear today. This is doubtful, but we are only at the very beginning of this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a program that contains between two and two-hundred-and two facts per newsletters or podcast. Actual amounts may vary by consumer. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

A site plan will be held tomorrow for a large condominium complex on land in Belmont that’s been used for automotive repair

It’s the 68th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling, and the R.R. Moton School in Farmville is now an officially designated historic site

Albemarle County’s Climate Action Coordinator talks Climate Action with the Crozet Community Advisory Committee

Albemarle Supervisors to vote on resolution to allow reintroduction of a freshwater mollusk to area rivers

Time is running out to inform surveys for climate action planning in Charlottesville

First shout-out: Charlottesville Jazz Society spotlighting benefit show for Ukraine

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out. The Charlottesville Jazz Society is spotlighting a benefit event to support the people of Ukraine at the Whiskey Jar this Wednesday from 6:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Young jazz students near the besieged city of Mariupol sent guitarist Royce Campbell a plea to help, and several area musicians have jumped into action.

Vocalist Monica Worth has organized the event, and Campbell will play for Ukraine with bassist Andre La Vell and drummer Jim Howe. Many of Charlottesville’s best jazz musicians will sit in. Donations will be collected and sent to Global Giving’s Ukraine Crisis Relief Fund, and you can also go ahead and support this effort with a payment online. That’s We Play for Ukraine at the Whiskey Jar this Wednesday from 6:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m.

City climate actions surveys closing this Friday

The city of Charlottesville is working on a Climate Action Plan to guide decisions on funding and resources for efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the community. Charlottesville and Albemarle County both have agreed to meet certain reduction targets by 2030 and to be carbon-free by 2050.

A pair of surveys has been live since April 20, but the deadline to participate is coming up this Friday.

The first seeks input on how you think greenhouse gas emissions should be reduced and there have been over 160 responses so far. (survey #1)

The second wants your thoughts on what issues are faced by vulnerable populations when it comes to the top three climate hazards identified by staff. They are extreme heat, increased intensity of precipitation and flooding, and changing season conditions. This survey is five pages long. (survey #2)

To learn more, there are five Climate Action Fact Sheets on the city’s website.

Site plan review meeting for Belmont infill residential scheduled for tomorrow

As Charlottesville continues to change under the impact of a new Comprehensive Plan that encourages more residential density, there are still some examples of projects that could build to higher density under existing zoning.

One such example comes up tomorrow at a site plan review conference that will be held virtually at 10 a.m. by the city’s Neighborhood Development Services Department. (meeting info)

An entity with the name Belmont & Carlton Holdings LLC owns 16 parcels in the area, with one of them being a 2.58 acre parcel purchased in February 2006 upon which an automotive repair use has been on the property for many years. All of the land is zoned Neighborhood Commercial Center, which is the reason there are commercial uses in what some refer to as downtown Belmont.

Now, that entity seeks to develop a portion of nearly 6.2 acres of their property and they need a critical slopes waiver to do it.

“The applicant is looking to construct 118 multi-family condominiums and 12 single-family attached townhouses,” reads a supplement for the site plan review related to the critical slopes waiver. “The site includes existing city right of way that will be improved with the project for the development of the street grid and proposed neighborhood.”

As part of the development, the applicant is seeking to designate eight of the units as affordable and argue that is why the slopes waiver should be granted. Of the total site, 14.31 percent are defined as critical slopes. To mitigate the impact, the applicant will build a stormwater management facility to reduce the impact to the watershed.

In addition to the site plan review meeting, the critical slopes waiver will need to come through the Planning Commission and the City Council.

Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education ruling today

Today marks the 68th anniversary of the ruling in the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court case which struck down the legal doctrine of “separate but equal” that sanctioned and required schools to be segregated.

This anniversary marks the first time the U.S. Park Service has extended official recognition to other sites in other communities across the country that played a role in the Brown v. Board ruling. One of them is Farmville, where students at the R.R. Moton High School walked out on April 23, 1951 to protest inferior conditions and a pattern of being denied funds for improvements. A month later a lawsuit was filed by NAACP lawyers Spottswood Robinson and Oliver Hill and the case Davis v. County School Boardwas consolidated with four other cases on appeal to the Supreme Court.

To learn more about the ruling and about how the ruling eventually led to the five-year closing of all public schools in Prince Edward County, visit the R.R. Moton Museum’s website or its Facebook page.

Last week, President Joe Biden signed into law the Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Park Expansion and Redesignation Act which officially designates the R.R. Moton Museum as a National Historic Site. Learn more in a press release on the R.R. Moton website.

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Albemarle Supervisors to be asked to support reintroduction of James Spineymussel

The Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources is working on a plan to restore an endangered freshwater mollusk back into the James River watershed from which it has perished.

On Wednesday, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will vote on a resolution giving their support to efforts to introduce the James Spineymussel into the Rivanna River as well as the James River.

“Existing JSM populations have been augmented in six streams in Amherst, Bath, Buckingham, Botetourt, and Nelson Counties, but to truly recover this endangered species, the mussel also needs to be reintroduced to waterbodies from which it has been lost,” reads the staff report.

According to a staff report, there are over 300 species of freshwater mussels and many of them are located in the southeastern United States. They provide filtering of water with each individual able to process as many as 12 gallons a day in a single day.

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service and the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources have been working on a recovery plan for decades and have raised James Spineymussel at the Virginia Fisheries and Aquatic Wildlife Center at the Harrison Lake National Hatchery. The species has been on the federal endangered list since July 22, 1988.

The sighting of James Spineymussel has been enough to stop infrastructure projects in the past. At one point, the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority was considering a reservoir in northwestern Albemarle County, but the potential presence of the James Spineymussel eliminated that from further consideration.

Albemarle CACs are being briefed on county’s climate action implementation

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted a Climate Action Plan in October 2020 to help guide the county’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent of a baseline by the year 2030. That’s the first step before a second goal to be carbon neutral by 2050 and the baseline is derived from the year 2008.

Albemarle Climate Program Coordinator Gabe Dayley began his journey through the county advisory panels by asking the Crozet Community Advisory Committee what their first thoughts are when thinking about climate action and what he might have as an update. (review Dayley’s presentation)

“I’ll jump in because I hope that I will hear some real substantive things that we’re going to do and not just talk about them,” said Supervisor Ann Mallek.

Another CAC member said he’s noticed temperature changed over the decades. Kostas Alibertis has been in Crozet since the 1980’s.

“Truly in the winter time we used to be a lot cooler than Charlottesville and now our temperature seems to be more comparable to Charlottesville,” Alibertis said. “I think that some of the growth has taken away some of the coverage, the greenery and the grass, and that’s led to the community being a little warmer. Maybe I’m completely wrong about that, but how do we address what we’ve lost?”

There are some new members of the Crozet CAC and this was the first for Mallory DeCoster.

“I feel excited that this is a topic because this is my first meeting and I joined this group because I care about the environmental issues particularly in this county,” DeCoster said.

Another new member is local Realtor Jim Duncan, who said more needs to be done about getting infrastructure built to get people out of their cars.

“Climate change is a real legitimate thing but I don’t know what the viable action items are that the CAC can voice our opinion on,” Duncan said.

The Climate Action Plan was adopted prior to the review of the Albemarle Comprehensive Plan which is currently underway. Dayley said the overarching Comprehensive Plan that will be adopted will be influenced by the climate plan as well as efforts to include equity as a major consideration in future county decisions. He also said there’s a lot of work to be done.

“Climate change is big and can feel overwhelming and I think sometimes in professional spaces, policy spaces, local government, and science we can shy away from that side of things,” Dayley said. “But the number two point is that there is research showing that actually kind of like acknowledging our reaction whatever it might be to climate change might move us to effective actions.”

Dayley said everyone can take actions to be part of the solutions to meet community targets. Dayley said CACs can play a role in communicating back to the public what the county and its partners are doing.

There are four themes to Albemarle’s Climate Action Plan that mirror the county’s adopted missions and values.

“Through our efforts to address global climate change we also want to attend to our local health of people and place here, benefiting the local economy through our climate action,” Dayley said. “Also the local environment and thinking about some of our intersecting county priorities like clean water and biodiversity and then making sure the work that we do and the services we offer to folks are equitable and inclusive in how they involve people in the community and bring benefits.”

The plan itself has 135 action areas to reduce emissions for each of the sources including transportation, land use, building energy use, sustainable materials, renewable energy sources, agricultural and natural resources and more.

The most recent inventory of greenhouse gas emissions dates back to 2018 and another one is underway now that will give a glimpse into 2020. In September, the Board of Supervisors was told more work needs to be done to meet the 2030 targets. (read previous coverage)

Dayley said for the county, climate action means things like transitioning to an electric fleet and continuing to make county buildings more efficient.

“We’re also looking at how the county manages landscapes it owns and that includes things like parks and natural areas as well as school grounds,” Dayley said. “We’re soon going to be looking at also our procurement and the sustainability of the materials that we procure like plastics and paper and things like that.”

A second phase for the climate action plan will be on adaptation and mitigation and to prepare for impacts. The results of a climate vulnerability and risk assessment will be available for review in the coming months.

As Albemarle reviews its Comprehensive Plan and the growth management policy, Dayley said one idea is to continue to build places to live that are more dense to support public transit. Study and analysis by county staff demonstrates the role that conservation of existing ecological resources can play.

“They found that our forests are helping us quite a lot,” Dayley said. “They are sequestering and drawing down carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, almost a million carbon dioxide metric tons a year.”

I’ll have from other CAC presentations in future installments of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

At publication time, there are 12 views of this meeting on YouTube. Can we make that 24 in 24 hours time?

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There is a month and a week left until the summer solstice, and the time when the days begin growing shorter. Until then, there are now over 14 hours of sunlight in the section of the Earth on the day when the May 16 edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement is produced. That’s enough time to ensure that this newsletter and podcast at least tries to bring as much information as possible. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville Planning Commission recommends a seven-story building on Jefferson Park Avenue

A fatal crash on U.S. 29 near Greenbrier Road has claimed the life of a Charlottesville man

An Augusta County elections official is the latest appointee to the State Board of Elections

A quick update on COVID-19 from the Univ

Today’s first shout-out goes to LEAP

We’re now well into spring, and many of us may have already turned on our air conditioning units for the first in months. To see what you can do to get the most out of your home, contact LEAP, your local energy nonprofit, to schedule a home energy assessment this month - just $45 for City and County residents.

LEAP also offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If someone in your household is age 60 or older, or you have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

COVID cases still increasing; UVA Health urges renewed masking

As the week begins, the Virginia Department of Health this morning reports a seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases at 2,750 a day and the seven-day percent positivity has increased to 14.6 percent. The actual amount of spread is likely higher due to the number of home tests that have become common as a first diagnosis for many people.

“There are many people calling saying they’re COVID positive and importantly and interestingly, a fair number of those people have been vaccinated,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology for the University of Virginia Health System.

With more cases in the community, UVA officials say its time to take precautions again.

“Personally I’m masking back up and I think a lot of people are making the decision,” said Wendy Horton, the CEO of the UVA Health System. “It’s people that have been really careful, been vaccinated, and I think we’re just in this interesting time where we’re really tired of masking but I think it’s alive and well. We know it. We see it in our workforce. We see it in our patients.”

The latest COVID model from the UVA Biocomplexity Institute was released on Friday.

“Models forecast a significant surge of cases in the coming weeks,” reads the model. “Case rates are not expected to reach levels seen during the January wave. But they will likely exceed those seen in pre-Omicron waves.”

Dr. Sifri said ebbs and flows are likely to continue as COVID-19 continues to transition from pandemic to endemic. He said the same public health advice exists.

“In a period of time like now where we’re starting to see a surge in cases, this is the time to say okay, in this time and place right now, wearing a mask is helpful to prevent transmission,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s also important because with COVID it still remains the case that probably half or more than half of cases are in people who are asymptomatic or have such mild symptoms that they don’t recognize that they’re sick.”

This week the Virginia Department of Health is retiring several dashboards and ways of reporting COVID. People who seek to know cases by vaccination status will need to go to the Centers for Disease Control website. Cases and Deaths by Date Reported will also be phased out.

The changes will take place on May 19. The VDH already has stopped reporting cases by locality on its website. Learn more about the changes on their website.

Fatal crash on Seminole Trail

Albemarle County police are investigating the cause of a fatal crash last night in the 1200 block of U.S. 29 near Greenbrier Drive. Thirty-six-year old Justin Michael Tilghman of Charlottesville died at the scene of the crash which happened at 9:21 p.m. last night. The driver of a second vehicle was taken to the University of Virginia hospital.

The Albemarle County Police Department’s Fatal Crash Reconstruction Team is leading the investigation. This is the fourth fatality on Albemarle County roads so far in 2022.
Augusta County official named to State Board of Elections

Governor Glenn Youngkin has named a member of the Augusta County Board of Elections to serve on the Virginia State Board of Elections. Youngkin named Georgia K. Alvis-Long to the position. A press release identifies her occupation as a registered nurse instructor.

Under Virginia law, the State Board of Elections is a five-member body that will have three members from the political party that won the Governor’s mansion in the last election.

“Each political party entitled to an appointment may make and file recommendations with the Governor for the appointment,” reads Section 24.2-102 of Virginia Code.

Alvis-Long fills a position left by the resignation of Jamilah D. LeCruise.

For more recent appointments, take a look at the full release.

Second shout-out: Charlottesville Jazz Society spotlighting benefit show for Ukraine

In today’s second subscriber supported shout-out. The Charlottesville Jazz Society is spotlighting a benefit event to support the people of Ukraine at the Whiskey Jar this Wednesday from 6:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Young jazz students near the besieged city of Mariupol sent guitarist Royce Campbell a plea to help, and several area musicians have jumped into help.

Divided Planning Commission approves seven-story building on Jefferson Park Avenue

A divided Charlottesville Planning Commission voted 4-3 on May 10 to recommend that City Council approve a special use permit for additional height and density for a seven-story U-shaped building at 2005 Jefferson Park Avenue. They’ve also recommended reducing parking requirements by 22 percent over what would otherwise be required.

“The [special use permit] is required to accommodate a development being proposed for 119-units of multifamily dwellings within one building with underground parking,” said city planner Matt Alfele.

This project was filed after the city adopted a new Comprehensive Plan and Future Land Use Map created as part of the Charlottesville Plans Together initiative, which is still underway. There are currently 17 units across multiple structures across the property.

“The Future Plan Use Map, the Comprehensive Plan that we went through, is increasing density and increasing density in certain areas of the city, and this area of the city is one that is looking to increase density and to increase density at especially this scale is going to create a big building,” Alfele said.

The developer would pay $500,000 into the city’s affordable housing fund rather than provide required affordable units on-site or at another location nearby. They’ll build 125 parking spaces in an underground garage with access on Washington Avenue. Residents would not be eligible to park on that street or Observatory due to restricted parking.

The building would be seven stories taller from JPA and would be five stories tall at the back.

“The biggest concern I think staff had was the rear elevation, the five story building going down into the mainly single-family, two-family neighborhood,” Allele said.

This request comes after City Council adopted a new Comprehensive Plan with a Future Land Use Map that encourages more residential density, but before the new zoning rules have been written.

“Do you happen to know and can you remind me what in our Future Land Use map, what this area is designated as, and what the by-right height would be in that corridor?” asked City Councilor Michael Payne.

“This is Urban Mixed Use Corridor and the height is five stories or up to eight at key intersections,” Alfele said. “This is one of the areas where our Comprehensive Plan land use conflicts with our current zoning because our Comprehensive land use map is anticipating our zoning changing. The Future Land Use Map measures in stories and not feet.”

Under the existing zoning, the structure could be 35 feet tall without a permit. This is one of the areas that will be clarified in the zoning rewrite. The term “key intersection” is also currently not defined.

Payne pointed out the Comprehensive Plan seeks to encourage more units that would be rented to people below market.

“The framework that we’ve adopted for that is that if we’re going above the by-right height, the reason we’re doing that is to have an inclusionary zoning program that’s going to required affordable housing as part of that,” Payne said.

Payne also suggested $500,000 as an affordable housing contribution would not go far.

“I know it’s their choice and we don’t have any control over it but I would just note for the record that we got an affordable housing report that included data on the total subsidy needed to construct a new affordable unit, and I can’t remember the exact number but I know in Virginia that total subsidy to build one new unit could be around $300,000,” Payne said.

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook noted that there had been a lot of concerns during the Future Land Use Map from other neighborhoods such as North Downtown, but he had not heard much from the JPA neighborhood at that time.

“The one area where it seemed clear that everyone was willing to agree we should have increased density was along JPA yet there was no basically no public discussion of that fact,” Snook said.

Until the rezoning is finalized, individual applications like this are the forum for how the city will look in the future.

The project will need a certificate of appropriateness from the Entrance Corridor Review Board, which is also the Planning Commission. They’ll get to influence the design.

The developer said the area was already predominantly occupied by renters, and that this level of density is served by transit.

“We are one block away in each direction from the trolley stops,” said Erin Hannegan with Mitchell + Matthews Architects and Planners.

Hannegan acknowledged the Future Land Use Map designation of Urban Mixed Use Corridor and said this project meets the goals of the Comprehensive Plan.

“The further definition is ‘higher intensity mixed-use development’ for this area and that’s exactly what we’re trying to do,” Hannegan said. “A higher intensity development. Mixed use is not allowed under the R-3 mixed-use currently designated.”

Hannegan acknowledged that the new building would be out of scale with what is currently there, but anticipated the future conditions of JPA.

“This building might be taller than its current neighbors but it won’t be out of character with the future implementation of the Comprehensive Plan and the implementation of the vision that’s been in the works for over 20 years for this particular neighborhood,” Hannegan said.

At the public hearing, Nina Barnes of the Jefferson Park Avenue Neighborhood Association said the Comprehensive Plan compels Council and the Planning Commission to take adverse effects into account when considering a special use permit.

“Adverse impacts may include traffic or parking congestion, undue density and population, and massing and scale,” Barnes said. “This project has adverse effects in all of these ways.”

Barnes said the seven-story building would block the sun from existing one and two story buildings.

Ellen Contini-Morava said the staff reports seemed to be in favor of the developer, and noted the gap between an adopted Comprehensive Plan and older zoning. She said this undermines the spirit of the Cville Plans Together Initiative.

“This application treats the rezoning that’s proposed in the Future Land Use Map as if it were already in place,” Contini-Morava said. “This application not only aims to short-circuit the rezoning process but even requests a height that is two stories higher than the five stories suggested in the Future Land Use Map for the JPA corridor.”

Fifeville resident Matthew Gillikin spoke for the group Livable Cville, which is not a registered entity with the State Corporation Commission but is active in promoting higher density in the community. Gillikin said the answer to affordability in Charlottesville is more housing.

“And the developer is planning to contribute nearly $500,000 to the Charlottesville affordable housing fund as a condition to build,” Gillikin said. “This will fund groups like [Charlottesvile Redevelopment and Housing Authority], LEAP, [Albemarle Housing Improvement Program], [Piedmont Housing Alliance], and Habitat for Humanity in the work to address local housing issues.”

Gillikin said approval of this project would prevent students from moving into local neighborhoods such as Tenth and Page and Fifeville.

These units would have no affordability provisions. For comparisons let’s look at the Standard, another building designed by Mitchell + Matthews Architects. According to their website, the lowest rent for a room in a four-bedroom unit goes for $1,029 a month. Double occupancy in a single bedroom in a three bedroom unit can go for $845 a month. One and two bedroom units in the Standard are sold out.

Pricing is not available online for the Flats at West Village.

The Lark on Main has a one bedroom unit with a study for $1,879 a month. A room in a four bedroom, four bathroom costs $955 a month. Garage parking is an extra $100.

Commission discussion

After the public hearing, Commissioner Hosea Mitchell said he supported the project, but did want the massing to be a little more consistent with the rest of the neighborhoods.

“We do need more housing in Charlottesville and we do a bit of relief valve,” Mitchell said. “We need housing in Charlottesville that is closer to UVA so that the housing that is further away from UVA can be used by the rest of our citizenry,” Mitchell said.

Commissioner Taneia Dowell said if the developer is going to additional density based on the future zoning for the property, the spirit of the Affordable Housing Plan must also be honored.

“That’s where I’m really having some heartburn,” Dowell said. “If we’re going to go off future endeavors for this project and this special use permit, then we need to go off future endeavors for everything related to this.”

Commissioner Jody Lahendro said he could not support this level of density in the area and especially with a building with that much massing. He said the Comprehensive Plan also calls for development on Entrance Corridors to be compatible with existing neighborhoods.

“I am not in favor of sacrificing a long term neighborhood for providing student housing for the University,” Lahendro said. “I think the people who have lived here and the single-family homes in this neighborhood deserve… we can’t just pretend that they’re not there.”

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg said he was reviewing the permit request under existing rules and not looking ahead to the new zoning. Quoting the standards of review, he noted that the Commission must review whether a proposal would be “harmonious with existing patterns of use and development in the neighborhood.”

“But it will shock you guys to learn that harmonious is not actually defined in the code so the question I think before us is whether a five-story building can co-exist near or next to even smaller buildings including detached houses,” Stolzenberg said. “I’d note there’s already a four and a half story building at the head of the street.”

Bill Palmer is with the Office of the Architect at the University of Virginia and sits as a non-voting member of the Planning Commission. He said UVA is not in an era where they are being required by the Commonwealth of Virginia to increase enrollment. According to the UVA office of Institutional Research and Analytics, there was an on-Grounds enrollment in Fall 2021 of 16,793 undergraduates and 6,928 graduate students. (enrollment data)

“If you look at our official projects, they are flat,” Palmer said.

Palmer said UVA is building additional housing on Grounds, including a second new structure in the Brandon Avenue Corridor. He also said the UVA initiative to build up to 1,500 new affordable units in the community includes a site further down from 2005 JPA in Albemarle County at the Piedmont housing site.

“In terms of having affordable housing close in the future, that will be a place where the University is trying to provide something,” Palmer said.

Council thoughts

Council will have the final decision, but did not vote during what is their first reading.

Councilor Payne said he was frustrated that the affordability rules of the future are not yet in place.

“This happened with another [special use permit] a few weeks ago where we’re in this strange situation where we’re sort of evaluating the Future Land Use Map and zoning map rewrite in mind, but if we’re using that in our evaluation, that will include our framework of inclusionary zoning and affordable housing overlays which are critical to the success of that plan for affordable housing,” Payne said.

Councilor Brian Pinkston said he is learning toward support because it did provide more housing close to the University of Virginia.

“I’m not able to fully articulate how we square that with point number one which is whether it is harmonious,” Pinkston said. “To some degree I think harmoniousness might be in the eye of the beholder. I will say that in terms of how the design was laid out and that you have seven stories in the front and five stories in the back, I thought there was some care and attention to trying to integrate into the neighborhood.”

Snook also said he had issues with the word “harmonious” and said the traditional form of land use control known as “Euclidean zoning” is not good at dealing with change.

“It doesn’t allow for us to grow gradually from a little bit of density to a little bit more density,” Snook said. “It allows us to say okay, we’re going to rezone the entire block of the entire neighborhood but it doesn’t let us go bit by bit.”

As the Entrance Corridor Review Board, the Planning Commission voted unanimously on a motion to acknowledge there would be an adverse impact, but those impacts can be mitigated through the design process.

As the Planning Commission, they consider a motion made by Stolzenberg to recommend approval. The was 4-3 with Stolzenberg, Mitchell, Habbab, and Commission Chair Lyle Solla-Yates voting in favor. Lahendro joined Dowell and Commissioner Liz Russell in voting no.

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Welcome to the only Friday the 13th of all of 2022!

Many consider the day to be unlucky, a tradition that goes back many centuries. Rather than go through all of that, I’m more curious to know what you think of this day. Do you take precautions? Did you even notice? Do other days in a Friday the 13th’d month also have powers? In any case, those questions aren’t the purpose of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a podcast and newsletter whose host still wonders why.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is mostly free but your financial support will help it growing!

On today’s program:

Governor Youngkin orders flags at half-mast to commemorate one million Americans who have died from COVID

There are five vacancies on the Charlottesville Planning Commission, and the city is seeking applicants

An update on the city’s zoning process as well as an update a lawsuit claiming the Comprehensive Plan is invalid under state law

And a quick preview of a conversation between the Reverend Alex Joyner and the author of a book on Virginia’s eugenics movement

Shout-out to Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes this spring and summer to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. Coming up on June 7 is a tree identification course taught on Zoom by tree steward Elizabeth Ferguson followed by a separate hike on June 11 at the Department of Forestry’s headquarters near the Fontaine Research Park.

One million Americans have died of COVID since pandemic began

Governor Glenn Youngkin has followed the direction of President Joe Biden and has ordered that the United States and Virginia flags be flown at half-mast until Monday to commemorate the milestone of a million Americans who have now died of COVID in the past 26 months. I’ll have more on the pandemic tomorrow.

On Thursday, the Virginia Department of Health reported another 3,144 new cases, and the seven-day average for new cases is 2,441. The seven-day percentage for PCR tests is 13.7 percent, up from 11 percent on May 6 and 9.1 percent on April 29. None of those numbers include tests taken at home.

This morning the Virginia Healthcare and Hospital Association reports 325 people in hospitals are currently COVID positive, but many of those patients may have been admitted for other reasons. Forty-five COVID patients are currently hospitalized in intensive care units and 20 of those are on ventilators.

Nationwide, the trend is toward more cases with 84,778 new cases reported through PCR tests according to data collected by the Centers for Disease Control. Hospitalizations are also trending upward across the country with a seven-day average of 2,603 new admissions a day.

It’s important to remember that the number of COVID fatalities continues to trend downward with a current seven-day average of 272 deaths. The highest seven-day average during the pandemic was 3,420 in mid January of 2021 and 2,709 in early February of this year.

Charlottesville hires two department heads

The City of Charlottesville has promoted two employees to take over their departments, and has also filled the position of Human Resources Director.

Mary Ann Hardie will move to Charlottesville from Washington state to take the human resources position, which has been vacant since November 2020 when Michelle Vineyard left after just over a year of service. Hardie has served for the past three years as human resources director in Lacey, Washington. That’s a suburb of state capital Olympia that grew from 42,393 people to 53,526 from 2010 to 2020 according to the U.S. Census.

Hardie starts work on May 16.

Misty Graves has been with the city of Charlottesville’s Human Services Department for 16 years and has been the interim director since Kaki Dimock left the city to work for Albemarle County.

“I am humbled by the opportunity to build on the existing work of the Department," is quoted in a press release. "Our Department is comprised of dedicated staff that are committed to creating a more equitable and just community so all of our residents may thrive, and it’s my honor to work alongside them.”

David Dillehunt has been the interim deputy director of the Office of Communications and Public Engagement since soon after former director Brian Wheeler stepped down late last year. Deputy Director Joe Rice left soon afterwards. Dillehunt began working for Charlottesville in 2005 as a consultant has won two Regional Emmy Awards for work he’s produced for the city.

In 2004, Dillehunt also produced a documentary on the children’s program You Can’t Do That On Television. (play the trailer)

The city is still looking to fill the director’s position for the Office of Communications and Public Engagement. The position closes May 18 if you want to throw your hat in the ring. (see the vacancy)

Vacancies opening up on Charlottesville Planning Commission

If you have an interest in advising Charlottesville City Council on land use decisions, and have time to devote to the effort, you may get your chance.

“There are spots on the Planning Commission that are coming open this summer,” said Missy Creasy, the Deputy Director of the city’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services. “And right now we are in the window for applications.”

There are five terms ending this summer, and at least two current members cannot reapply. They are Jody Lahendro and Taneia Dowell. Commissioner Karim Habbab is filling an unexpired term which runs out on August 31. The terms of Hosea Mitchell and Rory Stolzenberg are both running out on that day.

Stolzenberg is also filling out the unexpired term vacated when Hunter Smith resigned in 2018 after a handful of months in the position.

Apply for the position here.

Charlottesville zoning info slightly delayed

Work on the next phase of the rewriting of Charlottesville’s zoning ordinance continues, but it’s slightly delayed. Neighborhood Development Services Director James Freas told the Planning Commission Tuesday that a “diagnostic and approach” report was not ready in time for their May meeting, but he hopes it will be out by the end of this month. (previous coverage)

“As this point we are anticipating that the joint meeting between the Council and the Planning Commission to eventually make a decision on moving forward with that report, we’re projecting that happening in September at this point in time,” Freas said.

Freas is now referring to this report as a conceptual plan for the new zoning ordinance.

“It’s going to lay out what the approach is towards bringing our zoning into consistency with our Comprehensive Plan and its meant to include within it both modeling of potential building outcomes, so what type of buildings might be buildable under the policies articulated in the Comprehensive Plan, and how the market might respond to this new zoning,” Freas said.

Freas said a public meeting will be held two weeks after the report with other community engagement events happening over the summer.

The new Comprehensive Plan was adopted in November 2021. Consult Information Charlottesville for a series of property transactions in city limits since then.

That joint City Council and Planning Commission meeting in September will be after a pair of judicial proceedings related to a lawsuit filed by anonymous Charlottesville property owners challenging the validity of the Comprehensive Plan. A hearing on the initial motion will be held in Charlottesville Circuit Court on July 15 with Judge Richard E. Moore presiding. A hearing on a city-filed demurrer to require the plaintiffs to identify themselves will be held on August 26.

Alderman Library construction reaches milestone

The tallest portions of the new Alderman Library have been installed, and the University of Virginia marked the occasion with a “topping out” ceremony. UVA Today reports that over a hundred workers were on hand to witness the placement of two steel beams that had been signed by UVA officials and more.

“The two beams are part of the steel-framed clerestory roof structure, an architectural feature that will allow natural light to reach the study and reading rooms inside the library,” writes Matt Kelly in an article posted yesterday.

The library itself is only two thirds of the way to being completed. When it’s done, there will be a new entrance that faces University Avenue. Bill Palmer is with the UVA Office of the Architect and he gave an update to the Charlottesville Planning Commission on Tuesday.

“That’s a big milestone of a transformative project over there that will really open up the library towards University Avenue as you’re going up and down that thoroughfare,” Palmer said.

The original library opened in 1937, but was closed off to University Avenue in 1967 when the “stacks” were built.

I’ll have more from the Planning Commission in a future edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

In today’s other three shout-outs

In the middle, I’d like to take the opportunity to wish my brother, Steve Tubbs, a happy birthday for tomorrow.

The final comes from another Patreon supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!
Eugenics and the Making of Modern Virginia

The newsletter and podcast you’re experiencing stems from a website I created in 2005 to bring lectures, interviews, and audio segments to the public as an experiment. The Charlottesville Podcasting Network has been in the hands of my friend Dan Gould for several years, but he recently retired and passed the baton back to me. From time to time, I’ll end this newsletter with a small taste of what you might hear there.

The Reverend Alex Joyner is the pastor of Charlottesville First United Methodist Church, and he wants to ask questions about what it takes to make a place more whole. One thread in his questioning is the future of Market Street Park in downtown Charlottesville. In February, he interviewed Elizabeth Catte, the author of Pure America: Eugenics and the Making of Modern Virginia.

Catte said she wrote the book after learning about some of the history of Western State Hospital. After the original structure closed in 2005, the site was turned over to the Staunton Industrial Authority for redevelopment as apartments. At one point, the facility was known bluntly as the Western State Lunatic Asylum.

“Its history became part of its branding identity and that was a really interesting transformation to me,” Catte said.

“Yeah, that’s a long stretch to pull those two things together,” Joyner said.

“So 200 years of history had to get condensed into something that could be about two paragraphs on a website and could also be anchored to branding material for tourism, for community development, so it developed this really cozy kind of positive story about early physicians who committed themselves to the humane treatment of mental illnesses,” Catte said. “That was certainly one of the chapters of that sites’ history but the larger chapter that I knew as a historian was the history of the institution during the eugenics era.”

Eugenics was the legal practice of sterilizing those thought to be inferior so they would not reproduce. The 1927 United States Supreme Court ruling of Buck v. Bell cleared the way for the practice, with Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes delivering the line “three generations of imbeciles is enough.” The practice was legal until the 1970’s.

“At least 1,700 people were sterilized against their will at Western State Hospital,” Catte said. “The longest serving superintendent was a vocal leader of the Virginia eugenics movement and it has a very harrowing history.”

To hear more from Alex Joyner’s interview with Elizabeth Catte, visit the Charlottesville Podcasting Network.

Or view the interview on YouTube.

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Today marks 21 years since the death of Douglas Adams, a writer whose importance to my formation is not necessarily worth noting, but the commemoration of his passage is being noted all the same. Each of us is mortal and for the most part do not know when we will breathe our last. Until mine, I feel it is important for me to document as much as possible, and that is the mission of each and every installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a program that most definitely would not have existed if not for the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The jury is still out on the Celestial Homecare Omnibus.

Share and enjoy!

On today’s program:

Workers at one of Bodo’s Bagels three locations want to unionize

The latest version of Consumer Price Index is out, and inflation is up but not quite as much as last month

Area businesses involved in the Community Climate Collaborative’s Green Business Alliance report Greenhouse Gas Emissions reductions

And more study on future planning for transit takes place at a time when existing systems are struggling to find enough drivers

Shout-out: RCA seeks input on the restoration of Riverview Park

The first Patreon-fueled shout-out today is for the Rivanna Conservation Alliance and their work to help the City of Charlottesville with the restoration of Riverview Park. The RCA wants your input to inform a project that aims to restore a 600-foot section of the Rivanna riverbank in an area that’s designated for public access to the waterway as well as a 200-foot section of a dangerously eroding stormwater channel nearby. How should the work be prioritized? That’s where you come in with your input. Visit rivannariver.org to learn more about the project, which seeks to help Riverview Park continue to be a welcoming place to exercise, cool off, paddle, fish, play, explore, observe nature, and escape from the day-to-day stresses of life.

Workers at Bodo’s franchise seek to unionize

Two members of Charlottesville City Council will be on hand this afternoon as employees of the Bodo’s Bagels’ location on the Corner announce their desire to unionize.

“Employees with the union organizing committee cite several concerns leading up to the effort, including understaffing, a lack of pay transparency, inadequate paid sick leave, and wages that aren’t keeping up with the rising cost of living in Charlottesville,” reads the press release from the United Food & Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 400.

That group already represents grocery workers at Kroger and Giant Food. The release states that “approximately” 14 employees are involved and that they presented signed union authorization cards to Bodo’s management on Tuesday and seek voluntary recognition.

“The employees also filed for an election with the National Labor Relations Board in the event that management refuses to voluntarily recognize the union, at which point an election will be conducted by the federal labor department,” the release continues.

However, representatives from Bodo’s management said the cards were not presented. In a statement, they also said the company has always sought to set a high standard.

“Bodo’s has been doing the best we can in every way we can for the Charlottesville community for over thirty years, and we've always been keenly aware that that's a moving target,” wrote Scott Smith and John Kokola to Charlottesville Community Engagement.

“We support the right of our employees to choose whether or not they want to bring in a third-party representative, though we have always worked hardest to be that advocate by offering substantially above market wages, and hands on, proactive, compassionate management,” their comments continued.

Both Payne and Magill are advocates for a collective bargaining agreement that would allow city employees to unionize. Municipal employees in Virginia could not do so until legislation passed the Virginia General Assembly in 2020. Last August, Council directed former City Manager Chip Boyles to pursue study of a collective bargaining ordinance. Boyles was out of office two months later.

In March, the city issued a request for proposals for a firm to help establish a collective bargaining program, but so far a contract has not been awarded. (city bid page)

“There will be an award forthcoming, but the process of evaluating the submissions is ongoing so there is no date that can be provided of when the contract will be awarded,” said David Dillehunt, the interim deputy director of communications.

See also: Charlottesville to study collective bargaining options, August 19, 2021

Bureau of Labor Statistics: Inflation continues to grow

The federal agency that keeps the official metric on the cost of goods has released the numbers for April, and the Consumer Price Index rose 0.3 percent, a slower increase than reported in March.

“Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 8.3 percent before seasonal adjustment,” reads the release that was published this morning.

That’s a lower number than when the numbers were reported in April, when the increase was 8.5 percent.

The prices of shelter, food, airline fares, and new vehicles were the categories that increased the most. Food increased 0.9 percent over March, but the energy index actually declined in April. Gasoline dropped 6.1 percent, but natural gas and electricity increased.

There are two sub categories for food. The price of “food cooked at home” increased 0.9 percent and “food away from home” increased 1 percent.

Nonprofit group claims success in effort to reduce GHG emissions in business cohort

Last May, the Community Climate Collaborative formed the Green Business Alliance to encourage sixteen companies to take steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The goal is to reduce their collective emissions by 45 percent by 2025, five years ahead of when both Albemarle County and Charlottesville pledged to meet the same objective.

This morning the nonprofit entity reports the group has a collective 28 percent reduction in the first year since a baseline was established.

“Comparing 2021 emissions to the baseline year, which varies by member, the [Green Business Alliance] Boffset a total of 4,800 metric tons of CO2-equivalent,” reads their press release.

Some of the ways those reductions have been made are by relocations to new buildings. For instance, Apex Clean Energy moved to a new building that consolidated all employees in one place.

“The mass-timber Apex Plaza, which features green building materials, solar power generation, and on-site battery storage, is on the cutting edge of sustainable design—mirroring Apex’s work at the forefront of the new energy economy,” reads a description of the new building on the company’s website.

While the Apex Plaza building is not LEED-certified, it is one of the largest timber-built structures in the nation, and timber-built structures have a lower carbon footprint than those built of concrete or steel.

Additionally, the Quantitative Investment Management moved to the CODE Building, which is LEED-certified. Other participants have moved to LEED-certified building since their baselines, including the Center and the CFA Institute.

In addition, eight of the 16 companies installed over 1,600 solar panels on their properties, offsetting another 550 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent.

For more information, read the Community Climate Collaborative’s blog post on the topic.

Watch a video with highlights of Apex Plaza:

Second shout-out to JMRL’s How To Festival

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will once again provide the place for you to learn about a whole manner of things! The How To Festival returns once more to the Central Library in downtown Charlottesville on Saturday, May 14 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. There is something for everyone in this fast-paced, interactive and free event!

There will be 15-minute presentations and demonstrations on a diverse set of topics. Want to know how to do a home DNA test? Tune a guitar? What about using essential oils to repel mosquitoes? Visit the library website at jmrl.org to learn more. Schedule is coming soon! That’s the How To Festival, May 14, 2022.

Regional Transit Partnership updated on studies and drive shortages

The audience for Charlottesville Community Engagement may have successfully doubled the number of views for the April 28, 2022 meeting of the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership. At the tail end of the program, I called upon you all to take a look at the meeting and I can successfully report there have now been 11 views.

But, of course, the reason you read a newsletter like this is so you don’t have to view them. So, as promised, here are some highlights from the rest of the meeting.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission continues to oversee the creation of a Regional Transit Plan, and the Regional Transit Partnership will have a full review at their meeting scheduled for May 26.

But, the members of the partnership had the materials in the packet for the April 28 meeting. You have access to those materials here via cvillepedia.

“The project started in the fall of 2021 and the team developed a land use assessment and a transit assessment,” said Lucinda Shannon, a transportation planner for the TJPDC. “They identified community goals and solicited community input for the vision for the future of transit in the region.”

The consultants are currently writing up network and corridor improvements.

“And in June the team will gather public input on the proposed improvements and then will make adjustments and then the project should finish by August,” Shannon said.

The vision plan will be presented to City Council and the Board of Supervisors this summer.

This is not to be confused with a governance study that is in the planning stages to inform what a potential Regional Transit Authority might look like.

“The governance study is more on how we’re going to pay for the vision and the projects,” Shannon said.

This is also not to be confused with the draft route changes proposed by Charlottesville Area Transit that have not yet been implemented due to driver shortages.

“We’re extremely limited on our driver numbers and are actually really short,” said Garland Williams, CAT’s director. “We’ve got to figure out how to get more drivers in the hopper to do the level of service that the community wants.”

As of April 28, Williams said CAT needed 20 additional drivers. He said he’s lost several drivers to the private sector which have higher-paying jobs.

As of today, that number is down to 17.

“We currently have 3 new drivers in training,” said Kyle Ervin, the marketing coordinator for CAT.

The topic of driver shortages topic came up during a recent non-RTP roundtable of transit providers. Karen Davis, the deputy director at Jaunt, said her agency has been meeting with CAT and University Transit Service to work out solutions.

“Jaunt has identified some potential overlap of CAT routes with [Albemarle County Public Schools] routes which warrants discussion,” Davis said.

Davis said the City of Charlottesville has also approached Jaunt to assist with better transit service to Crescent Halls when it reopens later this year.

The next meeting of the Regional Transit Partnership is May 26. Until then, let’s see if we can get the number of views on the April 28 meeting up to 20! And let’s get likes up to 2!

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Following up from yesterday, did you find your lost socks? Do you have an interest in tying up loose ends? For that’s mostly what this May 10, 2022 edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement shall be, with bits and bobs from previous weeks knitted together in this 377th edition of this newsletter and or podcast. I’m your host, Sean and or Tubbs.

Send this on to someone new so we can grow the audience!

On today’s program:

Transit officials from Burlington, Vermont chat with Charlottesville-area transit officials about efforts to carry more public school students on public transportation

The latest campaign finance reports are in for the race for the Republican nomination in the 5th Congressional District

Stonefield will be the next place in the area that people can relax in public with an alcoholic beverage

And both Albemarle and Charlottesville are still recruiting lifeguards to open up the swim season
First shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

It’s springtime, and one Patreon subscriber wants you to know that the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign is a grassroots initiative of motivated citizens, volunteers, partner organizations, and local governments who want to promote the use of native plants. This spring the group is working with retailers across the region to encourage purchase of plants that belong here and are part of an ecosystem that depends on pollination. There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

Good raises $71K in April; Moy did not file FEC report by deadline

There are ten days remaining in the race for the Republican nomination for the Fifth Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. Incumbent Bob Good faces a challenge from Attorney Dan Moy of Charlottesville.

Yesterday was the deadline for candidates to file a report for campaign activity between April 1 and May 1, a report that only applies to candidates who are seeking a party nomination through a convention. (details on FEC website)

Good raised $71,058 in the period and spent $74,225, leaving a balance of $370,131.54. (read the report)

Updated after publication:
Moy filed a day late and reported $7,870 in contribution in April and the campaign spent $38,127.13. The challenger had $17,682.75 on hand at the end of the period. (read the report)

The winner of the Republican convention on May 21 will face Democrat Joshua Throneburg in the general election. Throneburg was the only candidate to qualify for the primary ballot.

(read all of campaign finance reports for the 5th District filed with the Federal Election Commission)

Supervisors support Stonefield as a Designated Outdoor Refreshment Area

A live music program at one of Albemarle County’s mixed-use communities got a boost earlier this month when the Albemarle Board of Supervisors agreed to a letter of support for an Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority license known as a DORA.

“A DORA is a designated geographic area licensed by the ABC annually that allows the consumption of alcoholic beverages, (wine, beer, mixed beverages) in a public space and a private space which include things like streets and lawns, and within any business without an ABC license as long as the business agrees,” said Roger Johnson, Albemarle’s economic development director.

These designated outdoor refreshment area licenses have been used in Scottsville and last month, one was used in Charlottesville for the Tom Tom Festival.

“I will mention to you that I spoke with the director of economic development from Charlottesville and there were no complications with this particular event,” Johnson said.

Johnson said beverages purchased at individual restaurants at Stonefield could not be transferred between those businesses. In this case, a nonprofit organization will be the entity that technically applies for the license.

“And what we’re asking you to do is provide a letter of support that verifies that Stonefield consulted with a local municipality and they will submit that with their ABC application,” Johnson said.

An ordinance would be required if an entity wanted to hold more than 16 events a year or for more than three days. Until then, all that’s required is a map of the DORA, a public safety plan, and designated cups.

“Also required at the events are specific containers that are no larger than 16 ounces with the name or the logo of the retailer from which it was purchased,” Johnson said.

In the case of Stonefield, they’ll produce the Music on the Lawn events and the Center for Nonprofit Excellence will be the nonprofit partner. But the whole point is to drive business.

“Stonefield informed us that onsite traffic increased by 25 percent when they held Music on the Lawn,” Johnson said. “The point being, we will be helping existing businesses with the foot traffic.”

Supervisor Diantha McKeel asked that there be outreach to the people who live in the apartments and condominiums at Stonefield. She was also concerned with the potential waste from the plastic cups.

“Is there a way to brainstorm or think about what other options we could provide that are not just, I mean, we’ve switched to paper here and I don’t think these cups are going to work,” McKeel said. “I am saying that it’s something to think about.”

Johnson said that could be made as a condition of the letter of support. A vote to authorize that letter passed unanimously.

The first event will be held on May 27 from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Lifeguards still sought for summer season

Memorial Day Weekend is less than three weeks away, marking the beginning of the summer outdoor swimming season. Both Albemarle and Charlottesville are preparing to open lakes and pools and need more lifeguards to ensure services can be offered to the public.

The Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Department will hold a job fair at Carver Recreation Center on Wednesday May 18 from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. that will cover more than just lifeguards.

“A sample of positions that are currently open include: camp counselors and directors, lifeguards (includes signing bonus), aquatic fitness and program instructors, instructor-American Red Cross, athletic officials, landscapers, custodial maintenance, aquatic maintenance, adaptive camp staff, customer service attendants, and more,” reads the website announcing the job fair.

In mid-April, the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board were told by staff that new lifeguards in Charlottesville are signing bonuses, and all of them are eligible for end-of-season bonuses. (story)

Albemarle County is also seeking lifeguards and needed 19 new employees as of last Wednesday in order to open on a full schedule. Until then, there is a contingency plan.

“We’re going to be moving forward with plans to open two of the three swim parks, Mint Springs and Chris Greene Lake,” said Trevor Henry, Albemarle’s assistant county executive. “We’re having issues getting enough [people] to staff Walnut Creek and so in order to safely open up the parks, the plan will be to start with those two.”

In the hopes of opening up Walnut Creek, Albemarle County is also recruiting for lifeguards and will pay $15 an hour, plus reimbursement for any certification costs. Apply online.

Charlottesville will open up the city’s four spray grounds this weekend, according to a news release that went out this morning. Learn more on the city’s website.

Today’s second shout-out goes to LEAP

We’re now well into spring, and many of us may have already turned on our air conditioning units for the first in months. To see what you can do to get the most out of your home, contact LEAP, your local energy nonprofit, to schedule a home energy assessment this month - just $45 for City and County residents.

LEAP also offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If someone in your household is age 60 or older, or you have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

Regional Transit Partnership briefed on efforts to use public transit fleets in Vermont to carry students to school

In the nearly five years the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership has been in existence, there have been many conversations about how various systems might be made more efficient. One idea that has been discussed is the combination of transportation for school pupils with regular transit.

“For Burlington, the school district has a handful of school buses for special needs kids but the majority of the school population rides Green Mountain Transit buses to school,” said Peggy O’Neill Vivanco, the Vermont Clean Cities Coordinator.

At their meeting on April 28, 2022, the members of the Regional Transit Partnership learned about efforts in Burlington, Vermont to do just that. Those efforts stemmed from a commonly asked question in the Green Mountain State.

“Why do we have two public transit systems?” asked Jennifer Wallace-Brodeur of the Vermont Energy Investment Corporation. “One for students, one for the public. That’s really inefficient. Wouldn’t it be great if we could get the public on school buses because school buses go everywhere and they go places that are hard to reach by transit.”

Wallace-Brodeur said a group came together to study the issue with funding from the Vermont Agency of Transportation as well as the Energy Action Network.

“We started out by looking at where our public transit system is currently providing services that students can access,” Wallace-Brodeur said. “There had been some research done for one of our regional planning commissions on the topic where they really dug into some of the legal issues and some of the other challenges that could come with this.”

Wallace-Brodeur said the best path forward was to adjust public transit to provide more service to middle school and high school students.

“Anybody can ride the bus,” Wallace-Brodeur said. “There’s really no barrier to that. Anyone can ride the bus including little kids, older adults, anybody. The general public can get on the bus. Not so for school buses.”

Some of that work extended to the exurbs of Burlington, Vermont’s largest city. Wallace-Brodeur said the group worked with school systems that were open to the idea. Two goals are to build lifelong transit riders and to fill service gaps.

“One of the things we hear a lot about is that students can’t access some after school activities if there isn’t a late bus or something that can get kids home after extracurriculars so if students don’t have personal transportation, they miss out on really important opportunities which then becomes an equity issue,” Wallace-Brodeur said.
How does it work?

Jamie Smith is the director of marketing and planning for Green Mountain Transit.

“We operate during the school year ten additional routes,” Smith said. “The [Federal Transit Administration] doesn’t really allow traditional school transportation to be operated by a public transit agency but they do allow for us to increase our capacity during the academic school year,” Smith said.

Wallace-Brodeur said there had been an attempt to reroute some rural transit routes in eastern Vermont to serve a pair of high schools, but that ran into some obstacles due to COVID. Mike Reiderer is with Tri-Valley Transit which serves Addison, Orange, and northern Windsor counties with commuter routes. He pointed out that many school children are transit-dependent until they have a driver’s license and a car.

“We were looking at an addition to one of these routes that would be able to transfer students basically from one high school to another to take more advantage of those after school opportunities,” Reiderer said. “Worked great, great partnership, really great information sharing that really culminating in our ability to provide that service. I think it was one of those instances where COVID came to bite us once again.”

Reiderer said he hopes that partnership can be resumed by the next school year.

Speaking of schools, the Burlington area is home to several institutions of higher education, such as the University of Vermont. Smith explains that an entity called the Chittenden Area Transport Management Association runs a transportation demand management program that seeks to get more people on buses, including university and college students.

“And we have an agreement with them, an unlimited access agreement where students are able to use their IDs to ride for free in our system,” Smith said.

The University of Vermont also has its own system of shuttle buses that run the inner loop of their campus in Burlington which has a student population of about 13,300. Champlain College also has a bus that runs throughout their campus.

I’ll have more from the April 28, 2022 meeting of the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership in a future edition of the program. If you can’t wait, take a look at the meeting on YouTube now. So far, there are 3 views. Why not give it the Charlottesville Community Engagement bump?

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Welcome to the second Monday of May, a fact that will likely fade from our minds the further we get from its actual happening. Let the record show that this was in fact May 9, which is considered by some to be National Lost Sock Memorial Day. That’s an appropriate feeling for this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, which seeks to catch up on as many loose threads as possible. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council is briefed on efforts to implement the Marcus Alert system across Virginia

Supervisor Donna Price will only serve one term on the Albemarle Board of Supervisors

Albemarle County’s Historic Preservation Committee weighs in on the Comprehensive Plan review

First shout to JMRL’s How To Festival

Price will not seek re-election to second term in Albemarle’s Scottsville District

Now that she’s announced a candidacy for the 55th District in the House of Delegates, Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price has announced she will not seek a second term representing the Scottsville Magisterial District. She made a Facebook post on Saturday.

“I will continue to dedicate my service to the County through the end of my term, be it January 2024 (the natural end of my four year term), or January 2023 (should there be a House of Delegates election this year and I am elected to commence service with that body at that time,” Price wrote.

That continues a string of one-term members in the Scottsville District. Price succeeded Rick Randolph, who had served one term from 2016 to 2019. Randolph succeeded Jane Dittmar, who was elected in November 2013 and did not seek another term in order to run for the Fifth District in the U.S. Congress.

Before Dittmar, William “Petie” Craddock had been appointed to the seat to fill a vacancy left when Chris Dumler resigned after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor charge of sexual battery. Dumler was elected after Lindsay Dorrier opted to not run for a fifth term representing Scottsville.

Price faces emergency room nurse Kellen Squire for the Democratic nomination for the 55th District. Incumbent Rob Bell has not indicated his plans. Squire officially launched his campaign with a video on Friday.

Albemarle Comprehensive Plan review continues; Historical Preservation Committee asked for input

Albemarle County is in the first phase of a four phase review of the Comprehensive Plan, and there are three opportunities to learn what’s happening. This first phase is intended to look at the county’s growth management policy.

The Let’s Talk Albemarle van will visit the Forest Lakes Farmers Market on Tuesday at 4 p.m. and will be at the Batesville Day Festival on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. There’s also a “virtual office hour” on Thursday at noon to get more information.

The Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee was consulted on the Comprehensive Plan at their meeting on April 25, 2022. Specifically they were asked two questions by Margaret Maliszewski, one of Albemarle’s planning managers.

“What opportunities exist for achieving our historic preservation goals, objectives, and strategies?” Maliszewski asked. “Are there new, or current, or ongoing threats to the county’s historic resources?”

Ross Stevens said he wanted the committee to play a larger role in the county’s land use process, particularly as it relates to demolitions of structures that may be historic but not protected. He specifically singled out a manor house called Dunlora that will be removed as part of a by-right development.

“I think we should be called upon for our advice and consulting of these structures and be part of the mix instead of just documenting stuff afterwards,” Stevens said. “I think we should be brought in to give our advice just like the Planning Commission does for the Board of Supervisors. I think we should be that resource to provide data and information regarding these properties.”

Another member, Liz Russell, agreed and said the committee currently has little venue to make their views known.

“And even if only on things like rezoning and special use permits and things that go up to the Planning Commission and the Board,” Russell said.

Russell is also a member of the Charlottesville Planning Commission.

Betsy Gondes-Baten said she would like the county to pass a historic preservation ordinance to protect certain structures.

“It would also provide an opportunity in that we would be able to qualify for certain funds for surveys and nominations and that sort of thing,” Gondes-Baten said.

Russell said an ordinance would take more support from the county’s elected and administrative leadership.

“So how do we educate not only the public but also our own leadership about the benefits, not just for protecting historic resources, but what other benefits?” Russell asked. “How do we make those links between the benefit between historic preservation and economic development? The benefits of historic preservation and sustainability? And I think now is the time to begin connecting those dots.”

Russell said preserving naturally occurring affordable housing is also a role that historic preservation can play.

“Older housing stock,” Russell said. “More modest turn-of-the-century, 1920’s, 1930’s, 1940’s. These houses are out there serving a role in our community in terms of affordable housing.”

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley threw cold water on the idea of historic preservation playing a stronger role in Albemarle.

“I sometimes have to be [what] I’ll call it the reality check,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “I know Betsy keeps bringing up the ordinance. That’s something you all would have to develop and we’d have to see what that is and what it means and what it entails. At this point I have no idea what kind of ordinance we want.”

LaPisto-Kirtley acknowledged many people have passion for historic preservation, but she did not think it was the county’s role to make it happen. She said it was unlikely more staff time be dedicated to the topic.

“I’m not going to lie,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “We’re up to our necks in all kinds of different things as people on the staff know we’re doing a lot of things at the county level. There’s a lot going.”

LaPisto-Kirtley suggested a private foundation be set up to raise funds for historic preservation efforts. She said many homestays are being set up in larger historic buildings and their outbuildings.

Russell said she was disappointed by Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley’s response.

“That is one of the most discouraging things I think anyone on this committee could hear from a Supervisor who is appointed to be on this committee to advocate for us,” Russell said. “Historic preservation is a chapter in the county’s Comprehensive Plan because ostensibly the county values it just as it values economic development, the environment.”

LaPisto-Kirtley said she was simply being realistic.

“This is an important committee,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “[But] this is not the top priority because of everything else going on.”

For the rest of the meeting, the committee members discussed ways to advance an ordinance, beginning with research into what other communities have done.

If you were to attend any of the three Comprehensive Plan meetings this week, what would be on your mind?

Watch the April 25, 2022 Albemarle County Historic Preservation Committee:

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Council briefed on efforts to bring Marcus alert system to region

At least one in ten American adults will suffer a depressive illness every year, according to information from the National Institute of Mental Health. That information was cited at City Council’s May 2, 2022 work session.

Officials with the Emergency Communications Center for Charlottesville, Albemarle County, and the University of Virginia briefed the Council on efforts to ensure that people experiencing mental health crises are not met with deadly force by public safety officers. (view the presentation)

“We do receive around a quarter of a million calls per year here in the Charlottesville-UVA-Albemarle Emergency Communication Center,” said Josh Powell, the support services manager for the ECC.

Powell said at least 90 percent of the 9-1-1 calls are answered within 15 seconds, an industry standard. He said that at least some of those calls are misdials or hang-ups.

“If you do happen to misdial 9-1-1, please do not hang up,” Powell said. “It is important that you are able to make contact with the communications officer and let them know there is no emergency because otherwise they are going to continue to reach you to confirm that there is not an emergency.”

A new emergency number will soon go into operation. Powell explains about what the 9-8-8 service will do.

“This is going to be a system that responds specifically for mental health crises,” Powell said. “Similar to 9-1-1 you will be able to reach it by call or text.”

Also coming in the future is something called the Marcus Alert, as explained by Sonny Saxton, the director of the ECC.

“The goal of Marcus Alert, if we were to place a singular goal on it, would be to provide a behavioral health response to behavioral health emergencies,” Saxton said. “Essentially Marcus Alert creates that coordination between the 9-1-1 and the regional crisis centers as well as specialized behavioral health response from law enforcement.”

Saxton said there are multiple initiatives to address multiple structural issues, including a shortage of psychiatric beds across all of Virginia.

“The time has long passed for us to deal with these behavioral health emergencies effectively and to understand that it can happen to any of us,” Saxton said.

The Marcus Alert system is intended to identify behavioral health issues whether the call comes in from a crisis line, 9-1-1, the future 9-8-8, or the rest of what’s referred to as the “crisis care continuum.”

“When it comes to 9-8-8 being the new short code if you will to emergency services for mental health crises, it’s really that ‘no wrong door’ approach,” Saxton said. “In order words, you could call any of those. You could call 9-1-1, you can call 9-8-8, you could call the suicide hotline and the idea is you would have a complete continuum of care no matter where you access it.”

Saxton said nearly 80 percent of calls can be resolved over the phone, but the remaining would require mobile crisis teams consisting of local law enforcement, emergency medics, and social workers trained in emergency responses.

“When you put that group together and deploy those into the community, that can really perhaps begin that emergency care treatment at the person’s side and then work on getting them to a crisis stabilization unit and then to a hospital or in-patient care if needed,” Saxton said.

Marcus Alert programs are in different stages of implementation across Virginia. There are two pilot rounds, but the Charlottesville area is not located within either of these. Saxton said it might be some time to have the entire state covered. Region 10 is serving as a “crisis hub” but that’s not connected yet to the ECC.

Legislation passed the General Assembly in 2020 to establish the system across Virginia, but legislation that passed in 2022 carves out exceptions for some communities (SB361).

Saxton said it also took many years for the technology to make 9-1-1 ubiquitous, and the same can be said for implementation of behavioral calls to be as universal.

“Now, we do know that for 9-8-8, the telephone companies have to have that short-code set up by July 1, 2022, so July of this year,” Saxton said.

Saxton said protocols are still in development and there will be more updates in the future.

A sizable group of people in Charlottesville would like to see the Charlottesville Police Department abolished. Mayor Lloyd Snook asked this question perhaps on their behalf.

“I know that a lot of folks in the community want very much for there to be as many opportunities as possible for there to be a non-police response to a mental health crisis,” Snook said. “Is there anything that can be done before we would get to the full implementation of the Marcus Alert System? Any sort of first step that we can be taking?”

Saxton said some steps have already been taken.

“For one, if you do call 9-1-1 today within the Charlottesville, Albemarle and UVA region, that call is answered by a communications officer that has received additional training,” Saxton said. “They’ll answer the phone and use the guidance from a National Academy protocol, so a new standard. They will do so quickly and get you on the line with someone that stay on the line until law enforcement gets there. They’re also trained in how they’re going to dispatch the law enforcement so they’re very careful about the information they give… over the radio to set the correct tone. That’s all training that’s underway that’s already happened.”

Saxton said an alternative is to call the non-emergency line and state that there is a mental health care plan in place.

“That’s essentially what the Marcus Alert voluntary database is,” Saxton said. “If you report to us or to Region 10, that you have a mental health care plan, we can notify law enforcement.”

The non-emergency line is 434-977-9041.

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Welcome to Mother’s Day Eve, a holiday that may not exist, but is certainly a possibility in a world that seems to have an occasion for everything. While we wait for Mommoween to be invented, we’ll just have to settle for another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that is most certainly not funded by Big Greeting Card.

Find the info worthwhile? Send it on to others!

On today’s program:

Greene County’s Commissioner of Revenue resigns after pleading guilty to federal charges of witness tampering

Kellen Squire officially launches his race to the Democratic nominee for the 55th House District

Dr. Denise Bonds is stepping down as director of the Blue Ridge Health District

Another surge of COVID appears to be in the making, but it’s too early to tell how severe it might be

And the City of Charlottesville is taking donations to help cover unpaid utility bills

Today’s first shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. This week is the annual Rock Marathon, so tune in and support freeform community radio on WTJU Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

Snow resigns as Greene County Commissioner of Revenue

Larry Snow has resigned as the Commissioner of Revenue in Greene County after pleading guilty in federal court to tampering with a witness. Snow appeared in the Western District Court in Charlottesville Friday to answer to charges that stemmed from a federal investigation, along with his son who pleaded guilty to a charge of heroin distribution.

The elder Snow was caught trying to harass and intimidate a confidential informant involved with the investigation.

“Elected officials should hold themselves to a higher standard and serve their community responsibly,” said Stanley M. Meador, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Richmond Division in a release sent out by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Virginia. “Mr. Snow violated the faith entrusted to him, and with his son criminally used personal information of community members for their own gain,”

Snow was first elected to the position in 1987 and was reelected in 2019 while under indictment with three quarters of the vote.

In November 2017, Bryant Snow was arrested on two state counts of distribution after selling methamphetamine and heroin to an informant. He plead guilty to the meth charge in April 2018 and was imprisoned at Central Virginia Regional Jail.

While there, the father and son discussed ways to intimidate someone referred to as Person A. At one point, the elder Snow sent out over 12,000 pamphlets to Greene County residents describing how the Sheriff’s Department uses informants in an attempt to dissuade Person A.

Larry Snow will be sentenced on July 25 and Bryant Snow will be sentenced on August 1 before Senior Judge Norman K. Moon.

Bonds stepping down as director of the Blue Ridge Health District

A search will soon get underway for a new director of the Blue Ridge Health District now that Dr. Denise Bonds has announced she’ll step down from the position at the end of this month. She’s been the health director since 2015 and led the agency during the COVID-19 pandemic and during a name change.

“Under Dr. Bonds’ leadership, BRHD expanded its HIV testing and prevention services, increased access to testing for sexually transmitted diseases, and broadened the size and reach of the Population Health Division, including launching a robust Community Health Worker program,” reads an announcement from the Blue Ridge Health District sent out yesterday afternoon.

Dr. Bonds also served as interim director of the Rappahannock Area Health District from August 2020 to April 2021.

The Blue Ridge Health District is also closing down its COVID-19 case investigation team. According to the release, they followed 47,274 cases since March 2020. After this weekend, the Mobile Health Unit created during the pandemic has held 200 events at which over 5,000 COVID vaccinations were administered.

A memorial to those lost during the COVID-19 pandemic will be held on May 24, 2022 at the Sentara Martha Jefferson Hospital Amphitheater.

COVID-19 update

A spring surge of COVID-19 continues to rise with the Virginia Department of Health reporting 2,677 new cases on Friday, with a seven-day average for positive tests at 11 percent. That’s about where things were in late February when the Omicron surge was waning.

“And that’s up from around three percent, three and a half percent in March, so we have seen an increase in test positivity,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System. “This is occurring in a background where we’re having less testing in general because of the growth of at-home testing and I would say the vast majority of the people who are testing positive at home through a rapid antigen test are not going on to get a PCR test somewhere else.”

The dashboard for the Blue Ridge Health District hasn’t been updated since May 1, and the Virginia Department of Health no longer provides that information in an easily-consumable fashion. The dataset is available here.

The increasing number of cases are not leading to increased hospitalizations. Today the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association reports 30 COVID-positive people in intensive care units and 11 on respirators. At the height of the Omicron surge in late January of this year, that number climbed over 400.

Dr. Sifri said the numbers are expected to rise as more people forgo wearing masks indoors and as people move further away from their vaccinations or boosters.

“There is some progressive loss of some immune response,” said Dr. Sifri. “And finally, in this background is new subvariants of Omicron.”

Dr. Sifri points people to the weekly models produced by the University of Virginia's Biocomplexity Institute. The latest from April 29 predicts a further surge this summer, though with lower death rates due to treatments that are now available, more than two years after the pandemic began.

“The open question is how much of an impact will that have on health systems?” Dr. Sifri asked. “Is that going to lead to more hospitalizations? Is that going to lead to more [intensive care unit] hospitalizations and deaths? That’s our concern.”

Dr. Sifri said vaccinations may not prevent infection but do limit the severity.

City taking donations to cover unpaid utility bills

It’s been nearly a month since the City of Charlottesville announced it would resume the practice of shutting down service for unpaid utility bills. There was a statewide moratorium on such disconnects that expired last September. In all, the city used $557,000 in various federal assistance programs to help some customers.

However, they announced in April disconnects would resume.

“To date, six accounts have been disconnected and remain out of service,” said Chris Cullinan, the city’s finance director, in an email to Charlottesville Community Engagement.

However, the city is taking donations to help prevent further disconnects. Cullinan said that as of Thursday, the city had received $800 from concerned community members. He said checks marked with “Water/WW Assistance” in the memo can be sent to:

City of Charlottesville Utility Billing Office
PO Box 911
Attn: Water and Wastewater Assistance
Charlottesville, VA 22902

Second shout-out goes to a Charlottesville Jazz Society event this weekend

In today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out, the Charlottesville Jazz Society and WTJU are pleased to bring bassist Joe Fonda back to town with his long-standing group the Nu Band. They’ll be appearing Tuesday May 10 at the Bridge at 209 Monticello Road. The Nu Band is a dynamic jazz ensemble from New York City, featuring some of the most unique, compelling and in-demand voices in creative music today. The band was formed in 1999, and since then has released 10 recordings, completed 9 European and several US tours, bringing forward-leaning, provocative and evocative music to the world. All tickets for The Nu Band at The Bridge, May 10th at 7 pm will be $10 at the door. For more information visit cvillejazz.org,

Squire launches campaign with ad release

There’s still no firm resolution on whether Virginia will elect the next set of members of the next House of Delegates this November or the next, but there are two active candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for the newly drawn 55th District.

On Friday, Kellen Squire released a video to launch a campaign for which he filed earlier this spring. He’s an emergency room nurse who ran in the 58th District in 2017 against incumbent Rob Bell.

“Just as I believe there’s hope for me when I come home to my family,” Squire narrates in the two-minute video that depicts him driving home from a shift, concluding with him getting out of his vehicle.

“I’m Kellen Squire and I’m running for the House of Delegates because as an emergency department nurse, I know that we all do better when we all do better,” Squire continues. “I’ll fight unapologetically for rural Virginia. I’ll put people before party. And I’ll make sure no Virginian gets left behind.”

Squire joins Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price in the race for the Democratic nomination, a race in which the winner could take on Republican Rob Bell, who has represented the 58th District since 2002. He’s not yet made an announcement about the next election. The 55th District is geographically different and will consist of most of Albemarle County, western Louisa County, and northeast Nelson County.

Price made her announcement on Facebook on Tuesday, a day after someone leaked a draft Supreme Court ruling purporting to overturn Roe v. Wade. (read the story)

There is a chance that an election could be held this year due to a federal lawsuit filed by Richmond attorney Paul Goldman arguing that legislators elected in 2021 are in unconstitutional districts. Judge David Novak of the Eastern District of Virginia is expected to rule on whether Goldman has the legal standing to file the case.

On Thursday, Novak admonished Goldman for filing a motion to ask the court to consider the draft ruling as evidence for why a House of Delegates race should be run this year.

“The Court hereby STRIKES this Motion at patently inappropriate and completely irrelevant to this case,” Novak wrote in an order. “Neither draft opinions nor press reports have any impact on the decisions of this Court.”

Novak told Goldman to stop filing additional motions.

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May moves most quickly, and here we are again with another edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and program that seeks to capture as much as possible about the rapid movement that appears to be experienced by so many. The goal is to give a quick look or listen at what’s going on as often as possible. This is the 374th episode hosted by me, Sean Tubbs.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s program:

The Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors releases its latest analysis of the Charlottesville market

Albemarle and Waynesboro are receiving more funds to electrify buses

Virginia localities to get more funding for Chesapeake Bay pollution reduction

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopts its budget for FY23

But the six elected officials are in a stalemate over how to proceed with grass or artificial turf at new athletic fields

First shout to JMRL’s How To Festival

There will be 15-minute presentations and demonstrations on a diverse set of topics. Want to know how to do a home DNA test? Tune a guitar? What about using essential oils to repel mosquitoes? Visit the library website at jmrl.org to learn more. Schedule is coming soon! That’s the How To Festival, May 14, 2022.

CAAR reports on activity in first three months of 2022

A lower inventory of available homes continues to drive up the sales prices in some parts of the region. That’s according to the latest quarterly report from the Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors covering the first three months of this year. .

“In the first quarter, the median sales price was $389,900, which was up 13 over a year ago, a gain of nearly $45,000,” reads the report.

A total of 888 homes were sold during January, February and March. That’s 177 units fewer than in the same period in 2021.

The report notes that inventory may be on the rise. A total of 1,327 building permits were issued in 2021 in the six localities covered by CAAR and that’s the highest number since 2006. Activity has increased this year as well.

“In January and February, there were 286 new construction permits, which is up significantly from prior years,” the report continues. “In the first two months of 2022, more than 70 percent of new housing permits were for the construction of single-family homes.”

However, the report also notes that interest rates are beginning to climb with the average interest rate for a 30-year mortgage at five percent for the first time in eleven years.

As for sales prices, all six localities saw increases in the median sales price.

Albemarle’s average is $476,750, an 11 percent increase since 2021’s first quarter

Charlottesville’s average is $412,000, a four percent increase

Fluvanna’s average is $335,263, a 24 percent increase

Greene’s average is $335,000, a seven percent increase

Louisa’s average is $282,651, a 22 percent increase

Nelson’s average is $308,500, a 17 percent increase

Tomorrow I will be posting an anecdotal summary of transactions in the city of Charlottesville and paid subscribers to this newsletter will get a first look. Take a look at the past 15 on the Information Charlottesville archive.

Virginia DEQ to award $14 million for electric school buses

More state funding is on the way to help localities make the transition from diesel-powered school buses to electric ones. The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality announced Wednesday that the Clean School Bus Program will award more than $14 million across Virginia, and that includes Albemarle County.

The funding comes from Volkswagen, a company that lied to its customers about the fuel efficiency of some vehicles. Virginia received $93.6 million from the Volkswagen Environmental Mitigation Trust.

“DEQ has also committed funds for innovative clean transportation projects including electric transit buses, medium and heavy duty trucks, electric equipment at the Port of Virginia and development of a statewide charging network for electric vehicles,” reads a press release.

Albemarle County will get $464,754 for two more electric buses, bringing the total fleet to four. Last year, the county received $530,000 from the same fund. (previous story)

Waynesboro will receive $1.4 million for six buses.

For more information about the Volkswagen settlement, visit this dedicated website.

Virginia gets funding for Bay clean-up efforts

Last November, President Joe Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act which included $238 million in funding for programs to reduce pollution that makes its way into the Chesapeake Bay.

This week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced that $40 million will be made available through two separate programs.

“I am pleased to announce the new funding that will help support ready-to-go projects throughout the 64,000-square-mile Chesapeake Bay watershed,” said EPA Deputy Administrator Janet McCabe in a news release. “This unprecedented funding can go straight into projects that will protect public health, improve water quality and help restore lands, rivers and streams that impact the Chesapeake Bay – from farm fields to suburban neighborhoods to city streets.”

First, $15 million will come from the Most Effective Basins (MEB) program. Virginia will get over $3 million from this pool of funding.

“The funding will largely support farm-based actions to improve local rivers and streams in locations most beneficial to the downstream Chesapeake Bay,” the release continues.

The other $25 million will be administered by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation through two grant programs. Specific awards will be made in September.

One group that is often a forum for local efforts to meet pollution reduction controls is the Rivanna River Basin Commission. They meet next virtually tomorrow at 2 p.m. (meeting info) (RRBC agendas)

Second shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

Albemarle Board adopts $586.3 million budget

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors took eight actions yesterday to complete the process of development and adopting a budget for FY23. They began with the tax rates. (view the presentation)

“We have the real estate, mobile homes and public service tax rate of 85.4 cents (per $100 of assessed value) that is the calendar year 2022 rate,” said Andy Bowman, chief of the Office of Management and Budget in Albemarle. “For personal property rate, which also applies to machinery and tool taxes, the current rate is currently $4.28 cents per $100 and it is proposed to be reduced to $3.22 per $100 of assessed value.”

The reduction is due to the increase in value of used vehicles due to reduced production. Many localities in Virginia opted to decrease this amount, though Charlottesville City Council opted to keep their rate at the higher one.

In the next three items, Supervisors had to vote on an increase in the food and beverage tax from four percent to six percent and an increase in the transient lodging tax from five percent to eight percent.

“And finally the disposable plastic bag tax which would be five cents for each disposable bag and that would go into effect on January 1 of 2023,” Bowman said.

Supervisors adopted those tax rates with no discussion. All of that took place at the seven work sessions held since the budget was introduced in late February. All of those tax rates add up to a budget that anticipated $586.282,008 in total revenues for FY 23.

“That is a number than is greater than the Board last saw, due to some changes primarily in the school budget,” Bowman said.

Those changes include additional funds for the school system related to reclassification of federal funds as well as $12 million in funding for the school that came down from the American Rescue Plan Act.

Virginia has not yet adopted its budget as the divided General Assembly did not reach consensus on one. Bowman said that means there is about $5 million in funds in question currently set aside as a placeholder.

“The current county budget includes $3.6 million in state funding that is currently in question with the impasse at the state budget,” Bowman said. “The Board of Supervisors previously asked the public schools what is the fallback plan if that state funding comes through? This plan is responsive to that direction so if the state keeps that $3.6 million intact, the school board would use that $3.6 million in one way. If that $3.6 million were to fall out of the state with an alternative approval for how that would be used.

Stalemate continues on synthetic turf fields

One issue that has come up during the budget process has been how to proceed with plans to update athletic fields managed by the Parks and Recreation Department. The original budget envisioned those being installed as grass fields at the future Biscuit Run Park, but at least three Supervisors sought to instead move forward with a previous plan to build synthetic turf fields at Darden Towe Park.

Some such as Supervisor Ann Mallek continued to want to keep those fields natural. The topic was discussed extensively at the work session on April 27, and the county executive prepared a potential way to move forward.

“If the Board were to show a majority or a consensus today that we would like to explore increasing the quality of the fields at Darden Towe, the first step would be to go out and get an expert in the turf management world to come in and do an assessment,” said County Executive Jeffrey Richardson.

That process could take a year and might mean taking the fields off line for some time. Richardson said the first step would cost about $20,000 and he asked the Board if they supported that pathway forward. However, that proposal was not included in the budget before the Board.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway asked what this study would give the county that it didn’t already know before.

“What it gives us is a detailed plan of execution,” said Trevor Henry, the assistant county executive. “A nutrient plan, things like aeration, lime, fertilizer, a seeding schedule, weed and pest control, a mowing schedule, a watering schedule, and a rotation. Those would be some of the outcomes of that.”

Supervisor Diantha McKeel made a motion to adopt the budget that did not include spending that $20,000 for the consultant. Supervisor Ann Mallek made a counter motion to amend the budget to include that funding.

Supervisor McKeel wanted to move forward with synthetic turf as recommended by staff in 2019 to put lighting and artificial turf at Darden Towe.

“In 2019, Albemarle County had nine organizations representing over 7,000 participants that were requesting rectangular field space,” McKeel said. “It was evident in ‘19 that Albemarle County not only lacked the available fields but lacked the ability to provide quality fields based on high usage.”

McKeel said artificial turf was not her first choice for grass athletic fields, but she supported their use at Darden Towe, which is considered an urban park.

“A mudhole is not an environmental success, nor is asking people to play in goose poop an environmental success,” McKeel said.

Supervisor Mallek said natural grass fields are safer for those who play on them. The topic was discussed extensively at the April 27 work session.

Gallaway said he did not support the motion because it would delay what he said was a need to provide fields. He supported synthetic.

“We’ve had in front of us an option that would fix our system of fields that would increase capacity, that would increase quality everywhere, not just for the current fields but for the future fields that would come into the system,” Gallaway said.

Supervisor Donna Price also did not support the motion.

“I call foul on that proposal and think we’re just simply kicking the can down the road,” Price said. “It’s been years that we’ve known our fields are inadequate and that we needed to do something like this.”

Mallek’s proposal failed 3-3, which is a stalemate. That means the adopted budget does not include a decision point on how to proceed with athletic fields. .

Other actions taken to complete the budget include a resolution for appropriation of $18 million for FY23 in FY22, a borrowing resolution, and a resolution to adopt the Capital Improvement Plan for FY23 through FY27.

Now that the budget is complete, the process will next begin on creating a new strategic plan.

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Today’s visit to the National Day Calendar reveals what many would regard as plain old silliness. Apparently it is National Chocolate Custard Day, National Garden Meditation Day, National Two Different Colored Shoes Day and National Lumpy Rug Day. If Charlottesville Community Engagement had a budget for promotional prizes, one would go for a winning photograph in a contest to capture the essence of all four of these fantastical days. In all seriousness, May 3 is also World Press Freedom Day and I’m honored to be able to bring your this information on as many days as possible.

On today’s program:

The chair of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will run for the Virginia House of Delegates

Several tourist destinations across the region receive matching funds from the Virginia Tourism Corporation

The head of the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless briefs Council on progress towards getting everybody housed

And the Albemarle Architectural Review Board takes a first look at a project to build 81 units of permanent supportive housing

Today’s first shout-out goes to LEAP

We’re now well into spring, and many of us may have already turned on our air conditioning units for the first in months. To see what you can do to get the most out of your home, contact LEAP, your local energy nonprofit, to schedule a home energy assessment this month - just $45 for City and County residents.

LEAP also offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If someone in your household is age 60 or older, or you have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

Supervisor Price running for 55th House of Delegates

The chair of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors has announced she will be a candidate for the Democratic nomination in the new 55th District for the Virginia House of Delegates, whether the next election is held this year or next.

Scottsville Supervisor Donna Price announced this morning on Facebook that yesterday’s leak of a Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade prompted her to file for her candidacy.

“I yesterday morning filed my campaign committee paperwork to be a candidate - whether it be this year as a result of the Federal District Court case of Goldman v. Brink; or, next year as regularly scheduled,” Price wrote.

Federal Judge David Novak is currently deliberating on whether Richmond Attorney Paul Goldman has the legal standing to have filed a suit claiming Virginia’s current legislative districts are unconstitutional because they are still based on the 2010 Census. The Virginia Supreme Court adopted new districts drawn by Special Masters in late December 2021 after a redistricting commission failed to reach consensus.

The incumbent in the 55th District is Republican Rob Bell, who currently sits in the 58th District. The new 55th District covers most of Albemarle County, western Louisa County, and northeastern Nelson County.

Price joins Kellen Squire as declared Democratic candidates in the 55th District. Squire ran against Bell in 2017 for the 58th District and was defeated 61.2 percent to 38.71 percent. Bell outraised Squire $471,519 to $115,210 that year. Squire was briefly a candidate in the 2021 Lieutenant Governor’s race.

The first campaign finance report for the next House of Delegates race is not due until July 2022.

In her announcement on Facebook, Price said she was running now to protect reproductive rights, which she said are one vote away from being overturned in Virginia.

“While I support the legal basis of the Goldman v. Brink plaintiff, I have been holding personal concerns about elections in 2022 given the mood of the country,” Price wrote. “Those concerns no longer exist. We are in a legally existential battle for the rights of Americans.”

Price was elected to the Board of Supervisors in 2019 by beating Republican Michael Hallahan on a 55.21 percent to 44.44 percent margin. Hallahan raised $92,256 to Price’s $38,234.

Squire, an emergency room nurse, said he will be making a formal announcement on Friday but responded to a question this morning.

“I filed the first week of March, but have spent the last two months building the local, regional, and statewide support that will be necessary to win this race,” Squire wrote. “I've been told by both current and former local, regional, and statewide elected officials of both parties that the Virginia GOP intends to dump whatever resources are necessary to keep this seat in their column.”

Squire credited his 2017 race with laying the groundwork for the eventual Democratic takeover of the House of Delegates and the Senate in 2019.

Youngkin decries leak

As for that leak, U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts has confirmed the publication of a draft opinion.

“Although the document described in yesterday’s reports is authentic, it does not represent a decision by the Court or the final position of any member on the issues in the case,” reads a press release from the Court.

Roberts has directed the Marshall of the Court to investigate the source of the leak.

In a statement, Governor Glenn Youngkin decried the leak and said it was premature to speculate on what the actual ruling will be.

“We learned from listening to Virginians over the last year that we have much common ground on this issue. I am pro-life, and I have been very clear about that since the day I launched my campaign,” Youngkin said.

As of today, there’s no ruling from Judge David Novak on the Goldman v. Brink case.

Area tourism efforts receive funding from the Virginia Tourism Corporation

Governor Glenn Youngkin has announced the award of 259 grants to entities across the Commonwealth to mark National Travel and Tourism Week. The funding comes from the Virginia Tourism Corporation’s Marketing Leverage Program & Regional Marketing Program Grants

“This funding cycle, local partners will commit more than $12.4 million to match the VTC funding, providing more than $15 million in new marketing activity,” reads a press release sent out on Monday.

The recipients are:

Blue Mountain Barrel House and Organic Brewery in Afton for their Road Trip to Nelson 29 promotion ($5,000)

Boars Head Resort for their Winter Wander promotion ($5,000)

Center for Independent Documentary Inc in Charlottesville for the La Loba Festival ($5,000)

Charlottesville and Albemarle County for the Historic Vines, New Roots promotion ($20,000)

Crozet Park for the Crozet Arts and Crafts Festival ($10,000)

Ix Art Park Foundation for the Cville Arts Winter Weekends / Charlottesville Arts Festival ($10,000)

Louisa Chamber of Commerce for Unplug & Play 2.0 ($5,000)

Louisa County Parks, Recreation and Tourism for the Happening Around Corner: Louisa County Events / Visit Louisa Mobile App ($24,936)

Love Ridge Mountain Lodging of Charlottesville for the launch of the program ($10,000)

Nelson County for the Nelson County Dark Skies Trail and the Nelson Winter Market ($20,000)

Orange County for the Orange Uncovered promotion ($20,000)

Queen City Mischief & Magic in Staunton for the Queen City Mischief & Magic Festival ($16,616)

Quirk Charlottesville for their program History, Hiking, and Heritage: A Trip to Charlottesville ($10,000)

Southern Revere Cellars LLC for the Land Made promotion ($10,000)

Staunton Augusta Art Center for the Art in the Park promotion ($3,000)

Staunton Music Festival for the Staunton Music Festival / BaroqueFest 2022 program ($13,750)

Summer Stage LLC for the Summer Stage @ the Blackburn program ($10,000)

The Front Porch of Charlottesville for the Boots and Bling Fall Gala ($4,350)

Tom Tom Foundation of Charlottesville for the Tom Tom Festival ($10,000)

Virginia Festival of the Wheel in Charlottesville ($10,000)

Wayne Theatre Alliance in Waynesboro for an Outdoor Production ($10,000)

Waynesboro for the Family Friendly Waynesboro program ($20,000)
Shout-out to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Council briefed on increase in homelessness in Charlottesville area

The Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless (TJACH) is the lead agency in this region for the U.S. Department of Housing and Development’s Continuum of Care program. They cover an area including Charlottesville, Albemarle, and the other localities in the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

“We believe that everyone deserves a safe place to call home and we believe that is a human right,” said Anthony Haro, TJACH’s executive director. (download Haro’s presentation)

Haro said the goal of TJACH is to make homelessness as rare, brief, and nonrecurring as possible. He said homelessess is a symptom of a system that lacks enough resources and coordination.

Every year, TJACH participates in the Point in Time survey to measure the size and scope of homelessness in a community.

“Every year we do it in January with the goal of trying to identify folks at a time when we’re hoping most people are in sheltered settings because of the weather,” Haro said.

The count is reported to HUD and the same methodology has been used for the past 12 years. The number of people in emergency shelters increased from 144 in January 2021 to 228 in January 2022.

“The most significant shift has just occurred over this past year and it’s directly related to the pandemic and also things that the pandemic has brought with it like high housing costs and lack of available affordable housing,” Haro said.

During the pandemic, congregate shelters moved to non-congregate settings as people were set up with private rooms in hotels. TJACH has partnered with Virginia Supportive Housing and the Piedmont Housing Alliance to purchase the Red Carpet Inn on U.S. 29, which has been converted to an emergency shelter. More on that in a moment.

Just under seventy percent of those counted are male, and 98 percent of those counted are individuals. Fifty-two percent are white, 41 percent are Black, and seven are listed as other.

Haro said the number of people who were chronically homeless dropped from 76 in 2012 to 32 in 2014. He attributes that to the opening of the Crossings at Fourth and Preston, a 60-unit single room occupancy building built by Virginia Supportive Housing. That number has begun to increase and Haro said there’s a need for more housing.

“The other real key component to address unsheltered homelessness is street outreach programs and so we have street outreach though the PATH program at Region 10 which is focused people living outside with mental health and or substance issues but those resources haven’t really changed significantly in a long time,” Haro said.

The Point in Time count isn’t the only metric. Haro said TJACH also measures the total number of people served each year and that figure increased from 290 in 2013 to 528 in 2021. He also said people are staying longer in emergency shelters with the average length of stay in 2021 was 136 days.

“Before the pandemic it was around 40 days, 30 to 40 days in shelter was the average,” Haro said.

That leads to a lack of turnover in those shelters, leading to shortages in emergency shelter capacity.

Haro said the forthcoming 81-unit project at Premier Circle will provide relief when it’s built, but it will take some time. Ground is expected break ground next May and will be supported by Low Income Housing Tax Credits as well as Housing Choice Vouchers.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade said constituents have asked him if TJACH had any outreach to people who panhandle on medians within the city.

“Have you all, or is there a way to reach out to them, to say yes, here is service?” Wade said. “They say they see many of the same people in the same intersection and it concerns them. Sometimes they say it seems dangerous and I tell them there’s really not anything we can do.”

Haro said many of those individuals may not be homeless. Some may be paying for hotels and some may be living in their own places.

“People choose to panhandle for many different reasons,” Haro said. “For some people it’s a social interaction activity and for other people they are paying to stay in a hotel that night and so it varies widely. We do have outreach workers who are familiar with many of those individuals. There are new individuals that pop up every now and again and that I see panhandling and I notify outreach team to see if they are aware of those individuals coming through.”

ARB makes comments on Premier Circle project

On Monday, the Albemarle County Architectural Review Board took a look at the initial site for Premier Circle which involves construction of a four story building as part of a three building campus.. The property is within the county’s Entrance Corridor Review guidelines.

“The focus is largely on the site landscaping and the building design in the Entrance Corridor facing elevation of the first phase one building,” said Khris Taggart, a planner with Albemarle County.

Staff recommended approval of the initial site plan with some recommendations for revisions. That means things like hiding electrical equipment from view, requiring windows to avoid blank walls, and to include a plan indicating how demolition of existing structures should proceed.

The building is being design by BRW Architects and they were represented by Whitney McDermott.

“The TJACH Premier Circle initial plan before you today is a component of a larger vision that is a partnership between the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for, Homeless, Virginia Supportive Housing who are developing the building before you today, and the Piedmont Housing Alliance,” McDermott said.

McDermott said the design of the whole plan is to allow for the existing motel units to exist for as long as possible.

The Piedmont Housing Alliance will eventually build a 60-unit multifamily building as part of phase 2 and the third phase will be a future mixed-use building.

View the entire ARB meeting:

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It’s been three months since February 2, prompting the question: Has anyone checked to see how the groundhog is doing? Still, May 2 is the 122nd day of 2022, and we are now mathematically one third of the way through. Perhaps nothing is still. In any case, this is Charlottesville Community Engagement and I remain Sean Tubbs, here for another week and another months of newsletters and podcasts that are hopefully informative.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville crews are taking down dead Ash and Oak trees this ye

COVID cases are up sharply across Virginia this morning

Charlottesville has a new Fire Marshal

A Buckingham County resident has died following a fatal crash this morning in Albemarle County

City Council will take up two land use items tonight, one of which would double the already approved residential density on a property near the University of Virginia

First shout-out goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners for their annual plant sale

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, the Piedmont Master Gardeners are pleased to announce the return of their annual plant sale! That’s happening on Saturday, May 7, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Albemarle Square Shopping Center. The sale will offer thousands of annuals, perennials, shrubs, vegetables, herbs and houseplants, including a large selection of native plants.

In addition, shoppers can purchase garden implements, yard ornaments and other “Green Elephants”; have their tools sharpened by an expert; and drop off their surplus plastic nursery pots for recycling. The sale will also feature a Help Desk for gardening questions and information tables on native plants, soil and composting, invasive plants, conservation landscaping and much more.

For more information, visit piedmontmastegardeners.org.

COVID-19 update: Numbers trending upward again?

As the week and month begin, it’s worth checking in with the COVID-19 pandemic statistics in Virginia. Brace yourselves for this number.

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 4,192 new cases today, and the seven day average for positive PCR tests is at 9.8 percent. The seven day average for new tests is at 1,870 new cases a day.

However, these cases have not yet resulted in a higher number of people in the hospital for COVID. According to the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association, there are 166 COVID patients currently in hospital care across Virginia and 28 are in intensive care units. Eleven are on ventilators. Those numbers are drastically lower than three months ago when the Omicron surge was at its peak.

On Friday, the VDH reported 1,705 new cases. That’s the same day the UVA Health System held its weekly briefing, which included Chief Executive Officer Wendy Horton. She encouraged vigilance.

“Among our employees and our workforce, we are seeing an uptick in community exposure in COVID so it isn’t going away in our community and I think a lot of friends and family are experiencing that this week,” Horton said.

Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia, said the actual case counts are likely higher due to the number of home testing and due to the spread of a variant in Omicron.

“They are increasingly more transmissible and because of that it’s very reasonable to take precautions,” Dr. Sifri said. “Masking works. It’s always worked. It will continue to work.”

Dr. Sifri also encouraged people to investigate whether it is a good time for them to take an additional booster if eligible.

“I think the first and foremost thing is to make sure that you are fully vaccinated and that you have completed what we consider the three dose vaccine series,” Dr. Sifri said.

With allergy season in play, Dr. Sifri recommends self-testing to protect those you spend a lot of time around.

“Your sniffles or scratchy throat that you may wish to attribute to hay fever may not be that but it could be a sign of COVID and to test yourself,” Dr. Sifri said.

The Friday briefing also covered another emerging medical issue across the globe.

So far there are no cases at the University of Virginia of severe unexplained cases of hepatitis in children, but doctors are keeping an eye out. Dr. Debbie-Ann Shirley is a pediatric infectious disease specialist who says more study is needed after an alert went out in late April.

“Both the Centers for Disease Control and the Virginia Department of Health put out health advisories to notify health care providers about an increase in clusters of cases of severe liver diseases in children which we call hepatitis,” Dr. Shirley said in a briefing last Friday.

One potential commonality is an adenovirus which can cause a variety of different ailments. The United Kingdom has seen a relatively high number of cases, some of which have required liver transplants.

“It’s really the severity of these cases in young children that is causing concern and alarm and the reason that we want to investigate urgently to find out more information,” Dr. Shirley said.

Local physicians are encouraged to reach out to UVA Health officials if they see pediatric patients with elevated levels of liver enzymes that are otherwise unexplained.

“For parents who are trying to understand what to do when they hear this message, if they see signs and symptoms of hepatitis then to talk to their health care provider,” Dr. Shirley said.

That includes yellowing of the eyes and skin, belly pain, and fatigue. I’ll have more on both issues as time moves on.
Fatal crash at Hillsdale and Rio intersection this morning

A 20-year-old from Dilwyn has died following a fatal crash this morning at the intersection of Rio Road and Hillsdale Drive. According to the Albemarle County Fire Rescue department, Mr. Kyjuan-Shallah Anthony Maurice Bell died at the scene after a collision with another vehicle.

“The cause of the crash remains under investigation by the Albemarle County Police Department’s Fatal Crash Reconstruction Team,” reads the press release. “This is the third traffic fatality investigated by ACPD in 2022.”
City to remove dead trees

The biological war between the Emerald Ash Borer and ash trees is still being waged, but it’s very much in the favor of the invasive species. That’s been confirmed by the city’s new urban forester, Steve Gaines.

“The beetle larvae tunnel under the bark, and damage nutrient and water flow throughout the tree – basically girdling the tree,” Gaines said in email Friday afternoon. “Once infested, the trees usually die within 2-5 years after initial infection.”

This morning, Charlottesville’s Parks and Recreation Department began removing six dead ash trees at the intersection of McIntire Road and West Main Street. That will take place Monday through Wednesday between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. and motorists can expect delays.

Gaines said it is hard to tell how many more ash trees across the city will die but there will be a focus on removing ones that can cause harm.

“It is safe to say that the city will be removing Ash hazard trees for quite a while,” Gaines said. “Standing dead Ash trees are particularly dangerous because the dead limbs are brittle and can easily break and fall during wind/weather events.”

Gaines said the city is seeking to treat some ash trees with injections, but this often requires a landowner or organization to help cover the cost of treatment.

Later in the week, crews will remove three dead Oak trees from Belmont Park. Gaines said there are many possibilities for why they have died.

The Charlottesville Tree Commission meets virtually Tuesday at 5 p.m. (meeting info)
Fire Captain Phillips elevated to Fire Marshal

A veteran with 23 years of experience on the Charlottesville Fire Department has been named as the city’s new fire marshal. Joe Phillips will replace Deputy Chief Joe Powers, who had been in charge of Community Risk Reduction.

According to a release, Phillips joined the department in January 1999 as a firefighter and medic. He has served as a battalion chief and has been in the Fire Marshal’s office since 2017. That’s where the fire department’s Office of Community Risk Reduction is located. A national search is underway for a new Deputy Chief for risk reduction.

In today’s other three shout-outs
Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects with the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department, and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. Visit codeforcville.org to learn about those projects.

In the middle, I’d like to take the opportunity to wish my nephew, Ryan Craig, a happy 29th birthday. Where did the time go?

Council to review two land use items this evening

Last month, the Charlottesville Planning Commission recommended approval of one land use item and recommended the denial of another at a joint public hearing with City Council. Tonight, City Council will hold final votes on both of them.

The first is on the consent agenda. Southern Development seeks an increase of residential density at 209 Maury Avenue near the University of Virginia. Here’s city planner Matt Alfele.

“The subject properties were rezoned from R-2U (residential two-family University) to R-3 with proffers in December 2019,” Alfele said. “The original plan called for residential development with 33 units. The new proposal calls for the same configuration but removes the parking underneath building 2 to accommodate additional units.”

The new maximum count would be 64 units. As part of the proffers, six affordable units would be built by Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville at the Flint Hill development in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood. Flint Hill is also being developed by Southern Development and that required eight affordable units. Habitat will be building those, as well.

Charlie Armstrong is vice president at Southern Development.

“Yes, it would create more units if we have more density on this site,” Armstrong said. “It does create more affordable units. Those will need to be off-site and we like the idea of doing them with Habitat at Flint Hill. We need to get Flint Hill through the approval process and built.”

Armstrong said University of Virginia students do not drive as much, but the company has agreed to develop a parking plan for the site. They’ll also build a seven-foot sidewalk along Maury Avenue. An existing structure on the property will be kept as part of the project.

The Commission voted unanimously to recommend the increase. Council has opted to put it on their consent agenda rather than discuss it in open session tonight.

Planning Commission recommends denial of conversion of apartments to hotel use

In the other matter, developer Bill Chapman sought permission to convert an apartment complex on 14th Street into a hotel. Here’s city planner Dannan O’Connell.

“The subject property is currently developed with a 21-unit multifamily condominium use and the applicant wishes to renovate the existing building to accommodate a 19-unit hotel with one residential apartment,” O’Connell said.

The structure was originally built as a hotel in 1964 but converted to apartment use some time later.

Tonight’s consideration by Council comes just over a year after the city adopted an Affordable Housing Plan that seeks to increase the number of units and nearly six months after a new Comprehensive Plan was adopted.

“The proposed redevelopment does meet some of the 2021 Comprehensive Plan’s goals regarding sustainable reuse of existing buildings, protecting the existing identity of city neighborhoods, and retaining successful businesses and jobs,” O’Connell said. “The proposed change of use would also result in a reduction of available rental housing within the city and this area. However, the existing apartment use is non-conforming in nature and located in an area of dense residential apartments geared towards short-term student housing.”

Much of the discussion at the Planning Commission was whether the residential units should be removed from circulation. Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg noted that the units rented at what would appear to be what’s known as “naturally occurring affordable housing.”

“The studio rents for $770 a month and that includes utilities,” Stolzenberg said. “And then I go look at what that is in terms of [Area Median Income] and it’s right at the 45 percent AMI range for a one-person household.”

O’Connell said the application made clear that none of those units were participating in a subsidized program requiring the rents to be that low.

“The reason these units are affordable is because they are older and so people can afford to live in them,” said Planning Commissioner Liz Russell.

Developer Bill Chapman said the conversion would be similar to what he and his business partners did at the Oakhurst Circle and Inn project at the corner of Jefferson Park Avenue and Jefferson Park Avenue.

“My partners and I own nine buildings over here on the south side of UVA in the Oakhurst Gildersleeve Historic District and some of them are apartments and some are private homes and some are hotel rooms,” Chapman said.

Chapman said he thought the end result of the renovations of those buildings has made some of those streets better than they been. He said he wants to do the same at 207 14th Street.

“The block just down the hill from this property on 14th Street is one of the dirtiest blocks in the whole city in terms of trash and we’re going to transform that a little bit because being in the hospitality business it needs to look good,” Chapman said.

Chapman said the apartments are run down and cheap because they are old hotel rooms. He is a contract purchaser, and does not currently own them. He said financing their renovation as an apartment would result in much higher rents.

“This property was built as a motel and I think it’s best operated as a hotel especially since it needs this new life brought to it,” Chapman said. “Now, could it go for a few more years as an apartment building? Yeah. Could it go for 20 more years as an apartment building. No.”

Russell said she did not think the people living in the apartment were necessarily students.

“We have to remember that not just students live in the area around the University but it seems like a pretty great proximity to the UVA Health System,” Russell said. “So many people can’t live in this community let alone proximate to UVA.

Russell said she would vote to recommend denial because she housing is more important than hotel rooms.

Commissioner Karim Habbab also could not support it.

“This is currently exactly the missing middle housing that we are trying to develop in the city and given our affordable housing issue, I cannot see how this would help with that,” Habbab said.

The Commission voted 4-2 to recommend denial. Now it’s up to Council to make a decision.

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Five Fridays in one month? What will they think of next? In any case, did you get enough showers this April? And, could someone remind me what May is for? I’ve lost my handbook of trivial facts that pepper up most installments of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that strives to bring something of relevant importance each and every time. I’m the host, Sean Tubbs.

What will happen if you sign up? You’ll get each and every newsletter sent to your inbox for free! Consider paying to guarantee more will be produced!

On today’s program:

The Virginia Senate Finance and Appropriations deals a mortal blow to Governor Youngkin’s gas tax holiday

A quick look at the commercial and retail market in the Charlottesville area

The spring running of Foxfield Races is tomorrow

And a lawsuit is filed against the City of Charlottesville alleging violations of the Freedom of Information Act

First shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

It’s springtime, and one Patreon supporter wants you to know the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign is a grassroots initiative of motivated citizens, volunteers, partner organizations, and local governments who want to promote the use of native plants. This spring the group is working with retailers across the region to encourage purchase of plants that belong here and are part of an ecosystem that depends on pollination. There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

FOIA suit filed against Charlottesville

A pair of activists and a journalist have filed suit against the City of Charlottesville seeking the release of documents they claim should be made available through the Freedom of Information Act.

Attorney Jeff Fogel filed a petition Thursday in Charlottesville Circuit Court on behalf of Tanesha Hudson, Cherry Hanley of the People’s Coalition, and Dave McNair of The DTM who submitted two separate requests for information. One was on March 24, 2022. (read the petition)

“For the years 2020 and 2021, all records concerning the settlement of claims of police misconduct, or other violation of constitutional rights, by the city or any of its employees, whether or not the claim was filed in an administrative or judicial agency.”

A second request was submitted on April 4 which among other items sought the release of “all records concerning the settlement of claims of police misconduct.”

The petition includes two exhibits of the results, which contain many redactions. Fogel argues that not all of the information was privileged under state law and that five settlement documents should have been made available as part of the FOIA request.

“The above violations of the FOIA Act by Defendant, City of Charlottesville, deprives not only petitioners, but every citizen of the community and other interested persons, the rights granted to them under the provisions of the FOIA Act,” reads paragraph 27 of the petition.

Paragraph 28 argues that the city’s policy of requiring non-disparagement clauses or non-disclosure agreements as part of settlement agreements is a violation of a person’s First Amendment rights. The petition seeks an opinion on that interpretation.

According to the petition, Hudson settled a First Amendment claim with the city in August 2020 that required her to enter into a nondisclosure agreement.

Exhibit A includes redacted correspondence between lawyers hired by both the city and former City Manager Tarron Richardson. Richardson filed suit last year in federal court alleging that the city violated the terms of a nondisparagement clause related to his departure from the city in September 2020. He withdrew from the case in a filing of voluntary dismissal on March 8. (read Exhibit A) (read Exhibit B)

“The [Virginia Risk Sharing Association], as the City’s insurer, has the authority to settle a case,” wrote city attorney Lisa Robertson in a March 9 email to former Mayor Nikuyah Walker. “The VSRA attorney appointed to represent City Council dealt with Dr. Richardson’s attorney. No city funds are being paid out.”

Walker had wanted more information on how the suit came to be dismissed. The former mayor had been named as a party in Richardson’s case, as had a former city attorney.

“Virginia Risk Sharing Association did not assign an attorney to you, John Blair, or [former City Councilor] Heather Hill because Dr. Richardson never served any of you with process,” Robertson wrote.

This story was originally out with the incorrected person attributed in the quotation above.

A less drunken Foxfield?

It’s time again for the annual spring running of the Foxfield Races. That means that Garth Road will be closed between Barracks Farm Road and Free Union Road between 8 a.m. and 1 p.m.

“Anyone not attending the event should avoid the area,” reads an email from the Albemarle County Police Department. “Keep in mind, heavy traffic delays should be expected until 5:30 pm, even after the roadway reopens.”

This will be the first spring races since Foxfield has updated its policies on alcohol. Vehicles that park in tailgating spaces are only permitted two fifths of hard liquor, three bottles of wine, and three six-packs of beer, seltzer, or cider. Those who drive in are permitted to leave their vehicles within 48 hours of the conclusion of the races.

Those with tickets for what’s known as the New Orange area are not allowed to bring in any alcohol at all, but can purchase from approved vendors.

Several years ago, there was an attempt to sell the property that resulted in a lawsuit. Parts of the property are now under a conservation easement.

Rent continues to increase for office and retail space in Charlottesville area

A major Virginia real estate company that specializes in commercial space has published its latest report on the Charlottesville market. Cushman Wakefield | Thalhimer begins with an overall assessment of the economy.

“After experiencing its highest unemployment rate on record of 10.2 percent in April 2020, Charlottesville employment has rebounded to near pre-pandemic levels of more than 116,000,” reads the top of the retail report.

The vacancy rate for office space is at 9 percent, but some of that is related to the placement of 359,000 square feet of space in the former State Farm Headquarters.

Recently constructed space is beginning to fill in.

“Apex Plaza delivered in the first quarter with a total of 187,000 square feet,” reads the office report. “Home to Apex Clean Energy and The Southern Environmental Law Center among other tenants.”

The report also notes the CODE building is coming online with coworking space and traditional offices. The price to rent these spaces is also increasing.

“Overall market rents reached north of $26 per square foot (psf), a historic high, and downtown Class A office rents are averaging north of $35 psf,” the report continues.

The retail report notes that more than 155,000 square of retail space have been built since 2020, and more is on the way.

“Projects like Albemarle Business Campus and Brookhill Town Center will bring continued growth to the market, delivering office and residential opportunities as well as restaurant and retail spaces, which are now pre-leasing,” reads the retail report.

The average asking rent for retail is $19.04 per square foot.

As for residential properties, I’ll be posting an anecdotal review of transactions early next week. Paid subscribers will get the first look before that content will go over to Information Charlottesville.

Shout-outs for Raised/Razed screening, ebike demonstrations

In today’s second and this subscriber-supported shout-outs, Preservation Piedmont wants you to know about this Saturday’s premiere of Raised/Razed, a film by filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson and Jordy Yager about the life and destruction of Vinegar Hill, one of the oldest African American neighborhoods in Charlottesville. The Maupintown Media production charts the lives of residents over nearly a century as they built prosperity in the face of racially discriminatory policies at every level. The film will be willl be shown outdoors at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center at 8 p.m. Tickets are available on the center’s website with donations to be divided between seven Black-led organizations.

On Sunday, May 1, from 2:00-4:00. A pair of interested ebike owners in town will be bringing their bikes to Meade Park, and anybody who's interested can stop by, ask questions, and take test rides. They will have some ebikes with seats for children. If you’re going, drop them a line in this form.

Virginia Senate panel kills Youngkin bill for three-month waiver of fuel tax

When Virginia legislators went to Richmond Wednesday to respond to Governor Youngkin’s 26 vetos and dozens of proposed amendments related to the official 2022 session, a Virginia Senate committee met to consider one of the only policy bills in the special session that’s currently underway.

The Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee voted 12 to 3 on a motion to waive a bill to halt the motor fuel tax for a three month period. Chair Janet Howell said what Youngkin calls surplus funds are intended to pay for new infrastructure.

“In 2020, the General Assembly made significant efforts to provide long-term, bipartisan transportation funding solutions and this included a two-year phased increase in gas taxes,” Howell said.

Howell said the bill (HB 6001) would reduce available funding for new transportation projects and maintenance by around $437 million.

“I also wanted to emphasize that other approaches supported by the Senate such as a tax rebate check or a refundable earned-income tax credit would likely be more effective options in providing relief to our citizens,” Howell said.

Ser Stephen Newman (R-23) said the bill is intended as an emergency measure given the growth in inflation.

“Over the last 12 months, the [Consumer Price Index for Urban Consumers] has increased by 8.5 percent, the largest 12 month increase since 1981,” Newman said. “In 2020 when the omnibus bill that [Howell] spoke about was passed, the CPI-U was 1 percent.”

Newman said the average price of gas was $2.42 a gallon when the bill was passed, an amount that has increase to over $4 a gallon. He disputed the claim that maintenance programs will be affected by the three month waiver.

‘In comparison to past [Six Year Improvement Programs], VDOT’s construction program remains overfunded by over $600 million,” Newman said.

Senator Richard Saslaw (D-35) said he didn’t think any money available for transportation should be taken away.

“The condition of the roads in Northern Virginia, and I can’t say for the rest of the state, are the worst [I]have seen in the 42 years I’ve been in office,” Saslaw said.

Saslaw described Braddock Road as a secondary road that carries 80,000 vehicles a day.

“It looks like they have driven tanks up that road,” Saslaw said, “I have never seen roads torn up to the degree that they were and when we left the session in March, on my way home I hit a pothole.”

Saslaw said it cost him $300 to get that fixed.

The 12 votes to defeat the bill included Republican Senator Emmett W. Hanger (R-24).

Moomaw article on 2022 House race is a must-read

For the past few months, I’ve been trying to keep track of a federal lawsuit seeking a House of Delegates election in 2022, a year off of the regular schedule. If that happens, things would have to move very quickly.

If you’ve not followed this case, I highly recommend reading Graham Moomaw’s article posted today on Virginia Mercurythat goes in-depth into what could be a historic election.

Local vehicular fatalities in Albemarle

To close up the show today, following up with something from a previous story this month. Earlier this month, the Department of Motor Vehicles reported that Virginia hit a 14-year high in traffic fatalities in 2021, and that the state is on track to surpass that amount this year.

Looking locally, there were 16 total fatalities on roads in Albemarle County in 2021, including on Interstate 64. Those were among 968 people killed on roadways in Virginia last year.

There have been two deaths in Albemarle so far this year.

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After today, there are only two more days in April. After today, there are 247 days left in 2022. But for now, it is still April 28 and this is the appropriate Charlottesville Community Engagement. After this installment, is it my hope that you will know slightly more than you did before. I cannot quantify precisely. I am Sean Tubbs, the host and producer.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts in your email, become a free subscriber. To keep them coming, become a paid one!

On today’s program:

The Jefferson Madison Regional Library is celebrating National Poetry Month today with a series of scrolls

The General Assembly takes action on Governor Youngkin’s vetoes and recommendations

More documents filed in the Goldman v. Brink case to force a 2022 House of Delegates election

The Virginia Film Festival is taking submissions and Virginians get a break

Charlottesville City Council approves a rezoning for 170 units in the Fry’s Spring area

An update on the elevators at Midway Manor
First-shout is for the Saturday premiere of Raised/Razed

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, Preservation Piedmont wants you to know about this Saturday’s premiere of Raised/Razed, a film by filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson and Jordy Yager about the life and destruction of Vinegar Hill, one of the oldest African American neighborhoods in Charlottesville. The Maupintown Media production charts the lives of residents over nearly a century as they built prosperity in the face of racially discriminatory policies at every level. The film will be willl be shown outdoors at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center at 8 p.m. Tickets are available on the center’s website with donations to be divided between seven Black-led organizations. Visit https://jeffschoolheritagecenter.org/ to learn more.

General Assembly convenes for veto session

Virginia legislators returned to Richmond yesterday to continue the 2022 regular session of the General Assembly by responding to vetoes and recommendations from Governor Glenn Youngkin.

Before both the House of Delegates and Senate convened at noon, the House Democratic Caucus met and ousted minority leader Eileen Filler-Corn. Brandon Jarvis of the Virginia Political Newsletter reports a secret ballot motion to remove Filler-Corn passed with 25 votes. That’s the minimum required by caucus by-laws. There are 48 Democrats in the 100-member House of Delegates.

Jarvis reports a motion to remove Delegate Charniele Herring failed. There was no vote for a new leader.

In total, Youngkin had vetoed 26 bills and made recommended changes to 117 others. David Blount, legislative liaison for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, reports in his update to area officials that none of the vetoes were overridden. Blount reports that no action was taken on the state budget, but the chair of the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee had an update.

“We’re working to resolve our differences while also maintaining the Senate position as it relates to the importance of funding core services, especially in the areas of education and health and human services,” said Senator Janet Howell.

For a full recap of the action on the vetoes and recommendations, check out the Virginia Mercury’s coverage.

We’ll hear more from Howell in tomorrow’s installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Attorney General’s office files briefs in 2022 House race case

The final round of briefs in a federal case to force a House of Delegates race this November may have been filed this week. Richmond Attorney Paul Goldman filed suit against the Board of Elections last year claiming the certification of winning candidates in the 2021 race was not valid because the districts are outdated because they are based on the 2010 Census.

In March. the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals sent the case back to the Eastern District of Virginia to answer the question of whether Goldman has the right to have filed the suit. In a new brief filed on Monday, Solicitor General Andrew Ferguson argues Goldman does not have standing.

“Goldman’s brief is long on rhetoric but falls short on standing—the only question the Fourth Circuit authorized this Court to answer,” reads the motion. “He offers no explanation of how he has suffered the sort of particularized injury-in-fact that Article III requires for any plaintiff who wants to invoke federal jurisdiction.”

The brief goes on to argue that the action by the Virginia Supreme Court to adopt new legislative boundaries in late December did nothing to invalidate the elections of 2021.

“The Supreme Court merely drew the maps for the next election,” the motion continues. “The Commonwealth of Virginia’s conduct of the 2021 election did not violate the United States Constitution.”

The brief also argues that a federal judicial order to hold a state election this year would be intrusive and would lead to “judicially created confusion.” The state also argues that oral argument on this question is not necessary.

In response, Goldman filed a surrebuttal arguing that the state’s latest motion introduced new matters that he deserves to have the right to respond to. On Tuesday, Judge David Novak issued an order supporting Goldman’s request to consider a case called Avery v. Midland Countyas he reviews how to proceed with the case.

JMRL celebrating Poem in Your Pocket Day

If you happen to be on the Charlottesville Downtown Mall today, you may have someone approach you with a small scroll. If so, take it, and rejoice that you have been handed an item of poetry. The Jefferson Madison Regional Library is once again celebrating Poem in Your Pocket Day at several locations throughout the area.

“On this annual international day honoring the power of poetry to inspire and delight, children, teens and adults are invited to stop by any JMRL library branch to pick out a poem scroll tied with a bow,” reads the information release for the day. “Unwrap it, and possibilities unfold: read it to yourself, share it with someone close (or even a stranger), or just tuck it in your pocket for a rainy day.”

The library system has teamed up with local businesses and other organizations for this occasion. Partners include: 2nd Act Books, Botanical Fare, Chaps, Mudhouse (Downtown), Splendora’s Gelato (Shops at Stonefield), UVA Medical Center, and Virginia Discovery Museum.

There’s also a virtual program at 2 p.m. with “An Afternoon with Laura Shovan.” The poet and children’s author will discuss her work with Supervising Children’s Librarian Tasha Birckhead. Shovan is the author of The Last Fifth Grade of Emerson Elementary.

Tonight at 7 p.m. there will a Poetry in the Park at Market Street Park next to the library. Everyone is to read their favorite poem at an open mic event. That goes through 8:30 p.m.

Virginia Film Festival waiving fees for Virginia filmmakers

The Virginia Film Festival is six months away but time is running shorter to enter your submission. If you live within the Commonwealth or attend a school here, you can send in your work without having to pay a fee.

“The VAFF showcases celebrated new narrative and documentary features, independent and international projects, fresh perspectives on timeless classics, and local filmmakers from throughout Virginia,” reads the submission webpage.

For those outside Virginia, the Early Bird Deadline is June 6, 2022 and you can submit a feature for $30 or a short for $10. For reference, features are anything over 31 minutes. The regular deadline is June 27, 2022 and those fees go up to $50 and $25 respectively.

Students from all over the world can submit their work, regardless of length, for $10.

The 2022 Virginia Film Festival begins November 2 and runs through November 6.

Second shout-out is for the Rivanna River Fest and an E-Bike demo

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out, did you know we are now in the middle of the Rivanna River Fest? A host of partners including the Rivanna Conservation Alliance and the Nature Conservancy are holding a series of events this week to celebrate that waterway that helps define urban Albemarle and Charlottesville. This all culminates in the main event this Sunday, May 1, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Rivanna River Company on the banks of the Rivanna. This includes the Rivanna River Paddle Race, the virtual Fix a Leak Family 5K, There will also be Water Quality Monitoring Demonstrations, City Nature Challenge, Pop-up Environmental Education Activities, and a Guided Bird Walk at Riverview Park. Learn more at rivannariver.org!

In the same area on the same day, there will be an ebike demo day at Meade Park this Sunday, May 1, from 2:00-4:00. A pair of interested ebike owners in town will be bringing their bikes, and anybody who's interested can stop by, ask questions, and take test rides. They will have some ebikes with seats for children. If you’re going, drop them a line in this form.

Council considering amendment of Friendship Court agreement

The current Charlottesville City Council had the chance this month to check in with the redevelopment of Friendship Court. The Piedmont Housing Alliance came before Council on April 18 with a request to amend an agreement that governs a $6 million forgivable loan granted in November 2020 for the first phase.

The amendment is a technical one because the full amount had not been allocated by Council in a subsequent budget cycle.

Brenda Kelley is the redevelopment manager for the city of Charlottesville, a position currently housed in the Office of Community Solutions.

“This request is not asking for additional funding,” Kelley said. “This funding is already approved in this current budget.”

Council had no issue with the amendment.

“This was kind of staggered mostly because of COVID,” said City Councilor Sena Magill. “Friendship Court was really trying to help ease some of the potential future unknown burden that we might be facing with COVID.”

The item will require a second reading and it will be on the consent agenda for the May 2 meeting.

Construction of the first phase of Friendship Court is now underway.

See also: Council approves agreement for Friendship Court funding, October 30, 2020

Council approves rezoning for 240 Stribling, new agreement to pay for sidewalks

Charlottesville City Council has voted to rezone nearly 12 acres of land in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood in order for Southern Development to build 170 units. They also voted for the first time on a proposal that would tie a specific infrastructure project to increased revenues that will be generated by higher property taxes.

“This is going to allow us to get infrastructure that we need in that part of the city that we would not have otherwise done,” said Councilor Brian Pinkston.

Approval came at the April 18, 2022 meeting.

Last year, the City Planning Commission recommended approval of the rezoning but only if Stribling Avenue would be upgraded as part of the development.

Southern Development agreed to loan the city $2.9 million to pay for sidewalks and drainage on Stribling Avenue. Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers recommended against the agreement as it was written at Council’s first reading on March 21.

“We did have discussions with the developer, [Charlie] Armstrong, and we did come to agreement, a funding agreement,” Rogers said

The amended agreement would keep the loan at $2.9 million. The idea has always been that Southern Development would be paid back through the tax revenue generated by higher assessments based on the new development. The initial agreement would have given Southern Development 100 percent of the new tax revenue, but that would have been against the city’s policy to allocate a percentage of new real estate tax funds towards education.

“We negotiated that it would be 60 / 40 and 60 percent would go to repay the loan,” Rogers said. “And we agreed for that arrangement, it would be a longer financing agreement.”

The city will also allocate $1.3 million funding in the Capital Improvement Program for the project as well to cover the costs and possible overruns.

“And from discussions with the engineer, that should be enough to cover the project,” Rogers said.

Armstrong said the $2.9 million will be available to the city shortly.

“The agreement stipulates that we would have those funds available and drawable by the city before we can pull a land disturbing permit,” Armstrong said.

City engineer Jack Dawson said he did not have a timeline when the roadway would be upgraded, but said planning work on Stribling would commence on July 1 if not before.

“Which means finding a consultant, doing the planning, community outreach, all of the things that go into development of a project of this size,” Dawson said.

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook was persuaded to proceed.

“If the neighbors’ concern is that somehow the developer is going to withhold the construction of the community assets until everything else is done, that’s not going to be happening,” Snook said.

Armstrong said he is hoping to be under construction within 12 to 18 months. The project will be constructed in 20 phases.

Snook said the intersection of Stribling and Jefferson Park Avenue Extended also needs to be improved.

“That’s the kind of thing it strikes me as a manageable problem and one that we can continue to work toward for solutions,” Snook said. “It doesn’t seem to me to be an insurmountable problem.”

Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders said Council would get an update in the future on how Stribling would be maintained at a time when construction of both 240 Stribling and the upgrade to the street are underway.

“We will bring back to you more details on how we will manage this project unlike maybe how we’ve done other projects in the past because this one is such a significantly complicated and somewhat controversial project,” Sanders said.

Councilor Michael Payne said the city should be able to better analyze how much economic value a developer gets for lots that are rezoned.

“So that we can understand our position vis-a-vis the developer in a situation like this when we are in a way going to be informally negotiating,” Payne said. “I will say I don’t think that we were perhaps were careful in our analysis in setting ourselves up for this.”

Payne voted in favor of the rezoning and the agreement, which passed unanimously.

Midway Manor Elevator update

Finally today, in Tuesday’s program, there was a section on Council’s approval of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s approval of $23 million in tax-exempt bonds to cover the costs of purchasing and renovating Midway Manor. Councilor Michael Payne had expressed concern about a faulty elevator. I checked in with Standard Communities and received this statement yesterday.

“We continue to plan for a comprehensive renovation and upgrade of Midway Manor, which is expected to begin later this year in conjunction with the implementation of extended affordability protections for the property. Recognizing that the elevators were in need of more immediate attention, we have accelerated the modernization of both elevators at the property, with on-site work currently underway. In efforts to minimize disruption to residents, one elevator car is being worked on at a time, with the entire project expected to be complete within the next 8 weeks.” - Steven Kahn, Director, Standard Communities

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What’s shaking? Sounds like an appropriate greeting for Richter Scale Day. Have yourself tied in knots? An appropriate pose for National Pretzel Day. I know I am able to tell you this is the 369th edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a clear sign of how I honor Get Organized Day. I’m Sean Tubbs, the host of this regular newsletter and podcast about things both trivial and of massive importance.

Help spread the word by sharing this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement!

In today’s edition:

The Virginia Solar Initiative has the first ever survey of how localities in the Commonwealth regulate solar installations large and small

The Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee in Albemarle will not be reappointed anytime soon

Charlottesville City Council ratifies the issuance of $23 million in revenue bonds for Midway Manor

And the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors get an update on Southwood in advance of a public hearing tonight for a rezoning for the second phase

Shout-out to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Survey released on solar rules across Virginia localities

In six years, the amount of electricity generated by solar panels in increased by 12,150 percent. That’s according to data cited in the first ever survey of Virginia localities on their policies related to permitting large utility-scale installations as well as rooftop panels.

The survey was conducted by the Virginia Department of Energy and the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia and asked a series of questions to officials in Virginia’s 133 localities.

“In Virginia, the permitting and siting of solar energy and energy storage facilities is heavily informed by local governments,” reads the report. “Therefore, to realize the full potential of solar energy development in Virginia, it is important to understand and support the solar experience, concerns and priorities of local governments.”

One hundred and nine localities responded to the survey, which was conducted a year after the General Assembly passed the Virginia Clean Economy Act which among other things mandates that Virginia’s largest two investor-owned utilities be 100 percent carbon free by 2050.

“The VCEA also deems 16,100 megawatts (MW) of solar and onshore wind to be in the public interest, greatly reducing the barriers for project approval with the State Corporation Commission,” the report continues.

The survey is intended to help inform policy across Virginia, given that localities set the detailed rules for siting and zoning of solar facilities.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, electricity generated through solar in Virginia increased from 30 megawatts in 2015 to 3,675 megawatts in 2021.

Smaller installations on homes and businesses are called “distributed” solar projects. That number has risen from 948 net-metering installations in 2011 to 26,237 in 2021.

No plans to reappoint VORCAC

There are eight vacancies on the Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors has no intention of filling them any time soon. That’s according to Emily Kilroy, the county’s director of communications and public engagement.

“The Board will not seek to make reappointments at this time, as Committee support right now is in a transition,” Kilroy wrote in an email to Charlottesville Community Engagement on Monday.

The previous appointees resigned en masse in April after their April 11 meeting was canceled by the county for a lack of pressing issues. Committee members disagreed and announced their resignation in an April 19 Substack post.

Albemarle County is currently reviewing the Comprehensive Plan, of which the Village of Rivanna Master Plan is a component. As part of that work, staff resources in the Community Development Department are not as available.

“Recently, the Community Development Department’s long range planning staff have traditionally managed all CAC meetings and scheduling,” wrote Charles Rapp, the deputy director of community development, in a March 1 email. “To transition the primary focus to the comprehensive plan, staff is proposing a structured schedule for the CACs for the remainder of the 2022 calendar year.”

That did not meet the favor of the former members of the Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee.

Today, the Free Enterprise Forum is calling for the county to disband all of the Community Advisory Committees.

To learn more about the Comprehensive Plan project underway, visit the AC44 pages on the Albemarle County website. This is not to be confused with the Air Canada flight between Vancouver and Dublin.

What do you think? Leave a comment!

City Council signs off on bonds for Midway Manor

At their meeting on April 18, City Council agreed with the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s decision to issue $23 million in bonds for a third-party to refurbish the Midway Manor housing complex in downtown Charlottesville.

“It is assistance with the financing for the substantial rehabilitation of Midway Manor Apartments by Standard Communities,” said Michael Graff, a bond counsel with McGuire Woods.

The funding will flow through the CRHA as a conduit for tax-exempt bonds, which requires the city to also issue its approval.

“At a high level we will be ensuring that this property continues to provide affordable housing for at least the next 30 years through partnership with Virginia Housing and an allocation of Low Income Housing Tax Credits as well as renewing the subsidy contract that provides the current residents with a rental subsidy that is set to expire in two years,” said Steven Kahn of Standard Communities.

Kahn said Standard is working with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to extend that contract for 20 years. He said that’s the maximum length HUD will allow. He also said there will be a substantial renovation of the units.

“Sixty-plus thousand dollars per unit,” Kahn said. “Very little will be untouched. The things you typically think of for renovations is kitchens, bathroom, flooring, and electrical systems, absolutely. But also some of the behind the scene elements that can also plague older buildings if they are not invested in. Façade, windows, roofing.”

Paragraph below updated on April 27, 2022

Kahn said work on the elevator systems is currently underway. More details was provided in a statement sent to Charlottesville Community Engagement on April 27.

Councilor Michael Payne also sits as a voting member of the CRHA Board. He voted to approve the bonds on February 28, but said he would vote on Council with “unease.”

“There’s not a way for City Council to have baked in our approval a lock-step assurance for example when and if the elevator get renovated, how is this process going to go, so I will certainly be trying to watch it as closely as I can and be talking to residents throughout this process,” Payne said.

Midway Manor sits on 2.32 acres and was built in 1981 according to city property records. Standard Communities paid $16.5 million for the property on January, 13, 2022.

Today’s second shout-out goes to LEAP

LEAP also offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If someone in your household is age 60 or older, or you have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

Albemarle Supervisors briefed on Southwood Redevelopment

Tonight the Albemarle Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on the rezoning of the second phase of the Southwood Mobile Home Park being overseen by a local nonprofit. (meeting info)

Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville purchased Southwood in 2007 and entered into an agreement with the Board of Supervisors in 2016 to work with the nonprofit. A performance agreement for a public private partnership was signed in 2019 to govern $3.25 million in county investment.

Supervisors got an update at their meeting on April 20, 2022.

“That was shortly followed by approval of the phase one rezoning application and just to let you know, the rezoning application for phase two was submitted to the county in 2021,” Pethia said.

Phase one is for 34 acres on the eastern and southern edges of the property, with a maximum of 450 homes, 270 units of which will be made affordable to residents through various interventions. There’s also a maximum of 50,000 square feet of non-residential space. Before describing phase two, Pethia gave an update on how the site plan for phase one has turned out.

“The approved site plan will provide a total of 335 residential units, 211 of those are affordable,” Pethia said. “The affordable housing units include approximately 121 low-income housing tax credit units which will be located along Hickory Drive, 86 Habitat built units to be located in villages one and two as well as in block ten. Habitat units include condominiums, townhomes, and single family attached and detached units.”

Pethia said Habitat has currently identified 37 Southwood households who are ready to move forward with purchasing their homes in phase one.

Phase 2 extends the rezoning to the existing mobile home park.

“If approved, phase two will approve 527 to 1,000 housing units, 227 of which will be affordable, including a potential sixty additional Low Income Housing Tax Credit units,” Pethia said.

Phase 2 would allow for a maximum of 60,000 square feet of nonresidential space. The Planning Commission will review this rezoning tonight.

Funding overview

In addition to $3.25 million associated with the performance agreement, Albemarle has used $675,000 from the housing trust to help pay for costs associated with the first phase of the rezoning as well as the equivalent of $175,000 in county staff time.

“Additionally, the county applied for and was awarded a little over $2.4 million in grant funding including a $40,000 Community Development Block Grant,” Pethia said.

Pethia said Habitat estimates the total cost to develop Southwood will be $154.7 million, including the cost to prepare the sites and to engage with residents.

“Habitat anticipates securing $131.1 million to cover the project costs,” Pethia said. “This amount includes funds that have already been received and that will be expended by the end of this fiscal year. The balance of total project funds include donations received through Habitat’s capital campaign, revenue generated through mobile home park operations, proceeds from the sale of land for market-rate housing, and funds Habitat anticipates receiving through federal and state grants, local government, and foundations.”

Pethia said there’s a current $16.6 million revenue gap and county staff are looking to close it. Many sources will include a local match from Albemarle taxpayers. Another option would be increased funding from the housing trust or development of a new public private partnership.

In March, MacKenzie Scott gave Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville $5.75 million. Habitat CEO Dan Rosensweig said the deficit already includes that spending. (Daily Progress story)

“It’s a blessing and a curse because it’s already baked into this,” Rosensweig said.

Another expense has been and will be removal of oil tanks under trailers as well as failing septic systems.

“There were two areas of the mobile home park that are on failing septic right now and there is one area of the park that was draining directly into the part of the park that we are trying to develop and that was obviously a catastrophe,” Rosensweig said. “One of the things that we’ve had to do earlier than we thought was scramble to create trailer pads on the other side of the park that’s on [public] sewer. We’ve been moving people. Some folks moved out over the years and we purchased mobile homes and rehabbed them. So the first 80 or so families, we’re about halfway through moving them out of the park so we can decommission all of that septic.”

Rosensweig said another 170 trailers are on failing septic and it is directly pouring into Biscuit Run and into the watershed. They’re applying for funding to install a sewer line into the park, but that cost is $6.5 million and the county will be asked to cover some of the cost.

“It would also be infrastructure that we’re designing to be part of the second phase so it would be infrastructure that’s not temporary infrastructure, but permanent infrastructure,” Rosensweig said.

The Planning Commission takes up the second phase of the rezoning tonight.

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The final Monday of the fourth month of 2022 is here, as April apparently prepares to transition into the middle of summer. Things are always heating up in local and regional government and this begins another week of coverage from Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that seeks to take the temperature as frequently as possible. I’m your unofficial proctor, Sean Tubbs.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s program:

The Virginia General Assembly meets this Wednesday and some members of the House Democratic Caucus seek new leaders

Finalists are announced for the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council’s awards gala in May

The entire Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee has resigned in protest

A committee will get to work to determine if an Albemarle elementary school should continue to be named for educator Mary Carr Greer

And Albemarle County Supervisors approved another $2.5 million to move Crozet plaza project forward

First shout-out is for the Rivanna River Fest

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out, did you know we are now in the middle of the Rivanna River Fest? A host of partners including the Rivanna Conservation Alliance, the Nature Conservancy are holding a series of events this week to celebrate that waterway that helps define urban Albemarle and Charlottesville.

This all culminates in the main event this Sunday, May 1, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Rivanna River Company on the banks of the Rivanna. This includes the Rivanna River Paddle Race, the virtual Fix a Leak Family 5K, There will also be Water Quality Monitoring Demonstrations, City Nature Challenge, Pop-up Environmental Education Activities, and a Guided Bird Walk at Riverview Park. Learn more at rivannariver.org!

General Assembly to meet this week as some Virginia House Democrats seek new leadership

The General Assembly is set to return to Richmond this Wednesday for a session to respond to Governor Glenn Youngkin’s recommendations and vetoes. Brandon Jarvis writes for the Virginia Political Newsletter that one Democratic member of the House is seeking a new leadership vote before that work gets underway, with him at the top. (read the story for more details)

Delegate Don Scott (D-80) sent a letter yesterday to members of the House Democratic Caucus offering his resignation as its Vice-Chair for Outreach. He also claimed caucus by-laws require an election for his replacement before Wednesday’s veto session begins. He also invoked the by-laws to call for a leadership vote.

“I therefore call for a vote for the Leader, Caucus Chair, and if a replacement is appointed, Vice-Chair for Outreach,” Scott wrote.

The current minority leader is Delegate Eileen Filler-Corn (D-41), who had served as speaker when the Democrats had a ten seat majority from 2020 to 2021. The current caucus chair is Delegate Charniele Herring (D-46).

Republicans now have 52 seats to the Democrats’ 48 and Scott nominated himself as the new Leader with Delegate Sally Hudson (D-57) as Caucus Chair.

Brandon Jarvis reports that the vote will be a secret ballot, and 25 votes are needed for a slate to be elected.

Process underway to reevaluate name of Greer Elementary School

Albemarle County Public Schools continues their review of existing schools this week to see if their current namesakes are appropriate for the third decade of the 21st Century. On Tuesday, a committee to review the name of Mary Carr Greer Elementary School will begin their work at a 3 p.m. organizational meeting, but the public is not allowed. Twelve people have been selected to see if the name is consistent with the county’s naming policy. This includes Principal Steve Saunders as well as guidance counselor Susie Lee.

As with other schools that have gone through this process, the committee will develop a community survey to solicit suggestions for a school name. Two public meetings will be held as well.

“Members of the community and the committee can recommend either a new name be chosen for the school or the retention of its current name,” reads a notice on the county’s website. “If the advisory committee selects the current school name as one of its three finalists, the policy requires the committee to examine if Mary Carr Greer, for whom the school is named, made contributions to the community of state, national or world-wide significance.”

According to the Ivy Creek Foundation, Mary Carr Greer lived from 1884 to 1973 and was the eldest daughter of Hugh Carr. She attended Union Ridge Graded School, a school for Black students established after Emancipation. Greer would become a teacher and joined the faculty at the Albemarle Training School before becoming its principal in 1931. She retired from education in 1950. The elementary school that carries her name opened in 1979 off of Lambs Lane.

So far, the names of Broadus Wood Elementary and Virginia L. Murray Elementary School have been retained.

Paul Cale Elementary was renamed Mountain View, Mortimer Sutherland Elemawas renamed Lakeside Elementary, and Murray High School is now the Community Lab School. Jack Jouett Middle School will become Journey Middle School on July 1.

Village of Rivanna CAC members resign en masse

All but two members of one of Albemarle’s growth area advisory committees have resigned. The county’s website shows eight vacancies on the Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee (VORCAC). That group is charged with making recommendations and providing guidance to the Board of Supervisors on land use items within the scope of the Village of Rivanna Master Plan.

However, in an April 19 post on their Substack newsletter, members cited staff interference in their efforts to provide education efforts about the master plan.

“Supervisor [Donna] Price is concerned that our review of the Master Plan update is taking too much staff time,” they wrote. “It is our opinion that more time is needed to create a working plan that can be used as intended.”

The group last met in March, but an April 11 meeting was canceled.

The post concludes with an email Price sent to former VORCAC Chair Dennis Odinov explaining that the ongoing review of the Comprehensive Plan takes precedence over other planning activities which are requiring staff time. Price is the Board of Supervisors’ liaison to VORCAC.

“There are no active development applications ready for discussion at the VORCAC, and consistent with Staff recommendation from [Planning Director] Charles Rapp on March 1st, there is no necessity for holding a VORCAC meeting this month,” Price wrote on April 5.

Many of the VORCAC members have insisted loudly for many years that the plan allows for no more than one housing unit per acre. Last October, they successfully held the Board of Supervisors to that interpretation of the vision with Southern Development’s Breezy Hill development. The company had sought to build many more units than the maximum of 80 approved by Supervisors.

Joe Fore is a member of the Crozet Community Advisory Committee who addressed the Board of Supervisors last week about the issue. He spoke as a community member and not in an official capacity as the Crozet group’s new chair.

“To the extent that this portends the Board’s treatment of all CAC’s, it is troubling,” Fore said. “The notion that CAC’s would be prevented from meeting or even setting their own agendas even in months where there are no pressing issues from county staff is a dramatic departure of how these committees have operated.”

Fore said county staff have used the pandemic to assert more control over the groups. Questions sent this morning the Office of Communications and Public Engagement were not returned in time for this newsletter, but I will continue to follow-up.

There is a precedent for Supervisors putting limitations on CACs and making other changes. In December 2014, Supervisors voted to suspend the Places29 CAC and split it into three different groups at the request of former Supervisor Brad Sheffield.

Three more shout-outs for our middle break!

Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects with the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department, and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. Visit codeforcville.org to learn about those projects.

Another supporter of the Town Crier Productions’ Patreon account wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

Albemarle Supervisors approve $2.5 million in infrastructure funding for Barnes Lumber project

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has agreed to spend an additional $2.5 million in public money on a public-private partnership to redevelop the Barnes Lumber yard in Crozet to provide the infrastructure for a more urban character.

Supervisors had previously agreed to the partnership in 2019. The original agreement required the county to pay $1.6 million toward the plaza and to provide the equivalement amount in tax rebates through a synthetic tax increment financing scheme.

Doug Bates is on the board of the Downtown Crozet Initiative, a nonprofit group also working toward the effort.

"For the last five years, we have engaged in an aspirational dream out in Crozet, hoping for a plaza," Bates said. "A couple years back that dream began to get some real teeth to it when you as a Board acted to develop an agreement between New Town Associates, DCI, and yourself, the county itself."

Bates said the addendum to the agreement is necessary to help jumpstart the economic development efforts to complete the project.

"It's going to be your western outpost," Bates said. "A moment of real inspiration to watch the mountains and see children play.

However, additional funding is required to help with cost overruns caused by inflation. The cost estimate for the first phase is now $7.88 million, higher than the $5.4 million originally anticipated.

“The roads in particular which are of most significance with respect with what we’re asking the Board to consider in its investment as a part of this package today,” said Doug Walker, the deputy county executive. (review Walker’s presentation)

Walker said the project would not happen without the public-private partnership.

“It provides public contribution to provide for public benefit including the developer’s contribution of his money in order to match [Virginia Department of Transportation] revenue-sharing money,” Walker said.

Walker said the closest equivalent to what the plaza hopes to be is the Charlottesville Downtown Mall.

“In fact, that is a plaza owned by and managed by the city Parks and Recreation [Department],” Walker said. “You can see the essential connectivity it provides to that business corridor and the life that it brings into that area.”

Walker said this project builds off of previous Albemarle investment into the Crozet Library which build a road connection to a future Library Avenue. It’s also interconnected with efforts to also transform what’s known as The Square.

“The Square is that piece of road that runs from Crozet Avenue in front of Mudhouse, Fardowners, Parkway Pharmacy, and then ties into what would be Phase One of this project,” Walker said. “That also is a VDOT transportation revenue sharing project.”

Staff suggested using $1 million from the American Rescue Plan Act and $1.5 million from the Economic Development Investment Pool.

“This is an old industrial site being repurposed,” Walker said. “This is putting it back into constructive public and private use.”

As part of the amended agreement, the developer will build public restrooms in the first phase. Another $50,000 will go to the Downtown Crozet Initiative for seed money for an executive director to program the new space.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway wanted to know more about how that $50,000 would be used

“How will the relationship between the county and that entity and then the responsibilities for each to manage the space and that position be formalized?” Gallaway asked.

Lance Stewart, the county’s director of Facilities and Environmental Services, said a management agreement would be worked out.

“I would expect a couple of work sessions with the Board in the future to make sure we are comfortable with the role that they would hold and the management responsibilities that they have,” Stewart said.

Gallaway said he just wants to avoid a county employee being required to run the plaza.

CBIC announces finalists for tech awards

An organization that seeks to promote business and technology in the greater Charlottesville area has announced the finalists for its annual awards gala. The Central Business Innovation Council will hold their first in-person ceremony since 2019 on May 26 at Castle Hill Cider.

“These awards serve as annual touchstones others can look to for inspiration and encouragement during their professional journeys,” said Tracey Greene. “These past two years have been challenging for many and we are delighted to recognize the perseverance, resilience, growth and creativity of these outstanding leaders, innovators, and organizations.”

CBIC has been handing out these awards since 1998, but took last year off due to the pandemic. The 2020 event was held in September and was held virtually, as reported in the September 11, 2020 edition of this newsletter.

Business of the Year

Adial Pharmaceuticals

Perrone Robotics

Rivanna Medical

Educator of the Year

Emily Anderson of Lakeside Middle School, Albemarle County Public Schools

Robbie Munsey of St. Anne’s Belfield

Heather Schmidt of Career and Tech Ed, Albemarle County Public Schools

Employer of the Year

ArcheMedX

Cosaic

Coconstruct

Entrepreneur of the Year

Aaron Reedy of Data Classroom

Sandy Reisky of Apex Clean Energy

Dan Schleifer of Cosaic

Innovator of the Year

Lytos Technologies

Lumacyte

Twin Thread

Partnership

BetterWorld

Center for Nonprofit Excellence + United Way of Greater Charlottesville

Code for Charlottesville

Startup of the Year

Molecular Biologicals

SceneThink

Springbok Analytics

Social Good Award

Sarnya

Steam Discovery Academy

Steam Kitz

VisitAble

Student Entrepreneur of the Year

Alec Brewer, Transfoam

Elizabeth Blankenship, Coton

Elliot Crotteau, Elliot’s Vision

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Today consists of a four and four twos, adding up to April 22, 2022. Far more understandable than Day 112, which is another name this Friday could go by. My name is Sean Tubbs, and this is another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that seeks to provide information about all manner of items in local and regional government in and around Charlottesville.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council learns of an even higher surplus than expected for the current fiscal year

Virginia is set to end its rent relief program in mid-May

A Colorado educator will become the next president of Piedmont Virginia community College

A series of speakers wants Charlottesville Area Transit’s Route 6 to continue to stop at the doorstep of Crescent Halls

And former UVA basketball star Sean Singletary enters the development community in Charlottesville

First shout-out goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners for their annual plant sale

For more information, visit piedmontmastegardeners.org.

Before we begin today, a quick program note. This show is a product of the pandemic. For the past two years, I’ve been producing informational podcasts to help people know what’s going on. I became a journalist almost 30 years ago because bringing people information is what I’ve always wanted to do. At no point do I want to tell you what to think. And for the past two years, I’ve more or less been able to do this all from home. And for a lot of that time, most of you were at home too.

Now that Albemarle and Charlottesville have both gone back to in-person meetings, it’s a bit jarring. I’m not used to it yet and I still have one eye on COVID cases to see what’s going on. Tomorrow’s show will contain an update from the UVA Health System.

But I know I’m not alone. At Monday’s first in-person meeting in 25 months, Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook had a similar sense of disorientation when a resident of Crescent Halls came up to speak.

“You’re Miss Sandridge… I know what you look like without a mask on a Zoom call but I don’t know what you look like face to face,” Snook said.

We’ll hear more from Judy Sandridge later in the show, but I wanted to begin today by acknowledging the past two years and how they were very different from any other time in my career. I’ve gotten used to writing from home. Soon I’ll be back out there doing more, but it’s still an end to an era.

The writer Addison Del Mastro has a piece on his Substack Deleted Scenes called Final Pandemic Thoughts which I think is worth a read. That’s not really within the scope of Charlottesville Community Engagement, nor is this whole first segment. But I am curious to know what your thoughts are on where we’ve been the last two years, and what you’d like to see going forward. As for me, I hope to continue bringing you this program.

Council gets revenue update

Even though Council has recently adopted a budget for the fiscal year that begins on July 1, there is never a time when the city’s finances are not in the public eye. Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers briefed Council this week on the state of revenue collection for the current fiscal year that ends on June 30.

“So far this year we have currently collected 66.93 percent of our budgeted revenue and we remain on track to collect more than the adopted revenue budget of $192,212,843,” Rogers said.

The next tax bills are due on June 6 and will include the one cent real estate tax increase adopted by Council earlier this month. Tax rates go with the calendar year, not the fiscal year. That means a budget surplus is almost certain.

“While we discussed during the budget process that we would end up with $12 million more, what I’m seeing now based on that revision, it’s $13 million,” Rogers said.

Final decisions about how to use that funding will be made by Council later this year after the FY22 books are audited.

Runyon named as PVCC’s next president

The chancellor of Virginia’s Community College System has named a Colorado educator as the next president of Piedmont Virginia Community College. Dr. Jean Runyon is currently the campus vice president at Front Range Community College in Larimer. .

“We are excited to welcome Dr. Runyon to PVCC and believe she will be able to build upon the success and great potential that exists here, not just at the College but throughout the community,” said PVCC College Board Chair Lola Richardson in a statement.

Runyon will be PVCC’s sixth president since it was founded in 1972. She’ll succeed Frank Friedman in the position he has held since November 1998.

The new president has a long history in higher education with positions such as the director of the Innovative Teaching Center at the College of Southern Maryland and eight years in various positions at Anne Arundel Community College in Maryland. She’ll take the reins at PVCC in July.

Virginia rent relief program is set to end

In another sign that the pandemic era is over, the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development is closing an online portal through which people can apply for rent relief. Virginians have until midnight on May 15 to make a new application.

Virginia was one of the first states in the nation to put a mortgage and rent relief program in place soon after the federal Coronavirus, Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES). The program went live in June 2020 and has provided more than $713 million in relief for 104,990 households across the Commonwealth.

To be eligible, households need to have an income less than 50 percent of the area median or have to have had one member out of work for up to 90 days.

“DHCD will continue to work with partners and stakeholders across the state to create comprehensive strategies to increase the supply of affordable housing, address and prevent evictions and reduce barriers in housing throughout the Commonwealth,” reads a notice on the agency’s website.

For more information, visit the DHCD’s website.

Today’s second shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. This week is the annual Rock Marathon, so tune in and support freeform community radio on WTJU Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

Former UVA basketball star part of redevelopment project at 1101 East Market Street

A former University of Virginia basketball player who also played in the National Basketball Association is part of a development team that seeks to build eleven townhouses in downtown Charlottesville.

“Just excited to be back in town and on about the progress with this project,” said Sean Singletary, who played for UVA in the mid 2000’s. “Ever since I graduated from school here, I’ve always wanted to move back here and just give back to the community. Charlottesville and UVA have done so much for me.”

A preliminary site plan has been filed with the city of Charlottesville to build several townhomes in the Little High subsection of the Martha Jefferson neighborhood at the intersection of East Market and 11th Street.

In all, 11th Street Partners seeks to consolidate four lots into one before building ten townhomes. Several existing structures on those properties would be removed, but a house at 1103 East Market Street would remain as it is not part of this project and is owned separately.

As part of this plan, the house at 1101 East Market Street would be replaced with a new structure.

“We determined that the most beneficial to the community would be to demolish these existing structures and replace them with very attractive units that we think are going to add a significant benefit to the community at large,” said engineer Eric Woolley.

One of these would be a sidewalk on this stretch of East Market where there currently is not one on the northern side of the road. Utilities would be placed underground. Each townhouse would have three bedrooms and three off-street parking spaces.

“The way we’ve oriented the units, we think it’s going to be beneficial to the neighborhood by actually providing more parking within the development which alleviates the pressure of overlap parking to other neighbors,” Woolley said.

While the application for the Vue at East Market is by-right and would not require a decision by elected officials, a request to close off a public right of way does.

“The alley closure piece does have discretionary review by City Council but the other components would not,” said Carrie Rainey, a city planner.

One of Singletary’s three partners is Keith Payne, an All-ACC conference running back on the UVA football team.

“This is extremely exciting for our team to be able to develop in Charlottesville, especially downtown in a great neighborhood,” Payne said.

Payne said he and Singletary graduated together, and have always been looking for an opportunity to develop in Charlottesville.

“Being on the corner there, we felt this could be a vibrant site for the city,” Payne said.

The team wants to develop other projects in the community.

No one spoke at the community meeting on Wednesday.

To view the discussion, take a look at the video here.

PHAR seeks to keep Crescent Halls bus stop in place

A series of speakers at Monday’s City Council meeting asked the elected officials to weigh in on a decision by Charlottesville Area Transit to relocate the bus stop at Crescent Halls, a public housing site that is currently undergoing renovations. The homes are currently served in both directions by Route 6 and the agency is making the change to help speed up the route.

That had not been the plan, according to one resident.

“We were told that they would pick up one side and when they come back they would let people off in front of the door,” said Alice Washington. “We need that. Crescent Halls is a senior and disability building.”

As such, Washington said many residents use wheelchairs or walkers to get around and need to be able to board the bus. That will be much harder if they have to walk what she said were the 89 steps to the new stop.

“If they got to walk from way over here over there and some of these people are almost 80 or 90 years old, it’s impossible,” Washington said.

We briefly heard from Judy Sandridge earlier. Let’s hear her again.

“If you see me hear with my cart here again, my oxygen, and a thing full with food trying to walk 89 steps?” Sandridge said. “She walked 89 steps. I can’t do that.”

Other voices included Brandon Collins, the redevelopment coordinator of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority who said keeping the bus stop where it is has been a high priority during renovation discussions.

Another was Shelby Edwards, who succeeded Collins as the main voice of the Public Housing Association of Residents in her capacity as executive director.

“PHAR has hosted both private and public conversations with CAT about this topic,” Edwards said. “We don’t understand why this has been such a laborious task. We know that that CAT would like to move to the 30 minute service to increase ridership, but this means little if the people who switch over already have other forms of transportation. Yes, we do want a world where everyone can use mass transit but we first need one where everyone who has no other form of transit can continue to move around freely.”

Council also heard directly from CRHA’s Executive Director, John Sales.

“We need that bus stop in front of the building,” Sales said.

Sales added that a site plan amendment to the Crescent Halls renovation would be required, which could delay the ability for residents to move back in. Sales also pointed out that the route change has not yet been finally approved by City Council.

“So I just want to make sure that any other route changes that are going to be impacted by this 30 minute transition gets discussed because not only will Crescent Halls be impacted, but people all over the city are going to be impacted, without anyone knowing,” Sales said.

In 2021, Charlottesville Area Transit worked with a consultant to realign the routes, but the changes have not yet been implemented. Under the new changes, Route 6 would no longer travel to the University of Virginia Health System but would stil travel between Willoughby Shopping Center and Downtown. The route would also no longer travel on Ridge Street via Brookwood Drive.

No action was taken at the meeting, but this morning Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders and CAT Director Garland Williams offered the following statement:

“The City Manager has asked staff to consider options regarding the bus stop service to residents of Crescent Halls, including the Paratransit service administered for the City by JAUNT. There are multiple conversations in progress and a number of options are being considered but the iterative process of review, feedback, and costing is in full motion. We will be convening all parties to review and determine workable options to present to Council as soon as possible.”

The route changes have not yet been made because of a lack of drivers that would be required to provide the additional service.

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April 20 is Chinese Language Day but perhaps more importantly, 4/20 is also Lima Bean Respect Day, National Banana Day, and National Cheddar Fries Day. Is there anything else that signifies this day? While you ponder that question, I’ll tell you that this is Charlottesville Community Engagement, a program back from a brief break and ready to get going with another year of information as it flows.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council gets an update on what environmental staff are doing to plan for climate action

Fatalities on Virginia roads reached a 14-year high in 2021

Andy Parker concedes in the 5th District race to be the Democratic nominee

Paul Goldman explains in writing to a federal judge why he thinks a House of Delegates race must be run this year

And the Virginia House of Finance advances a bill to provide a three month period where fuel haulers would not have to pay a tax to the state of Virginia

First shout-out goes to the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority for e-waste collection day

In today’s first subscriber supported public service announcement, the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority wants you to know about Electronic Waste Collection Day coming up on April 23, 2022. Residents of both Albemarle County and Charlottesville have the opportunity to drop off old electronics from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Ivy Material Utilization Center. Permissible items include computers, printers, VCRs, stereos and televisions and people can dispose of up to ten items. Only two tube-style monitors or televisions per person! You must register in advance online where you will be give a time slot. Registration is limited to 110 people per hour. Visit rivanna.org for more information.

Crashes reached 14-year high in Virginia in 2021

Nine hundred and sixty-eight people died on Virginia roads last year. That’s the highest number in 14 years, according to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Fatalities were up in several categories including speed-related crashes, pedestrians, motorcyclists, young drivers, and bicyclists.

The acting commissioner of the DMV is urging people to slow down, wear seat belts, and avoid distractions.

“Vehicles and roadways are safer than they ever have been, yet we continue to lose lives to senseless crashes,” said Linda Ford, who is also Governor Glenn Youngkin’s highway safety representative. “Do your part to help.”

Last year’s numbers in Virginia are part of a national trend toward higher fatalities in 2021 when over 31,000 people died across the United States in the first nine months. The full data for the whole country will be available later this year.

2022 might be worse than 2021. So far this year, 245 people have been killed on Virginia roadways, which is a 12 percent increase over last year.

Parker concedes Democratic nomination to Throneburg

A candidate who failed to get a thousand signatures to be on the Democratic ballot in the June 21 primary has conceded to the only one who met that threshold. Andy Parker made his announcement via Twitter on Monday.

“I was looking forward to a spirited primary and campaign against [incumbent Bob] Good but did not meet the technical requirements to be on the primary ballot,” Parker wrote in the tweet.

Parker’s daughter was murdered on live television while doing a report from Smith Mountain Lake in 2015, along with her colleague. The default nominee, Josh Throneburg, noted this in his statement on Parker’s concession.

"Andy is a person who rose from the ashes of his tragic personal loss and dedicated himself to a life of public service,” Throneburg wrote in a statement. “He was a tireless advocate who wanted to shield other families from the terrible grief he experienced, and I know his mission doesn’t end with this race.”

First-term incumbent Bob Good faces Dan Moy in the Republican convention to be held on May 21 at Hampden Sydney College in Prince Edward County. That’s right in the middle of the new Fifth District as drawn by two Special Masters appointed by the Virginia Supreme Court last year to complete the redistricting process.

Goldman files new motion arguing for oral arguments in suit to force 2022 Delegate election

When the statewide primary is held on June 21, will there be candidates for the House of Delegates on the ballot? Richmond attorney Paul Goldman hopes so and filed a new document on Monday arguing why Judge David Novak should not dismiss the case.

To recap, Goldman filed suit against the Virginia Board of Elections last year asserting that their certification of the 2021 election was unlawful because the districts were based on the 2010 Census. Goldman argues that action violates the principle of “one person, one vote” because some legislative districts are much larger than others.

“The old House District 87 ranked as the most populated with 130,192 inhabitants,” Goldman writes on page seven. “Old House District 75 ranked as the least populated with 67,404 inhabitants.”

The response goes into detail in its claim that this deviation is unconstitutional and deserves a remedy in the form of an election this year based on the new districts. At heart, Goldman argues that none of the current members of the House of Delegates are in legally valid districts, citing the Cosner v. Dalton case that forced a House of Delegates race in 1982. (learn more on Wikipedia)

Virginia’s Solicitor General has until April 25 to respond to Goldman’s response.

Second shout-out goes to a Charlottesville Jazz Society event this weekend

In today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out, the Charlottesville Jazz Society is partnering with the Front Porch and the Tom Tom Festival to host musician Joel Harrison and Free Country this upcoming Saturday. The free show will feature the guitarist, composer, and vocalist with the touring band of Adam Larrabee on guitar, Stephan Crump on bass, and Jordan Perlson on drums. The timeless, haunting melodies of this music anchor the flights of improvisation that the band creates anew every night. The tour is funded in part by South Arts through the auspices of the Doris Duke Fund and the Jazz Road initiative. For more information, visit frontporchcville.org!

Charlottesville City Council briefed on climate action

Earlier this year, the nonprofit group Community Climate Collaborative waged a campaign to get Charlottesville City Council to push staff toward meeting the city’s greenhouse gas emission goals. On July 1, 2019, Council adopted a goal of reducing community-wide gas emissions by 45 percent of 2011 levels by 2030, and to be carbon neutral by 2050.

Council had an hour-long work session on the issue on Monday. Kristel Riddervold, the city’s environmental sustainability and facilities development manager, led off the discussion.

“The city of Charlottesville has had an active climate program since 2007 when it committed to reducing community-wide greenhouse gas emissions by joining the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement,” Riddervold said.

(watch the update)

Riddervold said the City reaffirmed that commitment by also joining the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy, which offers resources for both reduction of gasses and adaptation to changing weather patterns.

“We use the terms climate action to be the umbrella for both of these areas of focus,” Riddervold said.

The presentation covered what work has been underway since the July 2019 goal was endorsed by Council. Riddervold said there have been stumbling blocks to preparing a specific climate action plan, and that includes the adoption of a new Comprehensive Plan. She also said going through several city managers during that time has been an issue, as has been the loss of top management in city government.

“I for example have been serving not only as the environmental sustainability manager, but also since mid-2018, the facilities development manager, and have been pulled into a variety of roles and responsibilities,” Riddervold said.

The city is currently taking applications for a climate program specialist to assist with planning and action. The job closes April 29, if you know of anyone.

“What we are looking at now is a reboot of focused effort to bring this process back on the rails and to get back on the same page,” Riddervold said.

Riddervold acknowledged the frustration on the part of climate groups and she asked for their support going forward.

Susan Elliott, the city’s climate protection manager, said a climate hazard assessment is complete, a climate vulnerability assessment is underway, and the adaptation plan will be ready for review next year.

“In parallel with these planning activities on these two tracks, we are also still delivering a program aimed at supporting and achieving greenhouse gas emissions across our community,” Elliot said. “What we have seen when we look at our emissions community-wide is that approximately 95 percent of emissions are coming from the community outside of our local government control and about five percent are from our municipal operations.”

About 30 percent comes from residential, 30 percent comes from transportation, and 30 percent comes from commercial uses. That will inform where government resources will go.

“This includes supporting and funding energy efficiency improvements including hundreds of home energy assessments annually, helping to find gap fill measures so that our low-income houses are as eligible for as many utility-funded programs as possible, providing EnergySmart home rebates, [and] the Commercial and Clean Energy Loan Fund,” Elliott said.

Other recent initiatives:

This month, the city hired CMTA Energy Solutions to review public buildings to see how energy and water usage could be reduced (press release)

Charlottesville Area Transit is conducting a study of how vehicles might transition to alternative fuels

Charlottesville participated in an urban heat island study last summer (press release)

Lower occupancy in city buildings due to the pandemic lead to less water and energy use (press release)

This morning, the city also released two public surveys to help inform future planning efforts. One is a climate action survey and the other is a climate vulnerability survey. Both will close on May 20.

Youngkin’s bill to temporarily eliminate gas tax advances

The Virginia General Assembly is in special session but have not had much action. Yesterday, the House of Delegates Finance Committee heard testimony of a bill sent down from Governor Glenn Youngkin that would waive the state motor fuel tax from May 1 to July 31.

“The purpose for this bill is to help cut the cost for Virginia families and fight the price of gasoline that has increased 48 percent in the last 12 months,” said Delegate Tara Durant (R-28). “This uses unanticipated transportation revenues to provide Virginians much needed tax relief.”

Under the bill, the tax would be restored to half-strength in August and September before going back to normal in October.

Speaking to the bill, Transportation Secretary Shep Miller talked about its fiscal impact.

“The revenue impact for the FY22-24 budget that I am responsible for is about $470 million,” Miller said. “That’s about a 12 percent reduction in the motor fuels over the 26 month period in question. The total [Commonwealth Transportation Fund] collections during that same period is about $14 billion. So this represents about a three percent reduction in the CTF collections during that period.”

Democrats are skeptical that any of the reduction in the tax will translate to lower prices at the pump because consumers don’t actually pay the tax. Here’s Delegate Vivian Watts (D-39).

“I wanted to make sure that the patron was aware that the gas tax is collected when the tanker truck fills up,” Watts said. “There’s no guarantee at all that when I fill up my tank that if there’s no gas tax charged that I’m going to benefit from this.”

Delegate Sally Hudson (D-57) said many in the state want to invest more in transportation.

“When I hear from Virginians, I hear them tell me that they think our transportation infrastructure or even behind, that the roads are too crowded, their commutes are too long, the buses are infrequent and unreliable,” Hudson said. “We have nothing approaching modern commuter trains.”

Durant said no existing projects would be cut, but this would just lower the amount of funds available in exchange for tax relief.

Testimony against the bill came from Virginians for Better Transportation, the Amalgamated Transit Union, the Virginia Transportation Construction Alliance, the Northern Virginia Chamber of Commerce, Virginians for High Speed Rail, the Old Dominion Highway Contractors Association, the New Virginia Majority, the Southern Environmental Law Center, the Commonwealth Institute, and the Virginia Association for Commercial Real Estate

“This coalition includes some pretty strange bedfellows,” said Trip Pollard of the Southern Environmental Law Center.

Testimony in favor of the bill came from a series of individuals representing small businesses or speaking to their own pain.

“I’d rather spend the money than have the government spend the money,” said Colonel Courtney Whitney, who served in the Youngkin campaign.

Democrats on the committee sought to introduce a substitute that would issue a direct tax relief to Virginians for each registered motor vehicle, but the effort failed. On voice vote, the motion to advance the bill passed and it will now move to the House Appropriations Committee. No meetings are currently scheduled.

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We are now halfway through the fourth month of the year, and when the clock strikes midnight later on, 29.77 percent of 2022 will have passed. Seven out of ten days of the year are still to come. Is this is a good place and time to take stock? That answer is up to you, but I can tell you that this is another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Thanks for reading, and please send it on to someone else!

On today’s program:

Campaign finance reports are in for candidates in the Fifth District

An update from the Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Department

An area grocery chain is set to eliminate plastic bags

A Jefferson Elm is planted on Grounds to mark UVA’s long term landscape architect

First shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign

It’s springtime, and the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign wants you to know they are grassroots initiative of motivated citizens, volunteers, partner organizations, and local government who want to promote the use of native plants. This spring the group is working with retailers across the region to encourage purchase of plants that belong here and are part of an ecosystem that depends on pollination. There are plenty of resources on the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page, so sign up to be notified of lectures, plant sales, and more!

Good leads in fundraising totals for 5th District candidates

Republican incumbent Bob Good has raised the most money among candidates seeking election to Virginia’s new 5th District for the U.S. House of Representatives. According to the Federal Election Commission, Good raised $152,092.13 in the first three months of 2022. His campaign spent $144,310.62 during the period and has spent total of $431,328.87 over the course of the campaign. Good has raised a total of $675,964.49 and had $376,792.76 on hand at the end of March.

Republican Dan Moy raised $114,046 in the first quarter and spent $66,106.12, and has $47,939.88 to spend. He did not file a report for activity prior to this year.

The Republican nominee will be selected in a convention at Hampden-Sydney College on May 21.

On the Democratic side, Josh Throneburg raised $37,524.33 and spent $106,726.72 in the quarter and reported a $50,000 debt. He’s raised $307,678 over the course of the campaign, and had $149,037.30 in his account on March 31. This week the Democrats announced that Throneburg was the sole nominee who turned in enough qualified signatures to make the ballot for the June 21 primary.

Andy Parker failed to make the ballot for the Democratic Primary, but raised $178,314.37 between January 1 and March 31. He spent $26,010.45 and had $152,303.92 in the bank. Park told reporters this week he is considering a challenge of the results.

A third Democratic candidate, Warren McClellan, raised $2,900 in the period and a total of $13,901.18 over the campaign.

A fourth Democratic candidate, Lewis Combs, dropped out of the race raised $5,155 in the period. Combs raised a total of $227,018 during his campaign and has disbursed $184,832, leaving $42,186.01 in his account as of March 31.

COVID-19 update

The Virginia Department of Health reported another 1,538 COVID-19 cases yesterday and a seven-day percent positivity of 5.4 percent. The total death toll over two years has now risen to 20,022.

The VDH no longer reports data by localities on their dashboard, and the Blue Ridge Health District’s dashboard last reports data from April 13. However, an email update sent out last night shows 22 new cases in Albemarle this week, and 16 in Charlottesville. While those figures may be lower than the actual number due to at-home testing, there does not appear to be a significant public health threat from COVID at this time.

“What we’re not seeing is a significant spike or a significant increase in case counts at the hospital of people diagnosed with COVID,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Medical Center. “Particularly with people diagnosed with severe COVID.

Second boosters are now recommended for those over the age of 50 or those who are immunocompromised. Those who got the Johnson and Johnson vaccine and booster may want to consider a switch.

“In general, for most patients we’d recommend if they received a Johnson and Johnson vaccine initially, that we steer them towards a [messenger]RNA vaccine, the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines,” Dr. Sifri said.

For more information on vaccinations, visit the Blue Ridge Health District website.

Wegman’s to eliminate single-use plastic bags

As Albemarle County and Charlottesville both consider levying a tax on plastic bags, a major grocery chain has announced they will phase out their use by the end of this calendar year.

“With this decision, the company’s goal is to shift all customers to reusable bags, the best option to solve the environmental challenge of single-use grocery bags,” reads a press release on the company’s website.

Wegmans will begin to charge five cents per paper bag, with proceeds going to local food banks or United Way chapters. The company has already eliminated plastic bags in New York, where they were banned ini 2019 by that state’s legislature. Wegmans has also experimented with eliminating them from some stores around Richmond. The release makes the claim that making the transition will eliminate over 345 million bags from going into circulation each year.

Albemarle County will hold a public hearing Wednesday evening on imposing a five-cent tax per bag. (staff report)

Charlottesville City Council will hold a work session on climate action at 4 p.m. on Monday.

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting Donate to Camp Albemarle.

Charlottesville Parks and Recreation still seeking lifeguards; no date yet for Smith reopening

This week, Charlottesville’s Parks and Recreation Advisory Board got an update on preparations underway to get the city’s pools and spraygrounds ready.

“We are currently still developing our operational hours and what that’s going to look like at our outdoor facilities,” said Gator Batton is the interim manager of aquatics for the department. “The goal is to open Washington Park, Onesty, and Smith.”

Of those three, only Washington Park opened last summer. Onesty Park didn’t open because of a shortage of lifeguards and Smith Aquatic Center has remained closed for the duration of the pandemic due to repairs to address air quality issues.

Hours and operations will depend on having lifeguards in place, and Batton said there are currently 65 set up for the summer.

“We have looked at some creative ways of recruiting and trying to bring in certified lifeguard staff as well encouraged current staff to stay with us throughout the summer,” Batton said.

These include waiving fees for certification courses, $250 signing bonuses, and a second bonus at the end of the summer. The city is also looking to outsource operations of Onesty Pool and there’s a request for proposals on the street.

Vic Garber, the deputy director of the department, said they need at least 25 more lifeguards for full operations this summer.

Garber said testing has been completed at Smith Aquatic Center.

“This included the filtration and chemical feed system,” Garber said. “We had National Pools do that. We basically passed that with flying colors.”

Air qualities have been conducted by two different firms.

“It should be totally sound from any type of chloramines or chlorine smell,” Garber said.

Tests will continue to be conducted after the pool opens and people are using it. An opening date will be announced after the results of a third test. Garber also said the equipment in the fitness room is being replaced.

“When people come in, they need to smile and stay as long as they want and be happy,” Garber said.

Batton said the hope is to have the spraygrounds at Belmont, Greenbrier, Tonsler, and Forest Hills Parks operational in less than a month.

“The goal is over the next two weeks to test out water features, balance water chemistry, and our project opening for those is May 14,” Batton said.

Elm planted at UVA Lawn for Mary Hughes

The University of Virginia celebrated its founding Wednesday with a tree-planting ceremony to mark the career of retired landscape architect Mary Hughes. Hughes stepped down in January after serving in the position for over a quarter of a century.

UVA Today reports that President Jim Ryan spoke at the event.

“While at UVA, she expanded awareness of the landscape beyond the Academical Village, both developed and wild lands,” Ryan said. “She secured funding for a multiyear research project on the history of land-use and landscape design of the University Grounds, which resulted in summer internship opportunities for UVA landscape architecture students and enriched the cultural landscape curriculum.”

During her time as landscape architect, Hughes directed a study of local waterways and UVA stormwater system, which led to the creation of the Dell. Hughes also studied the history of enslaved workers and served on the President’s Commission on Slavery and the University, which resulted in the Memorial to Enslaved Laborers.

A Jefferson Elm was planted outside of Pavilion III in Hughes’ honor. For a full list of memorial trees on Grounds, visit the Office of the Architect’s website.

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Admittedly, it is quite difficult to get the hang of Thursdays, but many of us endeavor to try. April 14 is the 15th such day of the year, and this is the equivalent edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Both the sonic version and its the textual counterpart seek to bring you to up to date on things you may not yet have known. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

A Charlottesville minister has become the Democrat’s de facto candidate in the race for the 5th District seat in the U.S. House of Representatives

More documents have been filed in a lawsuit seeking to force a House of Delegates race this year

Trees have come down on Garrett Street to make way for the redevelopment of Friendship Court

Nelson County Board of Supervisors are asked to allow a mobile home park in the rural area to help provide more affordable housing opportunities

First shout-out goes to the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority for e-waste collection day

Throneburg becomes Democrat’s default nominee for 5th District

Only one candidate in Virginia’s 5th Congressional District has correctly filed the paperwork required to be on the ballot for the June 21, 2022 statewide primary. That means Democrat Josh Throneburg will face the winner of the May 21 Republican convention in the general election.

Neither Warren McClellan nor Andy Parker turned in enough signatures to qualify for the ballot, as Throneburg announced on Twitter on Tuesday.

“We just received word a couple of hours ago that I am officially a Democratic nominee for Congress in Virginia’s 5th District.”

Throneburg is an ordained minister and small business owner who lives in Charlottesville. He grew up in a small town in Illinois. The candidate raised $270,154 in 2021, according to data collected by the Virginia Public Access Project.

Candidates seeking to be in the June 21 primary had until April 7 to turn in ballots to their party for verification. To get on the primary ballot, a candidate needed 1,000 registered voters in the district to sign a petition. A source in the Virginia Democratic Party confirmed a Washington Post report that Parker turned in 1,093 ballots, but only 937 of them were verified as valid.

Democrats in all eleven of Virginia’s Congressional districts chose to hold a primary, whereas Republican Committees in only seven chose that route. The other four will hold a convention, including the 5th District.

The Republican convention will be held in the Kirby Field House at Hampden-Sydney College. Incumbent Bob Good faces Charlottesville attorney Dan Moy (convention details).

As of the end of 2021, Good had raised $518,278 and Moy reported no funds. The next set of campaign reports to the Federal Election Commission are due tomorrow.

In his announcement, Throneburg said he believes he can win.

“We currently have a Freshman incumbent who is deeply out of touch with the people in this district,” Throneburg said.

This will be the first election under the new boundaries of the Fifth District, for which Albemarle County is the northern boundary.

New documents filed in Goldman suit to force 2022 House of Delegates election

The current plan is for the new legislative districts for the Virginia General Assembly to go into effect with next year’s state races, but a lawsuit seeking a race this year is still alive in the federal court.

Richmond attorney Paul Goldman sued the Department of Elections last year alleging the results of the 2021 House of Delegates should only be certified for one year because otherwise they would be unconstitutional.

In March, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals sent Richmond attorney Paul Goldman’s suit back to the Eastern District of Virginia to determine whether he has the standing to bring the case.

On March 25, Goldman submitted a detailed statement that documents his potential candidacy for the 68th House District in 2022 as well as a potential bid for Lieutenant Governor. Paragraph 22 points out that he now lives within the 78th District. (Notice of Additional Facts Relevant to Standing)

“The old 68th District no longer exists as a legal entity recognized under the Constitution of Virginia as pointed out by Article II, Section 6 [of the Virginia Constitution],’” reads paragraph 27.

“Accordingly, Plaintiff has no representative in the General Assembly that is constitutionally required to represent his interests or been constitutionally selected to be his said representative,” reads paragraph 28.

The Virginia Supreme Court finalized new legislative maps on December 28.

On April 1, the Virginia Attorney General’s office filed a motion to dismiss the case once again for lack of standing. Goldman has until April 18 to respond and the defendants have until April 25 to make their reply.

Trees come down on Garrett Street to make way for Friendship Court’s first phase

Crews removed several decades-old White Oak trees on Garrett Street this morning as part of a Piedmont Housing Alliance project to redevelop Friendship Court. The trees were removed as part of the first phase of the development, which got underway with a groundbreaking in January. Phase one is being constructed on a former open field.

Piedmont Housing CEO Sunshine Mathon said the trees’ removal ended up being necessary due to complex topography involving a waterway that travels below the site.

“We were not 100 percent sure until meeting with City staff to finalize sidewalk replacement, utilities, etc. along Garrett,” Mathon wrote in an email to Charlottesville Community Engagement this morning.

Mathon said the removal of the trees is an example of a trade-off related to the need for new buildings to be set back from the street. Accommodating the channeled Pollocks Branch reduced the amount of buildable area.

“The residents and the rest of the design team were balancing building footprints, number of total units, housing typologies (multifamily + townhomes), a new Community Center and Early Learning Center, ample amounts of open green space (including existing and new tree cover), parking needs, and interconnection with future phases,” Mathon continued.

Mathon said the remaining phases should not have similar constraints related to Pollocks Branch and that more of the mature tree canopy in those sections could be preserved. Phase one is expected to be completed by the end of 2023.

Mathon also said the wood from the trees will be used to make furniture and other products in the future.

Second shout-out goes to CBIC for the WeFunder Pitch night

In today’s second subscriber supported shout-out, the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council wants you to know about a unique event coming up on April 19 that aims to provide investment opportunities for regular people. CBIC is teaming up with WeFunder for live equity based financing for local start-ups who need capital. Recent changes in regulations allow for the event, where people can invest directly in these companies in exchange for early equity. The event will take place at 4:30 p.m. April 19 at the Irving Theater in the CODE building.

Nelson County Supervisors consider Ridgecrest Mobile Home Park

The Nelson County Board of Supervisors heard from the public Tuesday on a proposal to build a mobile home park near the Ridgecrest Baptist Church on U.S. 29 north of Lovingston. Civil engineer Justin Shimp needed a special use permit for the project.

Shimp said he was pursuing the project to help provide more housing that can be affordable to households with lower incomes.

“Five years ago, I would not have thought about this and didn’t think it would be needed because of affordability, but such are the increases in cost that achieving housing for folks who don’t make $100,000 a year is very difficult,” Shimp said.

Shimp said mobile home parks can be a good way to provide housing at a lower cost.

“One can buy a new mobile home so as little as $60,000 to pay to set it up,” Shimp said. “You could then rent a mobile home pad for around $400 a month. That is a much different sort of price point for folks than typical housing stock.”

Shimp said under his arrangement, the people who would live there would own a share of the common areas and could sell those shares in the future.

“I think this park investor opportunity will be a way for people who historically haven’t been able to set anchor somewhere would be able to buy in and take ownership of that and it will be good for the community,” Shimp said.

The Planning Commission voted 4-1 in March on the proposal but set 33 conditions for Supervisors to consider in their review.

Several neighbors of the proposed park spoke at the public hearing. One person wanted to know what Nelson County’s standards are for mobile homes and how wastewater would be handled.

“Has there or will there ever be done a study on the effects of 51 additional homes on the water source?” asked Larry Shelton.

Another person was concerned about the entrance off of U.S. 29.

“You have to be very careful with any kind of proposals about how you’re going to get the trailers in there, how is this going to happen, how this is going to affect the residents that are there,” said Tonya Bradley.

Another person was concerned that allowing 51 units in the rural area was not acceptable under the Comprehensive Plan.

The debate got heated as South District Craig Barton peppered Shimp with questions about the cost of housing. Barton said he was skeptical the trailer park would work.

“Have you thought about ways to figure out how to get it so people who live in this country can be able to afford a house?” Barton asked. “What could be done as a builder to help you build a house that a person will know will increase in value in his lifetime?”

Shimp said there was little that the Nelson County Board of Supervisors could do. The conversation broke down as West District Supervisosr J. David Parr tried to establish order.

Barton said he did not think it was likely that the trailers would increase in value.

“The problems of housing are real and we need to deal with those problems,” Barton said. “Whether or not a mobile home will help in solving this problem, I don’t know. I think probably not.”

Shimp said there was ample water on the site, and that many of the neighbors would be on the other side of Muddy Creek, which would mean any wells would not affect their groundwater.

There were only four Supervisors present when it was time to take a vote as North District Supervisor Tommy Harvey was not in attendance.

“There are aspects of this project that I think are positive and admirable, but the density concerns me,” said Central District Supervisor Ernie Reed.

Parr supported the project, as did East District Supervior Jesse Rutherford. He is chair of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission and sits on the Regional Housing Partnership.

“More often than not the struggle always comes down to how to make something affordable, Rutherford said. “Question always comes down to where is the appropriate place. I’ve found if you put it near an area that’s meant for high density, folks usually may not like it. And if you put it in the middle of nowhere folks might not like it and you’re going to get that perspective no matter which way you look at it.”

Rutherford said the only way to attain affordability is through density. He said the Comprehensive Plan update needs to consider this as Nelson considers how to make housing attainable for more people.

Given Harvey’s absence, Supervisors opted to continue the matter to the next meeting. That will give Shimp more time to respond to some of the questions asked.

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Is there anything terrifying about Wednesday the 13th, or is this a day reserved to be wacky? Either way we are now 103 days into the year, which may be startling for some. Some might be surprised to learn this is the 363rd installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. No one should be shocked that I am the host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council adopts a budget for FY23 including a the first increase in the real estate tax in in 41 years

The Charlottesville Dogwood Festival returns this week in a new location

An update on the city’s zoning rewrite

Governor Youngkin vetoes two dozen General Assembly bills and recommends changes to dozens more

Today’s first shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. Support freeform community radio on WTJU and get read for the Rock Marathon beginning next Monday! Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

City Council adopts FY23 budget, raises real estate tax rate by a penny

In a brief meeting last night, Charlottesville City Council adopted a nearly $212.9 million budget for the fiscal year that begins on July 1. However, a penny increase in the real estate tax rate goes into effect for the calendar year, which will be included in the tax bills that will soon be sent to property owners. That’s the first increase in the tax rate several decades.

“It’s been a long budget season,” said interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers. “We’ve listened as staff to your various proposals and desires to address issues in our community.”

The final shape of the budget was formed at a work session on April 7 at which Councilors agreed to the real estate tax increase and to keep the personal property tax to $4.20 per $100 of assessed value. Second reading of a vote to increase the meals tax to 6.5 percent will be held on April 18. (read the staff report)

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook is the only opponent of the increase to $0.96 cents per $100 of assessed value, but he did vote in the affirmative.

“I will note that I disagree with the levy and raising of the real estate tax by one cents but given the fact that we just passed a budget that has to be funded, I will be voting yes,” Snook said.

That additional penny will raise $925,000, all of which will go to pay for future debt service related to the renovation of Buford Middle School as well as school reconfiguration. The group Charlottesville United for Public Education released a statement thanking the Council, but signaled they will continue to push for more.

“While we thank City Council for making a strong commitment to our schools in their budget vote last night, we also call on them to continue to make investments in public education a top priority going forward,” reads a statement.

The first half of the tax bills are due on June 5.

The last time City Council increased the tax rate was in 1981 when Council voted to increase the rate from $1.10 to $1.13 per $100 of assessed value.

City Council to return to in-person meetings next Monday

Charlottesville City Council will follow the lead of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors and return to in-person meetings beginning this upcoming Monday. While there will be opportunities for the public to attend the 6:30 p.m. regular session, only Councilors will attend the 4 p.m. work session. Both sessions will be live-streamed.

At the regular session, 23 members of the public and two members of the media will be able to attend in City Council Chambers. All formal presentations will be delivered remotely.

Charlottesville is still under an emergency ordinance and today’s news release states that this system will remain in place for the duration.

“At this time, this is the only meeting permitted to resume in-person, but discussions are underway regarding other meetings resuming in CitySpace,” reads the release.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,115 cases and the percent positivity is at 6.9 percent.

Planning Commission updated on zoning code rewrite

Charlottesville planning staff and consultants hired to run the Cville Plans Together initiative are slightly behind in their work to create a diagnostic and approach report for the rewriting of the city zoning code. That’s what Neighborhood Development Services Director James Freas told the Planning Commission last night.

“By the next meeting, we’ll probably have released this next report,” Freas said. “In fact, we definitely will have. But before then we’ll have shared with you guys what we anticipate the schedule looking like going forward.”

City Council adopted an Affordable Housing Plan last March and a new Comprehensive Plan in mid-November. Freas said the goal is to have the new zoning code adopted around this time next year.

“Hopefully by March of next year we’ll have fully adopted it,” Freas said. “That’s what we’ve been aiming for and I don’t see any reason to push that back.”

For more on the zoning process, visit cvilleplanstogether.com.

Dogwood Festival returns with new location of carnival

After a two year break due to the pandemic, a major highlight of the annual Dogwood Festival returns tomorrow. However, the carnival will be held in a different location this year. Charlottesville Planning Commissioner Hosea Mitchell informed his colleagues on Tuesday night.

“It used to be at McIntire Park and now it’s going to be in the K-Mart parking lot,” Mitchell said.

The Dogwood Festival began in 1950 as the Apple Harvest Festival before getting its longterm name in 1958. As part of the festivities, there will be a rededication ceremony for the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial beginning on April 22. The 73rd Dogwood Grand Parade will be held on April 23 in downtown Charlottesville. For more information, visit cvilledogwood.com.

Today’s second shout-out goes to LEAP

We’re now well into spring, and soon many of us will turn our air conditioning units for the first i months. To see what you can do to get the most out of your home, contact LEAP, your local energy nonprofit, to schedule a home energy assessment this month - just $45 for City and County residents. LEAP also offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If someone in your household is age 60 or older, or you have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

Governor Youngkin takes action on legislation, vetoes over two dozen bills

The Virginia General Assembly is next scheduled to meet on April 27 to respond to actions taken by Governor Glenn Youngkin this week on bills that passed both the Republican-controlled House of Delegates and the Democratic-controlled Senate earlier this year.

On Monday, Youngkin took action on several bills that passed this past winter. Youngkin signed over 700 bills, made recommendations on over 100, and vetoed two dozen that had passed both the Democratic-controlled Senate and the Republican-controlled House of Delegates. The General Assembly can override the vetoes with a two-thirds majority and will consider whether to accept the amendments. (check out the Virginia Constitution for the details)

Vetoed bills include: (full list)

SB347 would have required the State Corporation Commission to establish annual energy efficiency savings targets for low-income, elderly, disabled, or veterans of military service. Youngkin said the SCC’s definition of “public interest” should not be expanded by the legislature and could lead to higher energy costs.

HB802 would have expanded the Virginia Residential Landlord and Tenant Act to give localities the power to take action against landlords who allow their units to become fire and safety hazards. In his explanation, Youngkin claimed this would duplicate existing provisions available under the Virginia Uniform Statewide Building Code.

HB675 would have eliminated the ability of health insurance carriers to levy a surcharge to tobacco users.

HB1298 would have prohibited high school student-athletes from being compensated for their likeness, name, or image. Youngkin said “the bill is a premature prohibition that fails to recognize the continually evolving marketplace for content creation and monetization and could have the unintended consequence of limiting young people from engaging in economic activity via social media unrelated to their athletic performance.”

SB250 would have increased annual fees for nonhazardous solid waste management facilities. Youngkin said this would “[increase] the cost of doing business in Virginia with pass-through costs to consumers.”

SB297 would have made it a violation of the Virginia Consumer Protection Act for a health care provider to seek debt collection prematurely. Youngkin said this would create “unintended consequences that could harm small healthcare providers by "creating additional legal liability.”

SB706 would have prohibited operators of heavy trucks from using cruise control and certain types of breaks during winter storms. Youngkin said “this bill would impose burdens on Virginia’s trucking industry, as well as interstate transportation, without any demonstrable public safety or transportation benefit.”

Asd for the amendments, there are several worth noting.

Youngkin put a sunset clause of July 1, 2024 on a provision of the Transit Ridership Incentive Program that would have required a quarter of the program’s funds be spent on programs to reduce fares. (HB142)

Youngkin wants to extend the date by which hotels must ensure their employees are trained to report human trafficking from July 1 of this year to January 1, 2023. (HB258)

HB891 would have removed the word “alien” from Virginia code as it refers to non-citizens. Youngkin amended the bill to require a work group be set up to study the issue.

SB24 would have extended the sunset date of Virginia’s Eviction Diversion Pilot Program, but Youngkin’s amendment would require the General Assembly to vote on this again in 2023.

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Today is April 12, 2022, and according to one source, it’s National Grilled Cheese Sandwich Day, National Licorice Day, and National Big Wind Day. April 12 is also commemorated across the world as Yuri’s night, marking the day in 1961 that the first person was sent into space. There have been 22,280 days since then, and this is yet another one of them. This is also another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, about absolutely none of the above, except maybe the big wind. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

Help grow the audience by sharing this with friends, family, co-workers, neighbors, and anyone else you think might want to know what’s happening

On today’s program:

The Virginia Department of Transportation always wants you to drive slowly through work zones, but this is week they really want you to be aware

Charlottesville responds to a lawsuit seeking nullification of the Comprehensive Plan

The Local Food Hub will pause drive-through markets this summer

City Council will vote tonight on a one-cent increase in the real estate tax rate

First shout-out goes to two important history programs

In today’s first subscriber-supported shoutout, two upcoming history programs. Tonight, at 7 p.m. a multitude of groups are hosting Dr. Anne C. Bailey of SUNY Binghamton presents Remembering the Victims of Charlottesville: The Healing of Charlottesville and a New Way Forward. The in-person registration is full for this Rememberance of Slave Auctions, but there’s still room on Facebook Live.

On Thursday at 7 p.m., the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will host Regina Rush as she tells the story of her family’s journey from enforced servitude in Nelson County to becoming landowners in Albemarle County. After a quarter century of research, she’s published Rushes of Chestnut Grove: One Family’s Journey from Slavery to Freedom. This event is on Zoom or Facebook Live.

City responds to Comprehensive Plan lawsuit

The city of Charlottesville has responded in Charlottesville Circuit Court to a lawsuit filed in December by anonymous property owners seeking to void the Comprehensive Plan adopted by City Council last November. The plaintiffs assert the city did not follow state code resulting in a plan that is not “general in nature” and that failed to present a transportation plan to support new density allowed under the plan. (read the plaintiff’s suit)

The city filed two responses, including one requesting the Court order the identities of the plaintiffs to be revealed. The other is a demurrer which argues the plaintiffs have no right legal basis on which to have filed their case. (read the demurrer)

“Plaintiffs have no express right of action under Virginia 15.2-2223… to challenge the sufficiency of the Comprehensive Plan,” reads the first section of the demurrer.

The city’s response goes on to state that localities have the legal requirement to designate land use categories, and that the General Assembly has given leeway for localities to do so. The response argues that the Comprehensive Plan is a different process than updating the zoning ordinance, which is currently underway.

“The adoption of the Comprehensive Plan did not and cannot change the zoning district classification of any of the Plaintiff properties,” the response continues.

The second motion to request identification argues that the plaintiffs have not given sufficient reason for why their identities should be protected. (motion to reveal ID)

“Upon information and beliefs, Plaintiffs wish to proceed anonymously to avoid potential embarrassment or public criticism for opposing increased residential density—and more types and units of housing affordable to low- and moderate-income persons—within their neighborhoods,” reads the second motion.

The City Attorney’s office had no comment. The next step is for the matter to go before a judge for scheduling.

Local Food Hub pausing drive-through markets

Two years ago, the pandemic shut down much of the economy as people avoided direct contact with each other. The state of emergency was declared at the same time farmers and other agricultural producers were getting ready for market season, but in-person markets were banned to avoid places where people could congregate.

Soon after, the Local Food Hub sprang into action and organized a drive-through market at the site of the former K-Mart, as reported in the March 25, 2020 edition of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

“Over the past two years, we’ve operated 150+ markets, facilitated over a million dollars in sales, partnered with dozens of vendors, and served hundreds of community members,” reads a post on the Local Food Hub’s Facebook page.

Two years later as market season begins again, they’re planning to cease these events.

“As the world has reopened – and along with it, more opportunity for in-person, walk-up markets – a drive-through, preorder market doesn’t currently best meet the needs of vendors or customers,” the post continues.

The Local Food Hub plans to relaunch the drive-through markets in the fall or if another wave of COVID causes a return to social distancing.

VDOT holds work zone awareness week

Last year, the number of vehicular fatalities that occurred in work zones in Virginia increased to 28, up from 11 in 2020. This week, the Virginia Department of Transportation and similar agencies across the United States are marking Work Zone Awareness Week to remind motorists to slow down when traveling through road construction or repairs.

VDOT has been doing this every year since 1997 as a way to protect the thousands of people who work within close proximity to speeding throngs of vehicles.

The week kicks off today with a tour of the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel Expansion Project, which will see a total of four more lanes at a cost of $3.8 billion. On Wednesday, people are asked to wear orange and post pictures on social media with #GoOrangeDay. On Friday, there’s a moment of silence at 10 a.m.

Second shout-out: RCA wants your photographs for a new contest!

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out, the Rivanna Conservation Alliance wants wildlife and nature photographers to enter their first-ever photography contest! They want high-resolution photos related to the Rivanna watershed and the winning entries will be displayed at the 2022 Riverfest Celebration on May 1. The two categories are 16 and under, and those over the age of 17. You can send in two entries, and the work may be used to supplement Rivanna Conservation Alliance publications. For more information, visit rivannariver.org. And don’t forget, Riverfest starts on April 22 with a big celebration at Rivanna River Company on May 1!

Council to adopt budget tonight; poised to increase real estate tax rate by one cent

Charlottesville City Council will adopt a nearly $212.9 million budget for FY23 this evening that includes a real estate tax rate increase for the first time in decades. This happens at 5:30 p.m. (meeting info)

The personal property tax rate will remain at $4.20 per $100 of assessed value, and there will be a half percent increase in the meals tax.

“The reason we’re trying to raise revenue is in my mind is to invest in long-term capital projects which I think will benefit school children for decades,” said City Councilor Brian Pinkston toward the end of an April 7 budget work session.

The budget also anticipates using over $12 million in budget surpluses for the current fiscal year to cover the cost of additional spending.

The five members of City Council stated their final positions on the budget and the tax rate at a budget work session on Thursday night, April 7. They had previously met on March 31, April 1, and April 2 and gave direction to City Manager Michael C. Rogers via email in preparation for the final work session.

“The city manager had circulated a spreadsheet that we were able to feed back to the city manager what our thoughts were on the various decision points that we had to confront tonight,” said Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook at the very beginning of the meeting.

On March 31, Councilors were told of an anticipated $12.4 million surplus in the current fiscal year that might yield enough funding to cover the budget that interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers had recommended in early March without raising any taxes. That would also require the drawdown of $11.433 million in from a capital contingency fund.

On April 7, Snook said one of the decisions before Council was whether they wanted to fund items not in Rogers’ recommended budget. These include additional funding for Charlottesville Area Transit, more funds to address homelessness, city funding for a sidewalk on Stribling Avenue, nearly $5 million for Piedmont Housing Alliance for two separate projects on Park Street.

“And one of the decision points I think we will need to make tonight is are some of these where we ought to say we’re waiting for a plan but we have enough in mind that we think we can at least put a ballpark figure on it and let’s figure out a plan,” Snook said.

In February, Council authorized the advertising of a ten cent increase in the real estate tax rate to cover the costs of debt service associated with more capital spending, including $75 million for renovations of Buford Middle School associated with school reconfiguration. That action did not obligate them to actually increasing the rate, but provided a ceiling.

During a series of work sessions in March, staff suggested the surplus could be used but the actual number won’t be known until this upcoming December.

“We can look with some certainty and feel pretty good that at least most of that is real surplus,” Snook said. “You never want to count your chickens before they hatch but maybe some of these chickens are close enough to being hatched. Remember, we’re three quarters of the way through the fiscal year.”

The budget includes a three percent raise for all city employees effective July 1, full funding of the School Board’s request for operating funds, and several new administrative positions.

“And in the overall scheme of things, we are also funding the school reconfiguration project through our [Capital Improvement Program] at a $68.8 million level,” said Interim City Manager Michael Rogers said.

The School Board is comfortable with that amount, which is based on their use of funding from the American Rescue Plan Act. The City Council agreed to float $54 million in bonds to contribute to the project’s cost.

For most of the April 7 budget work session, Council went line by line through a spreadsheet to see if they supported various changes in the FY23 budget. They supported:

An additional $55,514 in the budget for an upgrade to the position of housing coordinator

An additional $81,355 to hire an additional buyer

$300,000 in additional funding for the Office of Equity and Inclusion for support for team members such a community health worker to help find homes for “unhoused individuals”

$60,528 for an additional person in the Commissioner of Revenue’s office

$150,000 for Climate Action Planning

$175,000 in additional capacity for affordable housing initiatives

$100,000 for MARCUS Alert system

$250,000 in additional support for real estate tax relief efforts

$325,000 for the public works department for engineering

$20,000 to pay Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority for the payment in lieu of taxes they are required to pay the city

$25,000 in additional funds for tree planting per a request from the Tree Commission

Council agreed to consider the use of FY22 surplus funds to the following purposes, but there will be further discussions before action would happen later this calendar year:

$150,000 to replace software used by the Department of Social Services for foster care

$100,000 for software for procurement

$1 million to purchase two new buses to ensure more service on Route 6

An additional $2 million for Charlottesville Area Transit to help get more routes to 30 minute service

$2.109 million to cover costs of 15 firefighters once a federal SAFER grant expires in March 2024

Potentially set aside $1 million for a fund to be used at the discretion of the next City Manager with consultation from Council

Potentially $700,000 for a third section of the Meadowcreek Trail

Council agreed to commit some of the $11.433 million CIP contingency fund to these two projects, but this would also take a separate Council action outside of the FY23 budget discussion:

$6.7 million for school reconfiguration

$4.733 million for two Piedmont Housing Alliance projects on Park Street

Next steps after adoption

A work session on April 18 will further flesh out how the $150,000 for Climate Action Planning would be spent. Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders explained some potential uses.

“Home energy audits is something that we’re doing right now and we could increase those and do more,” Sanders said. “The next time would be a pilot street light conversion that would be to test the notion of what we can do with the lighting choices we are making in the streetlight section.”

Sanders said other options could be a supplement to be paid to community members who choose electric vehicles, incentivizing solar installations, and initiatives that may come out of an ongoing study of fuel alternatives for Charlottesville Area Transit and school pupil transportation.

As for the funding for public works, Sanders said the funding would go to help increase capacity to allow for projects in the capital improvement plan to move forward.

“We need project management capacity, period,” Sanders said. “We need more hands to do the projects that we currently have in our inventory. We need a project manager dedicated to [the Americans with Disability Act.] We are not doing a good job in the ADA space and we know this and we’ve known this for a long time.”

Councilor Sena Magill said this topic has come up in her conversations in Washington D.C. to try to secure money from federal sources.

“It was made very clear that we have to have our house in order to apply for this stuff

Sanders said there will be another work session coming up on the city’s relationship with the Virginia Department of Transportation.

“We are headed into a facilitated conversation with our district to look at rebooting the size and operations as they exist today,” Sanders said. “It will call for actually potentially canceling projects, turning some projects over to VDOT, and the team keeping some other projects.”

Sanders said the city is not ready to take advantage of any future infrastructure funding because of a poor record in delivering in what has already been funded.

Tax rate discussion

Toward the end of the April 7 work session, Council also discussed potentially increasing tax rates.

Councilor Brian Pinkston supported a one cent increase in the tax rate which would add $925,000 to the budget for additional spending. He also supported a half percent increase in the meals tax.

“I think it’s time for us to position the city for the future,” Pinkston said. “Maybe we could add another penny every year or two.”

Pinkston initially said he would support a reduction in the personal property tax rate but changed his mind.

Councilor Sena Magill did not support a reduction in the personal property tax rate, and she supported a one cent increase in the real estate tax to avoid relying on the surplus.

“A one cent real estate tax that goes straight into a fund to support the schools,” Magill said.

Magill did not support an increase in the meals tax.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade supported a one cent increase in the real estate, a reduction in the personal property tax rate, and a half-percent increase in the meals tax.

City Councilor Michael Payne said he would support a three cent increase in the real estate tax rate to apply to future capital spending.

“And I think we should just get over with it now and making a down payment on being able to afford what we’ve said we’re committed to but haven’t yet planned to fund,” Payne said.

Payne said he supported keeping the personal property tax rate at $4.20 per $100 of assessed value and increasing the meals tax.

Snook said he did not support an increase in the real estate tax rate given a sense that real property assessments will continue to increase.

“What I’ve seen of the real estate market so far in 2022 is that it has not slackened since 2021,” Snook said.

However, four Councilors agreed to the one cent increase up for a vote tonight.

Will there be any changes or surprises tonight at 5:30 p.m.? Stay tuned!

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Another Friday has arrived, and somehow this is the 14th such day of 2022. Is this year going faster than the others, and if so, is there a way this can be stopped? These are not questions within the scope of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast that seeks to put some of the pieces together. I’m your ever-puzzling host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Albemarle Supervisors return to in-person meetings and commemorate Fair Housing Month

Both the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission and the City of Charlottesville award funding to housing projects in the area

Charlottesville may change the way to administers transportation projects

Governor Youngkin rescinds an executive order that banned state agencies from using single-use plastic

Bacteria levels in a Charlottesville waterway are back to normal

And the city of Charlottesville will resume disconnecting utility customers for unpaid balances

First subscriber-supported public service announcement - MLKCVILLE

Charlottesville’s Community Celebration of the life, times, and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. continues on April 10 with keynote speeches from the Rev. Brenda Brown-Grooms, the Rev. Alvin Edwards, and Rabbi Tom Gutherz. All three will appear the event at the Ting Pavilion on the east end of Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall beginning at 3 p.m. Rev. Brown-Grooms is co-pastor of New Beginnings Christian Community; Rev. Edwards serves Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church, and Rabbi Gutherz, Congregation Beth Israel.

The Community Celebration is put on each year by the Mount Zion First African Baptist Church. Visit and bookmark the YouTube MLKCVille page to review part one of the celebration as well as previous events.

Albemarle Supervisors return to in-person meetings

After 25 months, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors have held a meeting in Lane Auditorium, where they have met since the county acquired the former Lane High School for an administration building back in the late 70’s. Members of the public were there, too, and Rivanna Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley noted the occasion.

“I just wanted to welcome everybody who came today and it’s wonderful to be back in person and to see so many people and all of us to be together,” LaPisto-Kirtley said.

The sentiment was shared by Scottsville Supervisor and Chair Donna Price.

“It is wonderful to be back live, in-person, in Lane Auditorium, and we expect that we will continue to see more people show up for our meetings,” Price said. “But the silver lining that’s come out of the pandemic in terms of our situation is that we now have this hybrid opportunity so those are not able to come to Lane Auditorium can still participate virtually.”

Albemarle Supervisors then made a proclamation to recognize April as Fair Housing Month. Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District read from the proclamation, which marks the 54th anniversary of the passage of Title ViII of the Civil Rights Act.

“This act provides for equal housing opportunities for all Americans, regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, familial status, or disability, as well as to ensure fair practice in the sale, rental, or financing of property,” Gallaway said.

The proclamation states it is the intention of Albemarle Supervisors to recognize the importance of housing rights. They heard from Stacy Pethia, the county’s housing coordinator.

“I can’t say enough about how important it is to be able to provide housing choice to all of our residents because where we live really does matter,” Pethia said. “It determines the quality of education we will have, the quality and types of employment opportunities that we can access, what amenities we have available to us. Fair housing is really the basis of success throughout everyone’s lives.”

Pethia said Albemarle is celebrating Fair Housing Month with an art contest. Visit the county’s website at engage.albemarle.org to learn more and to submit your work.

TJPDC funds three affordable housing projects; Charlottesville funds five

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has awarded $1.8 million in funds to regional housing nonprofits and entities. The funding comes from a $2 million grant to the TJPDC from the entity formerly known as the Virginia Housing Development Authority for the purpose of constructing or preserving affordable housing.

“By virtue of us receiving $2 million, we are obligated to construct at least 20 new affordable housing units,” said Ian Baxter, a planner with the TJPDC.

The TJPDC received five proposals totalling $6 million in requests. Baxter said these were measured by a series of metrics.

“Cost per unit, location of development, type of development, affordability level, site control, funding sources, and the capacity to be completed by June 2024,” Baxter said.

The funding will be split among three providers.

$640,000 for three Habitat for Humanity chapters for 32 new units to be build throughout the TJPDC region

$660,000 to the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority for 48 units at the second phase of the South First Street redevelopment

$500,000 for Virginia Supportive Housing for 80 new permanent supportive housing as part of the Premier Circle project

“This $1.8 million will fund developments in all of the six jurisdictions in the planning district,” Baxter said. “It will create a mix of rental, supportive housing, and new homeowner units, all affordable.”

This is the first time the TJPDC has received funds from Virginia Housing for this purpose. Executive Director Christine Jacobs said she is hopeful that there will be another round in the future.

Council makes CAHF awards, repurposes the HAC

On Monday, the city of Charlottesville awarded $750,000 in funds from the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund. Alex Ikefuna is the interim director of the Office of Community Solutions, a relatively new division of city government set up to oversee housing issues.

“Staff received seven applications totaling $4,6 million,” Ikefuna said.

They are:

$425,000 to the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority for South Street Phase 2

$75,000 for down payment assistance for Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville’s Equity Homeownership Initiative

$100,000 for Albemarle Housing Improvement Program’s Charlottesville Critical Repair Program

$50,000 for the Local Energy Alliance Program’s Assisted Home Performance and Electrification Ready (AHP) targeted to owner occupied homes.

$100,000 for LEAP’s AHP for renter occupied homes

Council also agreed to amend the by-laws for the Housing Advisory Committee to reduce membership and to transfer review of city housing funds to a dedicated Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund Committee.

Three Councilors indicated they wanted to make sure a representative from the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority is on the amended Housing Advisory Committee.

“In my view, the bottom line is just to try to have a body that is more effective in giving City Council guidance about how to implement our affordable housing strategy and meet our affordable housing goals and these are just changes meant to have it be a more effective and efficient body in doing that for us,” said City Councilor Michael Payne, who is also on the CRHA’s Board of Commissioners.

Charlottesville to resume utility disconnections for non-payment

In another sign that the pandemic has receded, the city of Charlottesville has announced they will resume disconnecting water, sewer, and natural gas service for non-payment beginning next week.

“Green door hangers will be distributed to addresses that owe balances, encouraging customers to set up payment arrangements,” reads the announcement sent out by the city yesterday.

The city’s utility billing office stopped disconnecting service for unpaid bills in March 2020 soon after the state of emergency was declared, followed by a moratorium imposed by the State Corporation Commission. That was lifted in last September.

According to the release, the utility billing office continued to tell customers with unpaid balances how much they owed. The city covered the cost of $557,000 through various federal assistance programs related to the pandemic.

Governor Youngkin overturns previous administration’s order to ban single-use plastic

In March 2021, former Governor Ralph Northam signed an executive order banning state agencies from buying, selling, or distributing single-use plastics.

His successor, Governor Glenn Youngkin, has called that directive “burdensome” and yesterday replaced it with a new one that directs state agencies to recognize the value of recycling.

"It is the policy of the Commonwealth, and all executive branch state agencies, including state institutions of higher education, and their concessioners (Agency or Agencies) to increase awareness of the importance of recycling and better capture recyclable material, as well as encourage the use of post-consumer recycled (PCR) products and biodegradable materials,” reads Executive Order 17.

The order also takes an economic development approach and directs the Department of Environmental Quality to attract recycling-related businesses to Virginia.

The University of Virginia formed a working group last April to begin to implement the Northam administration’s order. Last month, the UVA Sustainability Office accepted the 2022 Governor’s Environmental Excellence Gold Award for its efforts, according to an article on their website.

“The University of Virginia is taking active measures to enhance sustainability and reduce waste, pursuant with the directives detailed in Governor Youngkin's Executive Order 17 and in former governor Ralph Northam's Executive Order 77,” said Deputy UVA Spokesperson Bethanie Glover in an email to Charlottesville Community Engagement this afternoon.

Glover said sustainability leaders at UVA will be evaluating the new executive order to determine what additional steps need to be taken.

Need trees? Charlottesville Area Tree Steward sale is this Saturday!

In today’s first Patreon-fueled public service announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards are preparing to hold their first in-person tree sale since 2019. On April 9 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards will open up their tree nursery at the Fontaine Research Park and will sell saplings of native trees, some of which are hard to find from commercial sources. The prices will be between $5 and $15. There will be large trees from Birch to Sycamore, smaller trees from Blackgum to Witch Hazel, and shrubbery! Visit charlottesvilletreestewards.org to learn more!

Albemarle and Greene both receive regional support for Three Notch’d Trail planning grant

The members of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission have indicated support for two separate planning efforts for more pathways in the region. Both Albemarle County and Greene County are seeking federal funds to build new infrastructure.

“The grant would fund a shared bike pedestrian path from the city of Charlottesville to Crozet likely along U.S. 250,” said Jessica Hersh-Ballering, a transportation planner with Albemarle County. “From there it would continue west all the way to the Blue Ridge Tunnel in Nelson County.”

“In Greene, because we are a more rural community, there are no walking paths even in our growth area,” said Jim Frydl, the Greene County Planning Director. “If you live in the housing that’s in the growth area, there’s no safe way to walk to the shopping and the work centers.”

A federal infrastructure bill passed by the U.S. Congress last year has increased funding for the Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity grant program, which goes by the acronym RAISE.

Albemarle is requesting between $1.5 million and $3 million for the planning effort. The idea would be to build something that works as both a functional transportation use as well as a recreational destination that could attract tourism as is the case with the Virginia Capital Trail.

“This is a range that we are requesting because we are still working through our budget for this project with some local consultants,” Hersh-Ballering said. “We will have a number somewhere in this range finalized by the time we submit our application next week.”

If funded, the project would first conduct a feasibility study, particularly to identify a route between Crozet and the Blue Ridge Tunnel.

“It could go directly through Crozet, it could go a little south of Crozet and go near more schools, or it could follow potentially the CSX railroad line to have a very gentle grade for the entirety of that section,” Hersh-Ballering said.

The funding would also include public outreach as well as “functional design” for the trail that would fall short of environmental review required for the project to go to construction.

“So the idea is that it would be really expensive to construct the project all at once so what we’re probably going to do is identify those pieces that can stand-alone and then use some of our more common, smaller funding sources to fund construction separately,” Hersh-Ballering said.

The entire route would span between 25 to 30 miles and would connect three localities. The TJPDC agreed to send a letter of support without comment.

Greene County is seeking a $1.4 million RAISE grant to plan for a trail between the South River Falls in the northwest of the county to the town of Stanardsville, A second pathway would follow along U.S. 33 to connect to the unincorporated area of Ruckersville.

“And then interconnectivity pathways in Ruckersville that connect the two nodes of the Ruckersville growth area,” Frydl said.

Frydl said Greene’s project would also likely be built in phases.

Charlottesville will be reviewing how it works with VDOT

Since 2005, The City of Charlottesville has planned and administered construction of transportation projects within city limits as part of something called the First Cities program or the Urban Construction Initiative. This includes major projects such as the Belmont Bridge replacement currently underway, and extends to the many Smart Scale projects for which the city has received dozens of millions of dollars in funding.

This week, Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders told City Council on Monday that this arrangement is under review.

“Our leadership and project management teams are completing a review of our [Virginia Department of Transportation] program ahead of a deep dive with VDOT that’s scheduled fot later this month,” Sanders said. “We anticipate some changes that we’ll be bringing to Council in regards to how we manage those projects going forward.”

Last year, City Council agreed to withdraw local money required to match state funds awarded to the West Main Streetscape and to put this local dollars toward to renovations of Buford Middle School.

Sanders said the city has begun work with the firm EPR on a study of Fifth Street Extended to inform a new Smart Scale application for the next round. Community meetings may be held later this month but definitely by May. Council will get a presentation at their meeting on May 16.

Dairy Road bridge

There is no local match necessary for the pending replacement of a bridge that carries Dairy Road over the U.S. 250 bypass. VDOT has provided $7.2 million in funding to replace the bridge from a pot of money called State of Good Repair. Tony Edwards is the Development Services Manager in the Charlottesville Public Works Department.

“It received a condition rating of 4 for the deck, and therefore qualifies for the SGR funding,” Edwards said. “In 2015 the sidewalk was replaced by a separate bike and pedestrian bridge next to the original structure which will provide public access during construction.”

The design phase will now begin and a public hearing for that phase will be held at some point in the future.

Pollocks Branch bacteria levels have returned to normal

Finally today, the City of Charlottesville has reported that bacteria levels in a waterway south of the Downtown Mall have returned to normal. In late March, the Rivanna Conservation Alliance analyzed water samples from Pollocks Branch and found elevated levels of E.Coli. A second round of tests saw lower levels.

“Given the steady decrease in E. coli levels and the lack of evidence of a source of the E. coli, the elevated levels were likely related to rainfall and associated runoff,” reads today’s announcement.

The Rivanna Conservation Alliance will continue to monitor the situation. For more information, visit rivannariver.org.

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In one sense of the phrase, Charlottesville Community Engagement has now come full circle as this is the 360th edition. That coincides with April 6, 2022 but there is not necessarily correlation, but the hope is this edition and every other edition causes you to know more than you did before. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders asks City Council for their feedback on how to meet Charlottesvillle’s goal of putting $10 million a year toward housing

The U.S. House of Representatives votes to support NATO, and two area Congressman vote against the resolution

A quick profile of Fashion Square Mall

Louisa County doubles the amount of a tax rebate for a developer to pay for a regional wastewater pump station

First shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting the Camp Albemarle website!

U.S. House adopts resolution supporting NATO; Two Virginia Representatives voted against

The U.S. House of Representatives voted 362 to 63 yesterday on a resolution to uphold the founding principles of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and to make clear that the organization stands for shared democratic values. House Resolution 831 was introduced by Virginia Congressman Gerald Connolly in December and made its way through the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

“NATO’s founding document, signed here in Washington D.C. on April 4, 1949, this very week,” said Congressman Connolly. “It’s clear. NATO is an alliance of democracies. The preamble to the treaty notes the determination of Allies to ‘safeguard the freedom, common heritage, and civilization of their peoples founded on the principles of democracy. “

Nine of Virginia’s 11 members of the House of Representatives voted for the resolution, which also calls for the establishment of a Center for Democratic Resilience within NATO Headquarters. The resolution comes at a time when NATO forces are keeping a close eye on the Russia’s war against Ukraine. Ukraine is not a member of the organization.

Both 5th District Representative Bob Good and 6th District Representative Ben Cline voted against the bill.

Louisa Supervisors amend performance agreement for Crossing Pointe

When a developer asks for a rezoning to build a larger number of units than otherwise would be allowed, sometimes there are agreements with the locality to provide infrastructure.

When the Louisa Board of Supervisors approved the Crossing Pointe development at Zion Crossroads in December 2019, they entered into an agreement with the developer for a $250,000 real estate tax rebate in exchange for construction of a regional wastewater pump station on the site.

“That pump station is a regional pump station in nature that serves multiple properties in that area, the Zion growth area, and not just the Crossing Pointe [Planned Unit Development],” said Louisa County Economic Development Director Andrew Wade.

Wade said the developer has requested an increase to $500,000 due to the rising cost of construction.

“The price of the regional pump station over the course of three months has gone up from $650,000 to approximately $1.3 million due to material pricing and construction inflation and things of that nature,” Wade said.

Wade said the Louisa County Water Authority will own the pump station when it is completed. The rebates won’t begin until the pump station is operational. Supervisors agreed unanimously to proceed.

Construction on the Crossing Pointe development is soon to begin. There will be 321 dwelling units and 138,000 square feet of commercial property.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is currently overseeing a small area study for the growth area which straddles both Louisa and Fluvanna County. The next public meeting for the Zion Crossroads Gateway Plan is April 19.

Special thanks to Tammy Purcell of Engage Louisa for assistance with this story! The latest installment has the latest news on Zion Crossroads, including changes to Zion Town Center that would see fewer single-family detached homes and more townhomes.

Chamber of Commerce profiles Fashion Square Mall

Every now and then, the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce writes up a profile of a business in the area. This time around their staff asked the leasing and marketing manager of Fashion Square Mall a series of questions, including to mention recent success stories.

“We have recently opened up three new stores and will be opening up many more in upcoming months,” said Athena Emmans in response.

Fashion Square Mall opened in 1980 and has been through a string of owners. The property sold at foreclosure last year and was purchased by a firm called Charlottesville JP 2014-C21 LLC for $20.2 million and that deal closed on September 30.

Now the property is managed by JLL and Emmans writes that they are actively seeking to become a unique destination.

“We offer an indoor shopping experience with a community atmosphere for our tenants to get help with marketing, branding and foot traffic for their business,” Emmans wrote. “We provide small and large businesses with affordable commercial properties.”

To learn more, read the rest of the profile on the Chamber’s website.

Friends of JMRL Book Sale continues through Saturday

In today's second Patreon-fueled shout-out! Lovers of used books rejoice! The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library is back again with their annual Spring Book Sale opening this Saturday through Sunday, April 10! The Friends of the Library sale will once again take place at Albemarle Square Shopping Center from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. each day. There’s a special preview for members tomorrow from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. and there’s still time to volunteer!

Visit jmrlfriends.org to learn more! See you there!

Deputy City Manager Sanders reviews recent audit of Charlottesville’s housing fund

When Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders joined Charlottesville’s management team last July, he more or less filled a vacancy for a lower position that had been open for a year.

“I became your housing coordinator right away, because we didn’t have one,” Sanders said at an April 4 work session on the city’s affordable housing policy. “I have been spending a lot of time observing, reviewing, questioning, complaining, evaluating, and testing all of what we do, how we do it, why we do it, and trying to figure out what else we can do to make it all run more smoothly and definitely be run better.”

Around the same time Sanders was clocking into City Hall for the first time, Council had agreed to spend an additional $165,000 to pay the consultant HR&A Advisors to review how the city has spent its affordable housing funds since 2010. Council had a work session with that firm on March 21, but Sanders wanted to share his views.

See also: Charlottesville City Council discusses reform for affordable housing fund, March 30, 2022

HR&A found that the city has spent $46.7 million on affordable housing programs since 2010.

“The question that you should be asking is if that is good,” Sanders said. “The answer is yes, but good is relative, especially because you will never spend enough on affordable housing. I think most communities have found that around this country. Because markets are always changing, there’s always a need to do a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more.”

Sanders said the report found that 1,611 affordable units were constructed or preserved and that 640 additional households were served.

“Can we do better and can we do more?” Sanders said. “The answer is of course you can. But how will that decision get made? How often will you commit more? How much more? And when? Everyone of these questions are critically important to managing a program and knowing the cap helps to manage the many expectations.”

Watch the April 4, 2022 work session on affordable housing

View the April 4, 2022 presentation

Read the staff report for the March 21, 2022 work session

Sanders said there is a need to make sure that the funds are spread around and that many different organizations need to have access. There’s also a need to make sure that Council has accurate data about what has happened to inform future decisions.

In March 2021, Council adopted the Affordable Housing Plan which calls upon the city to invest $10 million a year for this purpose. A previous goal had been $4 million a year, but a big push for investment in affordable housing was made after the events of the summer of 2017.

“2020 was clearly a turning point and we see this as the shift to the $10 million being a good number,” Sanders said. “We know that there are a lot of organizations that have already made it clear that $10 million is not enough. Ideally for us internally we look at the face that you endorsed the Affordable Housing Plan at $10 million a year for ten years and it will be our priority to help you get there.”

Other metrics in the analysis seek to measure the cost effectiveness of funding spent so far. Sanders said that for those organizations who are constructing new units, the cost per unit is higher. However, competitiveness between proposals would encourage those entities to seek out private funding to help leverage city investment.

“But your priority would also be that they do go look in other places to bring additional dollars to the table so that that number doesn’t continue to grow,” Sanders said.

There are also demographic measures that seek to determine how funding is meeting equity goals.

“We only see Black and white as a comparison,” Sanders said. “One thing we have to remember in the equity space is that we make sure we are considering the other minority populations in our community that also deserve attention to be paid to their particular housing situations as well.”

Sanders’ questions for City Council

But, funding is one thing. The question is whether the city is managing its programs effectively. Sanders identified several problems.

“We don’t know how many affordable units still exist from those that we funded,” Sanders said. “That’s accurate. We don’t know even for how much longer they’re going to exist. But we got to do better and there’s work to be done there.”

Sanders said there is not an internal mechanism for the city to keep track. That will take more information from partner organizations that receive the funding. The city needs better tools to ensure compliance.

“We don’t have the best agreements in play,” Sanders said. “They’re not the comprehensive set of agreements that we would use that would ensure that we could capture the information, that we are denoting who is responsible for reporting said information and on what schedule. That way we can go back to them and get what we want.”

Another question for Council is if they want to come up with an official definition for affordable housing for the city, meaning what level of household income should be served by city funding?

“I think it is important for us to be able to define it for the community at large,” Sanders said. “It helps our partners understand what that means to you as the Council but it also helps staff understand how to do the work that they’ve been charged to do.”

Sanders wanted to know what each Councilor thinks about that $10 million for affordable housing. Is it a commitment, or if it is an aspirational goal.

City Councilors Pinkston and Payne said they expect the city to spend that amount. Mayor Lloyd Snook thought it was more of a goal.

“I’m willing to average, which makes it a goal, but it’s not a commitment to me,” Snook said. “Furthermore we don’t have the authority to bind future Councils as a commitment.”

Sanders wanted to know if Council wanted to consider whether the land trust model should be a priority.

“That’s an opportunity for you to add an item to your affordable housing toolbox,” Sanders said. “There are a lot of communities today that are wrestling with the idea of how we can make it more affordable because simply building it isn’t necessarily working it for everyone.”

Sanders said this could take the form of the city setting up its own land trust, or working with the one that is now operated by the Piedmont Housing Alliance after being incubated at the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

Councilor Brian Pinkston said thought it could continue to be maintained outside of city government.

“What I don’t want to do is invest in a bunch of rework if what PHA or whoever has is working as long as we’ve got solid guardrails to ensure that that is being done in a transparent way,” Pinkston said.

Sanders also said there’s a need for better coordination between the groups that offer support services for homeless individuals. The status quo isn’t enough.

“We locally with all of our housing providers can acknowledge we have gaps and there is no one in that gap,” Sanders said. “So if there’s no one in the gap, if you’re running a good affordable housing program, you stand in the gap. So what we need to be able to do is figure out how do we get in the gap in the right way with the right resources to successfully close that gap.”

That could be expansion of an existing organization through city funding creating a new one.

“But you don’t know any of it if you don’t do the assessment work, you don’t do the analysis work, and you don’t ask the questions,” Sanders said.

Councilor Sena Magill said she would like to see more attention toward homeless individuals.

“I am getting growingly concerned because regretfully it looks like we are back to numbers it looks like we were before the Crossings opened,” Magill said.

The Crossings was one of the earliest beneficiaries of the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund and was constructed by Virginia Supportive Housing. That agency has partnered with Piedmont Housing Alliance and the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless on a second facility to be built at Premier Circle on U.S. 29 in Albemarle County at the site of the former Red Carpet Inn.

Obligations from the recent past

Sanders also briefed Councilors on the reality that future city funds will be tied up to meet the obligations of previously approved projects that include tax rebates such as the one Piedmont Housing Alliance will get for Friendship Court.

‘Those are going to come for payment beginning with Friendship Court in FY24,” Sanders said. “We estimate it’s going to be roughly $200,000 a year for what that is going to cost the city itself to rebate for those improvements.”

All of the redevelopment projects underway by the Charlottesville Redevelopment Housing Authority will employ the same mechanism, another cost to the city over years.

“It’s the same synthetic [tax increment financing] scenario in that whatever tax obligation that would be due would not necessarily be paid and the city would be covering it,” Sander said.

Public housing projects move forward after Council talks on CRHA financial sustainability, CCDC property tax liability, October 24, 2020

Council approves agreement for Friendship Court funding, October 30, 2020

But what about the definitions of affordable housing. Sanders has this perspective.

“I always like to say it is not about affordable,” Sanders said. “We don’t need to be focused on the word affordable. Our focus is on the word attainable.”

Council ran out of time at this work session. Later in the night they would meet again to approve a new Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund committee, new purposes for the existing Housing Advisory Council, and to allocate projects from the CAHF. More on those items, as well as a 4-1 vote to approve a rezoning on Grove Street Extended in future editions of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

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There are over 7.9 billion people on the planet, an orbital body that moves around the sun at a speed of 66,660 miles per hour. On any given day there are so many human actions as we all go about our individual lives. Is there a number to capture a snapshot of what’s happening in any given moment, or is it best to focus on a handful of stories at a time? Charlottesville Community Engagement seeks to make sense of some of the activity across an increasingly expanded geographic space. I’m the host, Sean Tubbs.

The program is free, but your financial support will help Town Crier Productions grow and expand!

On today’s fast-moving program:

Area transportation officials learn about how a mobile app is seeking to make using transit in Dallas easier and more cost-effective

A new climate change report has been published by the IPCC

Charlottesville announces a campaign to increase energy efficiency and save water in public buildings

The Virginia General Assembly convenes to begin finalization of the budget, consider suspension of Virginia gas tax

Need a tree? Charlottesville Area Tree Steward sale is this Saturday!

In today’s first Patreon-fueled public service announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards are preparing to hold their first in-person tree sale since 2019. On April 9 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards will open up their tree nursery at the Fontaine Research Park and will sell saplings of native trees, some of which are hard to find from commercial sources for between $5 and $15. There will be large trees from Birch to Sycamore, smaller trees from Blackgum to Witch Hazel, and shrubbery! Visit charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org to learn more!

Governor Youngkin’s gas tax holiday is before the Virginia General Assembly

Both Houses of the Virginia General Assembly met very briefly in special session on Monday to complete work begun earlier this year. Governor Glenn Youngkin issued a proclamation in late March convening the session, as read by the clerks of both the House of Delegates and the Senate.

“A proclamation that in accordance with the provisions of Article IV, Section VI and Article V, Section V of the Constitution of Virginia and the powers thereby invested in the Governor to call a special session of the General Assembly, I, Glenn Youngkin, Governor of Virginia do hereby summon the members of the Senate and the House of Delegates constituting the General Assembly of Virginia, to meet in Special Session commencing the Fourth Day of April of 2022 for the purpose of completion of the 2023-2024 biennial budget.”

Both the House of Delegates and Senate adopted bills to establish the rules for the special session. Delegate Terry Kilgore (R-1) explains House Joint Resolution 6001.

“Basically it allows us to consider House Bill 29 and House Bill 30 and any other conference reports that were continued and still ongoing as we adjourned the 2022 regular session,” Kilgore said. “It would also allow legislation as may be communicated from the Governor.”

Some Senators objected to the Governor’s ability to suggest legislation.

“It’s up to us to decide what we want to consider in special sessions, not the Governor,” said Senator Scott Surovell (D-36). “I think that’s been the prerogative of our chambers forever. I think it’s important to protect that prerogative not only for this session but the for the future.”

Surovell made an amendment to ban this, but later withdrew this request.

Memorials and commendations are allowed, as well as confirmation of judges.

Any legislation sent down to the legislature from the executive branch would need to go through the committee process in both Chambers.

So far, Governor Youngkin has introduced one bill to eliminate the statewide gas tax from May 1 to July 31, as well as other provisions. This has been referred to the House Finance Committee. (HB6001).

The Virginia Senate received the resolution from the House of Delegates, as confirmed by Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears.

“Senator Saslaw, the senior Senator from Fairfax County, is ordered to inform the House of Delegate that the Senate is duly organized and ready to proceed to business,” said the Lieutenant Governor.

Budget conferees met immediately after the meeting. Delegate Barry Knight (R-81) gave an update from the House’s perspective.

“Budget negotiations are ongoing,” Knight said. “We are talking to them a little bit back and forth. They are kind of taking their time and we are ready to meet any time they are.”

Both Houses can reconvene by giving 48 hours notice. Stay tuned!

IPCC releases new report seeking quick action on greenhouse gas emissions

A new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change indicates that production of greenhouse gas emissions across planet Earth were at their highest levels in recorded history, but suggests the rate may be slowing.

“Without immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors, limiting global warming to 1.5°C is beyond reach,” reads the press release to mark the approval yesterday of an IPCC working group’s report called Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change.

The report states an 85 percent drop in the costs of solar and wind energy, as well as a push in many countries for laws and policies to reduce energy efficiency, limit deforestation, and create new forms of renewable energy. The report encourages creation of compact, walkable cities, a transition to electric fleets for public transportation, and further development of technologies to capture carbon from the atmosphere and store it.

According to the release, the IPCC’s overall strategy is to reduce warming to 1.5°C requires the greenhouse gas emissions to peak before 2025, and to begin to have them reduced 43 percent by 2030.

View a message from the IPCC on YouTube:

What are local governments doing?

Charlottesville

Charlottesville City Council will have a work session on April 18 to discuss efforts by city staff toward a climate action plan. (visit the city’s website)

This morning, the city announced the hiring of a company to review over forty public buildings to see how energy and water use can be reduced. CMTA Energy Solutions will perform the audit, which includes city schools.

“The Technical Energy Audits currently underway are part of the first phase of an Energy Saving Performance Contract (ESPC) process that aligns directly with fulfilling the City of Charlottesville’s commitment to climate action and reducing its greenhouse gas emissions,” reads the news release that went out today.

The city’s public buildings cover an area of 1.7 million square feet. The audit will inform plans to upgrade heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems, upgrade lighting, and install new plumbing.

Albemarle

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted a Climate Action Plan on October 7, 2020. The Facilities and Environmental Services Department releases a quarterly report that includes updates on steps Albemarle is taking to reduce its contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. Here’s some highlights from the latest report:

The grounds crew that takes care of county buildings are switching to all electric tools and vehicles.

Albemarle will launch an “environmental stewardship hub” online to collect county resources for community members on county programs to promote biodiversity, clean water, climate action, and reduced waste. This should happen around Earth Day, or April 22

Solar powered lights have been installed at electric vehicle charging stations at the McIntire Road County Office Building.

County staff in the Environmental Services Division have developed a mapping resource to assist property owners with flooding issues, sinkholes, poor water quality. There’s a whole article in the report about how collecting this information in one place can identify causes to specific problems such as blocked drainage pipes.

University of Virginia

The University of Virginia’s reductions emission plans are documented in the 2020-2030 UVA Sustainability Plan. The UVA Sustainability Office’s report to the Board of Visitors is available for review in the March meeting packet for the Buildings and Grounds Committee. (page 20 of this document)

Some examples:

Student programs include the Zero Waste Ambassadors program which seeks to increase composting across UVA Grounds, the Cville Solar Project, and something called the Shut the Sash Challenge

Professor Ben Laugelli has a course this spring called Science, Technology, and Contemporary Issues: Designing for a Sustainable World that will seek to direct further ways UVA can reach its goals

Other recent courses include Professor Kate Stephenson’s Writing about Food Justice, and Designing a Carbon-Neutral Future, Sustainability Leadership: From the Grounds Up, and Write Climate

Second shout-out: RCA wants your photographs for a new contest!

Dallas transit official briefs transit partnership on mobile app trip planning

The Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership was created a few years ago to serve as a clearinghouse to improve the efficiency of public transit in a community with multiple service providers.

At their recent meeting in March, they learned about how Dallas Area Rapid Transit has benefited from having an office of innovation.

“We now have the largest on-demand offering in North America,” said, Greg Elsborg, who has been Chief Innovation Officer since 2019

Since that time, he has focused on a few areas.

“One was to try and drive a culture of innovation across the agency and pull ideas from our employers and from communities and us, and that’s been an exciting activity set,” Elsborg said. “But another area has been the continued development and scalability of a mobile trip-planning and management application that we have for our transit providers.”

Dallas Area Rapid Transit covers 760 square miles including Dallas, and twelve other cities. On-demand service is available in a third of the service area.

Part of their funding comes through a one cent sales tax, an idea that has been floated in this community but is not authorized by the General Assembly. (view the presentation on the GoPass Mobility Platform)

The DART system includes light rail and community rail, as well as a large bus fleet. The first mobile application was created in 2013 to help make it easier for people to travel across multiple transit systems. There is a regional fare.

“So I can pay to travel across the entire region and pay a reduced fare to travel through the commuter rail and to get point to point in Fort Worth, as well as in Denton County in the north, as well as DART’s 13 cities,” Elsborg said.

To unite it all, DART built its first mobile app in 2013. There have been several iterations of the GoPass Mobility Platform to add more capabilities over time. In 2018, they added a feature to allow riders to transfer cash to their mobile phones at local retailers.

“So if I’m an individual that doesn’t have a debit card or a credit card but I’d like to use the mobile app, then I could use trip finding in the app and some of the other features, but to buy tickets, I could go and load cash at a retailer,” Elsborg said. “They would scan a barcode on the app and then this loads the funds into the app directly.”

In 2018, DART also introduced a fare-capping system where an individual user would no longer be charged after they’d paid a certain amount. The app tracks this information.

“And there’s a really nice tracker inside the app that shows you how much you spent to get toward that fare cap total,” Elsborg said.

The next year, DART introduced Multimodal Microtransit to the system which introduced on-demand services that can be used in conjunction with fixed routes. Soon there will be a new feature.

“We have a partnership that we’re working on with Uber so that we can direct people to Uber rides as on-demand mode through our app without having to have an Uber account or pay for your ticket through Uber,” Elsborg said. “You do it throughout our app. And that will be an industry first when that comes out.”

Elsborg said DART is seeking to add other transit agencies so that there can continue to be more investment into the platform. Currently they are running the mobile app functions for over 50 cities, including Charlotte, North Carolina. One of the agencies is the one for Tulsa, Oklahoma, which until recently was run by Jaunt CEO director Ted Rieck.

“I kind of call this the Swiss army knife for mobile apps,” Rieck said. “I think as we look for ways to bring our region together on transit, a mobile app like this could be a starting point.”

The platform also has connections to e-scooter services as well as bike-sharing programs.

To learn more about the app, view the March meeting on YouTube. Four people have viewed it so far. Will you give it a watch on YouTube and demonstrate the power of the CCE bump?

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Another week begins in a relatively new month and no matter what side of the Atlantic you are on, it is 4/4/22. This is also the 94th day of the year and we are now officially part a quarter of the way through. This is the relevant edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and I’m the usual host, Sean Tubbs.

You do not have to pay to read or listen! Even signing up for free helps this newsletter and podcast for free!

On today’s show:

A fish kill is reported off Barracks Road in Charlottesville

Community engagement for Albemarle Comprehensive Plan review moves forwaard with new newsletter

The Pantops Community Advisory Committee is briefed on transportation projects

Charlottesville City Council briefed on capital projects and are presented with a potential scenario where a real estate tax will not need to be increased this year

First shout-out: JMRL Friends of the Library sale continues through Sunday

In today's first Patreon-fueled shout-out! Lovers of used books rejoice! The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library is back again with their annual Spring Book Sale opening this Saturday through Sunday, April 10! The Friends of the Library sale will once again take place at Albemarle Square Shopping Center from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. each day.

Visit jmrlfriends.org to learn more! See you there!

Fishkill reported in Meadow Creek

The City of Charlottesville has reported the deaths in late March of hundreds of fish and other aquatic life in a section of Meadow Creek. Scientists with the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality evaluated the location near Cedars Court and found 842 dead fish, 130 dead salamanders, and 40 dead worms.

“Despite further exploration of potential sources by City staff, no source or responsible party has been identified,” reads the announcement that was sent out Friday afternoon. “It is likely that this is a case of illegal dumping of a chemical or toxic product.”

According to the report from the DEQ, there is no known source of pollution and the city will continue to monitor the area. The city worked with the Rivanna Conservation Alliance on the day the incident was reported by a community member, and found live creatures both upstream and downstream from the area, which is just to the north of the east wing of the Barracks Road Shopping Center.

Over a hundred people apply to be on AC44 working group

Albemarle County has begun the community engagement process for the Comprehensive Plan review, which is currently in the first of four phases.

“Behind the scenes, our project team has continued to gather data on existing conditions and recent trends in the county,” reads the first newsletter for what’s being called AC44. “This data is focused on the ways community members live, work, and travel in Albemarle County and how and where we may have room to grow within our existing Development Areas.”

The first phase is called Plan for Growth and is intended to review Albemarle’s Growth Management Policy, which are available for review on the AC44 website. A public survey on this will go live on April 29.

Over a hundred people have applied to be part of the working group that will oversee the work and staff are reviewing the applications.

Pantops group briefed on transportation projects

In March, Albemarle’s growth area advisory committees learned about the county’s transportation process, and got updates on area projects. Albemarle keeps a list of projects that have been identified to address congestion issues, improve public safety, increase economic development, and achieve other goals.

“The last it was updated was in 2019, but we are embarking on another update and a reprioritization over the next year or two combined with the Comprehensive Plan update,” said Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a principal transportation planner for Albemarle County.

A project to make changes at the intersection of U.S. 250 and Virginia Route 20 was funded via Smart Scale in the third round. A sidewalk will be added in front of the McDonalds in the northwest quadrant of the intersection. (read the application)

“It would add a two-stage pedestrian crossing of U.S. 250 on the east leg,” Hersh-Ballering said. “Additionally this project will add a right turn lane for westbound vehicles on U.S. 250 that are trying to turn right or north onto Route 20.”

Changes to the signalizations and the geometry will be made as well to increase the number of vehicles that can make each signal cycle. However, this project won’t begin until winter of 2025 with a public hearing scheduled in the summer of 2023.

“But, still great because the project is fully funded and it will be happening,” Hersh-Ballering said.

A second Smart Scale project will see corridor improvements made to the east of that intersection up to Hansen Mountain Road. This access management project will be built around the same time.

“VDOT is fast-tracking this project so that it can be on the same schedule as the previous project and also so that both projects can use the same construction contractor and what that will do is allow overall cost efficiencies for bother projects,” Hersh-Ballering said.

The center turn lane will be replaced with a concrete median with specific openings for turns.

Several projects are currently seeking funding, such as sidewalk improvements on U.S. 250 and a pedestrian crossing at Rolkin Road. Another would make changes at the intersection with Peter Jefferson Parkway that could involve a park and ride lot.

Hersh-Ballering also gave an update on the proposed pedestrian bridge across the Rivanna River. Last month, the Metropolitan Planning Organization Policy Board has selected an alignment that will connect the former State Farm Headquarters with the Woolen Mills at the Wool Factory.

The county will also launch a microtransit service in the Pantops area that would be more like a ride-sharing service than fixed-transit.

“While it works like Uber, and you can request a ride, it still functions as a public utility,” Hersh-Ballering said. “The vehicles that pick you up are not going to be anyone’s personal private vehicle. It is a transit vehicle and it will always be ADA accessible.”

There will also be no surge pricing. For more details view the video on YouTube. So far it’s had one view. Let’s get that number up seven through the CCE bump!

Second shout-out to the ACHS’s Race and Sports Event tomorrow night

Today’s second subscriber-fueled shout-out is for an upcoming panel discussion on local history on Tuesday, April 5. The Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society continues its Race and Sports project with a discussion with former star athletes and high school and college coaches. Dr. Shelley Murphy will moderate a panel with Wade Tremblay, Garwin DeBerry, and George Foussekis. They’ll share their stories and experiences during the desegregation of local public schools in the 1950s and 60s. The virtual event is available through Zoom registration and on Facebook Live.

Eight days until Charlottesville City Council adopts a budget

There are eight days left until Charlottesville City Council will adopt a budget for the next fiscal year, and many remaining decisions have yet to be made on tax rates.

Will there be an increase in the city’s real estate tax increase? Council can increase to as high as $1.05 per $100 of assessed value.

Will the city lower the personal property tax rate on vehicles to provide relief in the face of climbing values? The Commissioner of Revenue has recommended doing so, but leaving it at $4.20 per $100 of assessed value would bring in $2 million in additional revenue.

Will Council agree to a half percentage point in the meals tax? There’s a public hearing on this tonight.

Charlottesville City Council meets twice this week, and once again on April 12 to formally adopt the budget, which is larger than presented in March due to higher revenue projections.

Council met three times last week, including a work session on he capital improvement program on March 31 at which city staff indicated there may be more money available to support Council initiatives.

“That’s roughly about $3.7 million that we can add to the FY23 budget,” said Krisy Hammill, the city’s Senior Budget Management Analyst.

More on those details in a moment. This is a long one.

Capital Improvement Program recap

The March 31 work session was a chance for Hammill to go through the nearly $157.4 million five year plan in detail. (read the presentation)

The draft five-year CIP recommends $75 million for school reconfiguration, and the budget recommended by staff anticipates $2.5 million of that being allocated in FY23 and the rest in FY24.

It should be noted that Council can only make final decisions about the next fiscal year, and it will be up to their future counterparts to make the next set of choices. Over time, economic conditions will change.

The capital improvement plan does have projects that were approved by previous Councils and that budget staff have factored into the overall plan but for which bonds have not yet been sold.

Any Council can end those projects and transfer the paper money to another, such as last year when Council directed staff to take $18.6 million from the West Main Streetscape project and put it toward school reconfiguration.

The current schedule anticipates the issuance of nearly $16.9 million in bond sales in calendar year 2023.

Reviewing Planning Commission recommendations

Council was also briefed on recommendations from the Charlottesville Planning Commission on the CIP, including one that sought to overturn a decision made by Council five years ago to purchase property on East Market Street for a future parking structure.

See also:

Charlottesville PC recommends adjustments to FY22 Capital Budget, including defunding parking garage, February 10, 2021)

Charlottesville PC recommends more funding for affordable housing, new sidewalks, December 16, 2021)

“They recommended that existing and requested parking structure funding be reduced to a minimum so we basically removed all of the funding that was originally proposed in 23,” Hammill said. “It was remaining at $1.3 million. We took all of that out so if you look at this current draft there is no additional money for the parking structure.”

The city paid $2.85 million for the property and the idea had been to tear down two commercial structures and consolidate the lot with one next door to build a garage to support an expanded courts complex to serve both Albemarle and Charlottesville. Under the terms of an agreement signed in December 2018, the city must provide a certain amount of spaces to Albemarle.

“My understanding is that we’re still in discussions with the county on the path forward there, but there are no new dollars,” Hammill said.

The city has a balance of $2.8 million for the parking garage, according to economic development director Chris Engel. Again, this funding represents bonds previously authorized by Council but not yet sold.

Hammill said staff were able to accomplish some of the Planning Commission’s other requests such as fully funding the city’s efforts to treat and remove Ash Trees at a level of $105,000 a year as well as increasing funding for new sidewalks to $100,000. They also recommended decreasing funds for other categories, such as economic development strategic initiatives, small area plans, and implementation of the Strategic Investment Area.

New pathway forward for Stribling sidewalks

Other projects that have been discussed since the budget was introduced in early March include $4.9 million to cover the city’s cost to build a sidewalk on Stribling Avenue as well as new section of the Meadowcreek Trail.

See also: City Manager Rogers to negotiate with Southern Development on Stribling sidewalk agreement, March 25, 2022

Hammill suggested taking the $1.3 million from the parking garage and assigning that to the Stribling Project plus an agreement with Southern Development to pay a $2.9 million loan to city to build the project in order to support a rezoning for 170 units.

“And that would actually get you to a point where you could add that project and given the timing from the developer and otherwise, that is more suited for an FY25 add than a FY23,” Hammill said.

It must be noted that Fiscal Year 2025 begins on July 1, 2024. Budgets are confusing.

The city is still in negotiations with Southern Development with the details and the rezoning will return to Council at a later date.

“We are definitely facing well over a year of planning on this sidewalk project,” Sanders said. “It is that complicated.”

There are nearly $5 million in requests from the Piedmont Housing Alliance to help subsidize the cost of new units on Park Street.

Tax rate scenarios could lead to new real estate tax rate increase this year

Toward the end of her presentation, Hammill showed multiple scenarios for school reconfiguration, some of which are built on Council agreeing to a total of $68.8 million for that purpose.

This anticipates the use of $7.5 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds received by the school system as well as the use of $6.7 million from the city’s surplus from Fiscal Year 2021.

While Hammill showed two scenarios that include at least a five cent increase in the real estate tax rate, she also suggested the city may have more money than originally suggested.

Hammill also discussed increases in revenues for FY23, including an additional $900,000 for sales tax, $500,000 for the lodging tax, and $25,000 for the meals tax.

“We’ve bumped those up some based on our current collection rate,” Hammill said. “We continue to see growth in those and we continue to see recovery at a faster rate than we had originally anticipated.”

Council could also choose to not lower the personal property tax rate, as Commissioner of Revenue Todd Divers has suggested. All told, the city’s anticipated revenues are higher than presented in early March.

“That’s roughly about $3.7 million that we can add to the FY23 budget,” Hammill said.

Those higher than anticipated revenues are also affecting the current year and Hammill said there is currently a projected surplus of $12.4 million in revenues.

“If you were to decide to do a tax increase that would also be an impact on FY22 and that number would go up,” Hammill said.

That’s because the tax rate applies to the calendar year, not the fiscal year.

In addition, the city also has a CIP contingency account that has a balance of around $11.4 million. Some of this funding could be applied to some of the priorities and Council faces several choices for how to proceed, such as using some of the contingency to cover the Piedmont Housing Alliance requests?

“I like the opportunity to have options,” said Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade.

Councilor Brian Pinkston sought clarification if Hammill was suggesting that the city could use those funds to avoid an increase in the real estate tax this year.

“That is one option,” Hammill said. “The risk here is that something could happen and these two years, this surplus maybe does not materialize.”

Surplus funds cannot be used and allocated until they have been independently audited which usually happens in December.

Mayor Lloyd Snook said the surplus could be used to cover the costs of future debt services in the future.

“What that does is, A, it buys us a year before we have to decide whether to raise the tax rate, which also buys us some time to see if the General Assembly folks can pull some magic out of a hat for a sales tax increase,” Snook said.

Snook said he would prefer not to raise the real estate tax rate in a year when assessments are up over ten percent.

Councilor Sena Magill repeated her desire for a real estate tax increase this year.

“I would feel more comfortable if we had one cent at least that we are putting toward the school fund,” Magill said.

Councilor Michael Payne also supported a tax increase this year to ensure the city can increase spending on affordable housing, transit, and collective bargaining.

“I would think that a real estate would be less regressive than the meals or the personal property tax and that we should be looking at that,” Payne said.

Tonight’s public hearing is on the meals tax and there will be a budget work session on Thursday.

“I would hope that meeting would be the meeting where we would finally hash out the details and we would come at the end of the meeting with an agreement,” Snook said.

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One of these things is not like the other, but yet is exactly the same! Welcome to another edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a program that for some time now seeks to document what’s happening here in central Indiana with as much information as possible about Hancock County and all of the various townships in and around the 46117. I’m your host, Tawn Subbs.

On today’s program:

The tax deadline is coming up in Hancock County

Charlottesville continues to be divided by the four-lane U.S. 40

Comprehensive Plan for Hancock County continues to be under review

The first Patreon-fueled shout-out goes to WTJU on its 65th Birthday

Even though those of us in Charlottesville, Indiana are more than 500 miles away from our counterparts in Charlottesville, Virginia we are connected through the magic of the Internet, which allows us to stream WTJU 91.1 FM from the central portion of the Old Dominion! WTJU turns 65 today, marking the day when a handful of students gathered in a first-floor studio in Old Cabell Hall for the first broadcast of WTJU. In just a few minutes, classical music filled the airwaves, radiating out to a small audience in Charlottesville that would grow into a dedicated following!

Our unincorporated community of Charlottesville in central Indiana wishes a happy birthday to a different sort of radio station! Tune into the live stream tonight from 6 - 9 p.m. Eastern including a one-hour audio documentary and four live music performances covering the shores of classical, folk, blues, and rock.

Charlottesville continues to not be a town

As longtime readers and listeners know, Charlottesville is an unincorporated community mostly in Hancock County with a small portion to the south in the more rural Rush County. There’s no mayor, no elected officials, but just a village platted out in 1830 that stopped being a town in 1867.

The Hancock side is part of the official Jackson Township. That’s one of 47 units of government in Indiana that share that name

“The most common form of township government has an elected board of trustees or supervisors,” reads an explanation on the Indiana Township Association’s website.

Jackson Township is one of nine such entities in Hancock County. As a reminder, ours has a total area of 35.59 square miles and a 2020 Census count of 1,751.

Tax deadline looming in Hancock County

Property owners in Hancock County should be making plans to ensure that their taxes are paid. The deadline to pay is May 10. Contact the treasurer’s office for more information.

As longtime readers and listeners know, Hancock County government is split between a seven-member County Council that serves as the legislative branch, and a three-person Board of Commissioners who make the executive decisions.

The County Council last met on March 9 at 111 American Legion Place in Greenfield. They got updates on the Pennsy Trail, the budget for Buck Creek Township, as well as the Hancock Public Transportation Fund. They’ll meet again on April 13, and there’s no agenda yet available.

The three-member Board of Commissioners met this past Tuesday and got several updates. Charlottesville is represented on this body by Vice President Marc Huber.

Hancock County is within the jurisdiction of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization Charlottesville is just on the easten edge along U.S. 40. There was an update on the fire department at Buck Creek. (agenda)

The three Commissioners last met on March 29.and eventually that meeting will be posted online. The most recent meeting available is from March 14.

Comprehensive Plan under review with 2042 date in mind

It’s been ten years since Hancock County last updated its Comprehensive Plan but work is well underway on a new version. Such plans are mandated under Indiana Code “for the promotion of public health, safety, morals, convenience, order, or the general welfare and for the sake of efficiency and economy in the process of development.” The Plan Commission is responsible for the review.

One of the topics in the public feedback sessions so far has been to get community members’ thoughts on growth area prioritization and initiatives such as the Mount Comfort Corridor Plan and whether there is agreement that Hancock County’s unique position in the region could be leveraged for more economic development activity.

Charlottesville’s position as a rural village will likely not change significantly through the review process, and neither will Maxwell or Philadelphia.

“These villages are no longer significant centers of railroad or commercial activity, but do remain important historic settlements and can provide housing alternatives to the larger towns in the county,” reads page 20 of the current land use chapter.

The plan designates this as mixed-use areas but any new development “should be respectful” of existing development. The chapter also places Charlottesville within Critical Area 3 and notes that the rural setting is important to the character of the county, but notes that expansion of mixed-uses east of Greenfield are likely.

Community member: April Fool’s!

I have never done an April Fool’s bit as a professional writer or producer. I may not do one again, but I hope you got something out of this attempt to see what I could learn about my city’s namesake.

I had the idea to put this together less than 24 hours ago, and I had a lot of fun doing some research into this. I often think about what it would be like to be a reporter in another community, and I find looking at other local governments to be absolutely fascinating.

I’ve never been to Charlottesville, Indiana, and I don’t know anyone who lives there. But now I know a little about how another part of America works or doesn’t work. There’s so much to know. Sometimes I feel the most important thing people can do is learn something outside of themselves.

This newsletter will return to regular programming with the next one. That may be tomorrow, but definitely will be Sunday and the Week Ahead. Thanks for reading!

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The final day of the month, and the final day of 2022’s first quarter. A lot has happened so far, and there’s still a lot more to go. Mathematically we are 24.66 percent of the way through the year, and for those who want to take the long view, we are 21.25 percent of the way through the 21st Century. It all adds up in this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

Sign-up for free for as much material as I can manage to write! Payment is optional but very much supports continued production!

On today’s program:

People are warned to not come into contact with water in an urban stream in Charlottesville due to high levels of E. coli bacteria

The director of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority is hopeful Crescent Halls can be reopened this year

Charlottesville City Council will meet three days in a row beginning with tonight’s budget work session

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority gets an update on capacity in Albemarle’s northern growth area

First Patreon-fueled shout-out goes to the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s first Patreon-fueled Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards are preparing to hold their first in-person tree sale since 2019. On April 9 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards will open up their tree nursery at the Fontaine Research Park and will sell saplings of native trees, some of which are hard to find from commercial sources for between $5 and $15. There will be large trees from Birch to Sycamore, smaller trees from Blackgum to Witch Hazel, and shrubbery! Visit charlottesvilletreestewards.org to learn more!

High bacteria levels in urban stream

Charlottesville is warning the public to stay out of Pollocks Branch between Elliott Avenue and Rockland Avenue due to elevated levels of E. coli. Pollocks Branch is a waterway that travels south from downtown Charlottesville and is one of many locations monitored by the Rivanna Conservation Alliance.

“E. coli is a type of fecal coliform bacteria and when it is found in water, it is a strong indicator of sewage or animal waste contamination which can cause disease or illness,” reads an announcement from the city.

City officials are investigating the situation and advise that no one touches the water.

Pollocks Branch runs underground from the Downtown Mall and underneath the Ix Art Park before daylighting at Elliott Avenue where it flows into Moores Creek. The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality certifies the Rivanna Conservation Alliance’s monitoring efforts as a Level III which means the data can be used for official scientific purposes. The RCA has been monitoring bacteria since July 2012.

Charlottesville City Council to hold retreat this weekend

The Charlottesville City Council will meet in-person for the first time in over two years tomorrow when they convene at CitySpace for a retreat. A limited amount of public spaces are available, but the event can be viewed via Zoom.

The two-day retreat will be facilitated by the Virginia Institute of Government, a branch of the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia. On the agenda is a facilitated discussion of City Council goals and strategies, as well as an item called “Identify and Build Consensus for Priorities and Actions Items.”

The retreat begins tomorrow at 4 p.m. and on Saturday at 10 a.m. (Friday meeting info) (Saturday meeting info)

Tonight Council will meet at 6 p.m. for a budget work session. Read previous coverage courtesy of this Tweet thread.

CHRA Director wants Crescent Halls reopened by August

On Monday, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Directors voted to approve a $12 million budget for the fiscal year that begins tomorrow. They also learned that at least one revenue source for the current fiscal year is coming in much lower than had been anticipated. The CRHA had expected there would be some residents at Crescent Halls while it was renovated, but a flood last summer changed the plan.

“There was some knowledge as to what was going to happen but obviously with the flood it created a different wrinkle and deficit,” said Mary Lou Hoffman, CRHA’s finance director.

The CRHA had budgeted $291,049 in yearly rent from Crescent Halls but only received $122,745. The building is currently unoccupied as crews work to renovate all apartments.

CRHA Executive Director John Sales said the original plan had been to do to the renovation in stages and the budget had expected 70 units would be occupied at all times.

“After that we emptied half the building and put them in hotels,” Sales said.

However, Sales said insurance would not cover that expense long-term because the units that had been damaged were going to be renovated anyway.

“Then we started having the conversation with the residents that were living in the building about the conditions of the building with half of the building being empty, the work that was going on on the other side with the walls being town down, applianced ripped out, and just the morale and how depressing it was living in a building with only four floors occupied and only half of those units occupied,” Sales said.

Sales said some residents were moved to other public housing sites and others were given housing vouchers. The CRHA lost revenue not only from rent but from subsidies from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Sales said the project needs to be completed on time.

“So I’ve been pushing the contractor that we’re not changing that August date,” Sales said. “We have to make that date work.”

Sales said the first phase of South Street also needs to come online on time in order to meet the revenues that HUD officials are expecting. The federal agency considers CRHA to be a troubled agency.

When Crescent Halls does come back online, not all of the units will be considered public housing units by HUD. Sales said the units will remain affordable.

“At Crescent Halls you’re going to have your traditional public housing units, but then you’re also going to have the project-based voucher units where they will be higher rents but they’ll be subsidized with the voucher,” Sales said. Sales said under the vouchers, tenants would only have to pay thirty percent of their income toward rent.

“So we can charge $1,000 for a one-bedroom unit while not impacting what the resident that is living in that unit can actually afford because the voucher is going to subsidize their rent above their 30 percent,” Sales said. “So if they make $1,000, their rent is going to be $300. The voucher would cover the $700.”

For the public housing units, the CRHA can only charge what the tenant is able to pay.

CRHA Board members also asked City Councilor Michael Payne to ask Council to waive the payment in lieu of tax that CRHA pays to the city each year. Payne said he would bring up the matter at tonight’s budget work session.

See also:

Public Housing projects move forward after Council talks on CRHA financial sustainability, CCDC property tax liability, October 4, 2022

Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority turns 50 this June

The government entity responsible for providing drinking water and collecting and treating sewage will officially have to ask the state of Virginia for permission to continue existing.

“Authorities are authorized for 50 years and then they have to be reauthorized,” said Bill Mawyer, the executive director of the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority received its original authorization in June 1972, marking the 50th anniversary of the decision to create an authority to provide basic essentials for a growing urban community.

“So a part of our celebration will be submitting resolutions to the Albemarle Board of Supervisors and City Council to reauthorize the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority,” Mawyer said.

The RWSA owns and operates facilities that serve the urban ring around Charlottesville as well as Scottsville and Crozet. Mawyer said the Beaver Creek Reservoir has recently been treated to bring down levels of algae.

“It is the earliest we’ve seen that we’ve had an algae bloom at any of our reservoirs since our current staff have been around,” Mawyer said. “In the long term, we plan to have a hypolimnetic oxygenation system which is a pipe that goes along the bottom of the reservoir that bubbles air into the water and helps to oxygenate it to minimize the conditions that are conducive to algae blooms.”

That pipe will be installed as part of the upgrade of the Beaver Creek Dam scheduled to take place next year.

Another major capital project is a proposed waterline to connect drinking water from the Observatory Water Treatment Plant to other portions of the urban water system in Albemarle’s growth areas.

Some have expressed concern about the route preferred by staff. RWSA officials have been meeting with neighborhood groups to explain its purpose and to discuss its path through the Fry’s Spring neighborhood along Cherry Avenue, 6th Street NE, and East High Street before connecting to a waterline that serves Pantops.

“So the plan is that we’re going to collect all the information and feedback from the neighborhoods, assess it, get any feedback that Council may provide us or the Board of Supervisors and assimilate all that data and come back to the RWSA Board at the June meeting for the final location of the waterline,” Mawyer said.

The project has an estimated cost of $31 million and may be further informed by the completion of a master plan for water infrastructure.

Second shout-out goes to the JMRL Friends of the Library

Visit jmrlfriends.org to learn more! See you there!

Planning for additional homes and businesses in northern Albemarle

The RWSA Board of Directors were also briefed on whether there is enough capacity in Albemarle’s northern growth area to support additional homes such as at the University of Virginia’s North Fork Discovery park. There are also hundreds of homes coming online at Brookhill, RST Residences, North Fork, and other developments under construction.

“What we’re looking at now is that these significant utility demands that are being proposed may force one of two options,” said Jennifer Whitaker, the RWSA’s chief engineer. “One is to accelerate the utility plan or require some phasing so that we don’t have an unmet need in the future.”

According to a demand study from July 2020, current demand for the whole system is at 10.4 million gallons a day (MGD) and capacity can provide a safe yield of 12.8 MGD.

“Every ten years we try to take a very strong look at what we know as a community about growth and development and use within our community and then we also take a look at what’s going on in our reservoirs,” Whitaker said. “We try to look at how the raw water supply and the finished supply match up.”

Whitaker said there is enough water through 2060 as long as several parts of the Community Water Supply Plan are built by 2035. They are construction of a pipeline to connect the South Fork Rivanna and Ragged Mountain Reservoir and the raising of the pool at the Ragged Mountain Reservoir.

Northern Albemarle is served by the North Fork Rivanna Water Treatment Plant which Whitaker said can effectively treat one million gallons a day. There’s a demand of about a half million gallons a day. The RWSA is planning to decommission the plant but has to first connect that area to water from the South Fork Rivanna Water Treatment Plant.

“Some of the growth demand at the North Fork Research Park and another northern Albemarle areas, the need has picked up and we’re now looking at that plan and trying to figure out how to sequence it to meet that need,” Whitaker said.

Wastewater flows via gravity to the Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant and Whitaker said improvements to what’s known as the Powell Creek Interceptor are currently slated for some time between 2045 and 2065.

“As we evaluate future growth in this area we’re looking at potentially having to accelerate that as well,” Whitaker said.

Whitaker said the RWSA is working with the University of Virginia Foundation and the county as a rezoning for the North Fork park makes its way through the approvals process. They’ve asked for a maximum potential of 1,400 homes there. UVA has announced that some of these units will count toward UVA President Jim Ryan’s goal to build up to 1,500 affordable housing units.

“Ultimately we will be able to serve all of it but the question is how quickly will we allow them to bring that online,” Whitaker said.

The other two locations for affordable housing are on Fontaine Avenue at the Piedmont housing site as well as Wertland Street.

There was no action at the meeting, but certainly a lot to pay attention to into the future.

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It’s the fifth of Tuesday of the month, and what does that signify to you? For me, it’s a rare pause of sorts that allows me to catch up with items I’ve not been able to write about just yet. That’s the general theme of this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m your host Sean Tubbs, grateful for the opportunity to bring you as much information as I can in newsletter and sonic form.

Surely you know someone who would like to see this installment? Why not share it?

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council takes a deeper look at how $46 million in affordable housing funds have been spent since 2010

There are six days until the General Assembly meets again to finish the state budget

A nearby Board of Supervisors has a land use decision overturned by a Circuit Court judge

An update on mulch, clean-fill, and the budget for the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority

Today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out goes to LEAP

You don’t need the “luck of the Irish” to be safe and comfortable in your own home. To see what you can do to get the most out of your home, contact LEAP, your local energy nonprofit, to schedule a home energy assessment this month - just $45 for City and County residents. LEAP also offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If someone in your household is age 60 or older, or you have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

General Assembly reconvenes next Monday for special session

Virginia’s Legislative Information System has been updated to reflect that the General Assembly will convene next Monday for a special session to complete the biennial budget. There are 30 House Bills pending and 17 Senate bills. There’s also the possibility of more being added.

“Typically, the GA will approve an operating resolution that guides its work, including if/what legislation can be considered,” said David Blount, legislative liaison for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. “Typically, they will allow commending and memorial resolutions to be introduced.”

The main unresolved issue is the state budget. Each House has named members to be conferees to work on a compromise. Blount said the public will have a chance to review aht document as soon as a deal is worked out.

As the regular session ended, both the House and Senate have differing positions on how to increase funding for school facility construction and renovations. Legislation to allow all Virginia localities to levy a sales-tax increase for education did not make it out of the regular session. (House Subcommittee kills school sales-tax bills, February 25, 2022)

Solid waste update: How much Mulch madness? Two thousand tons!

This one is not a shout-out, but an update.

This year’s winter storms wreaked havoc on many trees across the region, and there was much debris for government crews and property owners. In January, the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority waived fees to drop off downed limbs and trees at the Ivy Materials Utilization Center where it was turned into mulch.

“We had so much mulch available after the free vegetative debris disposal program from the storm in January that we had so much mulch, we were giving away the first two tons and then charging people after that,” said Bill Mawyer, the executive director of the RWSA and the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority.

Mawyer said the RSWA wanted to get rid of the material as quickly as possible before it became a fire hazard. As of this morning they’ve distributed 2,004 tons according to Phil McKalips, the RSWA’s Solid Waste Manager. He said they are hoping to run out by the end of next week.

Clean-fill pilot considered a success

Since February, the RSWA has been working with Faulconer Construction on a pilot project to have lower tipping fees for “clean fill” from sites where buildings and old landscapes have been removed. This is in response to new rules in Albemarle County, a locality that until recently allowed that material to more easily be buried underground. The lower fees are because Faulconer is doing some of the work.

“The contractor that brings in the fill is going to take responsibility for all of the grading, compaction, seeing, and installation of interim stormwater controls,” said Philip McKalips, the solid waste manager for RSWA.

As of last week, Faulconer had dropped off 17,000 tons that will be placed in an unused cell of the former landfill.

“In total they’re expected to deliver between 30,000 to 40,000 tons by the end of May,” McKalips said. “They might get done with that a bit sooner.”

One lesson learned is that the RSWA has needed to limit the number of trucks that can come through in a day to 120.

“We had up to 165 trucks in one day and with our other operations it was a bit of a stress for the site staff,” McKalips said. “They were having to do a lot of crowd control and managing traffic out towards Dick Woods Road and things that are not acceptable for long-term operations.”

Even though the tipping fee for clean-fill is lower, the pilot project has brought in over $60,000 in revenues to date. McKalips said other contractors are very interested in participating in the program.

At their meeting on March 22, the RSWA Board of Directors also got the first look at the agency’s $6.84 million budget for FY23. That’s based off of an anticipated $3.53 million in revenues and $3.3 million from local and state government. Albemarle County pays 82.2 percent of that amount, Charlottesville pays 15.3 percent, and the University of Virginia pays 2.4 percent.

Albemarle’s share is increasing next year to help cover the costs of operating the new Southern Convenience Center which is expected to open next January. There’s also a need to build a new baling facility to handle recycled paper and cardboard. A cost share will need to be worked out for how much each locality would pay. More details will be available at the RSWA’s next meeting in May.

To learn more about the programs of the RSWA, take a look at the budget presentation from the March 22, 2022 meeting. (view the budget presentation)

Second shout-out goes to the Rivanna Conservation Alliance

In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out, the Rivanna Conservation Alliance wants wildlife and nature photographers to enter their first-ever photography contest! They want high-resolution photos related to the Rivanna watershed and the winning entries will be displayed at the 2022 Riverfest Celebration on May 1. The two categories are 16 and under, and those over the age of 17. You can send in two entries, and the work may be used to supplement Rivanna Conservation Alliance publications. For more information, visit rivannariver.org.

Charlottesville City Council discusses reform for affordable housing fund

The Affordable Housing Plan adopted by Charlottesville City Council in March 2021 established a moral commitment for the city to spend $10 million each year on affordable housing projects and administration. But how have previous funds for that purpose been spent since 2010?

“In summary, you’ve administered $46.7 million in funding [and] this is broken down into operating, program, development, and city administration,” said Callahan Seltzer, a principal with HR&A Advisors. “And when we see development here, we’re talking about new construction and rehab, so specific hard costs related to construction and rehab of affordable housing.”

HR&A Advisors were hired by Rhodeside & Harwell as a subcontractor for the overall Cville Plans Together initiative. HR&A wrote the plan, which helped inform the greater residential densities allowed under the new Comprehensive Plan adopted by Council last November.

City Council originally approved a Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund (CAHF) in 2007. Very few staff who were around at the time are left in the city government.

Last July, the previous City Council agreed to pay HR&A Advisors an additional $165,000 to review how the CAHF has been used since 2010. The review’s purpose was to determine if the city was getting a return on its investment and to suggest reform. An initial review was presented to Council in December, but the rest of the report was the subject of a City Council work session on March 21.

“The study is also designed to redesign the program to make it more efficient and then to show some kind of accountability moving forward,” said Alex Ikefuna, the interim director of the Office of Community Solutions.

View the March 21, 2022 presentation

View the March 21, 2022 staff and HR&A report

View the March 21, 2022 work session on the city’s website

That $165,000 also covers the costs of HR&A to write an inclusionary zoning program as part of the ongoing rewrite of the zoning code. That will come forward at a later date.

Seltzer said the review involved following up with transactions from the past 12 years. Around 95 percent of the funds have gone to eleven recipients.

There are two classes of recipients and they are households served versus units constructed. The study sought to create a metric to measure the efficiency of funding.

“We think it’s only one of many important metrics, and generally performance in terms of cost efficiency per unit, from what we see in the industry is very good,” Seltzer said. “You are getting a good amount of cost-efficiency per unit via the CAHF.”

Nearly half of the funding has gone to development of new units. Some highlights:

In 2010, Virginia Supportive Housing was awarded $1.825 million for what would become the Crossings on 4th Street. There are 60 single-resident occupancy units there.

The Thomas Jefferson Community Land Trust has been awarded $3 million since 2012. The land trust is now part of the Piedmont Housing Alliance.

Habitat for Humanity has received nearly $3.9 million since 2010 for a variety of projects.

Piedmont Housing Alliance received $5.545 million in 2021 for the Friendship Court redevelopment

Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority has received a total of nearly $8.4 million, with significant amounts earmarked for redevelopment since 2018.

The Albemarle Housing Improvement Program has received a total of $8.448 million primarily for rehabilitation of existing units.

Construction that is intended to subsidize the cost of housing always has multiple sources of revenue, but the above is direct investment of funds ultimately covered by city taxpayers either in terms of cash or bond proceeds.

Callahan said the review of the CAHF is intended to turn goals of the Affordable Housing Plan into reality, such as requiring affordability for as long as possible.

“So really trying to get 99 years of affordability whenever possible and we are working to help you get the right sight of agreements in place with your grantees that get you that longer term of affordability,” Seltzer said. “Twenty years at an absolute minimum would be our recommendation there.”

Those can take the form of covenants that return some of the value of the unit back to the city. One way to secure those covenants would be to restructure the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund as what Seltzer calls a “soft loan.”

“What that does is essentially bind that affordability and if a developer in ten or fifteen years decides they own the property, they have a covenant, but they’re okay to terminate that covenant because they’re going to sell the property and make a lot of money when they sell it,” Seltzer said. “It brings you back to the table to renegotiate and say, well, actually this is a loan. We paid for it as a loan and here you are needing to basically within your sale, we are going to recoup these funds so that we can reinvest in affordable housing in other ways.”

Seltzer said the city will need additional housing staff to track all of the information and to ensure the covenants and provisions are enforced.

One Councilor asked HR&A to give a sense of how Charlottesville is doing compared to other cities across the country.

“Charlottesville is punching above its weight on a per capita basis,” said Philip Kash of HR&A Advisors. “Almost any way you cut the numbers, you are very committed to this public policy priority.”

“You also have a very sophisticated group of affordable housing developers that I have not seen that level of sophistication in the southeast,” Seltzer said. “I think in Boston, New York, places where you have strong neighborhood-based [Community Development Corporations] with a 30 or 40 year history of neighborhood-based action. That exists, but it doesn’t exist in the southeast.”

However, both Kash and Seltzer said the administration of those funds has been lacking and better tracking will be required.

Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders said it is the intention of the city government to hire additional staff when the right positions are identified.

CAHF committee to be created

Another reform will be the creation of a committee to review competitive proposals for use of the city’s affordable housing funds. Council currently makes the ultimate decision with some guidance from the current Housing Advisory Committee. The new CAHF committee has not yet been named. Sanders said this will eliminate conflicts of interest such as members of nonprofits evaluating their own proposals.

“When you have one committee that’s been evaluating the actual proposals then that in itself leads to various confusion so the establishment of the CAHF committee is an attempt to pull the developers out of the conversation where they may have a direct benefit so that there are others that are fully vetting out those proposals and making a recommendation separate and apart.”

The Housing Advisory Committee would continue existing as a body to discuss policy, but would no longer be involved with making funding recommendations. The goal is to have all affordable housing proposals come through one channel.

“Anyone making a request for a housing investment to the city of Charlottesville should come through one door,” Sanders said. “That request should be factored against everything else that is being considered and it gives us a better ability to track it.”

Responsibility for this will be transferred to the Office of Community Solutions.

There is another work session on April 4 that will focus on affordable housing issues in Charlottesville.

Rappahannock Board of Supervisors overruled in land use case

In Virginia, elected bodies usually have the final say in matters related to land use and zoning. However, property owners have the right to appeal decisions to state courts.

The Rappahannock News reports that a Rappahannock Circuit Court Judge has overruled that county’s Board of Supervisors in a case where a contractor had sought a special use exception to store equipment on land zoned agricultural. The five person board unanimously voted to deny the request in March 2020, citing traffic issues.

Contractor John Cappali appealed, and Julia Shanahan reports that Judge Jeanette Irby ruled the use would not have any impact on traffic. Rappahannock County may appeal the ruling. Read Shanahan’s story to learn more about the case. (read through materials March 2020 hearing)

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Today begins the final week of the month as well as the last four days of 2022’s first quarter. There are so many ways to order time and to order our affairs as human beings as we move through a world that may or may not make sense, depending on how you count. I’m Sean Tubbs, I provide information on a regular basis in each installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement to describe a few of the things that have happened so far.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s show:

The area’s transportation decision-making body wants a future pedestrian bridge to connect Pantops with the Broadway Blueprint

The University of Virginia’s School of Architecture hires its first Associate Dean for Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

UVA no longer requires masks in classrooms, and an update on the COVID-19 pandemic

Today’s first shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. Support freeform community radio on WTJU and get ready for the station’s 65th anniversary this Friday, April 1! Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate

COVID-19 update: Masks now optional in UVA classrooms

Today marks the end of the mask requirements in classrooms at the University of Virginia, but people are still asked to carry one in case they are asked to by someone else.

“As we navigate the shift to most settings being mask-optional, we are encouraging everyone to treat each other with respect and common courtesy,” reads a March 25 email from Provost Ian Baucom and Chief Operating Officer J.J. Davis.

The Centers for Disease Control now regard the COVID-19 Community Level to be low for Albemarle County and Charlottesville.

This morning the Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,340 new cases and the seven-day average for percent positivity is now at 3.3 percent.

There is a subvariant of the Omicron virus that is leading to new surges across the world including Hong Kong. That’s a place where Dr. Costi Sifri of the UVA Health System said has not yet experienced much community spread because of an early zero tolerance policy.

“It is causing significant stress to their health system,” Sifri said. “There is this view that Omicron is less virulent than other COVID variants.”

However, Dr. Sifri said that Hong Kong also has low vaccine rates providing a population base through which the Omicron subvariant can spread.

“Here in the United States we’re seeing an increasing amount of B.A.2, the sister subvariant of the original Omicron strain,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s growing in proportion nationwide. In our region it’s about 30 to 35 percent or so of all isolates.”

Dr. Sifri said this subvariant is not as virulent, but does appear to be more transmissible and that it will become the dominant strain in a matter of weeks. Dr. Sifri said a local spike could happen as mask requirements are dropped and as more social gatherings.

“I don’t think that’s guaranteed so I think there is also a possibility we could just reach a plateau at least for the near-term,” Dr. Sifri said. “And of course, things may change if there is a new variant that emerges somewhere in the world that is able to essentially escape the protection that boosters and vaccinations have provided.”

As of today, 72.7 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated, but only 2.9 million booster doses have been administered. There’s still no word yet on whether an additional dose will be needed for the general population or just those who are at higher risk of developing a virulent infection.

There are 76 new cases in the Blue Ridge Health District today. On March 16ths, Last week, the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors voted to end the local COVID emergency, paving the way for in-person meetings beginning next week with the Albemarle Board of Supervisors.

UVA School of Architecture hires Associate Dean for equity and inclusion

The School of Architecture at the University of Virginia has hired its first ever Associate Dean for Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. C.L. Bohannon will take the position in late July as he also joins the faculty as an Associate Professor in the Landscape Architecture Department. Bohannon is currently the interim director of the School of Architecture and Design at Virginia Tech, as well as founder and director of the Community Engagement Lab.

“I am enthusiastic to collaborate with faculty, students, staff, and communities across the Commonwealth as we contend with long-standing socio-environmental inequalities,” Bohannon said in a news release on the School of Architecture’s website. “I believe that as creative practitioners, we have the necessary critical and creative tools to redress harms that have come from design and planning and that we can work with congruent integrity and practice.”

The Community Engagement Lab will come with Bohannon to UVA.

Second shout-out goes to a March 29 event happening at Morven

In today’s second subscriber supported shout-out, the Morven Summer Institute at Morven Farm wants you to know about a seminar coming up on March 29. How are UVA students, faculty, and community partners collaborating to tell the stories of Morven? Researcher Scot French has spent over ten years studying Morven’s history and will provide glimpses into a course he’ll be teaching this summer on Recovering the Stories of Morven’s Enslaved and Descendant Communities. The March 29 event is a chance for the public to get a preview of the four week course. If you’re interested, visit morven.virginia.edu to fill out an interest form.

MPO selects Broadway Avenue / East Market location for pedestrian bridge

If a bridge to cross the Rivanna River between Albemarle County and the Woolen Mills is ever built, the western end will be connected to East Market Street rather than Riverview Park.

“It seems to me that the connection at the East Market Street provides an additional value or return on the investment in that it is connecting two activity centers from Pantops over to what’s being planned in that Broadway corridor,” said Albemarle Supervisor Ned Gallaway, the chair of the Metropolitan Planning Organization’s Policy Board.

Transportation staff with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission are working on an application for Smart Scale funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation for the project, which would have an eastern landing just to the west of the former State Farm regional headquarters.

The MPO Policy Board voted 4-1 on March 24 to choose an alignment that would land at East Market Street. This alternative is more expensive with a preliminary cost estimate of $15.3 million compared to $11.3 million for the Chesapeake Street alignment.

They also discussed whether the bridge should be “cable-stayed” or should be built on a “truss.” bridge. A cable-stayed bridge would require more maintenance, and there are questions about who would be responsible for the cost.

“When we’re looking at new projects, we generally don’t try to promote or support projects that would provide an increased cost for maintenance when it’s not strictly necessary,” said Sean Nelson, the district engineer for VDOT’s Culpeper District.

Nelson said if the cable-stayed bridge was selected, the localities would be asked to cover the additional maintenance.

Albemarle Supervisor Ann Mallek wanted to know if that might affect the project’s Smart Scale score.

“Getting something approved is my highest priority and I want to make sure that we are thinking about that rather than asking for the beautiful, blue crystal slipper,” Mallek said. “ Are we then not getting something at all then if we applied for the work boot?”

The group opted to proceed with a truss bridge.

No matter the type of bridge, the East Market / Broadway bridge would have two spans connected with a pier.

City Councilor Brian Pinkston was the lone vote in favor of the Chesapeake Street option.

“To me, if the least expensive, more likely to occur option is to have it at the park on the northern side,” Pinkston said.

A majority of people on a stakeholder committee favored the Chesapeake Street option, as did the MPO-Technical Committee.

More information needs to be gathered as part of a necessary environmental review and that will be gathered as the application is finalized. This includes impacts on historic sites well as the impact on the floodway.

Nelson said one of the sites would provide more room for flexibility if the design needed to be amended to take into account potential impacts.

“The Woolen Mills location there [are] more opportunities to mitigate at that location then at the other location,” Nelson said.

Mallek said she supported the Woolen Mills option because of the county’s planning work.

“There are things in the Broadway corridor which the county has been planning and working on for several years including more sidewalk connections and improvement of the connector road which would also benefit users of the bridge,” Mallek said.

After Mayor Lloyd Snook offered his opinion, one member of the public who was on the call expressed their opinion.

“I would vote for the southernmost route, the route that goes down to East Market,” Snook said.

“Unbelievable,” said an unidentified voice in what may be one of the last awkward moments of the Zoom era of public meetings.

Before the vote, nearby resident Jenny Milulski said she would have supported either option, but wanted the MPO to take Albemarle’s economic development planning efforts into account.

“I just wanted to voice my enthusiasm for considering this project in tandem with the Broadway economic development plan,” Milukski said.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors recently received information about the Broadway Blueprint and the Economic Development Authority had a conversation about the document earlier this month (read the final study)

Mikulski said the bridge would transform the way she thinks about where she lives.

“For example it would only be a 1.5 mile walk from my house to the Kluge-Ruhe Museum,” Mikulski said.

Currently that would be a three mile walk.

Preliminary Smart Scale applications are due by the end of the month. A final application is due on August 1. The rankings will be released in late January.

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The final Friday of March has arrived and it’s also the twelfth such day of the year. One question is how many more are left in 2022? Is it worth the research it would take to bring you that piece of information? Or would it be better to proceed with another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement? One fact I can say with some confidence is that I’m Sean Tubbs, your stenographic host.

Know someone who might want to read or listen to detailed accounts of how decisions are made in local government? Share Charlottesville Community Engagement!

On today’s program:

Council holds first reading on a rezoning for 170 units in Fry’s Spring but approval will hinge on finding funding for sidewalk improvements

Charlottesville City Council weighs in further on tax rates and the budget

Today’s first shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. Support freeform community radio on WTJU and get ready for the station’s 85th anniversary on April 1! Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

City Manager Rogers to negotiate with Southern Development on Stribling sidewalk agreement

As Charlottesville contemplates a more dense future with more people, how can today’s elected officials ensure the infrastructure is in place before new homes are built?

The fate of Southern Development’s request to rezone undeveloped land in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood depends on if Charlottesville Council is satisfied sidewalks will be built on Stribling Avenue.

“At 12 acres, this is one of the largest undeveloped properties within the city,” said City Planner Matt Aflele.

Southern Development’s plan is to build 170 residential units in a mix of single-family attached, townhomes, and multifamily buildings at a density of 15 dwelling units per acre.

The Planning Commission has voted unanimously to recommend a rezoning and a critical slopes waiver, but only if funds were placed in the capital improvement program for a sidewalk on Stribling Avenue. Southern Development had agreed to loan the city $2.9 million to cover the cost. This would be paid back in the form of real estate tax rebates until the amount is paid off.

At Council’s first reading of the matter on Monday, Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers said he did not recommend proceeding with the sidewalk for many reasons. For one, the city would need to issue additional bonds and it’s already at capacity.

For another, Rogers said if the city is going to enter into public-private partnerships for infrastructure, there need to be rules first.

“The city does not have in place a policy infrastructure for these kinds of arrangements,” Rogers said. “So that it’s clear to everyone up front and that’s something that we will work on. But at this time there are too many unknown variables.”

However, staff does recommend the rezoning.

“After a lot of considerations we do think that 170 new housing units in that location would be a benefit to the city, and the fact that 26 affordable housing units would be added would be beneficial to our affordable housing program as well.”

Rogers said the city would have to find a way to pay for the sidewalk if the development was to move forward.

“So we would have to go back to the CIP, include this project, find the money for it, and make it happen,” Rogers said.

Jason Halbert is co-president of the Fry's Spring Neighborhood Association. They’ve been working on this issue since the idea of the rezoning emerged.

"We as a board never said no, NIMBY, we didn't take that position," Halbert said. "We took a position to try to advance what we have always been trying to advance, which is improved safety on Stribling Avenue and the intersection of Stribling and Jefferson Park Avenue.”

Halbert said the development should not occur without infrastructure. He thanked interim Michael C. Rogers for his announcement earlier in the meeting that the process for the capital improvement program would be overhauled.

"If we want to work with developers to get more density in the city and really do this new zoning ordinance in a proper way, the city's CIP and the infrastructure has to keep pace," Halbert said. "If it can't keep pace you're going to create serious problems on city streets, city intersections, and you're going to have more and more consternation from neighborhoods."

City resident Ben Heller asked for the city to ask for $2.9 million in cash from Southern Development rather than the loan. He pointed out the company paid $2 million for the 11 acres of undeveloped land in June 2021.

"With 170 houses there that's only $12,000 per development entitlement," Heller said. "In general you are talking about $120,000 per development entitlement in that neighborhood. You could ask the developer for $3 million and they would still be getting a bargain in terms of the price per development entitlement."

Council discussion

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade worked for many years as a transportation planner for Albemarle County and is familiar with the road because this area is within in the jurisdictions of a joint planning study known as Southern Area B.

“We had some projects on the county end of this and it was a real gnarly, gnarly road there and i think it prevented some of the county projects from getting done in that area,” Wade said.

Wade said the city has to find a way to build the sidewalk.

Councilor Brian Pinkston said he could not vote for the rezoning until there was a plan in place to guarantee the sidewalks would be built.

“I see why the notion of trying to fund this with a loan was a great idea, kind of a hail mary sort of thing, but I can see why it’s very difficult and problematic on the policy side and the debt management side and not having the policies and procedures in place to govern that,” Pinkston said.

Another issue is lack of funding to upgrade the intersection of Stribling and Jefferson Park Avenue Extended to handle left-hand turns. That concerned Mayor Lloyd Snook as much if not more than the sidewalk.

“That kind of improvement is never going to be made unless we’ve got a project like this,” Snook said. “Now to me the question therefore is how do we end up not having to hold the bag?”

Snook said he was skeptical the city would be able to find the money in the capital improvement program. He said it would be his first preference for Rogers to continue to work on the loan to resolve outstanding questions.

Charlie Armstrong of Southern Development said his company has looked at many options over the past few years, including developing the property by-right.

“And that is 46 or so large single family lots, some of them approaching an acre in size,” Armstrong said. “They would be beautiful but affordable for very view.”

A rezoning to R-2 would yield 64 units.

Armstrong said the agreement was not so much of a loan but a tax increment financing structure.

“It’s another odd version of a loan where we provide the funds and then we provide the funds again to pay ourselves back,” Armstrong said “Those tax revenues from the project don’t exist right now. The project would create them.”

Armstrong said he would be willing to work with the city to move forward on the agreement, but needs to know if there is Council support for the rezoning. Rogers said he would set up a conversation with Armstrong but suggested Council hold first reading on the matter. They did so, and the matter will come back to Council at their next meeting on April 4.

Second shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting http://campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Council weighs in on budget, real estate tax rate

Charlottesville City Council held a community forum last night on the recommended budget for FY23. They had held a public hearing on Monday, but their own conversation at that time was somewhat limited. Staff asked Councilors to offer their perspective. (watch the budget forum)

Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers has recommended a two cent increase on the real estate tax rate with the approximately $1.84 million in revenue going to a fund dedicated to paying for renovation of Buford Middle School.

Staff also presented Council with three other scenarios for higher tax rates for how to cover the costs of the $75 million the School Board wants for the project.

“It seems our decision points are raising taxes by eight to ten cents, real estate taxes,” said City Councilor Michael Payne. “Going quickly in with $75 million for the reconfiguration plan. And I think if we do that we need to acknowledge that the trade-offs that all of those things not in our budget that are not going to get funded unless we have an extremely large unexpected surplus or we raise taxes above even ten cents.”

Some of the things not in the budget include a contribution to Piedmont Housing Alliance for their project to build 50 units on the grounds of the Park Street Christian Church. Another is funding for the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center to cover their rent. Another is an additional $3 million for Charlottesville Area Transit to increase the system to 30-minute headways.

City Councilor Brian Pinkston said he was not sure he could support a steep increase in the real estate tax rate because he thought it may push more people to leave the city.

“I get these phone calls from folks whose housing has appreciated by ten, eleven, twelve, fifteen percent, their housing assessments,” Pinkston said. “And it is hard to put on top of that a real estate tax on top of that.”

However, Pinkston said he could support a two cent increase in FY23 while an attempt is made to reduce the cost of the Buford renovation.

Pinkston said all increases in the real estate tax should go to debt service for school reconfiguration.

Krisy Hammill, senior budget analyst for the city of Charlottesville, offered this clarification.

“There’s $2.5 million in the CIP in FY23 that is my understanding would complete the design and require no tax increase,” Hammill said.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade served sixteen years on the School Board, where reconfiguration has been sought for many years. The School Board voted in October 2010 on a plan to build a single middle school to serve 6th through 8th grades, with fifth graders returning to elementary schools. The project has not yet advanced as a capital project.

“Each time we have been putting it off so I will definitely be in the camp that we need to start on this now because one of the big issues is the inflation costs,” Wade said. “So I think that we were looking at some of the options and alternatives that we looked at on Monday, we’re in a rock’s throw of working this out and I think that we will as a community and a Council.”

Wade said Council will have to make some tough decisions.

‘Many of the emails we receive say they want us to do it all, but we can’t!” Wade said. “We’re going to have to make some difficult decisions and that’s why they place us here.”

Councilor Sena Magill said design of Buford would still continue during the next year and that the draft budget doesn’t show floating the bonds for Buford until Fiscal Year 2024. But she understood why some might be skeptical of the fate of dedicated funds in the Capital Improvement Program.

“As we found with West Main Street, even if it’s in the CIP doesn’t mean it’s going to stay,” Magill said. “West Main had been allocated out and we as a new Council took it out.”

In all, previous Councils accumulated $18 million in capital funds for West Main that only existed on paper. The bonds are authorized but not yet sold, and the last Council agreed to transfer them to the Buford project.

Magill said she would support a higher tax rate than two cents as presented to Council on Monday.

Councilor Brian Pinkston said he wanted to consider a drop in the personal property tax to reduce the burden to those who will be hit with higher than expected bills.

“My original inclination with that is that this is a windfall for us but [Commissioner of Revenue Todd] Divers has made some good points is that it will be an affordability issue for many people,” Pinkston said.

Divers has suggested that continuing to charge $4.20 per $100 of assessed value would yield an additional $2 million and that a rate of $3.22 per $100 would be an equalized rate that would bring in the current year’s revenue. Pinkston suggested somewhere in the $3.75 range. That would yield approximately $1 million.

Councilor Snook said that $1 million coupled with $1.2 million from a half-percentage increase in the meals tax would yield additional revenue that could be used to pay for other initiatives.

“I think at some point we need to agree on what purposes we’d like to try to fund and then we can try to fit the taxes to meet those expenditures,” Snook said.

Wade said he wanted the city to do what it can to keep the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center in place.

“Whether it’s a combination of working with them for fundraising and the city assisting because I know when I was on the School Board the programs that they provided was invaluable and what they can do no one else can do, the way they bring the community together to have those courageous conversations,” Wade said. “They’re there to do that.”

Councilors appeared to be willing to support a request to fully fund the Public Housing Association of Residents’ request of $41,000. The draft budget only recommended $21,035.

Rogers said the conversation at the community budget forum was useful.

“We will work the budget staff and the departments heads in the city to address what you have identified as priorities of sincere interest,” Rogers said.

However, Rogers reminded the Council to be mindful of what the city could afford. He suggested they review the three scenarios presented by Hammill on Monday.

“And there are some hard choices,” Rogers said. “Whether to raise taxes or not, and if so, do it all at once, or have a phased approach?”

The next step in the budget process is a work session on the Capital Improvement Program on March 31 beginning at 6 p.m. (meeting info)

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After today, the year 2022 will be 22.7 percent complete, a statistic that appears both appropriate and confounding. This is the 353rd edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a program that only contains a fraction of the stories that I would like to be telling, but efforts to increase efficiency are on an upward trajectory. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council appears poised to approve a 28 unit apartment complex on a cul-de-sac in Fifeville

Governor Glenn Youngkin summons the General Assembly to return to Richmond on April 4 to complete a budget

The Charlottesville Human Rights Commission holds a town hall meeting tonight

And the Great Eastern Management Company offers the public a chance to weigh in on a plan to redevelop Seminole Square Shopping Center to add 352 apartments

First shout-out goes to a March 29 event happening at Morven

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, the Morven Summer Institute at Morven Farm wants you to know about a seminar coming up on March 29. How are UVA students, faculty, and community partners collaborating to tell the stories of Morven? Researcher Scot French has spent over ten years studying Morven’s history and will provide glimpses into a course he’ll be teaching this summer on Recovering the Stories of Morven’s Enslaved and Descendant Communities. The March 29 event is a chance for the public to get a preview of the four week course. If you’re interested, visit morven.virginia.edu to fill out an interest form.

Governor Youngkin calls special session to resolve Virginia’s budget

The Virginia General Assembly adjourned earlier this month without completing work on a budget. They also left several bills pending. Now the head of the executive branch has called them back to Richmond to complete the work early next month.

“I, Glenn Youngkin, Governor of Virginia, do hereby summon the members of the Senate and the House of Delegates, constituting the General Assembly of Virginia, to meet in Special Session commencing the 4th day of April, two thousand and twenty-two for the purpose of the completion of the 2023-2024 biennial budget.

In a statement, Youngkin said he wants the budget to include a tax cut, but also an increase in spending on education, law enforcement, and the behavioral health system.

Youngkin also wants the General Assembly to pass legislation that would suspend Virginia’s 26-cent gas tax for three months. Graham Moomaw reported in the Virginia Mercury last week that that could cost $437 million in transportation funding.

The Legislative Information System lists 48 bills still pending, including the budget bill. A total of 166 bills were carried over to the 2023.

Youngkin has signed 31 bills into law including one that makes switchblade knives legal again. Other blackjacks such as throwing stars remain illegal. Another approved bill will change the process by which “accommodations intermediaries” pay their transient occupancy taxes, though guidelines won’t be published by the Department of Taxation until August 1, 2022.

Human Rights Commission Town Hall tonight

The nine-member body appointed by City Council to “provide citywide leadership and guidance in the area of civil and human rights” wants you to consider attending a meeting tonight. City Councilor Michael Payne made this announcement at Monday’s Council meeting.

“The Human Rights Commission would like to hear from the public on Emergency Housing Access and the quality of affordable, public, and subsidized housing,” Payne said.

That will take the form of a virtual town hall meeting to be held tonight at 7 p.m. They’ll be working off of a community survey that got 128 responses. The top two responses are the subject of the meeting, where people will have up to three minutes to discuss. Learn more in a press release.

City Council adopted an affordable housing plan on March 1, 2021 as the first step in the Cville Plans Together initiative. The three major themes in the plan are a commitment to spend $10 million each year on affordable housing programs, reforming the governance for how that funding is allocated, and to adopt reforms to encourage more housing all across the city. (read the plan)

Council supportive of rezoning for 28 units on Valley Road Extended

Charlottesville City Council appears willing to support three land use applications to allow 28 units to be built on about two thirds of an acre on a cul-de-sac in Fifeville. Lorven Investments needs a rezoning, a special use permit, and a critical slopes waiver.

“The development being proposed are for four low-rise apartment buildings with eight one-bedroom units and 20 two-bedroom units for a total of 28 on site,” said city planner Matt Alfele.

By right, the developer could have gotten three duplexes, but only with a boundary line adjustment.

“Six houses down there versus 28 when we desperately need housing?” Councilor Sena Magill wondered. “It’s very hard to say no to.”

However, both Magill and City Councilor Michael Payne had questions about the terms of affordability provisions, and the item will come back to Council for a second reading at their next meeting on April 4.

The out-ot-town developer has agreed to contribute $48,000 to build pedestrian improvement somewhere off-site, as well as to commit eight of the units to be income-restricted for a period of at least ten years.

The Planning Commission voted 4-3 earlier this month to recommend approval.

“Traffic, affordability of units, [and] scale of the buildings were the main points of focus from the Commission,” Alfele said. “In addition, members of the community who spoke brought up character of the development as it relates to the surrounding neighborhood, anticipated problems with parking, and the poor condition of Valley Road Extended.”

Civil engineer Justin Shimp represented the applicant and he said the affordability proffer echoes the city’s housing policy and it is legally binding.

“There are terms spelled out within on how much the rent will be, and also the rent limitations in both income and on what the rental price is,” Shimp said.

Shimp said there was no subsidy involved and that the developer will assume the costs of providing the units below market.

“It depends on what you calculate market rent in the area but I think it’s something like a $250,000 to $300,000 commitment on this project to affordability,” Shimp said.

One question is how the city will enforce the affordability. The city has been without a housing coordinator since the summer of 2020.

“Whether or not someone is compliant will need to be determined by the zoning administrator down the road,” said City Attorney Lisa Robertson. “This proffer statement does not obligate the city to pay any money.”

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade had a question about the length of the affordability period.

“I mean, ten years, is that typically what we use as the time period?” Wade asked. “It seemed kind of short.”

Robertson said there is no standard length for Charlottesville, and that in this case the developer was offering the affordability on a voluntary basis above and beyond the minimum requirements of the zoning code. That will change as the zoning code is rewritten to include provisions where this kind of density would be allowed only if units were provided below market.

“We don’t really have a standardized program yet,” Robertson said.

Wade also wanted to make sure that University of Virginia students do not end up taking units that he thought should go to low-wealth families.

“Will [federal housing] voucher holders be able to take advantage of this location?” Wade asked.

“Yes,” Shimp responded. “And that’s part of what we were encouraged to look into by the Planning Commission. Part of the units being split is that all eight of them become voucher eligible.”

Before the discussion, one member of the public argued that the subsidized low rents that would be provided at Grove Street would outweigh any concerns over traffic.

"With more apartments on that street, the cars will drive slower but I think that's okay," said Joshua Carp said.

Councilor Michael Payne noted that this use appeared to be in excess of what’s allowed under the new Future Land Use Map that designates this as General Residential.

“What justification and where in the project in terms of affordability are we at in terms of justifying going beyond our adopted land use map that did have density increase throughout the city, but had land use designations that we decided on?” Payne asked.

Shimp said that was up to the City Council to decide. In this case, he said the undeveloped nature of the three lots are a perfect opportunity to add density.

“This site in particular, there’s not a tree on it,” Shimp said. “There’s a degraded stream we’re going to fix. This is one site that clearing it all and building housing on it is 100 percent improvement for all parties involved.”

Shimp said the proposal fulfills the spirit of the new Comprehensive Plan. Strategy 1.3 of the Land Use Chapter is to “implement zoning changes needed to support the creation of more housing, including affordable housing opportunities throughout the city.”

Mayor Lloyd Snook said the city does not have enough money to make major improvements to Valley Road Extended.

“What’s concerning generally is the narrowness of the street or the fact that there’s no street definition on one side,” Snook said. “There is street definition on the other side because there’s a guard rail to keep you from going into the creek.”

Snook said if Council approves this project, they should expect that neighbors will report issues in the future. He said on balance, he would support the project because of the provision of new houses.

The item will come back to Council on April 4 for a second reading. There were at least three votes to approve.

Second Shout-out goes to Mulch Madness!

In today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out, are you ready for Mulch Madness? The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority has a free mulch giveaway through April 16. In between all the big games, the RSWA wants you to get your yard ready for spring. If you have a way to transport mulch, head on over to the Ivy Material Utilization Center between 7:30am and 4:00pm, Monday through Saturday, where you can pick up up to two tons free. Rivanna staff are available to help load, but ask that you bring a covering. Mulch is double ground and derived from vegetative materials brought to Ivy for disposal. That’s Mulch Madness at the Ivy Material Utilization Center. Visit rivanna.org to learn more.

Great Eastern Management Company presents plans for mixed-use redevelopment of Seminole Square

Members of the public had the opportunity Wednesday to ask questions of the developers of Seminole Square Shopping Center. The Great Eastern Management Company has submitted plans to convert the former Giant store and other commercial sites.

“What we have here actually are four individual structures,” said David Mitchell is with GEMC.

“We’re staying in the existing development area and we’re not going down into any of the slopes or any of the critical areas. We’re staying up on the platform that we built 30 years ago.”

Mitchell said this is a by-right plan and will not require a rezoning or special use permit.

One structure will be a mixed-use building and the rest will be all residential. Parking would be underneath and Mitchell said the minimum requirements would be met.

Another commercial building will be built along Hillsdale Drive but Mitchell said there are no identified tenants.

Planning Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg asked how the project was different from the previous plan. GEMC filed for a rezoning in early 2019 for eleven five story buildings with around 500 residential units.

“Obviously the building configuration looks a little bit different,” Stolzenberg said. “In particular, what caused the number of units to drop?”

Mitchell said the reduced number comes down to parking requirements and construction costs.

“When we started to look harder at this after that initial plan you saw three years ago it became obvious to us that these buildings are already going to be five to seven stories with underground parking,” Mitchell said. “To get any more than that… this is not downtown New York. There are limitations on the economics.”

The units would either be one-bedroom or two bedroom units. Five percent will be affordable under the city’s existing affordable housing policies.

“It’s not required because this is by-right but we’ve just decided we’ve done it on another project that was a special use permit so it was required,” Mitchell said. “We think we can provide that within the economic structure of the project.”

Two public streets would be created as part of the project.

In addition to Stolzenberg, only one other person actually spoke. Peter Krebs of the Piedmont Environmental Council asked questions about connectivity.

Mitchell said GEMC would like to move forward with the project as soon as possible. The company is also offering an easement for a trail connection to the Meadow Creek stream corridor.

Talking real estate tomorrow on Real Talk with Keith Smith

It’s been some time since I have appeared on the Real Talk with Keith Smith program, but I will be on tomorrow with Neil Williamson of the Free Enterprise Forum. There are multiple ways to watch what will hopefully be an informative conversation. I believe you can watch beginning at 10:15 a.m. tomorrow on Facebook Live and YouTube.

Support the program!

Free installation

Second month of Ting service for free

A $75 gift card to the Downtown Mall

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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One website I frequently pursue claims that March 23 is National Puppy Day, Melba Toast Day, Near Miss Day, World Maths Day, and World Meteorological Day. Whether or not these are bona fide or bananas, there certainly are a lot of interesting things to pay attention on this ever-changing planet of ours. Charlottesville Community Engagement seeks to document as much as possible in this corner of the world, and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

This newsletter and podcast are free, but your financial support ensures regular updates!

On today’s program:

Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers recommends a two-cent increase in Charlottesville’s property tax rate to begin saving up money for school reconfiguration

Members of the public weigh in on the FY23 budget and that tax rate

A new schedule has been set for a federal lawsuit seeking to force a House of Delegates race in 2022

Charlottesville seeks input on a traffic safety study on Fifth Street Extended

First shout-out goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners

The first subscriber-supported shout-out today goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners to announce their 2022 Spring Lecture Series featuring leading experts on sustainable landscaping, indigenous gardening wisdom and small fruit production at home. For two more Thursdays in March, you can buy a virtual ticket for these informative events.

On March 24 at 7 p.m., Jayesh Samtani will discuss “Home Garden Berries—Selection, Cultivation, and Growing Alongside Ornamental Plants.”

On March 31 at 7 p.m., Barbara Ryan will discuss “The New Sustainable Garden - Designing with Native Plants.”

To purchase a ticket or to learn more, visit piedmontmastergardeners.org/events.

2022 House suit proceeds

Now that a federal lawsuit seeking to force a House of Delegates race in 2022 has been sent back to the Eastern District of Virginia, Judge David Novak has provided a path forward for how the suit will proceed.

Plaintiff Paul Goldman has until Friday to file arguments for why he feels he has the legal standing to bring forward a case against the Board of Elections that challenges the constitutionality of allowing Delegates elected in 2021 to continue to serve until the end of 2023.

The Virginia Attorney General’s office has until April 1 to file a motion as to why Goldman lacks jurisdiction and to express an opinion on whether Novak or a three-judge panel on the Fourth Circuit should rule on the question of standing. Goldman would then have until April 15 to respond.

“Because the Fourth Circuit remanded this case to the District Court to address only the issue of standing, the parties shall not file any motions or other pleadings beside those listed above,” Novak wrote in his ruling. (read the March 21 order)

For more information, read Graham Moomaw’s report on Monday’s hearing in the Virginia Mercury.

City seeking input on Fifth Street safety

Charlottesville is pursuing Smart Scale funding for improvements to Fifth Street Extended as part of an overall effort to prevent future fatalities on the roadway. The city is looking at the area between Old Ridge Street and Harris Road.

“This study focuses on improvement concepts that target known needs, reduce community impacts, and address all modes in a cost-effective manner,” reads the introduction. “Projects and solutions may be considered for future funding through local, regional, state and/or federal transportation programs — but not without first getting YOUR INPUT!”

According to an information sheet on the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission’s Smart Scale page, there is no scope or cost estimate for the project.

“Charlottesville identified the need for a project between Cherry/Elliott and Harris Roads in the 5th Ridge McIntire Multimodal Corridor Study, in Streets That Work, and in the Bike and Pedestrian Master Plan,” reads that page. “Considerations for the application include redesigning the intersection, enhancing multimodal facilities along the corridor, improving access, and enhancing transit access, lighting, and landscape of the area.

The city has already been awarded Smart Scale funds to address the intersection of Elliott Avenue, Ridge Street, Cherry Avenue, and Fifth Street Extended. (read the application)

The Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization’s Policy Board will discuss the Smart Scale projects at their virtual meeting on 2 p.m. Thursday. (meeting info)

Rogers recommends two cent property tax increase for CY22

Charlottesville City Council held a public hearing Monday on the real estate tax rate and personal property tax rate for the fiscal year that begins on July 1.

Before then and before the general public comment period, Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers presented Council with several ways forward on raising funds in the next five years for paying up to $75 million for the renovation of Buford Middle School. (review the presentation)

“Several of you asked that we dig a little deeper and come back with several scenarios as we try to get to some resolution on how to deal with this issue,” Rogers said.

The presentation featured another lesson from Senior Budget Management Analyst Krisy Hammill about the city’s looming debt crisis.

“We have approximately $85 million that’s currently outstanding,” Hammill said.

Hamill said the city currently pays about $11 million each year for debt service and that amount would drop if no further debt was issued.

“Of this outstanding debt, about 28 percent of that is for school-related projects that have already been completed,” Hammill said.

Hammill presented multiple scenarios, all which assume an annual growth rate of 1.5 percent over the next from the real estate property tax as well as two percent in revenues from meals tax rate.

Hammill said it is the size of the project that is presenting an accounting problem. Without it, the city would expect to have a total five-year CIP of $82.4 million, requiring the sale of $46.9 million in bonds.

“With the other projects that are on the Capital Improvement Plan list, they are of such amounts that we can manage our CIP within our affordability,” Hammill said.

But adding a $75 million project will increase the total CIP to $157.4 million, requiring the sale of $121.9 million. VMDO, the architectural firm hired by the school system for reconfiguration, has suggested splitting those bonds sales over the period with $2.5 million this year, $20 million in FY24, $32.5 million in FY25, and $20 million in FY26.

“Our annual debt service payment is moving from the $11.4 million that we’ve been talking about up to about $22 million in 2032,” Hammill said. “This is roughly equivalent to about a two cent tax increase over the next four years if we were going to that incrementally.”

Other scenarios include a seven cent tax increase in FY23 in order to build up a larger reserve to pay off debt service. Another would be to reduce the city’s cost for reconfiguration to $50 million.

Kevin Rotty, a financial consultant who advises the city on long-term debt, said other options would be to reduce city spending as well as to continue exploring state funding in advance of a special session to resolve the state budget that has not yet been called.

“There’s a couple bills in the General Assembly right now which are talking about school construction,” Rotty said. “Certainly the city is not unique in having some school needs here.”

The exact funding scenario depends on multiple variables, but the main lever Council gets to control is the tax rate.

Rogers weighs in with his recommendation

Rogers reminded Council that the city will have to pick up the tab for paying 15 firefighters after a federal SAFER grant runs out. Collective bargaining will also have a cost as well.

“There are some big opportunities in transit and opportunities to make progress on our climate plan but we’ve got to add money to match the funds that are available from the [federal government and the state,” Rogers said.

Rogers had this recommendation for Council.

“The proposed school reconfiguration has not been integrated into the city’s capital improvements program in a manner that will allow City Council to make a coordinated funding plan,” Rogers said.

Nevertheless, he said there was a need to ensure that the city could cover its obligations for past needs as well as future ones.

“For the FY23 budget I recommend that Council should enact a two cent real estate tax and set the money aside within the capital projects fund earmarked as the beginning of an annual funding program to generate funds for school reconfiguration,” Rogers said.

Rogers recommended delaying a bond issue for reconfiguration for the school in FY23 until after a long-term plan could be developed. He also suggested a rehaul of the entire capital improvement program to be ready for next year’s budget.

“Let’s move forward but not too fast,” Rogers said. “Let’s take a pause and start putting away some money for this project.”

Rogers said that would give more time to see how the statewide conversation on school construction funding plays out.

See also:

Fourth Circuit hears arguments in case challenging Virginia House of Delegates election, March 8, 2022, Courthouse News

Federal appeals court hears oral arguments in suit to force 2022 election, March 9, 2022, Information Charlottesville

Federal appeals court sends Virginia election calendar lawsuit back to lower court, ABC8 News, March 15, 2022

New Albemarle Planning Director starts work in April

A planning official from the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia will be the next planning director in Albemarle County. Candace Perkins has recently served as assistant director of planning and development in Frederick County to the northwest of Albemarle.

“The Director of Planning is a key leadership role within the Community Development Department, serving as the liaison to the Planning Commission and providing management and leadership for our Planning Division, which manages Albemarle County's Comprehensive Planning program and coordinates the development review process in cooperation with the Zoning and Engineering divisions,” reads a press release for the announcement.

The previous occupant of the position has moved up to be Deputy Director of the Community Development Department. Charles Rapp has only been with Albemarle County since March 9. 2020. His boss, Jodie Filardo, has only been in Albemarle since September 9, 2019. Previous occupants of all three jobs had been with the county for decades before retirement.

According to the release, Perkins has over twenty years in local government. She’ll begin work as the department continues its work on the first phase of the Comprehensive Plan review. Perkins’ first day is April 11, 2022.

UVA President Ryan addresses Chamber of Commerce at State of the Community

It has now been a month since the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce held its first ever State of the Community to allow officials from Albemarle County and Charlottesville to present themselves to members of the business community.

Ryan attended UVA’s School of Law and served on its faculty in 1998. He returned to Charlottesville as UVA President in 2018 after serving as Dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

“Since he returned to returned to UVA in 2018 to serve as President, Jim has continued to emphasize the important of educational opportunity, especially for underrepresented students and first generation college students,” said Collette Sheehy, the senior vice president for operations and state government relations.

Sheehy said one of Ryan’s central goals is to strengthen the relationship between the University, Albemarle and Charlottesville. He appeared at the Irving Theater in the CODE building via Zoom.

“The relationship between UVA, Charlottesville, and Albemarle County is incredibly important, and although strong I thought there areas for improvement,” Ryan said. “And part of this is about being a University that is Great and Good and I think part of being a great university is taking seriously the obligations of an anchor institution in our community.”

Let’s take stock of some population numbers.

In the fall of 1991, the University of Virginia had an on-Grounds student enrollment of around 18,000, a figure that includes both graduate and undergraduate students. Thirty years later, the total on-Grounds enrollment increased to over 26,000. (UVA enrollment statistics)

In 1990, the U.S. Census Bureau counted 68,040 people in Albemarle and 40,341 in Charlottesville. Albemarle’s population has increased to 112,935 as measured in the 2020 Census, and Charlottesville’s official count increased to 46,553 that year. The Weldon Cooper Center at UVA believes that last figure is higher due to an undercount of college towns. Their 2021 estimate puts Charlottesville at 51,079.

So that’s the total size of the community. When he got here, Ryan put together a working group of community leaders, staff, faculty, and students. He asked them to report back on what the biggest issues are facing the community.

“One, jobs and wages,” Ryan said. “The second is affordable housing. Third is access to public health. And fourth, youth education.”

Since then, UVA raised its minimum wage to $15 an hour, including a requirement for contractors to do so. That working group became the President’s Council on UVA Community Partnerships.

The pandemic put much of the process on hold but the working groups are back. There’s a recent report from the Pipelines and Pathways group which is intended to make jobs at UVA more accessible to people in the community. There’s a Local Economy group seeking ways to improve connections with area businesses.

“Some of it is just about making that local businesses know about the opportunities to engage in business with UVA so that’s looking at everything from how we select vendors to how we advertise what we’re looking for and what requirements we have,” Ryan said. “But some of it is just making sure that local businesses understand the process and understand that we are very much interested in working with them.”

UVA has also pledged to build between a thousand and 1,500 affordable housing units over the next decade on properties owned by the University or the University of Virginia Foundation. Three sites have been selected and they are the North Fork Discovery Park in Albemarle County, property on Wertland Street in Charlottesville, and the Piedmont housing site off of Fontaine Avenue.

“We have an obligation to contribute but it’s also in the interest of UVA just as its in the interest of Charlottesville and Albemarle County,” Ryan said. “If you want to attract and retain a talented workforce, you need to make sure that there are places where people can live affordably.”

Under this arrangement, UVA will supply the plan and a private developer will build the housing. Ryan said he would also like to see second-year students living on Grounds and there are plans to proceed, but it will take more construction.

“Right now we have housing for upper-class students but we don’t have enough housing to house all of the second years,” Ryan said.

UVA’s economic impact

In 2016, University hired a firm to review its economic impact on Virgina and found that there had been $5.9 billion generated by activities across the Commonwealth and 51,653 jobs. President Ryan said it had been some time since that report but the numbers are believed to be holding up. (read the report)

“Visitors coming to UVA and students spend nearly $200 million annually and that in turn supports roughly 2,000 jobs locally,” Ryan said. “It’s not an insignificant contribution to the local economy. It’s obviously not the only thing and we’re not the only game in town but we are a pretty big economic actor in town.”

The answer to this next question is worth hearing in full.

City Councilor Michael Payne has argued that the University of Virginia should directly pay the city of Charlottesville a form of taxes. Here he is at a budget work session in early February before Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers introduced his budget.

“It’s longer term but it seems like a discussion we should engage the University on,” Payne said. “I know that’s something that the University of Michigan, Yale, Harvard, and many other institutions have done.”

Here’s the question:

“Will UVA consider payment in lieu of taxes to the city or the county?” Sheehy asked.

“We’ll consider it,” Ryan said. “This came up just the other day. I think there are likely restrictions on our ability to do this because we are a state agency. So there are all sorts of restrictions on what we can with state funds. Because we are a state agency, when we receive money from Richmond it’s money that they are delegating to us and whether we can turn around and delegate that or allocate that to a locality seems unlikely to me.”

Another change made during the Ryan administration has been the elimination of a public body known as the Planning and Coordination Council in favor of a closed-door body called the Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee. That group next meets on Friday. (agenda)

Watch the entire State of the Community event on the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce’s website.

Second shout-out goes to an event happening at Morven

In today’s second subscriber supported shout-out, the Morven Summer Institute at Morven Farm wants you to know about a seminar coming up on March 29. How are UVA students, faculty, and community partners collaborating to tell the stories of Morven? Researcher Scot French has spent over ten years studying Morven’s history and will provide glimpses into a course he’ll be teaching this summer on Recovering the Stories of Morven’s Enslaved and Descendant Communities. The March 29 event is a chance for the public to get a preview of the four week course. The presentation will be available for viewing online, but there are some in-person positions! If you’re interested, visit morven.virginia.edu to fill out an interest form.

Council holds first work session on FY23 budget

There are a lot of numbers involved in this next story so grab a pencil or open up a spreadsheet to follow along.

There’s less than a month left before the Charlottesville City Council will adopt a budget for FY2023 and four days away before the first public hearing. The five elected officials began their detailed review of the budget.

“We’re presenting a balanced budget of $216,171,432,” said interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers. “This represents a 12.46 percent increase over 2022.”

Resources for this story:

Presentation from the March 10, 2022 Council work session

Interim City Manager Rogers’ proposed FY23 budget

Technically, Rogers’ budget does include the ten cent increase in the property tax rate that Council agreed to advertise, but does not indicate how it should be spent.

“In this budget we have presented unallocated those revenues so there is flexibility for you to decide how much of an increase will be required based upon your programmatic decisions,” Rogers said.

That means the expenditures in the budget as introduced by Rogers are built on the current rate of 95 cents per $100 of assessed value. But Council’s review was built on the assumption that the rate will be increased to $1.05 per $100.

Budget staff estimate that would bring in $97,770,160, an increase of $17,492,718 over the revised budget for the current fiscal year. That would be due to both the proposed tax increase as well as an increase of over ten percent in property assessments.

Krisy Hamilll, the senior budget management analyst, told Council that staff already believes tax collections in the current year will be $3 million over what was expected. The surplus for FY22 would be as much as $5 million higher because the tax increase is for the calendar year, not the fiscal year. And that’s not the only potential for revenues to come in higher than budgeted.

“We continue to see increases and improvements in sales taxes and meals and lodging along those same lines,” Hammill said. “And it’s very likely as we continue through the month of March, we will have another month of those projects and we probably will be coming back to you with some amendments for the FY23 budget as well.”

Hammill said the additional money that would come from the tax increase have been left unallocated because there are still many scenarios for funding the construction costs to renovate Buford Middle School as part of an overall school reconfiguration.

“There is still question about the construction and the funding options for that project,” Hammill said. “Additionally we know that the construction dollars themselves are not needed until [fiscal year] 2024.”

As you heard in the last segment, Councilor Michael Payne has called on the city to require the University of Virginia to pay a Payment in Lieu of Taxes, or PILOT.

Currently Charlottesville utilities pay such a charge, budgeted at $6.27 million in FY23. These are included in city utility bills.

“It’s a payment as if the utilities were a private utility provider within the city,” said finance director Chris Cullinan. “It emulates the tax burden that they if they were a private corporation what they would owe the city. It’s an expense of the utilities, included in the utility rates, and it’s remitted to the city each year from the water, sewer, and natural gas utilities.”

Now, onto expenditures. There is an across the board eight percent increase in salaries for city employees, building off of a two percent cost of living increase that went into effect on July 1, 2021 as well as an additional six percent increase granted to Council in late December that was paid for the surplus from fiscal year 2021. There’s another 3 percent cost of living adjustment scheduled for July 1, 2022. That’s a total of $5.2 million for salary increases for city employees.

There are also seven new proposed employees, including a Freedom of Information Act coordinator for the city attorney’s officer, a new transportation planner, and a new building inspector.

The budget also reflects changes to tax relief programs.

“We’ve added nearly a million dollars in new funding for the tax, rent, and grant relief,” Hammill said. “We will be merging all the tax relief programs into one program. We will also be increasing the income threshold from $55,000 to $60,000.”

If the tax rate increase goes forward at the full rate of ten cents, Hammill said there will need to be an additional $500,000 spend on the program to cover the costs.

How to pay for a $75 million renovation of Buford Middle School?

The biggest question about that tax increase relates to the funding of $75 million for school reconfiguration. The current draft budget recommends $2.5 million toward the project in FY23 and $72.5 million in FY24. Hammill said there are funding sources the School Board are suggesting.

“They also have additional [American Rescue Plan Act] federal dollars that they have offered up as a potential use to buy down some of the school-related projects in the [Capital Improvement Program] and that totals to about $7.5 million.”

That would leave Council needing to identify $65 million in revenue. A bill to allow Charlottesville to hold a referendum on a school-related one percent increase in the sales failed to make it out of a divided General Assembly.

See also:

House Subcommittee kills schools sales-tax bills, Information Charlottesville, February 25, 2022

“We’re sort of at a crossroads about next steps,” Hammill said. “I know that we started with a $50 million project, we got up to a $75 million project. I know there have been multiple construction options that have been presented with varying dollar amounts and additional questions. And so we need to figure out what next steps are so we can get to a decision factor for that amount.”

Charlottesville currently pays about $11.6 million in debt service on existing bonds for existing projects, according to Rogers.

“We’ve looked at including the $75 million and bonding that, and that would have the effect of increasing debt service to $22 million [annually] over the course of the project,” Rogers said.

The Council last year agreed to reallocate $18.25 million that had been allocated to the first two phases of West Main Street to the school reconfiguration project as well as $5 million from the parking garage.

“And those were already built into our projections so that’s how we got from $50 million to $75 million,” Hammill said. “We still have the issue of how we’re going to pay for $50 million.”

Councilors weigh in

Councilor Brian Pinkston said he would like to see scenarios based on rate increases lower than ten cents.

“My initial sort of assessment of the city as I have been getting to know it is that it still feels like its underfunded operationally and in terms of capital projects, based off what people in the community have made clear what they want,” Pinkston said. “Now, obviously it’s one thing to say we need these things and it’s another to fund it.”

Pinkston said a reduced scope for the reconfiguration could be found, such as delaying construction of an auditorium at Buford. He thought the project should be reduced to at least $65 million, including the school system’s ARPA money.

In his day job, Pinkston is a project manager for facilities at the University of Virginia.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wage said he wanted the City Council to be able to pay as much toward the project as possible, and that the School Board’s option should be the one that moves forward. Wade spent 16 years on the School Board before becoming a Councilor.

“Brian has a unique insight because its his day job but I think we leave it to the School Board to determine which alternative to use,” Wade said.

City Councilor Sena Magill said she was personally lobbying for more funds at the federal level to avoid bonding the project which would mean local taxpayers would pay for most of the tab.

“I’ve actually got appointments with people in D.C. next week to talk about how to try to get Build Back Better money for this project,” Magill said. “I am using every single connection I can build, find, or not burn to find money for this project.”

The Build Back Better Act is an infrastructure spending bill that passed the U.S House of Representatives on a 220 to 213 vote, but is not likely to pass the Senate.

Councilor Michael Payne said he was struggling with the numbers and the message from city budget staff that the debt service for the school would mean no new capital projects for several years.

“Our draft budget, where it is, if you’re talking about a ten cent real estate tax increase and freezing our budget for several years, taking all politics aside, is that good public policy?” Payne asked. “To me it seems like it is just not.”

Payne said the city needs to be able to have the flexibility to further increase wages, fund firefighter positions that are currently covered by a federal grant, funding for further subsidized housing to be built by the Piedmont Housing Alliance project, and more.

Payne also suggested continuing to pursue a PILOT with the University of Virginia, implementing a plastic bag tax, and lobbying the General Assembly again for the sales tax referendum

Mayor Lloyd Snook suggested for this year leaving some tax rates the same.

“Why don’t we simply leave personal property tax rates where they are,” Snook said. “Let’s leave real estate estate taxes where they are, leave personal property tax rates where they are. I as a general proposition am not a fan of trying to change the tax rate based on whether the underlying values have gone up or down by a commensurate amount.”

Snook also suggested increasing the meals tax by an additional half of a percentage point.

“Those two sources would give us $3 million, roughly,” Snook said.

Pinkston agreed with leaving the personal property tax rate the same, as well as the half-percent increase on the meals tax.

This paragraph was amended on March 19, 2022 to clarify Wade’s position on the meals tax

Payne said he would be open to both. Wade said he would support keeping the personal property tax rate the same, but was flexible on changing the meals tax.

Commissioner of Revenue Todd Divers said leaving the rate at $4.20 of assessed value would likely yield $2 million this year in additional revenue due to the sharp increase in the value of used vehicles.

“I can tell you some of these bills are going to curl people’s hair and so you need to be ready for that,” Divers said.

Council directed staff to advertise the half-percent increase in the meals tax. Snook said he wants to hear from the public about how to proceed.

“Get that advertisement in and get the public hearing on it held and let’s hear from the public and let them weigh in,” Snook said. “If they’ve got thoughts that they would rather see their personal property tax go up rather than real estate taxes. Obviously some of these are issues that they’ve elected to deal with.”

Councilor Magill made clear she wants property owners to pay more this year in order to build up the capacity to pay for debt service.

“I am interested in raising our [real estate] property tax one or two cents this year,” Magill said.

Pinkston was in agreement.

“My sort of sense is two cents this year, two cents next and sort of spread it out,” Pinkston said.

The next work session is tonight and will be on funding for outside agencies. There will be another work session on the Capital Improvement Program on March 31. There is a public hearing on the real property tax rate on March 21 followed by one on April 4 on the meals tax increase and the budget.

What do you think?

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Welcome to the Ides of March. Should you beware? I’d recommend always being somewhat skeptical, but willing to trust if there can be confirmation that your friends, Romans and countrypeople will lend you their ears and not their knives. This is Charlottesville Community Engagement for March 15, 2022. I’m your host Sean Tubbs, grateful that you’re here to lend me your ears or your eyes, depending on what format of the program you’ve decided to experience.

On today’s program:

Albemarle Supervisors take the first review of a $368 million operating budget

A very small fraction of that budget comes from a proposed 5 cent tax on plastic bags

Site plans are filed for two projects in Albemarle

Also, it’s the two-year anniversary of the first installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report, a show I produced to figure out what was happening. Go take a listen to that first episode, which was the basis of this newsletter!

Today’s first shout-out goes to LEAP

Plastic bag tax included in Albemarle’s next budget

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors has now held two work sessions on a proposed $565 million budget for the fiscal year that begins on July 1. The budget goes by the name Transform Albemarle and for the first time anticipates a very small portion of revenues from a tax on plastic bags.

“It is proposed to be effective January 1, 2023,” said Andy Bowman, the chief of the Office of Management and Budget for Albemarle.

Those revenues are projected to be $20,000, and Bowman said their use is limited.

“And for this there are uses that are restricted by the state for environmental clean-up programs, pollution and litter mitigation programs, educational programs on environmental waste reduction, and also providing reusable bag to participants in the programs,” Bowman said.

Five localities have already taken advantage of a law that passed the General Assembly in 2021 allowing them to collect a five cent tax for each disposable bag, according to the Virginia Department of Taxation. Albemarle will monitor Roanoke, Alexandria, Fredericksburg, Fairfax County and Arlington County to see how much revenue they bring in. Albemarle Supervisors will also have to approve an ordinance to enable the plastic bag tax.

The budget also anticipates a decrease in the personal property tax rate as well as an increase in the food and beverage tax as well as the transient lodging tax. Supervisor Donna Price said this would help the county become less reliant on its biggest source of revenue.

“I really appreciate the county looking to take action to reduce the 68 percent of total revenues coming from the real estate tax and in particular the transient occupancy tax going up three percent,” Price said. “Those are tourists who come to our area. The meals tax going up two percent is not limited solely to transients who may come through and our tourists, but it’s a relatively small amount.”

The budget will also need to be updated to reflect the Virginia budget, which has not yet been finalized. The General Assembly adjourned on Saturday without doing so and a special session will be called to finish up.

Albemarle Supervisors review $368.25 million operational budget

When they were done talking about the revenues that make up the next budget, Bowman turned the Supervisor attention to the anticipated spending of $368.25 million.

Forty-five percent is transferred to Albemarle County Public Schools. The next largest expenditure is for public safety at fourteen percent, followed by a 10 percent that goes to the capital fund mostly for debt service.

Bowman went department by department to explain various aspects of the budget. One of the overarching themes is a need for workforce stabilization. Bowman said that seven percent of the county’s positions are currently unfilled.

“We have included $2.8 million to fund a four percent salary increase that will be effective July 1 for our employees,” Bowman said.

There’s another $500,000 for a study of how the county’s salaries compare to others, as well as another $1 million to implement that study.

“The intent of this funding at this time is not to say specifically what will happen, but position the Board and the organization to move forward whenever that right time will be,” Bowman said. “The county does have need for a plan to evaluate its compensation.”

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said he feels the county needs to attend to the issue, citing that seven percent figure again.

“I mean 18 to 36 positions above usual turnover, and then we haven’t talked about retaining staff which the comp study is all about, frankly,” Gallaway said.

Mia Coltrane became the new director of Human Resources for Albemarle in September, and she agreed the compensation study is intended to keep people working for the county

“That’s one of the tasks of really getting a good pulse of every department and where the energy needs to be focused,” Coltrane said. “We know public safety is one but as we’ve mentioned, it’s not just public safety. We’re seeing it across the board, even with [human resources].”

The budget also anticipates the hiring of two temporary positions to help with community engagement on the Comprehensive Plan that is currently under review. Emily Kilroy is the Director of Communications and Public Engagement.

‘The staff that are working on the Comprehensive Plan, which is estimated to be about a three-year endeavor, are the same team that currently supports the seven community advisory committees,” Kilroy said. “In order for them to focus on the work of the Comprehensive Plan there was an identified need to look at staffing those differently. So the thought was let’s bring in temporary positions sort of in alignment with the timeline for the Comprehensive Plan onboard to support the needs of those communities.”

Another position will be based out of the Yancey Community Center in the southern portion of Albemarle.

The recommended fiscal year 2023 budget continues a trend toward greater county spending on fire and rescue services. The FY21 actual budget saw $15.73 million spent in this category and that has increased to around $21.6 million in FY23. One reason for the increase this year is the addition of around the clock fire and rescue service operating out of the Pantops public safety station.

“That is to further support and strengthen the fire rescue service there in the county’s development area,” Bowman said. “In the long term, this will also reduce our reliance on the city of Charlottesville for calls east of the city.”

Albemarle is expected to pay Charlottesville around $240,000 for FY23, but Bowman said the contract between the two jurisdictions will soon be renegotiated.

There’s another $100,000 in the budget to reimburse volunteer medics and firefighters for fuel used in the call of duty.

“Volunteerism has been a special challenge of late and it’s not anticipated to get any better so something that will help show our volunteers the support we have for them is greatly appreciated,” said Supervisor Price.

The budget also covers the cost to establish a Community Response Team to respond to public safety calls with people trained to deal with people in mental health crises.

“This is an effort led by the Department of Social Services with a police officer, a firefighter/EMT, and a social worker working to respond to calls to individuals in crisis and depending on the details of the call, the team would adapt their response to best meet the critical needs of the person to ensure the safety of all parties involved,” Bowman said.

A portion of the funding comes from the cigarette tax that has begun to be collected in Albemarle.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel said the Community Response Team is a step in the right direction.

“I am looking forward to an upcoming discussion among staff and the supervisors about how that team could be used to assist in our panhandling issues, many of who might fall into this category,” McKeel said.

The recommended budget provides $275,000 in a reserve fund for a pilot project to run microtransit service on Pantops and U.S. 29 North.

Review the video of the first budget work session on the Board of Supervisors’ website. The second is not yet available, but the third is scheduled for Thursday at 8 a.m. (meeting info)

Today’s second shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. Support freeform community radio on WTJU and get ready for the station’s 85th anniversary on April 1! Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

New convenience center for Southern Albemarle likely to be delayed

Work continues to design a new place for people in southern Albemarle to drop off household waste and recycling. Albemarle’s current budget included $1.1 million for a “convenience center” to be built in Keene. The idea had been to open the center this fall, but the county’s director of Facilities and Environmental Services said there will be a delay.

“We are anticipating supply chain issues with some key elements including the trash compactors that will collect the tag-a-bag program as well as the containers themselves that collect the recyclables,” said Lance Stewart. “Everything’s made from steel.”

The proposed FY23 budget proposed spending $180,500 for the first six months of operating at the new convenience center. The proposed capital improvement budget anticipates $1.62 million being spent in FY24 on a northern convenience center to serve U.S. 29 North.

Site plans filed for 100 homes at River’s Edge and utility-scale solar project

Staff in the relevant Albemarle County departments have until April 21 to respond to two site plans for projects that have already been approved by the Board of Supervisors.

One of them is for 100 units along the North Fork of the Rivanna River at the northern edge of the county’s development area. The Board of Supervisors approved a rezoning for River’s Edge in August 2020 that will allow for 32 three-story buildings and two two-story buildings at a density of three dwelling units per acre.

The other is for a utility scale solar facility on a 145 acre property that will generate 12.5 megawatts of electricity. The project on Route 53 southeast of Charlottesville will disturb about 90 of those acres. Supervisors approved a change to the zoning ordinance in June 2017 that allowed for solar panels to be installed in the rural area with a special use permit.

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The United States of America is only one of a handful of places on Earth that puts the month before the day when listing a date numerically. There are likely arguments for why the other way around would be more appropriate, but the best argument in favor of the American way is that today is Pi Day, thus named for 3/14. This is likely the least significant fact contained within this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, but perhaps the most salient. Does it matter that I’m your host, Sean Tubbs?

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s program

Virginia to receive $74.2 million in the latest auction carbon cap-and-trade program

Charlottesville to pay Cville Plans Together Initiative consultant additional funds for community engagement and a housing model

Albemarle County has a new portal to file for land use applications online

Charlottesville Area Transit gets state funding to study alternative fuel sources

The General Assembly adjourns without passing a budget and several bills, but a special session will soon be called

First shout-out goes to Mulch Madness!

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, are you ready for Mulch Madness? The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority has a free mulch giveaway through April 16. In between all the big games, the RSWA wants you to get your yard ready for spring. If you have a way to transport mulch, head on over to the Ivy Material Utilization Center between 7:30am and 4:00pm, Monday through Saturday, where you can pick up up to two tons free. Rivanna staff are available to help load, but ask that you bring a covering. Mulch is double ground and derived from vegetative materials brought to Ivy for disposal. That’s Mulch Madness at the Ivy Material Utilization Center. Visit rivanna.org to learn more.

Virginia nets $74.2 million in latest carbon cap-and-trade auction

The Regional Greenhouse Gas initiative has held its latest auction of carbon allowances to organizations that generate electricity. Virginia will receive $74.2 million in proceeds from the latest sale last week. That’s the fifth time Virginia has participated since joining the interstate compact in 2020 for a total of $301,855,695.52.

“RGGI is a cooperative effort among eleven states – Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Virginia – to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” reads the nonprofit’s website.

Those states have received nearly $5 billion in proceeds. By law, Virginia is required to direct 45 percent of its funding to the Community Flood Preparedness Fund and 50 percent to support energy efficiency programs for low-income households.

RGGI has no enforcement authority and exists to facilitate each state’s carbon dioxide trading program. Governor Glenn Youngkin wants Virginia to end its participation in the program, but legislation to to allow that to happen failed in the General Assembly session this year.

To learn more, read Sarah Vogelsong’s story posted this morning at Virginia Mercury. The headline is As Virginia nets another $74 million, RGGI uncertainty lingers.

Council to allocate additional money to Cville Plans Together initiative

It’s been three years since Charlottesville City Council opted to hire a consultant to create an affordable housing strategy, update the Comprehensive Plan, and rewrite the zoning code. Rhodeside & Harwell has been working on the Cville Plans Together initiative for over two years, and has accomplished the first two tasks.

Work is underway now on the zoning code and the Department of Neighborhood Development Services is seeking additional resources.

“The first part is for $143,810 for community engagement and projects management as an ongoing activity,” said James Freas, the director of NDS. “And then the second part is for a housing market outcome modeling at $45,000.”

Freas said the community engagement work is necessary because the original scope with Rhodeside & Harwell was for them to do that work for 25 months.

“And now we’re in month 28 with another 12 to 13 months or so left to go,” Freas said.

Freas said the work to actually rewrite the zoning is funded, but the additional funding will go to create the model, which is intended to predict how the housing market might respond to the land use changes already embedded in the Comprehensive Plan as well the new zoning.

“That would be essentially looking at what would be the scale or pace of new housing development that might happen, what types of housing, what level of affordability, etcera,” Freas said. “And we really consider this essential work for both the Council, the Planning Commission, and the public to get an understanding of what these changes in zoning would produce on the ground.”

Freas said subcontractor HR&A will look at housing trends and data to attempt to project what might happen when the zoning code is rewritten to enable more units on every residential lot across the city.

“To put it more clearly, how many housing units will we see on a year-by-year basis with the changes in zoning,” Freas said. “What types of housing units? Is it going to steer more toward two-families or more towards [AccessoryDwelling Units]? Looking at different parts of the city, is it going to lead to tear-downs or is it going to lead to reuse of existing buildings?”

This model will be developed as HR&A is also working on a build-out analysis of what can now be built under the Comprehensive Plan. This is the first phase of the zoning process.

In August, Council allocated another $165,000 to the firm HR&A to further work on ways to ensure the zoning rewrite is “inclusionary” and to audit how Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund has been used since it was created in 2007.

This funding will come from money in the city’s Capital Improvement Program budget for small area plans. Freas recommends the city produce a small area plan for the Tenth and Page neighborhood as well as the Preston Avenue corridor. However, that work would not begin until after the new zoning code is adopted.

The second reading of the item will be on the consent agenda for the March 21 meeting.

See also:

Council moves forward with long-range planning package, February 5, 2019

Council discusses tax increases to help cover $60 million Buford upgrades, August 2, 2021

Council briefed on affordable housing funds, December 31, 2021

Anonymous group of city property owners files suit against Comprehensive Plan approach, January 12, 2022

Charlottesville releases Zoning 101 presentation, February 22, 2022

Fourteen months of anecdotal summaries of property transactions in Charlottesville

Additionally, the Steering Committee for the Cville Plans Together initiative met on March 2. You can watch that event here:

Charlottesville Area Transit to study alternative fuels

The Commonwealth Transportation Board is expecting additional funding due to more favorable revenue forecasts, and agencies such as Charlottesville Area Transit will receive additional money this fiscal year. CAT Director Garland Williams told City Council on March 7 that his agency will receive an additional $980,599. About a third of that will be used for a study Williams told Council about at a work session on January 18. (watch the entire work session)

“We talked about doing alternative fuel vehicles as priority vision number two,” Williams said. “The $300,000 that will be earmarked will complete the feasibility study and help us to also develop the integration plan.”

The remaining funds would be added to this year’s operating budget.

Today the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation has launched a new campaign to try to encourage people to return to public transit. The Rediscover Your Ride program is part of the DRPT’s Transit Recovery Initiative.

“We know there’s a lot to consider as you head back to work, school, or anywhere else,” says the narrator of a television spot. “For over a year, public transportation providers have put your health first by working hard to make your ride as safe as possible. As you think about getting on board, you can trust we’re taking care of the big things.”

For more information, visit vatransit.org.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 350 new cases and the percent positivity is 4.2 percent.

Today’s second shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

In today’s second subscriber supported shout-out, Livable Cville wants you to know about an online presentation coming up on Wednesday, March 16. "Can Zoning Create a More Affordable Charlottesville?" That’s the question to be explored by Dr. Jenny Schuetz of the Brookings Institute. She’s the author of Fixer-Upper: How to Repair America’s Broken Housing Systems. The event is free but you’ll have to register at EventBrite.

Albemarle launches online portal for land use applications

This segment was updated with new information at 6:50 p.m. after the newsletter was sent out

This morning Albemarle County announced the public launch of software intended to make it easier for builders and developers to apply for land use permits and changes. Camino will allow for online submission of “building permits, architectural review board applications, home occupations, subdivisions and applications relating to our water protection ordinance.”

“Camino will create a more streamlined and automated front-end interface, resulting in complete applications prior to submission,” said Jodie Filardo, Director of Community Development. “It will enable faster processing times and implements the first of many technology-oriented process improvements within the department.”

The system will cost $40,000 for the first year, according to Emily Kilroy. She’s Albemarle’s Director of Communications and Public Engagement.

The new software is one of many projects under the county’s Core Systems Modernization initiative. Kilroy said other examples include a new Human Resource Information System, an Enterprise Resource Planning system, and a Customer Relationship Management system.

The current way to track and monitor land use applications, CountyView, will continue to be available.

Earlier this month, Charlottesville awarded a contract to the Timmons Group to develop software to accomplish the same goals. NDS Director James Freas told the City Planning Commission that information at their meeting on March 8.

“That’s going to be probably up to a year of implementation time,” Freas said. “Hopefully there will be aspects of this project we can roll out periodically through that time but it is moving us toward a digital permitting system.”

General Assembly adjourns without adopting budget

The last day of the regular session of the Virginia General Assembly was on Saturday, and both houses adjourned without passing a budget. Governor Glenn Youngkin said he was encouraged about progress between the Republican-controlled House of Delegates and the Democrat controlled Senate.

“We still have work to do,” Youngkin said in comments recorded by political reporter Brandon Jarvis. “We need to get taxes down and we need to make some investments in some important areas like education and law enforcement and behavioral health. There’s still work to do.”

There are a number of bills that remain in conference. The budget and those bills will carry over to a special session that will likely be declared later in this week. Pending legislation includes:

The elimination of sales tax on groceries and personal hygiene products (HB90) (SB451)

A bill to require witnesses of absentee ballot signatures to provide their date of birth and last four digits of their social security numbers (HB177)

A bill to establish lab schools in partnerships with institutes of higher education (HB346)

A bill to make hazing a Class 5 felony if it results in someone’s death (HB993) (SB440)

A bill to create a Virginia Football Stadium Authority (HB1353) (SB727)

A bill to create a School Construction Fund (SB473)

I’ll have a wrap-up segment on the General Assembly in a future installment. In the meantime, here are some other resources:

They left without a budget, Virginia Political Newsletter, March 14, 2022

General Assembly to adjourn without a budget, Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, March 12, 2022

Southwest ‘really flexed its muscle this year’, Cardinal News, March 14, 2022

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March Eleven. 3/11? 3-1-1? In some places you can dial that number to get information, a valuable commodity in a complex world. On this 70th day of 2022 and in this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, you can find out a lot of odds and ends about what’s happening. How many of each? Stick around and find out. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

For all the odds and ends, please sign up for free and consider becoming a paid subscriber!

On today’s program:

Charlottesville City Council will get an update on efforts to create a long awaited climate action plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

The city will use funding from a carbon cap and trade program to prepare for future flooding

Charlottesville Area Transit wants your input on the next generation of bus shelters

Charlottesville is close to hiring a new communications director, and is seeking college students to apply for internships

A brief update on the pandemic

First shout-out if for CBIC’s C-E2 event

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council wants you to know that after two years, they’re holding their Charlottesville Entrepreneurs and Espresso event in-person on the morning of Tuesday, March 15 at the CODE Building? What is Charlottesville Entrepreneurs and Espresso, or C-E2? It’s a casual, caffeine-fueled gathering of learning at all stages of venture creation. Get inspired, meet fellow entrepreneurs, share lessons learned, and become a part of Charlottesville’s vibrant and growing entrepreneurial ecosystem. Visit cvilleinnovation.org to learn more about this free event or sign up on Eventbrite.

Pandemic turns 2

Tomorrow marks the two-year anniversary of the declaration of emergency for the COVID-19 pandemic in Virginia. The seven-day percent average for new COVID tests is at 4.7 percent, around a level not seen since late last July when the Delta variant caused a surge that has not quite receded until now. Still, the Virginia Department of Health marks another 1,272 new cases today.

The agency has also made changes to its COVID dashboard and no longer is listing case counts by locality. That data, as well as deaths reported by date, will continue to be available on Virginia’s open data portal.

The Blue Ridge Health District does report local case data and there are 48 new cases today and the percent positivity is at 4.5 percent.

The Centers for Disease Control now list Albemarle, Charlottesville and the other Blue Ridge Health District localities as medium. (review the map)

“We were anticipating that we would be dropping to a medium level when we were looking at the numbers earlier this week so those were born out yesterday when the CDC updated their calculations,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System.

Dr. Sifri said he would recommend that those with underlying conditions or who are immunocompromised to remain masked indoors and to make sure their mask offers enough protection.

Dr. Sifri said there is a lot of immunity in the community through both vaccination and infections, but he said there is still opportunity for another variant to happen in the future. When will be determined on a number of variables.

“And I think clearly for a lot of people after two years of living through this pandemic, they are at a point where they’ve been vaccinated, they’ve taken precautions, but have now sort of have come to a point where its an understanding there will be some level of circulation likely going forward for the foreseeable future and we could anticipate this may become another seasonal virus,” Dr. Sifri said.

As we hit the two-year mark, there have been 19,212 COVID deaths in Virginia, and 431 in the Blue Ridge Health District.

It’s been two years since I launched a podcast to cover the response. Go back and listen if you’d like to revisit any of that recent past. (Charlottesville Quarantine Report)

Charlottesville sets April 18 work session for work session on climate action

Nearly all functions of government in most Virginia localities can be derived from their Comprehensive Plan, which lays out broad steps to turn a community’s vision into action.

The new Comprehensive Plan adopted by Council in November calls upon the city to create a specific plan to demonstrate how Charlottesville will meet specific reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

The nonprofit Community Climate Collaborative wants City Council to spend more money to get a plan in place as soon as possible. Executive Director Susan Kruse posted a blog entry on March 3 saying Charlottesville has fallen behind on efforts. She read from this post at Council’s meeting this past Monday.

“This July will mark three years since Charlottesville set its sights on climate leadership,” Kruse wrote in the post. “Three years, and we have no Climate Action Plan, our GHG emissions inventory is four years out-of-date, and the window to reduce emissions to prevent catastrophic impacts is rapidly closing.”

On Monday, Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders acknowledged that the city has not been able to move swiftly to create a plan.

“I just want to be upfront with everyone and acknowledge we know there’s work to be done there,” Sanders said.

Sanders said there will be a Council work session on April 18 and staff in the city’s sustainability division will present what they have been working on since Council adopted reduction targets on July 1, 2019. That stated the city would work towards a “community-wide greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 target from its 2011 inventory year” as well as to be carbon neutral by 2050. (read the minutes)

At the time, then-city manager Tarron Richardson was less than two months on the job and two other people have held that position since. Sanders has only worked for the city since last July.

“There have been significant impacts from the COVID pandemic and organizational staffing changes that have prevented them from moving as originally planned,” Sanders said. “Our goal would be to try to get back on track so this would be a moment to reboot that effort.”

Sanders said groups such as the Community Climate Collaborative will be involved in the work.

After Sanders gave Council an update, Kruse read from her prepared letter during the city’s Community Matters portion. She acknowledged the April 18 work session, but pushed for a deadline to complete a Climate Action Plan. .

“If current resources are not enough to complete the plan, it’s time for Council to bring in some outside help,” Kruse said.

Last November, City Council adopted an update of the Comprehensive Plan, a document for which state code requires periodic revision. Review of this plan took nearly five years and its completion required the city to pay a consultant over a million dollars.

One of the guiding principles in the plan is under the heading Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability. (look for it on page 22)

“The City government will reduce its carbon footprint and other environmental impacts,” reads that guiding principle. “The Charlottesville community will be empowered and encouraged to reduce their environmental footprint and benefit from energy-efficiency efforts.”

The various chapters of the Comprehensive Plan are embedded with many directives, strategies, and goals.

For instance, Strategy 3.4 of the land use chapter (page 38) is to “encourage sustainable, energy efficient building designs and low impact development as complementary goals to historic preservation, including through support for adaptation, reuse, and repurposing of the built environment.”

Goal 4 of the housing chapter has four strategies with steps toward addressing energy efficiency in new and existing housing (page 50)

The transportation chapter (page 55) seeks to expand alternatives to driving and encourages the “adoption and support of new and emerging transportation technologies will further expand travel options throughout the city and will contribute toward the City’s climate goals and improving public health by reducing vehicle-related emissions.”

There is an entire chapter with the title Environment, Climate, and Food Equity (page 65) that repeats the July 1, 2019 greenhouse gas emissions goal of which the first goal is dedicated to reaching the reduction targets, with eight strategies. The first listed is to create a Climate Action Plan.

The environmental chapter also includes directives to prevent further degradation of the tree canopy, continue work in the city’s Water Resources Protection Program, and to encourage use of sustainable materials.

The Community Facilities and Services chapter (page 79) covers community infrastructure and strategy 2.4 calls for the city “to employ innovative technology and green building practices for all eligible capital construction and renovation projects” and strategy 4.10 to “participate in and complete Climate Hazard Risk Assessment activities, to follow finalization of the Climate Action Plan.”

Goal 1 of the Community Engagement and Collaboration is to “empower community members by providing and actively sharing the information they need to participate in a meaningful way.”

Albemarle County adopted a Climate Action Plan in October 2020 that has much more specific details about how to get there.

That work session will be held on April 18. Make sure you’re reading the Week Ahead newsletter each Sunday to know what’s coming up and follow along with stories on climate action at the Information Charlottesville archive.

Today’s second shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, Livable Cville wants you to know about an online presentation coming up on Wednesday, March 16. "Can Zoning Create a More Affordable Charlottesville?" That’s the question to be explored by Dr. Jenny Schuetz of the Brookings Institute. She’s the author of Fixer-Upper: How to Repair America’s Broken Housing Systems. The event is free but you’ll have to register at EventBrite.

Charlottesville seeking firm to model Moores Creek watershed

A changing climate has meant the likelihood of more flooding across the Commonwealth, and Virginia’s participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) has meant more funding to help with preparation. Charlottesville is currently seeking an engineering firm to update models from 2008 for how stormwater flows in the Moores Creek watershed.

Back then, the city partnered with the United States Army Corps of Engineers to produce that model, as well as ones for the portions of the city in the Rivanna and Meadow Creek watersheds. Now Charlottesville will use $153,000 from the Virginia Community Flood Preparedness Grant program to further study the Moores Creek watershed, which makes up a third of the city’s land along the southern border with Albemarle.

“The stormwater management model will be a critical tool for planning and project implementation efforts administered under the umbrella of the City’s Water Resources Protection Program,” said Andrea Henry, the program’s administrator. “This is the first in what will hopefully be a series of models to support the development of stormwater management and flood resiliency plans for the City.”

The more detailed information will help determine best locations for stormwater pipe upgrades, and to develop flood inundation maps for the various tributaries of Moores Creek including Lodge Creek, Rock Creek, Pollock’s Branch, and Quarry Creek.

Goal 10 of the Community Facilities chapter of the Comprehensive Plan relates to stormwater conveyance infrastructure, with strategy 10.3 related to modernization efforts.

Virginia joined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative in the summer of 2020, which means companies that generate electricity through fossil-fuel companies must pay to exceed caps on the amounts of carbon dioxide. In Virginia, more than half of the proceeds go to pay for flood preparedness programs.

Governor Glenn Youngkin signed an executive order soon after being inaugurated to withdraw Virginia from RGGI, but legislative approval is needed and so far efforts to withdraw have been blocked by the Senate, where Democrats have a 21 to 19 majority. So far, Virginia has received $227.6 million in proceeds from four auctions, including $85.6 million in December.

Charlottesville Area Transit seeking input on future bus shelters

The area’s primary fixed-route transit service is seeking your input into how their future bus shelters will look.

“Charlottesville Area Transit (CAT) seeks to develop a bus shelter design that will serve as a unique and universal identifier of transit in the Greater Charlottesville Area,” reads an announcement for a public survey seeking input on three designs.

All three come out of a charette held last August, and CAT’s architectural consultant wants more comments in order to come up with one single concept. Another round of presentations will be held when that’s ready for public review.

City seeking applications for internships, close to hiring CAPE director

Do you know someone younger who could use an opportunity to gain some real-world experience? The City of Charlottesville is accepting applications from college students to work as paid interns all across the municipal government.

“This is developmental work designed to provide university students and recent graduates with meaningful entry-level professional work,” reads the press release for the opportunity. “The assignments require application of university-level knowledge typically gained in profession-specific curriculum typically found in local government.”

The release goes on to state that interns will be closely supervised and will work on a specific project during their temporary employment.

Departments seeking interns include the City Manager’s office, the Office of Communications, Neighborhood Development Services, and the Police Civilian Oversight Board. Applicants need to have completes sixty hours of coursework and to have a grade point average of 2.0.

Anyone interested can apply here.

Speaking of jobs, the city still has several top vacancies that are still being filled. Deputy City Manager Ashley Marshall have City Council an update on Monday, March 7.

“The city is making some progress on some key hires,” Marshall said. “Interviews are underway for our director of communications and public engagement. And yes that title does sound a little different because we are going to emphasize public engagement within our communications’ professional team.”

That matches the same job title as the equivalent job in Albemarle County.

Marshall said the city is also reviewing resumes for the Director of Human Services and the Director of Informational Technology. The position of Human Resources Director is still being advertised.

“We expect to move forward to interview phases on all three of those last director positions shortly,” Marshall said.

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The only constant is change, a dynamic that frustrates many but a phen upon which others thrive. Charlottesville Community Engagement is intended to document as much of what’s coming as possible in the hopes that more people can affect outcomes if they simply have information. It’s March 9, 2022, and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s program:

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals hears arguments in a case that could require the Virginia Board of Elections to hold a House of Delegates race this November

Another church in Charlottesville wants to build housing on its property

Albemarle’s top official explains to business leaders how the county works

And one of Charlottesville’s former city managers has dropped a suit against the City Council ‘

And singer songwriter Michael Clem talks about his upcoming appearance at the Center at Belvedere

First shout-out goes to the Rivanna Conservation Alliance

Community meeting for 72-unit apartment complex on Locust Grove church property

The Mount View Baptist Church on St. Clair Avenue in the Locust Grove neighborhood is seeking a rezoning to allow for the construction of up to 72 units on their lawn.

“With this rezoning request, Mount View Baptist Church seeks to remain operational on the property and expand opportunities to serve the community by requesting to have the ability to establish a day care on their property,” reads the announcement for a community meeting tonight.

Shimp Engineering has been hired to oversee the land use application process for the 3.4 acre property. Sixty of the units would be built in a series of “linked townhouses” and the rest would be for the church to build in the future should they want to do so. The property has potential road connections onto several roads in the neighborhood.

Not all of the property is connected to the church. An entity called Route 250 Homes purchased two single family homes that front onto Otter Street last June, and these two properties are being added to the church’s property.

A community meeting for the rezoning begins at 6:30 p.m. tonight. (register) (more information)

Former City Manager Richardson withdraws suit against the city

An attorney for former Charlottesville City Manager Tarron Richardson has filed a motion with the United States Western District Court ending a lawsuit against his former employer. Richardson had filed a civil rights suit against the City Council and the city attorney in November alleging his rights were violated by the terms of his severance agreement. However the suit was not formally served to the city until late December, and the individual defendants were never served. The motion from attorney Kevin French is a voluntary dismissal with prejudice.

For more information, read Ginny Bixby’s story in the Daily Progress.

Federal appeals court hears oral arguments in suit to force 2022 election

A three judge panel of the United States Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has heard arguments in a case that could force the state of Virginia to run elections for the House of Delegates this year, and then again in 2023. Richmond attorney Paul Goldman has argued those elections in 2021 are unconstitutional because the districts are based on Census data from 2010, and he sued the state Board of Elections.

However, the 40-minute session largely dealt with procedural issues such as whether Goldman has the legal standing to bring the case forward or whether the appeals court was the appropriate venue. (hear the arguments on Youtube)

Andrew Ferguson is the Solicitor General for Virginia, and he inherited the case from the previous administration.

“The plaintiff in this case contends that Virginia broke the law when it failed to hold the 2021 election on the basis of Census data that did not exist when the electoral process began,” Ferguson said. “We strongly disagree, but the question before the court today is whether it has Article 3 jurisdiction to decide this case at all.”

Article 3 refers to the U.S. Constitution which lays out how the nation’s courts systems should work. Ferguson argued that Goldman could not demonstrate how he was personally harmed by the elections. Last week, he filed a motion to return the case back to a lower court in order to get a ruling on that issue before taking up Goldman’s underlying claim. Ferguson argued the court should not even weigh in on what is referred to as a “sovereign authority” claim.

“I think that the reason that sovereign immunity shouldn’t be addressed before determining standing is that if the court were to issue an opinion on sovereign immunity but subsequently determined there had never been any standing in this case, that sovereign immunity opinion is effectively an advisory opinion because the court never had jurisdiction to issue it in the first place,” Ferguson said.

After a long and legally nuanced discussion about this issue, Goldman was asked to go ahead and make his argument which is built upon a 1981 federal case called Cosner v. Dalton that forced Virginia to hold House of Delegates’ elections in 1982. Goldman argued that the current districts are not balanced by population, a violation of the “one-person, one-vote principle.”

“I am asking and am here for an election in 2022,” Goldman said. “They say there won’t be an election in 2022. I want to run in 2022 and the state says they’re not going to hold an election in 2022. I say Cosner says I have a right to run in 2022. They say it doesn’t.”

Goldman said the legal remedy should be a new election to ensure that people are properly represented as is their Constitutional right. But he said his standing is based on being a potential candidate.

“I gotta wait until 2024 before my new district kicks in,” Goldman said. “I am still represented by the people picked in the old districts and that’s the harm, that’s why you can’t do it. That’s the unusual circumstance in this case.”

Goldman cited data that shows the imbalance.

“There’s one district that’s got 130,000 people in it and there’s another district with 67,000,” Goldman said, “They propose that doesn’t change until 2024. That blatantly unconstitutional and I’m in this courtroom today to try to get justice,” Goldman said

In rebuttal, Ferguson continued to press on the question of Goldman’s legal standing, but said the Commonwealth would not be afraid to argue against his claims.

“If the courts conclude that Mr. Goldman has standing to maintain his claim, we will vigorously defend the constitutionality of the 2021 election,” Ferguson said. “We do not think the 14th amendment requires states to reapportion on the basis of Census data that don’t exist when the electoral process has begun.”

The three judges will take the matter under advisement and will issue an opinion at a later date. For more on the topic:

Fourth Circuit hears arguments in case challenging Virginia House of Delegates election, March 8, 2022, Courthouse News

Second shout-out goes to an arboreal event at the Virginia Festival of the Book

In today’s second subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards wants to draw your attention to a Virginia Festival of the Book event coming up on March 16. Michelle Nijhuis will lead a virtual conversation on “Seeing Trees, Saving the Great Forests”. Nijhuis will speak with forest scientists and preservationists Meg Lowman and John Reid. Lowman is the author of The Arbornaut: A Life Discovering the Eighth Planet in the Trees Above Us. Reid is the co-author of Ever Green: Saving Big Forests to Save the Earth. The event on March 16 begins at noon. To register, visit vabook.org.

Albemarle County officials address business community at Chamber event

On February 18, the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce held the first ever State of the Community forum, where leaders from Charlottesville, the University of Virginia, and Albemarle got the chance to introduce themselves to business leaders. Yesterday’s edition of this program featured comments from city officials, and today we’ll hear from county leaders.

Emily Kilroy is the director of community and public engagement for Albemarle County. She said she wondered why there had never before been a gathering with city, county, and UVA officials.

“It felt like such a natural convening of our community’s leaders,” Kilroy said. “And of course being together today, we are reminded that the community is not just our individual pieces of the pie, but we all do together to grow the entire pie.”

County Executive Jeff Richardson said the event was a chance to discuss what he called community opportunities and to introduce his leadership team to the Chamber.

“The most effective leaders anticipate where the community is headed and they see changes before others do,” Richardson said.

Richardson recently put that statement out to community leaders and there were some common threads about what they thought was needed.

“Three basically said equity, access, [and] affordable housing, which means good paying jobs and access to health,” Richardson said. “So it’s keeping the community affordable at all economic levels, that was three out of six.”

Richardson said one person said there was a need to find a “new normal” post pandemic and another said shoring up support for public safety first responders. Richardson said local government needs to be working in all of these areas.

“It’s not just one thing,” Richardson said. “It’s so many things.”

The county’s strategic plan is intended to prioritize where county investments should go. For Richardson, that means making sure his employees are stable and that there is investment in economic development. (read the strategic plan)

“Recently at the end of our past budget year, we closed the year our better expected financially so an example of this working in real time is that we put $5 million in our economic development fund, $4.1 million was transferred to capital to move infrastructure along, $3.1 million into a dedicated housing fund, and $1 million went to our workforce stabilization which made our human resources director very happy,” Richardson said.

Richardson urged people to apply for vacancies on various boards and commissions. There’s a list on the county website if you’re interested.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors will hold its first budget work session today beginning at 3 p.m. (meeting info)

See also: Richardson presents $565M “Transform Albemarle” budget to supervisors, Information Charlottesville, February 23, 2022

Michael Clem to kick off The Center’s Thursdays around Five series

This next piece is more of a podcast piece, but I advise clicking on the songs below as you read!

The Center at Belvedere opened in June 2020 to offer a gathering space for people of all ages with a new facility with much more room than the former facility on Hillsdale Drive. The relatively new Center has a performance space, and this Thursday singer songwriter Michael Clem will kick off a concert series for the press.

“For over 30 years, Michael Clem has been playing bass, singing, and writing songs for the national touring act he co-founded, Eddie from Ohio,” reads the event listing on the Center’s website. “Since relocating to Charlottesville, he’s established quite a foothold in the musical scene.”

It’s a return performance for Clem, who appeared there last fall.

“This is a very well-attended event,” Clem said. “People from the community come out and they bring their lawn chairs, and I’m playing in basically like a theater-type of environment. This wasn’t just me playing incidental white noise music while people were gabbing and socializing. They were there focused, facing forward, giving the singer songwriter exactly what a singer songwriter would want! An attentive crowd!”

Clem said the last show was an artistically satisfying event where he got to play original songs and he’s looking forward to playing Thursday’s show.

I spoke to Clem two years ago at the beginning of the pandemic. Like so many others, he began performing online to people at home, and contributed the proceeds to restaurants.

“I felt really bad for these businesses that were taking such a hit, specifically the ones who butter my bread, the restaurants and the music venues,” Clem said. “And a number of them didn’t survive the shutdown which is really sad.”

One of them that survived is the Local, where Clem hosts a singer-songwriter open mic night on Mondays, though that’s currently on what he called Omicron hiatus.

The downtime also allowed him to take on a personal challenge.

“I decided I would dedicate the month of April to writing one song a day, and I did!” Clem said. “I’m not saying that every song was great but just having that exercise was important to battle the hypocrisy because I teach a songwriting class and that was another thing that moved online. My songwriting class is through the Front Porch, and I did a number of them on Zoom.”

Clem said he would play some of these songs, some of which are on an album he produced with Rusty Speidel. You can hear some of them tomorrow night at the first Thursdays Around Five. The website states the event begins at 5:01 p.m.

The event is free, but registration in advance at the Center is required. (register)

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There are 298 days left in the year, but let’s pause for a moment to mark International Women’s Day and the spirit in which it was founded over a hundred years ago.

This is Charlottesville Community Engagement, a newsletter and podcast created two years ago in the spirit of bringing information to as many people as possible. I’m your host Sean Tubbs, approaching my fourth decade as a reporter filled with a spirit of public service.

On today’s program:

Charlottesville’s new leadership is introduced to local business leaders at the Chamber of Commerce’s State of the Community event

The city hires the Timmons Group to implement software to improve the development review process

Charlottesville City Council get an update on the pandemic, and directs staff to create a safety plan to guide the transition to in-person and hybrid meetings

Today’s first shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

Blue Ridge Health District director briefs Council on pandemic

The director of the Blue Ridge Health District told Council last night that the region is experiencing a “strong downswing” in the number of COVID cases.

“So, overall a downward trend but we are still seeing spikes occasionally,” said Dr. Denise Bonds. (view her presentation)

Today the seven-day average for new cases in Virginia is 1,177 and the percent positivity has declined to 5.9 percent. Since Dr. Bonds’ last appearance, the Centers for Disease Control have altered their guidance on the use of masks to slow the transmission of COVID. (CDC website)

“The CDC has lowered it down to three levels, low, medium, and high, and you can see in Virginia right now, most of northern Virginia and the Tidewater / Eastern Shore area is actually moved into the low area, with most of the Southwest tail in the high area.”

Charlottesville is also listed as high, so recommendations are to wear a mask indoors and stay updated on boosters, and to get tested if you have symptoms.

“And I am really highly encouraging everyone If you have not gotten your booster to please do that,” Dr. Bonds said. “It’s really important to have that additional shot to have full immunity.”

The community testing center at the Pantops Shopping Center will close on March 15, but Dr. Bonds said rapid tests can be picked up at the health department or at local pharmacies. The community vaccination center at Seminole Square Shopping Center will close on March 12. Visit the Blue Ridge Health District’s vaccine webpage to learn more about where you can get a shot or a booster.

Council directs staff to plan for return to in-person and hybrid meetings

Council discussed a potential return to in-person meetings at the end of last night’s meeting. Dr. Bonds said she would like to see a hybrid-option for people to participate. (staff report)

“Because it is still quite risky for some individuals who are immunocompromised, who can’t get vaccinated for whatever reason, or who have been vaccinated and are just not mounting a strong immune response, it’s really critical that those individuals still have they opportunity that they’ve had over the last two years with Zoom meetings to participate,” said Dr. Bonds.

Dr. Bonds suggested that masks still be required for attendance, or to hold Council meetings in a larger space than the City Council Chambers.

Council took about half an hour to discuss whether to extend a local ordinance to allow for the continuing operations of city government during the local declaration of emergency. That declaration expires on April 7 and Council will have to decide whether to renew. A continuity of government ordinance expires on March 18.

“The reason it’s on your agenda tonight is because March 18 will happen before your second meeting in March,” said City Attorney Lisa Robertson.

Robertson said staff wanted input on how to proceed with meetings. The continuity of government ordinance can still be in place even after the emergency declaration ends, allowing for electronic meetings to continue. One idea is for Council to convene and meet in person with people being able to view remotely. This would require creation of a safety plan and Robertson explained some of the questions that would need to be answered.

“How that meeting would be managed in terms of COVID precautions, things like how many people would be in the room, would there be a mask requirement, how will compliance with the rules be monitored, what would the spacing be,” Robertson said. “All of those things that we haven’t really had the chance to nail down specifically.”

Another issue is where boards and commissions would meet. Many of the meeting rooms in City Hall are too small to fit many people with spacing rules. That will also be factored into the safety plan.

Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers said staff is examining what it will take to make City Council Chambers work under the safety plan.

“And there are some estimates that we are waiting to get back so I would say that probably in the next two weeks we should have the information that we need with respect to that,” Rogers said.

Rogers said CitySpace is being considered as another place for meetings to occur as are school auditoriums. Another item under consideration is how Councilors could participate remotely.

Council adopted the motion unanimously to extend the continuity of government with the addition of the need for a safety plan.

“I would like to see us open as much as we reasonably can with reasonable safety, and this is going to sound utterly lawyerly, but with also reasonable safeguards available to people who have different medical needs.”

See also: Albemarle Supervisors briefed on eventual end of the local COVID emergency, March 4, 2022

Councilors address Russia’s war against Ukraine

The invasion of Ukraine continues this week and City Councilors touched upon the crisis at their meeting last night.

“I’ve had many constituents reach out to me to see what we could do, a statement or something,” said Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade. “I think what we can do is if you are the type to pray, please pray. I think we’re doing as a nation what we can at this point I know it’s an ongoing crisis.”

More than two million people have fled Ukraine to escape Russian bombardment according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

Mayor Lloyd Snook said it is likely some of that number will come to this community in the near future.

“Charlottesville is a place where a lot of refugees come,” Snook said. “We’ve got the International Rescue Committee and a lot of other folks who know that Charlottesville is hospitable to refugees and immigrants and when the opportunity presents itself I know that Charlottesville and Charlottesvilians will be generous and welcoming.”

Visit the IRC website at rescue.org to learn more about how you can contribute.

I’ll have more from this City Council meeting in a future Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Second shout-out goes to Mulch Madness!

In today’s second subscriber-supported shout-out, are you ready for Mulch Madness? The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority has a free mulch giveaway beginning tomorrow through April 16. In between all the big games, the RSWA wants you to get your yard ready for spring. If you have a way to transport mulch, head on over to the Ivy Material Utilization Center between 7:30am and 4:00pm, Monday through Saturday, where you can pick up up to two tons free. Rivanna staff are available to help load, but ask that you bring a covering. Mulch is double ground and derived from vegetative materials brought to Ivy for disposal. That’s Mulch Madness at the Ivy Material Utilization Center. Visit rivanna.org to learn more!

Chamber of Commerce explores the State of the Community: Charlottesville edition

On February 18, the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce held its first ever State of the Community event with speakers from Albemarle County, Charlottesville, and the University of Virginia. Elizabeth Cromwell is the president and chief executive officer of the Chamber.

“These institutional anchors are responsible economic development decisions that affect all of us in our businesses,” Cromwell said.

Cromwell said the Chamber’s mission is to strengthen the business community, and the purpose of the event was to move forward on that pathway.

“Our goal is to engage our business stakeholders with the institutions that have crucial oversight and the ability to leverage opportunities for regional economic prosperity,” Cromwell said.

The event was also the first ever held in the auditorium at the new CODE building on the Downtown Mall.

“It’s hard to believe that this space used to be an ice park just a few years ago,” said Chris Engel, the city’s director of economic development. “As an economic developer, I think about the built environment and changes to it and watching cities evolve and change all of the time. Going back a little further, this space was a parking lot in 1995. And then it served as a community ice park for more than 20 years. And then it has obviously transitioned again.”

Engel said the city has changed a lot over the years as well, including a string of city managers in the past four years. Interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers represented city leadership at the event.

“I have been in local government and the private sector over my career for more than 30 years,” Rogers said. “I have had the fortune of working for some very complex organization which means that I have been in the midst of dealing with some very complex and challenging problems in the public sector.”

Rogers said he enjoys being part of the solutions of helping organizations in conflict through strategic planning as well analyzing the values to see if they are oriented toward success.

“I look at things that are not doing well and try to figure out how we can do this better for the people that we’re supposed to do it for,” Rogers said. “And in the public sector, that’s the citizens of the community that you serve.”

Rogers said there has been instability in the city’s bureaucracy because of the turnover at the top position, and one of his first goals is to help reverse the trend. He acknowledges that morale has been low.

“The other priority is working with the staff to return to boring government,” Rogers said. “I think that no-drama government that’s focused on bottom-line problem solving is one that can deliver effective services to the citizens of this community.”

There are currently two deputy city managers in Charlottesville, and Ashley Marshall has been the deputy for Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion since last May. She comes from a family whose members have served in local government.

“Local government has the opportunity [and] it has the honor of making someone’s day better,” Marshall said. “We have the chance to dig in to our communities and to really focus on their needs, what we can help, what we can provide, who we can lift because all boats rise together.”

Sam Sanders has been the Deputy City Manager for Operations since last July after working for a community revitalization nonprofit in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He called himself a disruptor.

“I disrupt the status quo,” Sanders said. “It is not my friend and I have made it a mission to do my best to help people see that we don’t just have to do it that way if that way doesn’t get us to where we want to go.”

Sanders said he believes it is possible to help Charlottesville overcome its problems and that can be done by making sure the basics of government are functioning.

“We need to pick up the trash, we need to make sure the water flows, we need to make sure the buses are running, that we get snow off the ground, and that the basics of the community environment are adhered to and that the parks are clean, available, and accessible,” Sanders said.

Sanders said the city also needs to ensure that it can respond when major projects are underway at the University of Virginia. That will take process reform in the Neighborhood Development Services Department.

“And I want to make sure that we also are doing the same level of collaborative work for the everyday citizen that is trying to come in and make something happen,” Sanders said.

I’ll have more from the State of the Community Event in a future installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Watch the event on the Chamber’s website at cvillechamber.org.

Timmons Group hired to build software for city’s planning department

This segment was updated on March 16, 2022 with new information on the procurement contract

The city of Charlottesville has hired a civil engineering firm to build a new software platform to help speed up the development process. The Timmons Group will be paid $902,337.50 over five years for the work, according to material obtained from the city’s procurement office.

The city issued a request for proposals (RFP) in November 2020 seeking a firm to provide a GIS-Centric, cloud-based Enterprise Land Management software system.

“The City realizes that part of the modernization effort of becoming a “Smart City” includes strategically aligning People, Process and Technology in order to manage work more efficiently and effectively,” reads the RFP.

The software will be used by the Department of Neighborhood Development Services to replace programs from 2008 that track the permitting process. The RFP states that the older software lacks provisions for automated workflows, which creates “bottlenecks in the comprehensive Development Process” with a reliance on paper.

“The lack of citizen self-service capabilities through the current system limits the local development community’s ability to engage remotely with the City by applying for permits electronically,” the RFP continues. “The City expects NDS to achieve substantial gains in productivity, accuracy, mobility, and capacity to make data-driven decisions through the implementation of the ELM software.”

The hope is to have the software functional and live by May 2023.

I know this might be “inside baseball” but I am very excited about the prospect of being able to view land use applications remotely, as we can already do with Albemarle County’s Community Development Department. So, I will be tracking this with great enthusiasm!

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Seven days into March and we finally encounter a Monday. Will this day be any different from the six that have come before it? Certainly there is more light and green shoots from yesterday are a little bit longer. There are more bird songs in the air than this time last month. The perfect soundtrack for to begin another week of Charlottesville Community Engagement! I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s show:

The University of Virginia’s Buildings and Grounds Committee gets an update on the next round of construction projects

UVa students vote to change the one punishment for an honor code violation

More examples of divided government as the Virginia General Assembly meets in its final regularly-scheduled week.

Today’s first shout-out goes to LEAP

Charlottesville’s FY23 Budget posted - Rogers does not recommend a property tax rate increase

Just as I was about to hit send today, interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers’s $216.17 million budget was posted on the city’s website. Rogers does not recommend an increase in the real estate tax rate at this time. However, Council can still decide to move forward with a ten cent tax increase, which would generate $9.2 million.

“While the funding from that additional 10-cents assessment is in the presented budget for City Council to consider, the City Manager’s budget does not utilize thosefunds as part of the presented balanced budget,” reads Rogers’s letter to the Council.

This budget is presented almost two years after the pandemic altered the economic situation. Rogers said there has been a rebound.

“Sales tax is up 8.33 percent, meals and lodging tax are up 19.3 percent and 30 percent respectively,” Rogers said. “While the City’s unemployment rate was at acalendar year high in June 2021 at 4.1 percent, by year end it had plummeted to 2.35 percent.”

The Commissioner of Revenue is recommending a decrease in the personal property tax rate due to the increased valuation, but the budget currently recommends that being kept at $4.20 for now. Senior Budget Analyst Krisy Hammill said the recommended rate would be unveiled during the budget process.

Bond proceeds to cover the cost of the $75 million reconfiguration would not be authorized until FY24.

The budget will be presented to the City Council tonight and the first work session will be held virtually Thursday beginning at 6 p.m. More details in a future installment of the newsletter.

UVA students vote to end expulsion for honor violations

Students at the University of Virginia have voted to end a long-standing tradition where people can be kicked out permanently for violating the honor code. Instead, the new single-sanction punishment will be a year’s suspension rather than the traditional expulsion.

According to UVA Today, over 6,000 students voted on the proposal with around 80 percent in favor of the change.

The University Board of Visitors met last week and President Jim Ryan told the group that he would not have voted to make the change. He also spoke of the enhanced community involvement UVA has made during his tenure. Ryan established the President’s Council on UVA-Community Partnership and a report was completed in February 2019. (read the report)

“It has been in the spirit of what we can do together and the approach on affordable housing is a great example of that,” Ryan said.

UVA has pledged to work with a private developer to build up to 1,500 below-market units and has selected three sites on land owned by the UVA or its real estate foundation. One of them is at the North Fork Discovery Park, and a rezoning for that project is making its way through Albemale County’s land use application process.

“All of it going a long way to changing the narrative about UVA and about UVA’s relationship to Charlottesville and Albemarle County and I think that that’s a very good thing for the University,” Ryan said. “There’s still plenty of work to do but the conversation is different than it was four years ago.”

Ryan also sought feedback on the University’s strategic plan and some of the initiatives within. One of them is to “Be a strong partner and good neighbor to the Charlottesville region.”

(See all of the articles tagged Land Use - University of Virginia on Information Charlottesville)

UVA committee gets update on construction

On Thursday, the BOV’s Buildings and Grounds Committee met and discussed several matters of interest. There are several major construction projects underway with the most impact likely coming from the Emmet - Ivy Corridor where the School of Data Science is well underway heading toward a December 2023 completion date.

The committee was briefed on some changes coming to UVA’s Capital Plan which has a budget of just over $3 billion, according to Colette Sheehy, Senior Vice President for Operations and State Government Relations.

“We’ve actually completed quite a bit of work in the last year, $700 million worth of projects,” Sheehy said. “Some of the more notable ones include the University of Hospital expansion, the orthopedic center, and the Student Health and Wellness Center.”

Sheehy said staff are proposing adding $411 million in new project, with $20 million of that just to plan projects. The proposed 2022 Capital Plan would be $2.67 billion.

They’re also proposing removing a standalone project to construct a $60 million new building for the Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy.

“We now are pursuing a partnership between the Karsh Institute for Democracy and the Batten School to provide some space for Batten within the Karsh Institute,” Sheehy said.

That building will also be within the Emmet - Ivy precinct along with a new hotel and convention center. Construction of that building is expected to begin in late spring or early summer.

Projects under construction are the renovations of Alderman Library, a new residence hall on Brandon Avenue, and the Contemplative Commons near the Dell stormwater pond.

Projects in the planning stages include a football operations building, an Olympic sports complex, the Karsh Institute, and a new building for the McIntire School of Commerce.

There are three new projects that will be added to the planning pool.

“One is the Center for the Arts,” Sheehy said. “The planning authorization was included in Governor Northam’s introduced budget allowing us to actually use our money to do the planning. But that is a good signal the state is interested in funding that project in the future.”

This authorization remains within the budget bill currently being negotiated in the General Assembly. UVA has an $11 million gift to cover the cost of the design work.

There’s also a $4 million gift to begin planning work for a Center for Design for the School of Architecture and a $5 million gift for an academic building for the Engineering School.

“We’ve done some planning already for both of those schools and there is a need for additional space,” Sheehy said.

Four projects would be added for construction, with one of them being a $350 million Institute for Biotechnology.

“It is a research facility with a manufacturing facility included in it that would allow us to produce research through to clinical trials for new drug therapies,” Sheehy said. “The intention is that it would attract many biotechnology companies that would want to work with our faculty and to locate in and around Charlottesville.”

This project is also within both the House and Senate versions of the budget. Other new projects are additional landscaping on Ivy Road, HVAC work at Monroe Hall, and infrastructure at Memorial Gym to make it more accessible as well as ADA compliant. There is also funding for a study of childcare needs as well as a space study for nursing to accommodate more instructional space.

The changes to the Capital Plan will be voted upon in June.

Sheehy also said there will also be an update of the 2019 Parking and Transportation Study post-COVID. (read the 2019 study)

“The president has asked us to go back and do a more comprehensive kind of broad-based look at the need for parking overall across the institution,” Sheehy said.

One member of the Buildings and Grounds Committee suggested building additional parking on the other side of the railroad tracks south of the University of Virginia Health System. Sheehy pushed back.

“We have to be careful that that’s a residential neighborhood and there are lot of issues to consider,” Sheehy said. “Traffic, neighbors, the needs of the health system. We will look at all of that.”

The next meeting of the University of Virginia Board of Visitors is in June.

Shout-out to the Piedmont Master Gardeners

The second shout-out today goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners to announce their 2022 Spring Lecture Series featuring leading experts on sustainable landscaping, indigenous gardening wisdom and small fruit production at home. For all four Thursdays in March, you can buy a virtual ticket for these informative events. On March 10, Renée Gokey and Christine Price-Abelow of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian will discuss “The Three Sisters: Indigenous Origins and Best Growing Practices.” On March 24, Jayesh Samtani will discuss “Home Garden Berries—Selection, Cultivation, and Growing Alongside Ornamental Plants”. To purchase a ticket and for the rest of the sessions, visit piedmontmastergardeners.org/events.

General Assembly update

There are only a handful of days left in the 2022 General Assembly, and there are several bills that are now in conference. I’ll try to track the progress as many of those as possible, but for now, here are some more bills that originated in the Republican-controlled House of Delegates that did not make it out of the Democrat-controlled Senate.

A bill to delay the requirement of the State Air Pollution Control Board to implement federal Clean Car regulations failed to make it out of the Senate Agriculture, Conservation, and Natural Resources Committee on a party-line 7 to 8 vote. The House of Delegates had passed the Bill 52 to 48. (HB1267)

A bill to allow hunters to go onto other people’s property to retrieve the animals they’ve killed also did not make it out of that Senate committee on a 10 to 5 motion to pass by indefinitely. (HB1334)

A bill that would have required people seeking an abortion to provide written consent and undergo counseling was passed by indefinitely in the Senate Education and Health Committee on a 10 to 5 vote. (HB212)

A bill related to abortion that would have made it a Class 4 felony to not treat an “infant born alive” passed the House on a 52 to 48 vote but was passed by indefinitely by the Senate Rules Committee on an 11 to 4 vote. (HB304)

The Senate Education and Health Committee also defeated a bill to allow the Commissioner of Health to allow people to be exempt from vaccine mandates for religious reasons. That was defeated on a 9 to 6 vote. (HB306)

Also passed by indefinitely is a bill that would have directed the Board of Education to provide alternate pathways for people who want to attain an advanced high school diploma. (HB340)

Another would have created Parental Choice Education Savings Accounts. HB1024 passed the House of Delegates on a party-line 52 to 48 vote but was passed by indefinitely by the Senate Education and Health Committee on a 9 to 6 vote.

A bill to prohibit the teaching of moral dynamics of race and sex had passed the House of Delegates on a 50 to 49 vote, but the Senate Education and Health committee passed this by indefinitely on a 9 to 6 vote. (HB787)

A bill to require the Department of Planning and Budget to establish a program to reduce regulations and to limit spending by state government agencies made it out of the House of Delegates on a 51 to 47 vote, but the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee voted this down on a 11 to 4 vote. (HB244)

That committee also killed a bill to lower the state’s gas tax rate for a one-year period. This was on a 12 to 4 vote. (HB1144)

A bill to eliminate permanent lists for absentee voters passed the House of Delegates on a 52 to 46 vote but the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee voted to pass it by indefinitely on a 9 to 6 vote. (HB175)

A bill that would allow some school security officers to carry a firearm passed the House on a 52 to 46 vote but was passed by indefinitely by the Senate Rules Committee on a 13 to 3 vote. (HB8)

A bill that would have allowed high school students to be arrested for disorderly conduct on school property also was killed by the Rules Committee on a 13 to 3 vote. The House of Delegates had passed that 52 to 48. (HB89)

The Senate Rules Committee also passed by indefinitely a bill that would have created a Commission on Historically Black Colleges and Universities in the Commonwealth. The vote was 14 to 2 on a bill that had passed the House of Delegates unanimously. (HB1057)

Oral arguments scheduled for tomorrow in House 2022 race appeal

Tomorrow afternoon, a three judge panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals will hold oral arguments for a lawsuit in which one party seeks an election in the House of Delegates this year. Richmond attorney Paul Goldman sued the Virginia Board of Elections last summer that argued the boundaries for the House of Delegates in the 2021 election were unconstitutional because they are out of date.

For more on the case and how we got to where we are, I recommended reading Brad Kutner’s March 5 story on Courthouse News.

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The name of today is also a command. March Forth! The world has changed a lot in the past several years, and it will change again as our future quickly becomes history. With so many potential choices and pathways, sometimes all you can do is march forth, and today is a good day to ponder what that all may mean. This is Charlottesville Community Engagement and I’m your host Sean Tubbs, fervently hoping that you will find your way.

On today’s program:

Area transportation planners are submitting three projects to VDOT to improve the Fifth Street Corridor in both Albemarle County and Charlottesville

Riverbend Development has filed plans for a mixed-use community near the intersection of U.S. 29 and Interstate 64

Another update on the waning of the omicron surge

Albemarle County may soon return to in-person meetings

Today’s first shout-out goes to Mulch Madness

In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, are you ready for Mulch Madness? The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority has a free mulch giveaway beginning tomorrow through April 16. In between all the big games, the RSWA wants you to get your yard ready for spring. If you have a way to transport mulch, head on over to the Ivy Material Utilization Center between 7:30am and 4:00pm, Monday through Saturday, where you can pick up up to two tons free. Rivanna staff are available to help load, but ask that you bring a covering. Mulch is double ground and derived from vegetative materials brought to Ivy for disposal. That’s Mulch Madness at the Ivy Material Utilization Center. Visit rivanna.org to learn more.

Pandemic update: Omicron continues slow decline

The Omicron surge of COVID-19 that began in mid-December continues to slowly recede. Today the Virginia Department of Health reports a seven-day percent positivity of 7.2 and the seven-average of new cases is 1,326.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are 81 new cases reported today and the percent positivity is 7 percent.

Dr. Costi Sifri is the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System and he said he expects the numbers to remain on a steady decline, but people should remain vigilant.

“I think we can anticipate that in the spring and hopefully the summer, COVID is going to be much less of an issue for us on a day-to-day basis,” Dr. Sifri said. “But we should anticipate that it could come back.”

Dr. Sifri said there are no new variants of concern on the horizon, but a substrain of omicron continues to spread. He said monitoring efforts must continue and also be strengthened.

“The genome surveillance systems around the country and around the world have continued to improve,” Dr. Sifri said. “There needs to be continued investment in those to beef those up so that we can have better early warning signals for variants of concern.”

This week a new law went into effect allowing parents and guardians let their children opt out of mask mandates in public schools. The Centers for Disease Control lists this region as having a high level of transmission.

“It seems very prudent to me that students continue to mask indoors until those case counts come down to a low level,” Dr. Sifri said.

Tonight, the UVA Medical Center’s South Tower will be illuminated in blue and yellow to support members of the community who are affected by the Putin administration’s invasion of Ukraine. That will continue on Saturday and Sunday night.

Dr. Sifri called the invasion a humanitarian catastrophe that could be compounded by COVID.

“I do think about the intersection between the pandemic and what is occurring with displaced peoples,” Dr. Sifri said. “Ukraine has a populace that is I think only 40 percent vaccinated and they are having to flee their country and their cities and their homes on buses and trains and we can anticipate will be living in challenging situations with multifamily settings and the opportunities in that setting for infectious disease like COVID are tremendous.”

Dr. Sifri said the world’s response to COVID as well as other challenges speaks to the need to be prepared for crisis before it happens.

Albemarle Supervisors briefed on eventual end of the local COVID emergency

Albemarle County and Charlottesville remain underneath a local state of emergency, which has meant virtual meetings for the past two years. On Wednesday, the Board of Supervisors were briefed on the steps to move forward.

“The local emergency has allowed the county a number of advantages in addressing timely issues related to mitigating the spread of the COVID virus during the emergency,” said Doug Walker, the deputy county executive. “We now believe that those advantages are no longer needed and we are in the progress of returning to a more normal operation.”

The Board will be asked to vote on a resolution to end the emergency while also allowing the “continuity of government” ordinance to remain in place. That would allow for some meetings to remain virtual for a period of time.

However, if they adopt the ordinance, the Board of Supervisors, Planning Commission, and the School Board would begin holding hybrid meetings beginning with the first week of April. Other groups such as the Economic Development Authority would begin hybrid meetings in June, and others would have up to the end of March 2023 to meet virtually.

Lane Auditorium would be reconfigured to allow distanced seating on the left hand side of the room and normal seating on the right hand side. Total visitor capacity would be capped at 200. The ventilation system has been upgraded to refresh the air in the auditorium ten times an hour.

The resolution will be voted on at the March 16 meeting.

Rezoning sought for land near Virginia Eagle distribution facility

The highway-like character of U.S. 29 in Albemarle County southwest of Charlottesville will further change in the near future now that a rezoning has been filed for around 63.5 acres around the Virginia Eagle distribution center.

Riverbend Development is seeking a rezoning to the Neighborhood Model District to build several hundred apartment units.

“This project will include a mix of residential and commercial units, as anticipated by the Comprehensive Plan for this location,” reads the narrative for the application. “Approximately 475 residential units are proposed, primarily multifamily.”

Also proposed are a hotel, a congregate care facility, office buildings and retail. The Board of Supervisors adjusted the county’s growth area boundaries in September 2015 to add 51 acres as part of an incentive package to attract a brewery to locate on the site. That was a lower amount than had been requested, and only extended to land that already within the jurisdictional area for public water and sewer. (read the minutes from the September 23, 2015 meeting)

“At 64.36 acres, the Sieg property is strategically positioned at the crossroads of Interstate 64 and Route 29 and within the growth area of Albemarle County,” the narrative continues. “This land is ideally situated for a new mixed-use community with a variety of housing options, office sites, aging in place and retail destinations.”

The Comprehensive Plan designates the land as Regional Mixed-Use. Riverbend Development will pay to extend water and sewer to the properties.

U.S. 29 is considered by the Virginia Department of Transportation to be a Corridor of Statewide Significance.

A traffic light was installed in late 2020 on the southern side of the U.S. 29 and I-64 interchange as part of a Smart Scale funded effort to make the junction safer. That signal is about 1,400 feet away from Gold Eagle Drive, which would serve as one primary access point to the property with Shepards Hill Road serving as the second. The plans propose a “Green T” intersection which would halt southbound traffic on U.S. 29 at a second traffic light in the area.

Second shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

Review process continues for next round of Smart Scale candidate projects

Efforts are underway to secure funding to transform the character of Fifth Street and Fifth Street Extended between Ridge Street and Ambrose Commons. There are at least three projects being considered for the next round of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process.

“Smart Scale is the process that the state uses to prioritize and fund transportation projects,” said Sandy Shackelford, the director of planning and transportation for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

The deadline for the fifth round is approaching later this spring. Each locality can submit up to four projects, and regional planning bodies also get four.

“Projects are evaluated and given a benefit score based on how well the project meets needs in areas like safety, congestion relief, and economic development,” Shackleford said.

Project pre-applications need to be submitted by March 31 with a final application is August 1. The results will be presented to the Commonwealth Transportation Board next January. Funding is limited. The TJPDC held a workshop on February 28 to present candidates to the public. (watch the workshop)

Charlottesville will only submit one application this year. That will be for safety improvements on Fifth Street Extended that could be coordinated with a previous Smart Scale project. (read that application)

“We do currently have a funded project at the intersection of Cherry [Avenue] and Elliott [Avenue] so we are looking to kind of connect to that already-funded project and continue south,” said Brennen Duncan, the city’s traffic engineer.

How far south depends on how much funding would be available. Earlier this year, the City Council dropped the speed limit on 5th Street Extended to 40 miles per hour to try to slow down traffic after a series of fatalities in 2020.

“We’re primarily focused on safety, congestion, pedestrian access, and bicycle access,” Duncan said.

Duncan said public meetings will be held in April to shape this project and there is no current cost estimate. There are other previously awarded Smart Scale projects along the corridor.

Further to the south, the Metropolitan Planning Organization will submit an application to make improvements for a four-tenths of a mile long stretch where Albemarle County is on one side of the road and Charlottesville is on the other. (read details)

“The Fifth Street improvements include adding a left turn lane south into Fifth Street Station Parkway, median adjustments into the Willoughby Shopping Center across from the Willoughby residential neighborhood, construction of a left-turn midblock into Willoughby Shopping Center, [and] traveling north, restricting south turn lane into the Willoughby Shopping Center,” said Ryan Mickles, a regional planner with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District.

A shared-use path is also suggested in this project as are other elements. There’s no cost estimate yet for this project.

Another project would see bicycle and pedestrian improvements between Ambrose Commons to Stagecoach Road south of I-64. These would provide a way to get to Southwood on foot or bike while passing by the Albemarle Business Campus and Albemarle County’s southern office building. (read those details)

“We’re going to basically install a shared-use path on the west side of the road offset by a six foot buffer strip,” said Chuck Proctor, a transportation planner with VDOT.

In the fourth Smart Scale round, Albemarle County won $5.263 million in funding for a roundabout at the intersection of Old Lynchburg Road and Fifth Street. The Board of Supervisors committed a $2 million match to the project to help improve its ranking under Smart Scale.

I will have more from this workshop in future installments of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

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For those who like the rhythm of numbers, 3/3 is the sixty-second day of 2022. For those who do not, disreputable sources tell me that this is I Want You to Be Happy Day, If Pets Had Thumbs Day, and Talk in Third Person Day. With that, Sean Tubbs truly wants you to know that this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement has nothing to do with any of those things besides this introductory paragraph.

Sean Tubbs would be happy if you signed up for the free newsletter, but cannot imagine a pet with a thumb?

On today’s program:

Albemarle County holds the first public hearing on staff’s recommended $565M budget for fiscal year 23 and it appears a turf battle is brewing

A land use advisory group gets a first look at the rezoning to add homes at the North Fork Research Park

The University of Virginia’s Buildings and Grounds committee will rename a building after the late Senator John Warner

Governor Youngkin signs eight relatively non-controversial bills

First shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting http://campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Albemarle holds first public hearing for $565M budget

The first of several opportunities for the public and elected officials to mark up Albemarle’s next budget got underway with a handful of people taking advantage of the first public hearing.

The total budget is $565.1 million, and that’s made up of several different components including the general fund, the school fund, the school special revenue fund, the special revenue fund, the capital improvement fund, and the debt service fund.

“These funds can be highly variable year to year,” Richardson said. “As an example, the FY23 recommended budget includes the influx of $12 million in remaining one-time funding through the American Rescue Plan Act. Additionally the nature of capital projects and their related borrowing will vary year to year based on the timing of projects beginning.”

This next year’s budget includes funding for High School Center 2 as well as the final phases of the construction of a new General District Court in downtown Charlottesville that would serve both communities. Richardson said for those wanting to make a year-to-year comparison of budgets, the general fund is where to look.

“It’s where all tax revenue is received and its the primary ongoing funding source for the school fund, the capital fund, the debt program,” Richardson said. “It also doesn’t involve pass-through grants that may vary from year to year.”

The general fund is built on maintaining the same property tax rate of 85.4 cents per $100 of assessed, but an increase in the rate for the food and beverage tax and the transient occupancy tax. There is funding from the new cigarette tax and proposed revenues from a plastic bag tax.

There is also a proposed 86 cent drop in the personal property tax rate due to a spike in used car values in the past year.

See also: Richardson presents $565M “Transform Albemarle” budget to Supervisors

The public hearing was the first chance for professional groups and community members alike to influence the budget.

A representative from an environmental group supported additional funds for Biscuit Run and for the transportation-leverage program, but lamented that the capital budget anticipates no new funds for a program where Albemarle funds the acquisition of conservation easements.

“As you all know, our land and water resources are vital for the future of our region and are a critical component of what makes Albemarle County a special place to live,” said Rex Linville of the Piedmont Environmental Council. “In fact, the Albemarle County Comprehensive Plan acknowledges this and specifically calls for the county to ‘strengthen the Acquisition of Conservation Easements ACE Program by providing a stable, dedicated funding source and staff resources for administering the program.”

Later in the meeting, Supervisor Ned Gallaway said that the program is under review at this time and that is not being zeroed out.

“We’ll do a proper evaluation and Mr. Richardson, I presume if we wanted to put funds into the

ACE program, even though its zeroed out now because of the pause, that we would have plenty of reserve options to go if we had projects to fund,” Gallaway said.

Several people want the county to restore $2.9 million in funds to install lights and artificial turf for athletic fields at Darden-Towe Park, which is owned by both Albemarle County and Charlottesville. That was anticipated in the FY2020 budget but has not proceeded.

“Quite frankly, I am very disappointed that this extremely important community project has been pushed to the wayside,” said Robyn Mattern.

The project was paused in the FY21 budget due to the pandemic and was not recommended to be resumed. Charlottesville would also need to provide a portion of funding in their capital fund.

Mike Ginsberg also spoke to the issue and he argued for more athletic facilities for youth sports at Darden Towe Park.

“In my time coaching child soccer in Charlottesville for the past 20 years, I have seen hundreds of multisport turf complexes across America and Europe,” Ginsberg said. “Every sports complex mirrors one another in that they all have numerous turf fields lined for various sports like soccer, lacrosse, field hockey, football.” .

The FY23 budget anticipates $3 million in spending at Biscuit Run Park in FY23 and $5.3 million in FY24, and that will include new athletic fields.

The executive director of Live Arts appeared before Supervisors to thank them for the recommendation of $5,000 in funding next year.

“I just wanted to let you know the focus of this grant is rebuilding our 1,200 person volunteer corps after it was decimated during the pandemic,” said Anne Hunter.

Hunter was the last speaker at the public hearing.

After that, Supervisors had the chance to provide direction in advance of next Wednesday’s budget work session. At one of those events, there will be a discussion about the future of athletic fields in Albemarle and whether Supervisors want to unpause the project.

“We are planning to present to the board at the March 23 work session,” said Assistant County Executive Trevor Henry. “It’s not just a turf field discussion. It’s also going to be a discussion led by Parks and Recreation on overall field needs. We will talk a little about the history of the Darden Towe turf project and the current CIP request for four natural grass fields at Biscuit Run Park.

Darden Towe Park is within the Rivanna Magisterial District represented by Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley. She said she looked forward to the work session.

“Because I do feel that we need to have a really good sports venue here in Albemarle County,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “Biscuit Run, I think, is the optimum place to have that. I’m just going to put that out there already.”

Supervisor Chair Donna Price said she also wanted a sports plex within Albemarle and looked forward to the discussion.

“I also continue to have questions as do many of our community members based upon various opinions that have been shared with us about the advisability of artificial turf versus natural grass because there are advantages and disadvantages of each,” Price said.

The first work session begins at 3 p.m. on March 9. (meeting info)

UVA building to be renamed for late Senator

The University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors this week, including the committee that reviews land use items. Tomorrow the Buildings and Grounds Committee will consider a proposal to rename Maury Hall after the late Senator John Warner. The university’s Naming and Memorials Committee reviewed the name and found that Matthew Fontaine Maury has no connections to UVA except for an 1855 speech when he gave a lecture supporting slavery.

“During the 1850’s, Maury was an outspoken advocate for the policy that slave-holding states should establish a commercial slave network with Brazil and other parts of South America,” reads the staff report.

Maury Hall was built by the U.S. Navy in 1942 as an ROTC facility and continues to house that program even though the military branch no longer owns the building. The naming committee has recommended renaming the building after the late Senator Warner who died in May 2021. Warner temporarily left his studies at the UVA School of Law at the start of the Korean War in 1950 and returned at its conclusion. After some years in private practice, he was Under Secretary of the Navy and served as Secretary of the Navy in the mid 1970’s. If approved by the Board of Visitors, Maury Hall would become John W. Warner Hall.

The Buildings Committee will also see a schematic design for the new UVA Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital at Fontaine Research Park. The existing structure will be upgraded to a 60-bed hospital with all private rooms.

The Buildings and Grounds Committee will also review revisions to the Major Capital Plan, which was last revised in June 2021. There is a proposal to begin design for a Center for the Arts, the School of Architecture Center for Design, and an engineering academic building.

Four major capital projects are also being proposed to be added. They are the Institute for Biotechnology, Ivy Corridor Landscape and Infrastructure Phase IIA, Memorial Gym Infrastructure and Accessibility Renewal, and Monroe Hall Addition HVAC Renewal.

Shout-out to the Piedmont Master Gardeners

The second shout-out today goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners to announce their 2022 Spring Lecture Series featuring leading experts on sustainable landscaping, indigenous gardening wisdom and small fruit production at home. For all four Thursdays in March, you can buy a virtual ticket for these informative events. On March 3, acclaimed garden designer and photographer C. Colston Burrell will discuss Beauty, Integrity and Resilience: Can A Garden Have Everything? On March 10, Renée Gokey and Christine Price-Abelow of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian will discuss “The Three Sisters: Indigenous Origins and Best Growing Practices.” For the rest of the sessions, visit piedmontmastergardens.org/events.

Places29-North Committee gets first look at North Fork rezoning to add residential

The University of Virginia is working to locate up to 1,500 units of affordable housing at three locations, one of which is the North Fork Discovery Park on U.S. 29 near the Charlottesville Regional Airport. The Places29-North Community Advisory Committee got a look at a rezoning that UVA’s real estate foundation needs in order to place some of those units. (watch the February 10, 2022 meeting)

“We’re at the very early stages of this [and] there are a lot of much more detailed things that will be coming out at a later date,” said Bill Fritz, Albemarle’s lead reviewer for the project.

Albemarle community advisory committees play the role of information clearing house more than an advisory body, as any resolutions adopted by the group are non-binding. They often host community meetings for land use applications.

This land is currently all zoned Planned Development Industrial Park and the University of Virginia Foundation seeks to change a portion of it to the Neighborhood Model District.

“That district has the widest variety of uses of all of the districts that we have and in that particular portion of the property… they are proposing to be allowed to do residential development and some commercial development,” Fritz said.

The land is within the Places29 Master Plan, which was adopted in February 2011.

“Even though North Fork does not currently permit residential, which is why we’re here, it was clearly contemplated back with the Places29 Master Plan when that was adopted ten years ago,” said Valerie Long, an attorney with the law firm Williams Mullen.

Since then, the UVA Foundation has covered the costs of extending Lewis and Clark Drive to Airport Road, providing more connectivity to the area. They’ve also been slowly adding more businesses to support companies that have offices in the research park. For instance, Foods of All Nations runs a café and there is also a large outdoor area enabled with wi-fi.

“However to support those amenities you actually need people who live near or who will spend money on those service-oriented companies,” said Deborah Van Eersel, chief administrative officer at the UVA Foundation. “We think that bringing housing in makes it more vibrant. We’ve talked about multifamily, townhomes, and single-detached housing to create active, diverse communities. We’ve talked about affordable housing.”

In the application, the UVA Foundation is asking for a minimum of 200 and a maximum of 1,400 units.

“That’s quite a range,” said Supervisor Bea Lapisto-Kirtley (Rivanna).

“We acknowledge that most certainly,” Long said. “We wanted to provide flexibility to accommodate the market demand and interest but also it’s a new thing for North Fork so we think there will be a lot of interest.”

Part of that range may depend on water supply. Learn more about that aspect of this development in Allison Wrabel’s February 20 story in the Daily Progress.

UVa Foundation wants to add up to 1,400 homes at North Fork, February 20, 2022

There is no date yet for when the project will go to the Planning Commission for a public hearing. Fritz said the county is expecting a resubmittal based on input from staff and the public so far. Read the latest round of comments back to the UVA Foundation in this February 9, 2022 letter.

Youngkin signs eight more bills

As the 2022 Virginia General Assembly continues to reach its end point, legislation continues to either be passed, passed by indefinitely, continued until next year, or some other fate. The ultimate fate that any legislator wants is for a bill to make its way to the Governor’s mansion for consideration.

Governor Glenn Youngkin signed eight more bills yesterday and it is worth documenting upon these.

HB518 changes the way that transient occupancy taxes are collected and alters the steps “accomodations intermediaries” must take when submitting revenue to the Department of Taxation.

HB3 will allow a sales tax exemption on gold, silver, and platinum bullion to remain in place until June 30, 2025. This would have expired at the end of this June.

The sunset of Major Business Facility Job tax credits will now be June 30, 2025 rather than this June 30. (HB269)

Another sales tax exemption is also being extended for three years, this time for components used in building or renovating aircraft components. (HB462)

HB148 allows a locality to certify pollution control equipment themselves rather than have that done by the state government.

James Madison University and Virginia Tech will both be able to float up to $101 million in bonds for “revenue-producing capital projects” now that HB165 has been signed into law.

Some changes to the Shipping and Logistics Headquarters Grant program have now been made. (HB324)

Some definitions of contributions to the Virginia Retirement System will also happen with the passage of HB473.

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Welcome to an appropriately named month, one that marks the beginning of meteorological spring in the Northern Hemisphere. That’s a phrase I’ve not known until today, nor did I know that the equinox in three weeks marks the beginning of vernal spring. There is so much to be learned about the world around us, and every installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement seeks to bring a little of it to your attention. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Governor Youngkin issues his first veto, and a round-up of bills that have not passed the General Assembly

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority agrees to issue $23 million in bonds for a California firm to renovate Midway Manor

An international panel releases new information about the efforts to slow the rise in global temperatures

First shout-out goes to the Rivanna Conservation Alliance

Governor Youngkin vetoes Arlington police auditor bill

Arlington County will not be able to appoint an independent auditor to monitor the police department with the same powers as a civilian review board. Governor Glenn Youngkin has vetoed HB670 which would have granted the Arlington County Board that ability. The measure passed the House of Delegates on a 65 to 35 vote and the Senate on a much closer 21 to 19 vote.

In his veto statement, Youngkin said such a move would grant too much power without appropriate protections for law enforcement officers.

“Investing in a single politically-appointed individual the power of judge, jury, and executioner without any input from law-enforcement officers or delineated qualifications for such [an] individual constitutes an undue burden for those who protect and serve the community,” Youngkin wrote in his statement.

More on the General Assembly later on in this newsletter.

IPCC releases new report

A new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns that rising global temperatures are causing disruptions for nature and humanity across the planet. A working group of scientists from 195 nations gathered for two weeks to review and approve Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability.

“The world faces unavoidable multiple climate hazards over the next two decades with global warming of 1.5°C (2.7°F),” reads a press release for the report. “Even temporarily exceeding this warming level will result in additional severe impacts, some of which will be irreversible. Risks for society will increase, including to infrastructure and low-lying coastal settlements.”

The report urges continued work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and suggests ways this can be done while improving people’s lives, but also points out that growing urbanization and social inequality will hasten the problem.

The full report is 3,675 pages long but the technical summary is a bit more manageable at 96 pages. I suspect most readers and listeners will opt for the 36-page summary for policymakers.

“This report has a particular focus on transformation16 and system transitions in energy; land, ocean, coastal and freshwater ecosystems; urban, rural and infrastructure; and industry and society,” reads the introduction to that summary. “These transitions make possible the adaptation required for high levels of human health and wellbeing, economic and social resilience, ecosystem health, and planetary health.”

For more information on what local and state governments are doing to meet their greenhouse reduction goals, here are some resources:

Albemarle Climate Protection webpage

Charlottesville Climate Protection webpage

University of Virginia Sustainability

Virginia Coastal Resilience Master Plan

Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court heard a case that challenges the power of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Read the transcript of the argument here or listen to the oral arguments. Read one account of how it went on Bloomberg Law.

CRHA approves $23 million in bonds for Midway Manor renovations

The Board of Commissioners for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority has taken the first step toward issuing up to $23 million in bonds for a California-based company to renovate Midway Manor in a way that will keep existing affordability requirements in place.

“This is a 98-unit elderly affordable housing development on Ridge Street very close to the Greyhound station and the proposal is to issue some bonds to assist with the financing of a comprehensive renovation of this project,” said Delphine Carnes, the legal counsel for the CRHA.

Standard Communities closed on their $16.45 million acquisition of Midway Manor on January 13. They say that the current affordability levels will be maintained, and common spaces and amenities will be upgraded. They’re asking the CRHA to issue “exempt facility” bonds to renovate the 98 units. No new market-rate units would be added.

“The role of the housing authority in this particular project is as a conduit bond issuer,” Carnes said.

That means the CRHA would not have any obligations for the property, and neither CRHA or the City of Charlottesville would be responsible for paying back the bonds. Carnes said there were benefits to issuing the bonds.

“First, they ensure the continued renovation and redevelopment of affordable housing units in the City of Charlottesville which is very complementary to your own mission but it doesn’t cost you a dime,” Carnes said. “As a matter of fact, it creates some revenue to you because you are receiving a fee for being the issuer of these bonds.”

Carnes did not have a number on hand at the public hearing, but said the funding could be used for any purpose by the CRHA.

The CRHA will need to approve the project once more after the bond documents are finalized.

Steven Kahn is a director with Standard Communities. During the public hearing, he acknowledged that many do not know what his company does.

“We’ve got about 13,000 units of affordable housing across the country in 19 different states,” Kahn said. “This will be our first project in Charlottesville but hopefully not our last as we see to it that we try to do our business the right way and always get invited back for repeat performances and we’ve done that very successfully across the country.”

Kahn called Midway Manor a tremendous asset that has served a population in need of housing and a need for certainty. The current affordability requirements are running out.

“And our intentions with Midway Manor are to take the federal rental subsidy contract that does expire in a couple of years and renew that for as long as the [U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development] to do so which is at present is a 20-year contract,” Kahn said. “And in partnership also work with [Virginia Housing Development Authority] to receive an allocation of four percent low-income housing tax credits which will allow us in partnership with these bonds to do a very extensive renovation of the property.”

Kahn said the renovations would be expansive with full upgrades of interiors as well as an energy-efficient retrofit of heating and cooling systems and electric systems.

The specifics of how renovation will work are not yet available, but Kahn said the hope is to not relocate tenants while the work is done over an 18-month period.

“We’ve got a tremendous amount of experience doing that,” Kahn said. “North of ten thousand units completing renovations without displacing residents, even during the renovation process.”

The executive director of the Public Housing Association of Residents asked for careful consideration of the issuance of the bonds.

“I’ve spoken with two resident leaders at Midway Manor and their desire is to come to an answer as expeditiously as possible about the status of the building,” said Shelby Marie Edwards. “To be clear, I know CRHA does not own the building. And if anybody can help them make sure the units are affordable and that the building is upgrade and becoming of our citizens they would be grateful for the help. They are looking for the answer to the question: What’s going to happen to the resident. Where are we going?”

Kahn said Standard Communities is a “high-touch” organization when it plans for these projects to make sure residents know what is going on. He said there will be a kickoff meeting for residents when the project is closer to moving forward.

“Miscommunication or misinformation spreads very quickly through communities and we try to make sure that it is not something we are a part of,” Kahn said.

Kahn said they are hoping to close the sale of the bonds this summer and get started with construction soon after. In the meantime, he said there were a number of issues that Standard Communities know need to be fixed.

“There are a lot of things that we became aware of during our due diligence of the property that need some attention before then,” Kahn said. “We’ve put those underway. Elevator modernization is one of them. I know there [are] some concerns with the intercom system at the entryway.”

The five CRHA Commissioners who were present on the virtual meeting voted unanimously to authorize the bond issuance.

It is important to note that the Low Income Housing Tax Credits are in a separate category than the competitive ones that are being sought for other projects in the area.

“The four percent LIHTC pool is noncompetitive while the nine percent pool is very competitive,” said John Sales, executive director of the CRHA.

Sales said Council will also have to approve the issuance of the bonds.

More from the CRHA meeting in a future version of the program.

Second shout-out goes to an arboreal event at the Virginia Festival of the Book

General Assembly update: Divided government edition

The 2022 Virginia General Assembly has just over two weeks left to go, and the pattern remains much of the same. Many bills that narrowly passed in one House of the bicameral legislature are now being defeated in committees of the other, a clear sign of divided government. Let’s go through some of those today.

A Senate bill (SB27) to expand the Education Improvement Scholarships Tax Credit was tabled by the House Appropriations Committee.

A Senate bill (SB290) to require local and state government agencies to construct energy efficient roofs on new public buildings failed to report out of the House General Laws Committee on a 10 to 12 vote.

A Senate bill (SB559) to require more disclosure from registered lobbyists was tabled in the General Laws Committee on a 12 to 9 vote.

Senate Bill 576 would have allowed betting on Virginia college sports, but it was tabled in the House General Laws Committee on an 18 to 4 vote.

A Senate bill (SB310) that would have prohibited plastic guns and made their sales or posession a Class 5 felony was tabled in the House Public Safety Committee on a 12 to 10 vote. This had passed the Senate on a 22 to 18 vote.

Now over to the Senate.

House Bill 1301 would have directed the Department of Environmental Quality to withdraw from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. It passed the House of Delegates on a 52 to 48 vote, but was tabled in the Senate Agriculture, Conservation, and Natural Resources Committee on an 8 to 7 vote.

Another bill that would have watered down the Air Pollution Control Board’s requirements for renewable energy had passed the House of Delegates on a 53 to 47 vote, but was passed by indefinitely in the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee on a nine to five vote. (SB81)

A bill that would have required parental notification of the use of any sexually explicit materials in public school failed to report from the Senate Education and Health Committee on a 7 to 8 vote. (HB1009)

A bill to advance Governor Glenn Younkgin’s Lab School initiative was passed by indefinitely by the Senate Education and Health Committee on a 9 to 6 vote. (HB356)

House Bill 539 would have required public colleges and universities to notify would-be students that they could be disqualified by “certain criminal convictions.” That bill was passed by indefinitely in the Senate Education and Health Committee.

Localities would not have been allowed to require contractors to provide certain benefits if HB58 had passed. The Senate General Laws and Technology Committee passed this by indefinitely on an 8 to 7 vote.

Virginia’s Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion will retain that name. HB1300 would have required the renaming to Director of Diversity, Opportunity, and Inclusion was passed by indefinitely on an 8 to 7 vote.

Currently law-enforcement officers who are in a community with a police civilian review board are subject to a different interpretation of the Law-Enforcement Officers Procedural Guarantee Act. HB70 would have changed that, and the Senate Judiciary Committee passed that by indefinitely on a 9 to 6 vote.

Law enforcements will continue to not be allowed to stop motorists for minor infractions. House Bill 79 would have removed those provisions passed by a Democrat-led General Assembly and it passed the Republican-run House of Delegates on a 52 to 45 vote. The Cemocrat-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee passed this by indefinitely on a 9 to 6 vote.

Currently if you have a firearm stolen from you, you must report that to a law-enforcement agency. House Bill 325 would have dropped that requirement by the Senate Judiciary Committee passed this by indefinitely on an 8 to 7 vote. Other House bills related to firearms were also defeated. One would have repealed a recently passed law that allows firearms to be removed from the possession of people deemed to be a risk (HB509). Localities will also continue to be able to prohibit firearms in public places (HB827).

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It’s the final day of February, but 2022 still has a long way to go. In fact, after today there is 83.8 percent left before it’s time to change the yearly calendar once more. Tomorrow may be heralded by a lion, so be on the listen-out for a roar. But for now, it’s time for another Charlottesville Community Engagement, and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

This newsletter and podcast is free to sign up for, but your paid subscription ensures this one-person operation will continue well into the future!

On today’s program:

A new group called Friends of Cville Downtown launches by wrapping the Dewberry structure with a mural

City Council upholds a decision made by the Board of Architectural Review

One Charlottesville tax relief deadline is approaching, and the city is looking for more people to serve on advisory panels

A University of Virginia epidemiologist weighs in on what’s next with COVID

First shout-out goes to a Livable Cville event

In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, Livable Cville wants you to know about an online presentation coming up on Wednesday, March 16 at 5:30 p.m. "Can Zoning Create a More Affordable Charlottesville?" That’s the question to be explored by Dr. Jenny Schuetz of the Brookings Institute. She’s the author of Fixer-Upper: How to Repair America’s Broken Housing Systems. The event is free but you’ll have to register at EventBrite.

Pandemic update to begin the week

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports the seven-day percent positivity is now at 7.3 percent, another indicator the Omicron surge is continuing to wane. The seven-day average for new cases is now at 1,621 with 764 new cases reported today. However, the death count from the Omicron variant continues to grow with a cumulative total of 18,771. Ten days ago, that number stood at 18,016 but the VDH always stresses that it takes a while for COVID deaths to be officially recorded.

The Blue Ridge Health District now has a total of 419 deaths from COVID, and that number was at 386 ten day ago. There are 26 new cases in the BRHD today.

What’s next? Dr. Costi Sifri is director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System. He said a majority of people in the Charlottesville area are either fully vaccinated or have had COVID.

“I think in the near term we can and are expecting that we will see a continued diminution of cases going forward and I think that’s likely to occur not only over the next couple of weeks but perhaps and hopefully the next couple of months,” Dr. Sifri said.

However, Dr. Sifri said COVID can be unpredictable and there are many parts of the world have low vaccination rates, allowing further mutations to occur. He said the current question is how long immunity through vaccination or previous infections will last.

“Will there be future differences with the virus?” Dr. Sifri asked. “Does it evolve or change to overcome some of these protective immune responses that we’ve developed? And how robust or how prolonged are those immune responses?”

Tomorrow is also the day that a new law goes into effect allowing parents to opt out of school mask mandates.

This morning the UVA Health System announced that the drop in case counts will result in additional visitation at the UVA Medical System. To see the details of what has changed, visit the UVA Health System.

Tax relief deadline is tomorrow

Tomorrow is the last day for elderly and disabled property owners in Charlottesville to apply for tax relief.

“If you own and are living in your home in the city of Charlottesville, if you are over 65 years of age, or are permanently disabled, and if you have a yearly household income of $55,000 or less, and a net worth of $125,000 or less excluding the value of the home, you may qualify for tax relief under this program,” said City Councilor Sena Magill.

Visit the Commissioner of Revenue’s website for more information and to find the application.

Residential property is up 11.69 percent in 2022. In addition, Council has advertised an increase of ten cents on the property tax rate. City Council will be presented with the budget on March 7.

Want to be on a Charlottesville board or commission?

With spring here perhaps you’re looking for a fresh hobby. Why not consider being on a Charlottesville Board of Commission? There are several vacancies and Council is taking applications through March 12.

Charlottesville Economic Development Authority - one opening

Citizens Transportation Advisory Committee - two openings

Community Policy and Management Team - two openings

Historic Resources Committee - four openings

Housing Advisory Committee - one vacancy (specifically for a member of a neighborhood association)

Measurements and Solutions Group - eight openings

Personnel Appeals Board - one opening (for a non-city employee)

Region Ten Community Services Board - one opening

Social Services Advisory Board - two openings

Tree Commission - four openings

Vendor Appeals Board - one opening

Youth Council

You can apply here. Council will next make appointments on March 21.

Council upholds BAR approval at 605 Preston Place

The Board of Architectural Review approved what’s called a “certificate of appropriateness” to allow for an apartment complex to be built in the side yard of a 19th century structure. Council was asked to hear the appeal from neighbors who argue the city’s architectural design control (ADC) rules were not followed.

At the beginning of the appeal, city historic preservation planner Jeff Werner described the project.

“The project is a proposed three-story apartment building,” Werner said. “It’s located on a parcel at 605 Preston Place. The property is within the Rugby-Road-University Circle-Venable ADC district. Also on this property is Wyndhurst which is a home constructed in 1857 and it was formerly the manor house for a 102-acre farm.”

The appellants sent in a 19-point letter to make their arguments. Point number two argued that the footprint and massing of the new building would not be not in harmony with the district. Werner disagreed.

“To be clear, the design guidelines are intended to be flexible and flexible enough to both respect historic properties and to embrace future new design,” Werner said.

Werner recommended the Council uphold the BAR’s determination.

Larry Getty represented the appellants.

“We actually feel the Board of Architectural Review did not really explain their decisions as to why the number of elements that Jeff Werner discussed actually do satisfy the guidelines,” Getty said. “It is totally out of place with the buildings that are on three sides of the site.”

Breck Gastinger is the chair of the BAR and before he spoke he told Council a little about what the panel does.

“We are made up of nine citizens of Charlottesville,” Gastinger said. “All of us are volunteers and we are appointed by City Council. We work on your behalf for the city. We’re made up of design professionals, business owners, residents of properties within historic districts.”

Gastinger said BAR members must follow the guidelines as they make their determinations. He said the city’s architectural story is always changing.

“Our guidelines for the BAR do not mandate particular styles of architecture or prevent new buildings from being added within historic districts,” Gastinger said. “As Charlottesville continues to grow and evolve as a city, we want to make sure it’s going to be done in a compatible way.”

Gastinger said the BAR helped inform the project through multiple hearings and their approval was a unanimous 8-0 vote.

Mayor Lloyd Snook said he sided with the BAR.

“I was struck by the fact that some architects for whom I have a great deal respect were looking at it quite critically and praising what was being done and I would have to say that if those architects are saying good things about it, that’s a very strong recommendation for me,” Snook said.

The vote to uphold the BAR was unanimous.

Patreon-fueled shout-out to LEAP

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Friends of Cville Downtown launches with unveiling of mural on Dewberry building

It was a warm morning for this last day of February and several dozen people gathered in Central Place outside the Dewberry Hotel, an unfinished structure for which construction stopped over 13 years ago when the previous owner ran out of money.

A group called Friends of Cville Downtown has raised funds to wrap the skeleton of the unfinished hotel with artwork. The official reveal was a chance to also launch the organization. Board member Michael Caplin called a “placemaking partnership” to increase economic development downtown in an inclusive manner.

“Friends of Cville Downtown is raising private money to fund the costs of a campaign for Main, an array of projects that can invigorate the downtown environment with lights, art, paintings, seating, events, banners, sanitation, safety add-ons, and a rich array of events with something for everybody,” Caplin said. “We will accomplish this by working together with one another and with city government in the spirit of goodwill and common purpose.”

The first project is the Music Box on Main, which is the name for the temporary installation by the artist Eric Waugh which covers all nine stories of the unfinished Dewberry.

“Eric’s paintings, Jazzmaker 1 and Jazzmaker 2, were enlarged and printed on a 13-foot-wide vinyl mesh banner wrap,” Caplin said. “Ten giant rolls of wrap were carried to the roof.”

Crews rappelled from the top affixed the wrap to the building, and the goal is to cover up the skeleton for at least the next year. Caplin said the work has been done in conjunction with the Dewberry Group, who even donated $10,000 to the project.

“I hope you will say to yourself, ‘what wonderful thing shall we do next, and how shall we get it done together?’” Caplin said.

Mayor Lloyd Snook said he welcomed the effort.

“We lost sight of the fact that so many of the businesses on the Downtown Mall are operating on very thin margins and the last few years have been very tough for them,” Snook said. “To have people who have the ability to step up to make significant contributions to be able to do the kinds of things the Friends of Cville Downtown are talking about doing is really exciting. It’s exciting for the city government to know that there are going to be people out there who are able to help and willing to help.”

Ludwig Kuttner is the vice chair of the Friends of Cville Downtown board. He said he wanted to take action to cover up visual blight and to restore what he described as “positive energy” to the mall.

“I think people have complained about it now for over 12 yeers, and it’s ugly and there have been complaints and we just decided let’s do something about it,” Kuttner said.

Caplin came up with the idea for the wrap, which includes a wrap on 2nd Street SE. He saw the black façade of the old Boxer Learning building as being like the black keys of a piano.

“So I envisioned the windows white and then a swirly jazz thing at the top and I had a friend of mine photoshop it for me to see what it would like when it was done and we sent that image to the Dewberrys and said ‘would you give us permission to do this to your building?’ and Jaimie Dewberry called up and said ‘this is genius, go right ahead!’”

As for the future of the Dewberry, Caplin said he was not privy to any information but that they had full permission to apply the temporary measure.

“It’s now a positive element of our skyline instead of a ‘what’s happening’ element of our skyline,” Caplin said.

Stay tuned for more information as it develops. What do you think? Leave a note in the comments.

Support the program!

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A $75 gift card to the Downtown Mall

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The final Friday of February is here, and March is just in front of us. In all of the next 115 days going forward, there will be more hours of light than dark and the first signs of emerging vegetation are popping out. The best thing to do is to focus on each and every day and Charlottesville Community Engagement seeks to capture as much of the journey as possible. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

No additional localities in Virginia will be able to hold a sales tax referendum this year to help pay for public school infrastructure

Charlottesville releases the results of a citizen-science campaign to map the urban heat island

And the Charlottesville Tree Commission details the decline in the city’s tree canopy

Shout-out to the Piedmont Master Gardeners

The first shout-out today goes to the Piedmont Master Gardeners to announce their 2022 Spring Lecture Series featuring leading experts on sustainable landscaping, indigenous gardening wisdom and small fruit production at home. For all four Thursdays in March, you can buy a virtual ticket for these informative events.

On March 3, acclaimed garden designer and photographer C. Colston Burrell will discuss Beauty, Integrity and Resilience: Can A Garden Have Everything?

On March 10, Renée Gokey and Christine Price-Abelow of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian will discuss: The Three Sisters: Indigenous Origins and Best Growing Practices.

For the rest of the sessions and to purchase tickets, visit piedmontmastergardens.org/events.

Urban Heat island data available

Staff working on climate action issues in Charlottesville have published the results of a survey conducted last summer to map out temperature and humidity levels across the city.

“How urban environments and neighborhoods are built affects the amount of heat absorbed and retained, which can increase or reduce the impact of extreme heat events,” reads a page on the city’s climate protection website. “Increases in extreme heat are one of the top projected impacts Charlottesville will experience from climate change.”

Areas with more concrete and less tree cover retain the heat from the previous day and the survey sought to document how this manifests in temperature differentials across the city’s neighborhoods. Thirteen volunteers took 34,401 measurements across the city on August 24, 2021, walking seven routes.

The map shows a clear difference between neighborhoods on either side of West Main Street which are much hotter than those such as Fifeville which have a much greater tree cover.

You can learn more about the project on the city’s Climate Action website.

Council briefed on declining tree canopy

There are other data sources that the city uses to assess its environmental health.

“About every five years we get a consultant to do what’s called a ‘leaf on aerial’ shot from a satellite and do an analysis of our overall tree canopy,” said Chris Gensic, the city’s parks planner.

The Parks and Recreation Department has been measuring the tree canopy since 2004 when it was around 50 percent but the number has been dropping and was measured at 40 percent in 2018, the last year for which data is available.

“Not only is it a continuous decline from that level that we see at 50 percent in 2004, but in fact the canopy is declining at an accelerating rate,” said Brian Menard, a past chair of the Tree Commission.

Menard said another report will be done soon and he fears the decline will be even worse.

The updated Comprehensive Plan has a goal of to “contribute to the creation, protection, and expansion of robust urban forests.” Menard said the latest data shows that the city is not meeting that goal. He urged Council to keep this in mind as the zoning code is rewritten.

Chair Peggy Van Yahres said the Commission has four goals in mind.

“One is to increase the requirements for new trees, strengthen and enforce tree protection, establish consequences for public tree damage,” Van Yahres said. “We can also refine the site plan application and review.”

The Tree Commission wants a seat at the table for site plans to point out the ecological damage of removing mature trees.

Van Yahres said the Tree Commission is helping with a program called ReLeaf Cville to help rebuild the canopy, and one of the ideas is to raise money to plant more trees on private property.

“We believe that trees save lives so our mission is to protect the health and well-being, particularly of our low canopy neighborhoods from the heat effects of climate change,” Van Yahres.

The ReLeaf effort will focus at first on the 10th and Page neighborhood, which has a tree canopy of 18 percent.

Menard said the city government needs to plan 200 trees a year on its property and that requires funding. The Tree Commission has asked for $100,000 in the next capital budget.

Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade said he felt the presentation was compelling.

“I can only imagine what it’s going to be when they recalculate or redo it again because the storm in the beginning of January just took down a whole bunch of trees,” Wade said. “And if not the whole tree, certainly a lot of the branches so I think this is very valuable.”

The presentation included a note that several mature trees would be removed at Friendship Court. Councilor Michael Payne responded that those decisions were approved by residents who live there.

“It’s been a very intense resident-led process to design the specific types of units, their locations, and through that resident-led process and the priorities they chose in terms of the types of housing, number of units and locations of those units,” Payne said. “That’s where the project is.”

Another request the Tree Commission has is to further increase setbacks for buildings and to eliminate the possibility of building right up to the property line. Mayor Lloyd Snook pointed out a tension.

“We were told in part of the affordable housing debate that one of the things that is getting in the way of more affordable housing is bigger setback requirements,” Snook said. “But of course when you have set back requirements you have room for trees. At least part of the discussion we were having last year about all of this, and I kept saying ‘don’t worry, we’ll solve this when we get around to rewriting the zoning ordinance which is under but part of what we need to do I guess is make sure that we have some better way of recognizing the balance of what we’re trying to strike.”

James Freas, the director of Neighborhood Development Services, said he hoped the zoning update will bring more flexible to help achieve a balance.

“All of these things come with trade-offs and I know that will be part of the conversation as we go forward with the zoning ordinance rewrite,” Freas said.

The Cville Plans Together Steering Committee will meet on March 2 at 5 p.m. Register to attend the virtual meeting here.

Second shout-out goes to WTJU

Algorithms know how to put songs and artists together based on genre or beats per minute. But only people can make connections that engage your mind and warm your heart. The music on WTJU 91.1 FM is chosen by dozens and dozens of volunteer hosts -- music lovers like you who live right here in the Charlottesville area. Listener donations keep WTJU alive and thriving. In this era of algorithm-driven everything, go against the grain. Support freeform community radio on WTJU and get ready for the Rock coming up in April. Consider a donation at wtju.net/donate.

House Finance Subcommittee kills all three school sales-tax bills

Charlottesville’s plan to invest dozens of millions in public schools conclusively lost one financing source this morning. A subcommittee of the House Finance Committee voted to lay three bills on the table that would have allowed localities to decide if they wanted to raise the sales tax to finance school construction.

Under current law, localities have to ask permission from the General Assembly to hold a referendum in which community members would decide whether to levy the tax. For the past two years, the Democrats held a majority and legislation passed that put the question on the ballot in Danville and Pittsylvania County. Danville approved a one percent sales tax increase with a 60 percent margin, but Pittsylvania voters rejected the tax on a 33 vote margin.

The Republicans picked up seven House of Delegates in that same election, giving them a 52-48 advantage. House Finance Subcommittee #3 has seven members, four of whom are Republicans.

The panel this morning first dealt with SB37 which would add the Isle of Wight County to the list of localities that could hold a sales tax referendum. Senator Tommy Norment (R-3) was the chief patron and he told the Committee that Isle of Wight had a clear plan for how they would spend the revenue. He asked the Committee to allow for a pragmatic solution.

“I came out of local government and in trying to balance my perspectives sometimes between local government and state government, I reflect,” Norment said. “In this instance, the Board of Supervisors in Isle of Wight unanimously supported it. They cultivated support by working through the Chamber [of Commerce] and the Board of Supervisors and there has not been any outcry of objection within the business community about this.”

Norment said if Isle of Wight was not granted this avenue for revenue, there would be a 4.5 cent increase on the county’s property tax rate. However, he said he did not support legislation that would grant every locality the ability to hold such a referendum automatically because not all of them might have plans in place.

“I am adamantly and unequivocally unsupportive of the statewide bill,” Norment said.

William McCarty is chair of the Isle of Wight Board of Supervisors and said that body has not raised the property tax rate for six years.

“The bill before you actually allows the citizens to choose by vote how to pay for school infrastructure in the future,” McCarty said. “The one percent in this bill is outlined for that very thing.”

However, that bill was “laid on the table” which is a parliamentary way of saying it was defeated.

The vote was four to three, with Delegate Bobby Orrock (R-54) explaining his opposition.

“Philosophically I don’t like bifurcating sales tax,” Orrock said. “And to the point of what we have before us I will tell you with my inlaws living in Pittsylvania County, if they have a major purchase to make they don’t make it in Pittsylvania County, they go to Campbell because that one percent differential in sales tax if its a major purchase does make a difference in their shopping pattern.”

Next up was Charlottesville’s specific request for a referendum in the form of SB298 which passed the Senate on a 28 to 12 vote. Senator Creigh Deeds (D-25) is the bill’s patron, which would help finance a proposal to renovate Buford Middle School to add 6th grade as the first step in a major reconfiguration.

“Unlike a lot of localities, there’s a lot of retail in Charlottesville and they expect to generate $12 million a year which will more than service the debt they need to get the work done,” Deeds said.

Subcommittee Chair Kathy Byron (R-22) acknowledged that there is a need to address Virginia’s growing school needs, but she could not support this kind of a tax increase, especially when Governor Glenn Youngkin wants to return $4.5 billion in tax payments back to taxpayers.

“We’re going to have to look at other ways to help localities and to be able to determine how we can do this in a manner that’s beneficial,” Byron said. “We’re trying to return extra dollars at a time that people really need it and it just seems counterproductive to turn around and ask for more.”

Senator Deeds called the measure “self-help” and said it should be up to local voters to decide whether to raise the sales tax to pay for public school improvements.

“This is an issue we’ve been talking about the whole time I’ve been here, more than 30 years,” Deeds said. “We’ve got a dribs and drabs approach and we’ve not moved the ball significantly further in all that time.”

Byron said it was a matter of political differences.

“You represent an area and they may be in agreement with you,” Byron said. “I represent an area that sends us here to vote to hold back on taxes and they don’t want us to become where we have to put everything in a referendum back to them again. That’s what they elected us to do.”

Delegate Sally Hudson (D-57) is a member of the subcommittee and she pled with her Republican colleagues to support the bill in part because a Virginia study group recommended this approach. (recommendations adopted December 1, 2021)

“We do have a [Commission on School Construction and Modernization] and this tool was unanimously approved on a bipartisan basis by that commission so I don’t think we can argue that this was understudied,” Hudson said. “We know that we need many tools in the toolbox and this is one of them.”

Both Vice Mayor Juandiego Wade and Mayor Lloyd Snook spoke in favor of the bill as well.

“Charlottesville desperately needs the authority to pay for a $75 million improvement to Buford Middle School,” Wade said.

Charlottesville has advertised a tax rate increase of ten cents per $100 to help cover the costs of a growing capital budget.

“If we were forced to finance this school project through other taxes it will make it impossible in the next decade for us for example to buy a new fire truck or improve police and jail facilities or redevelop public housing,” Snook said.

Motions to lay on the table are not debatable, and the Charlottesville bill also went down on a 4 to 3 vote despite the testimony.

The final bill was SB472 from Senator Jennifer McClellan (D-9). It would have allowed all localities to proceed with a sales tax referendum. McClellan chaired the Commission on School Construction on Modernization.

“Forty-one percent of school divisions are at or above enrollment capacity for their current building and twenty-nine percent are nearing capacity,” McClellan said. “Over fifty percent of the schools in Virginia are 50 years or older and that number is growing.”

Justin Pope has two daughters at Prince Edward Elementary School, which he said is in dire conditions.

“Our community has had a lot of disagreements but we have consensus, our Board of Supervisors has consensus that this approach to fixing our schools is what we need to do, or at least put to our voters,” Pope said.

Pope said the alternative was a very steep increase in the property tax rate because real estate assessments are low in Prince Edward. His daughter Eliza also testified in favor of the bill.

“Yesterday I counted seven buckets in the gym and saw many more leaks around the school,” Eliza Pope said. “I am also aware that there are two classes in the second grade building which cannot be used because of leaks and mold.”

Byron pointed out that a similar House bill from Delegate Hudson had already been through the committee and it was time to move on.

After the vote, Hudson addressed Eliza Pope and said this was an example of how government works.

“You might rightly wonder what happened here today because you came and you shared your story and you did such a good job,” Hudson said. “And a handful of grown-ups who are leaving right now despite hearing no opposition from any of the other people that we serve chose to vote against that so you might wonder…”

Delegate Byron interrupted Hudson.

“Young people, we think it’s very important that people come and have their voice heard and I want you to note that these Delegates who have to leave have to go see Senators over there who may vote for or against their bill too based on what they think that bill might be. This is how government works. I do support school construction but I just have a different way to get there and I promise Senator McClellan that we’re going to continue those discussions and Senator Norment as well in regards to different ways that we can get funding for our schools.”

Charlottesville’s FY23 will be introduced to City Council on March 7.

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No European nation has attacked another for decades but as I write this, Russian forces have spent much of the past 18 hours been advancing on multiple sites across Ukraine, a country on the Black Sea just to the south of Russia. In the days to come, the shockwaves will reach every part of the globe in ways we do not yet know. This is a pivotal day and it will affect the region covered by Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m your host Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Responses to the invasion from Virginia’s elected officials as well as President Biden

Jefferson Madison Regional Library and the Charlottesville Albemarle NAACP are teaming up with a paid internship program, and the Community Read kicks off this week

Unemployment claims are down sharply since this time last year

The Center for Politics to hold a panel discussion on Ukraine tomorrow

Shout-out to supporters of Town Crier Productions

In today’s shout-out, a shout-out to the shouters-of out! I want to thank all of the individuals and entities that have supported this newsletter and podcast through a $25 a month Patreon contribution or through some other combination of support. Thanks to the Charlottesville Jazz Society, Code for Charlottesville, LEAP, the Rivanna Conservation Alliance, Lonnie Murray and his penchant for native plants, WTJU, the Albemarle-Charlottesville Historical Society, James Madison Regional Library, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards, Cville 350, Piedmont Master Gardeners, and of course, the Valley Research Center. Learn more at Information Charlottesville.

Invasion update

Local and regional government continues today with several meetings about land use and transportation. I’m recording all of them, as decisions made at the local level are crucial.

But I’ve spent today trying to learn more about what is happening in Ukraine, where Russian forces have attacked multiple places. President Joe Biden addressed the nation this afternoon. (watch the briefing)

“The Russian military has begun a brutal assault on the people of Ukraine without provocation, without justification, without necessity,” Biden said. “This is a premeditated attack.”

Biden said in the day and weeks and months leading up to last night, over 175,000 troops were mobilized on Ukraine’s border based on propaganda and mistruths.

“And at the very moment that the United Nations Security Council was meeting to stand up for Ukrainian sovereignty to stave off invasion, Putin declared his war,” Biden said. “Within moments, moments, missile strikes began to fall on historic cities across Ukraine.”

At his briefing, Biden announced new sanctions separate from ones being considered by member states of the European Union, but that the United States is not acting alone.

“For months we’ve been building a coalition of partners representing well more than half of the global economy,” Biden said. “Twenty-seven members of the European Union including France, Germany, Italy as well as the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and many others, to amplify the joint impact of our response.”

To follow that response, there are many other sources. Here are some that I’ve been following today:

The Guardian has been providing live updates since the beginning at this location

The Kyiv Independent is a Ukraine-based media outlet providing on-the-ground updates

I have created a list on Twitter of journalists and others writing about what’s happening

This is a newsletter about the Charlottesville region as well as Virginia.

Governor Glenn Youngkin issued a statement via Twitter condemning the invasion

“Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is an assault on a sovereign nation and will have devastating consequences for Ukrainian citizens,” Youngkin wrote. “This senseless, unprovoked attack undermines democracy worldwide and we must hold Russia accountable. And we pray for the Ukrainian people and for peace.”

In January, Senator Tim Kaine was one of many co-sponsors of the Defending Ukraine Sovereignty Act of 2022 which is intended to place sanctions on Russian financial assets.

“America’s commitment to Ukraine is absolute and has the steadfast, bipartisan support of Congress,” Kaine wrote in a release today. “Make no mistake: Russia’s aggression will continue to have significant consequences, including through additional crippling economic sanctions.”

Senator Mark Warner is the chair of the Senate Intelligence Chair and he told Axios that he’s concerned about the role cyberattacks may play in the coming days.

Fifth District Congressman Bob Good also condemned the invasion, but also took aim at President Biden.

“We have a president who claimed with great bravado on the campaign trail that Putin feared a Biden presidency,” Good wrote in a subtweet. “Now it is clear to everyone, perhaps even to the President Biden, that Putin does not fear or respond to him.”

Seventh District Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger has called for unity in fighting what she called Putin’s war.

“In the hours and days ahead, he must feel the sting of unprecedented sanctions from the United States and our partners around the world,” Spanberger said.

In his comments, Biden pointed out that world markets have turned against Russia in these early days of an uncertain war.

“We’ve already seen the impact of our actions on Russia’s currency, the rouble, which earlier today hit its weakest level ever, ever in history,” Biden said. “The Russian stock market plunged today.”

The next installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement will get back to the usual topics.

Center for Politics to hold panel discussion on invasion

Tomorrow at 3 p.m., The Center for Politics at the University of Virginia will convene a panel discussion of experts on Eastern Europe to provide background for what’s happening in Ukraine. (register)

The program will be conducted in partnership with the UVA Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies and the UVA European Studies Program. The title is “Crisis in Europe: The Russian Invasion of Ukraine.” Here are some of the questions the program seeks to cover:

“What does Putin want? Are Russia’s grievances with NATO and the U.S. legitimate? How should Ukraine respond? How does this affect the United States and the rest of the world? How should President Biden react?”

The program is free but you must register with EventBrite to gain access. The moderator is Chris Krebs, a Resident Scholar at Center for Politics who is the former director of the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

Panelists are:

Dr. Alina Polyakova, President and CEO of the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA)

Professor Jeff Rossman, Director of the UVA Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies

Unemployment filings at pre-pandemic levels in Virginia

It’s been nearly two years since the early days of the pandemic shut many sectors of the economy down completely. Today the Virginia Employment Commission released data for the week ending February 19 and 1,610 people filed new claims, a decrease of 363 over the previous week.

“Over half of initial claims that had a self-reported industry were in administrative and waste services, health care and social assistance, retail trade, professional and technical services, and manufacturing,” reads the press release.

The total number of claims was 7,258, and included a category called “continued claims” which refers to people who have continued to file for unemployment insurance during the pandemic.

A year ago, the number of continued claims was 64,575, making this an 89 percent decrease over last year.

JMRL and NAACP team up to offer paid internship

The Jefferson Madison Regional Library and the Albemarle-Charlottesville NAACP are teaming up to offer a paid internship for local Black students to encourage them to consider library work as a profession. Students are asked to write a 300-word essay on literacy and education as well as academic information. The deadline to apply is April 15, 2022.

“The program offers 200 annual hours of library work experience and a stipend of $3,000,” reads a press release. “In addition, Interns are eligible for an annual scholarship of $2,000 to be used toward completion of an Associate’s, Bachelor’s, or Master’s degree.”

Electronic copies must include the subject “NAACP/JMRL Program” and be submitted to director@jmrl.org. Paper copies may be submitted to Library Director, Jefferson-Madison Regional Library, 201 East Market Street, Charlottesville, VA 22902.

The funding comes from a grant from the Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library.

On Sunday between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library will kick off the Community Read on the steps of the Central Library’s front porch. This year’s book is We Are Not Free by Traci Chee, and free copies will be available at that time.

“A National Book Award finalist for young people's literature, We Are Not Free (2020) is the collective account of a tight-knit group of young Nisei, second-generation Japanese American citizens, whose lives are irrevocably changed by the mass U.S. incarcerations of World War II,” reads a listing on JMRL’s Same Page website.

There will be take-and-make craft activities, BINGO with prizes from the One Small Step program uput on by StoryCorps and the UVA Democracy Initiative. For more information, visit https://jmrl.org/samepage

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Curling is Cool Day. Inconvenience Yourself Day. National Rationalization Day. These are some of the themes supposedly associated with February 23, 2022, another day with a little more light than the one day before. I suppose it is inconvenient that it’s way too warm and there’s no local ice rink to go curling. Instead, dig in for another installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a podcast and newsletter that seeks everyday to emulate the principles of World Understanding and Peace Day.

On today’s program:

Albemarle County Executive Jeffrey Richardson presents a fiscal year budget for FY23 that’s 20 percent higher than the current year

Amazon will build a 1 million square foot fulfillment center in Fishersville

Governor Youngkin signs four more bills into law

Charlottesville’s Parking Advisory Panel further discusses civilian enforcement of parking

First two shout-outs go to good cheer and local media

Let’s begin today with two Patreon-fueled shout-outs. The first comes a long-time supporter who wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

The second comes from a more recent supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, the Crozet Gazette, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

Amazon to open fulfillment center in Fishersville

Governor Glenn Youngkin has announced that the internet distribution company Amazon plans to open a 1 million square fulfillment center in Fishersville, creating 500 jobs where workers will specialize in packing and shipping bulky and large-sized items. The Virginia Economic Development Partnership (VEDP) and the Shenandoah Valley Partnership have been working to secure the project.

“It has been a great pleasure to work with the Amazon team and Augusta County to secure this major expansion by one of the world’s largest corporations,” said Shenandoah Valley Partnership Executive Director Jay A. Langston, Ph.D. “We are excited about the expanded logistics infrastructure that will exist as a result of Amazon’s location.”

Youngkin said the economy is a top priority for his administration.

“Amazon’s new fulfillment center in Virginia is a testament to the Commonwealth’s exceptional infrastructure, competitive business costs, and long-term commitment that I’ve made to make sure we are developing talent and training workers to make Virginia the best state for business,” Youngkin said.

Amazon has over 30,000 full-time and part-time employees in the Commonwealth of Virginia already and recently launched delivery stations in Louisa County and Waynesboro. They opened a robotic fulfillment center at Richmond Raceway in Henrico County and both a delivery center and a “cross-dock fulfillment center” in Stafford County last year.

The announcement is a sign that economic development is bipartisan. Last year, the Shenandoah Valley Partnership worked with the Northam administration and the VEDP to locate:

An Italian cured meats producer to Rockingham County

The expansion of Virginia Industrial Plastics in Rockingham

A distribution center for the restaurant chain CAVA in the Mill Place Commerce Park in Augusta

A factory in Rockbridge County for Modine Manufacturing Company, a company that makes cooling systems for data centers

Expansion of textile-based engineering firm Ryzing Technologies

Learn more about the announcement on Virginia Business.

Youngkin signs four bills

This morning, Governor Youngkin signed four more bills that have passed both houses of the General Assembly.

HB55 will require the State Registrar of Vital Records to provide a weekly update of recently deceased people to the Department of Elections “to promptly cancel the registration of a person on the list.”

HB195 would allow a locality’s registrar to waive requirements for location of polling places if a suitable building cannot be found within legal parameters.

HB386 adds the Arland D. Williams Jr. Memorial Bridge to a list of those where D.C. and Maryland have jurisdiction to clear disable vehicles.

HB971 would grant additional tax relief to Virginia businesses

“Through this bill, Virginia expanded and made retroactive tax benefits related to Paycheck Protection Program loans and Rebuild Virginia grants to ensure COVID-19 aid granted to businesses would not be treated as taxable income,” reads a press release. “Altogether, this bill will save Virginia individual and business taxpayers $201 million in taxes.”

Charlottesville Parking Advisory Panel discusses civilian enforcement of parking

Charlottesville in November 2020 was in a different place, with interim City Manager John Blair at the helm. At that time, the city’s Parking Advisory Panel endorsed a proposal to ask the City Council to transition enforcement of on-street parking limits from the police department to a civilian contractor. (Parking panel supports non-police enforcement, November 18, 2020)

Since then, Blair left the city. Chip Boyles was hired and resigned within nine months, shortly after he terminated former Police Chief RaShall Brackney.

Charlottesville’s Parking Director Rick Siebert told the panel earlier this month that neither the policy or parking enforcement appears to be a priority at this time.

“I’m aware the police have a lot of challenges right now but parking seems to have fallen pretty far down the list,” Siebert said.

Now the interim City Manager is Michael C. Jones, and his primary focus is getting together Charlottesville’s budget for next fiscal year.

“He has not been briefed on this issue at all,” said Chris Engel, the city’s economic development director.

The panel discussed whether they should bring the matter up during the city’s budget development process. Siebert said there would be be no additional revenue, but panel chair Joan Fenton said switching to a civilian firm could free up resources in a department that is understaffed.

“And it would free up the [Community Service Officer] or somebody else to do other duties which they are short-handed for so perhaps it does make sense to present it as part of the budgeting,” Fenton said.

Engel said it was more of a policy issue than a budget one and suggested this was not the right time to approach Jones or Council.

“It might be the type of thing that a citizen could submit as an idea though rather than coming officially from one of you all,” said panel member Kirby Hutto.

The panel then suggested resending its previous letter. Siebert urged them to be realistic until after the city’s FY23 budget is adopted later this spring.

“We only have an acting chief of police and this kind of policy issue is just not on anyone’s radar right now compared to trying to hash out what the city is going to do about its budget,” Siebert said.

Siebert suggested trying again in May. The panel agreed to wait.

Third shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting http://campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Richardson presents $565M “Transform Albemarle” to Supervisors

A strong projection of revenues in Albemarle has led County Executive Jeffrey Richardon to present the Board of Supervisors with a budget for fiscal year 2023 that is twenty percent higher than the existing year. (download the budget)

“This fiscal year’s recommended budget is built to transform Albemarle,” Richardson said.

The property tax rate will remain at 85.4 cents per $100 assessed value. Property assessments in Albemarle are up an average of 8.4 percent in 2022. Sales tax, food and beverage tax, and transient occupancy taxes are up 17.1 percent from FY21.

However, Richardson said not all signs are positive.

“We are mindful that those indicators don’t highlight some of the challenges in the local economy,” Richardson said. “The prices that consumers are paying have risen, they’ve risen by 7.5 percent when comparing January 2022 to January 2021. Gas prices are up nearly 40 percent from where they were a year ago. Participants in the SNAP Supplemental Nutrition Assistance program remain higher than in pre pandemic 2019.”

Richardson said he has had direction from Supervisors to reduce the amount of the county’s budget that is based on the property tax. In fiscal year 2007, sixty percent of Albemarle’s revenue came from that source, but that has increased to 68.5 percent in the current year’s budget.

The budget is built on an increase in the food and beverage tax from two percent to six percent, and an increase in the transient lodging tax from three percent to eight percent. That would match the same rates in Charlottesville.

“Thousands of people visit our community for vacations, sporting events, weddings, and to visit our natural and historic resources,” Richardson said. “We are also a regional hub for commercial activity. Increasing our taxes in these two areas means we can begin to shift revenues away from the people who live here and spread it out more broadly to those who are visiting our community.”

The budget also anticipates lowering the personal property tax rate by 86 cents due to a sharp increase in the valuation of used vehicles.

“We’ve been given the authority for a local cigarette tax which went into effect in January,” Richardson said. “A plastic bag tax which we will be exploring in the coming months.

Richardson highlighted several areas of new spending in the budget.

A Community Response Team will be created to respond to “individuals in crisis with a cross-functional team” consisting of social workers, police, and firefighters. The funding source is the cigarette tax authorized by the General Assembly in recent years.

“Depending on the details of the call, this team will adapt their response to best meet the critical needs of the person, ensuring the safety of all parties involved,” Richardson said. “This program responds to a troubling growth in mental health call services that have unique needs.”

The capital budget for fiscal year 2023 anticipates spending the highest one-year amount in county history. In fiscal year 2006, the figure was $23 million and the Albemarle population was around 91,400. Now the population is estimated at 114,424 and the recommended capital budget for next year represents a need to catch up.

“For fiscal year ‘23 the recommended capital budget is approximately $93 million and I would like to note that in 2010 and in 2011 these years were impacted by the Great Recession and in 2021 by the pause in the capital program due to the pandemic,” Richardson said.

A fire engine at Pantops Station 16 will be operated 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

“Seven days a week to further support the strength of the fire rescue system and to reduce reliance on Charlottesville Fire for calls east of the City,” Richardson said

The capital budget also has funding to increase space to address increasing enrollments in Albemarle public schools.

“The budget recommendations will over the next five years advance three new public school projects to address capacity needs within our school system,” Richardson said. “Two elementary schools. One in the northern feeder pattern and one from the south, and a second high school center.”

Biscuit Run Park will be opened with five miles of trails and athletic fields.

“This is a 1,200 acre natural park within the county’s development area and it will provide a park experience unlike any of our other parks, combining the natural features of our rural parks with athletic amenities that you’d expect in an urban park,” Richardson said.

In recent years, Albemarle has been putting money into a line item to match other sources of funding.

“This budget recommends continued investments in our transportation leveraging program which provides local funding to draw down state funding for road and bike and pedestrian improvements,” Richardson said.

Some of the American Rescue Plan Act funding will be used to pay for the cost of some urban Albemarle properties to be connected to the sewer system.

“There is a connection cost that can be out of reach for many homeowners,” Richardson said. “The proposed program will provide fiscal support to low-income households in making that shift as the age of these homes and the infrastructure attached to them is reaching a tipping point where the failure of a septic system in the urban area presents a real environmental health hazard.”

Other aspects of the budget:

There’s a four percent market adjustment for staff

The county will pick up funding of the Yancey Community Center once a grant from the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation expires.

The county will fund a microtransit project on Pantops and the Places-29 area

Work to implement the Housing Albemarle plan will be paid for through a combination of the budget surplus

The public hearing on Richardson’s recommended budget will be held virtually on March 2. Work sessions will be held throughout that month before a public hearing on the tax rate on April 27 and the version of the budget marked up by Supervisors. Approval is set for May 9.

Supervisors had a few comments in advance of the public hearing next week. Several expressed concern that action in this year’s General Assembly may affect the budget.

It will be the first budget for new Supervisor Jim Andrews (Samuel Miller).

“A lot of times I’ve always been advised that when you try to figure out what’s a priority in any organization it’s not to ask what they’re doing but what they’re not doing,” Andrews said.

Supervisor Ann Mallek (White Hall) has been through over a dozen budget cycles so far, including during the Great Recession when the capital budget was slashed.

“That reduction of $100 million in new projects three and four years in a row is why we have the backlog that we have,” Mallek said. “We are making a valiant effort at catch-up with available one-time money that is a once-in-a-lifetime generational thing to have at hand.”

Supervisor Donna Price (Scottsville) praised staff for reducing the personal property tax.

“We talk about using equity and inclusion in our decisions and your proposal here to reduce the personal property tax provides an across the county truly equitable calculation of relief for our community members,” Price said. “We do have so many people who are in tenancies and almost everyone has to rely on their vehicle for transportation because of the nature of our county being so rural in so many areas.”

More to come in the very near future.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Two is the only even prime number, an odd fact to point out on this February 22, 2022. We are twenty days past the predictions of large rodents and less than a month away from the spring equinox. Time does move fast, but we’re still only 14.5 percent of the way through the year. Oh, the things you’ll learn in every installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement! I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Albemarle County Supervisors discuss incentives for developers to build housing units below market rate

Midway Manor may have a new future in which part of the downtown Charlottesville property will remain age and income restricted

A round-up of planning for other affordable housing projects in Charlottesville

Albemarle County wants state regulators to require CenturyLink’s successor to maintain old copper telephone lines

And Charlottesville wants the public to get a zoning 101

Patreon-fueled shout-out to LEAP

Pandemic update: Percent positivity below ten percent

The waning of the omicron surge of COVID-19 continues as the Virginia Department of Health reports a seven-day average of positive PCR tests of 9.6 percent, below ten percent for the first time since December 21. Case loads are still high, with a seven-day average of 2,423 new cases a day. Today the Blue Ridge Health District reports another 168 new cases.

Deaths associated with the omicron surge continue to be recorded. As of today there have been 401 total COVID deaths in the Blue Ridge Health District and 18,230 statewide over the past 23 months.

Albemarle County offers comments on transfer of CenturyLink assets to Lumen

This week, the State Corporation Commission is holding two meetings on a petition from Lumen Technologies to take over control of CenturyLink. Among the public comments submitted so far is the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors who sent a letter on February 10 summarizing concerns they made to Lumen officials at a January 12 meeting. As part of the deal, the new company would acquire copper-based assets and the county wants to make sure that service continues. (hearing webpage)

“Many of our vulnerable communities live in the rural areas of our county, where topography and distance often preclude cellular coverage,” the letter reads. “For these residents, this copper-plant is a vital lifeline for accessing 911 service, particularly during and after severe weather events.”

The letter also includes dozens of complaints about CenturyLink service for “terrible and ineffective customer service” and for a lack of maintenance of older equipment. (letter and complaints) (second set of complaints)

For anyone interested in learning more, there is a whole repository of documents available for public review, including Lumen’s petition to the SCC.

Midway Manor subject of new affordable housing development

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority will hold a public hearing next Monday on the issuance of up to $23 million in bonds that would be used by a California-based company to redevelop Midway Manor. In January, the property sold for $16.5 million, more than double its 2022 assessment of $7.5 million.

According to a legal notice published in the Daily Progress, the new company has requested the CRHA issue up the exempt facility bonds “to assist the Applicant in financing or refinancing a portion of the costs of acquiring, constructing, renovating, rehabilitating and equipping an age restricted affordable housing development to be known as Midway Manor Apartments, to consist of 94 one-bedroom units and 4 two-bedroom units.”

The notice states in capital letters that taxpayer funds will not be sought to pay back any of the debt that Standard Midway Manor Venture LP will incur. To learn more about exempt facility bonds, visit the Legal Information Institute at the Cornell Law School.

Since February 1, Midway Manor is now under management by the Franklin Johnston Group. Financing of the houses is provided by the U.S. Department of Housing through the Section 8 program, which bases rents on the income of tenants.

In an email this morning, CRHA Executive Director John Sales said the agency’s only role will be to issue the bonds.

Low-Income Housing Tax Credit applications underway

We are in the season when providers of affordable housing are preparing applications for Low Income Housing Tax Credits in advance of a March deadline. Summaries have been sent to the agency formerly known as the Virginia Housing Development Authority and that’s required notifications to localities. (read all of the summaries)

Piedmont Housing Alliance is seeking credits for 30 rental units at the Monticello Area Community Action Agency property on Park Street. These will be four one bedroom units, 22 two bedroom units, and four three bedroom units.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority seeks credits from the housing authority pool for 60 units for Phase 1A of the Sixth Street redevelopment with half of them being one bedroom and the other half being two bedroom units.

This is separate from Phase 1 of the Sixth Street redevelopment, for which CRHA is seeking credits from the housing authority pool for 44 units with eight of them one bedroom, 20 two bedroom units, and 16 three bedroom units.

CRHA is also seeking credits for 113 units in the second phase of redevelopment of South First Street. These would replace existing units and would consist of 19 one bedroom units, 38 two bedroom units, 26 three bedroom units, 15 four bedroom units, and 15 with more than four bedrooms.

Last week, the company that is constructing the development of Friendship Court issued a press release announcing the groundbreaking from January. The firm Harkins is based in Columbia, Maryland.

“Friendship Court’s redevelopment will be the largest construction of low-income housing for the area in over 20 years,” reads the release. “A multi-phased project, Phase 1 will consist of 106 units with buildings 1 and 2 totaling 35 stacked townhome-style units, while building 3 will include a one-level structured parking garage and three levels as a wood-framed, center corridor apartment building.”

The project is being built to Passive House standards and will be Harkins’ third such project.

Charlottesville releases Zoning 101 presentation

The next new information in Charlottesville’s rewrite of the zoning code won’t be available until mid-April when staff and Rhodeside & Harwell will publish a document with an inventory of the existing housing stock versus what could be built under the new future Land Use Map. This will take the form of a Diagnosis report and an Approach report.

In the meantime, the city and the Cville Plans Together team has published a new page to provide an education on what the zoning process is all about.

“Today’s zoning also has a number of flaws and barriers to development previously identified by City planning staff, elected and appointed officials, and others,” reads the Cville Plans Together website. “This process is an opportunity to cure these flaws and remove the barriers to the kind of development that is described in the updated Comprehensive Plan.”

In January, a group of anonymous Charlottesville property owners filed suit in Charlottesville Circuit Court seeking to overturn the validity of the Comprehensive Plan. Read more in my January 12, 2022 story on that lawsuit.

Shout-out to the Charlottesville Jazz Society

In today’s second subscriber-supported public service announcement: The Charlottesville Jazz Society at cvillejazz.org is dedicated to the promotion, preservation, and perpetuation of all that jazz, and this Sunday the Society is sponsoring the return of Jane Bunnett and her all-female band from Cuba, Maqueque. A concert will be held at 7 p.m. at Unity of Charlottesville where Maqueque will play music from their latest release On Firm Ground/Tierra Firme. Get tickets online with discounts for students or members of the Charlottesville Jazz Society.

Albemarle Supervisors discuss incentive package for housing

Last July, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted a housing plan that seeks to increase the number of units guaranteed to be rented or sold below the market rate. Housing Albemarle was adopted without a system of incentives to developers to keep those prices lower than they otherwise would be. That came back to the Board on February 16.

Albemarle Housing Coordinator Stacy Pethia has suggested creation of an overlay district in the zoning code that would allow for reduced fees and other waivers in exchange for creating lower-priced units.

“We did engage with developers and we had four meetings with developers between June and October of last year,” Pethia said. “During the first two meetings, staff listened to developer concerns and discussed housing policy goals. Based on that feedback collected during those meetings and research into incentive programs implemented in localities within Virginia and across the country, staff developed a list of potential incentives that could be in a package.”

The overlay would be restricted to Albemarle’s development areas and would be optional, meaning developers would not have to participate. If they did, there would be the possibility of many ways their bottom line could be assisted.

“They would offer a bonus density, reduction in building permit fees, and flexibility in design and parking standards,” Pethia said.

The overlay would also allow developers to bypass the zoning process in some places if they build to the maximum density allowed in the Comprehensive Plan. At a minimum, twenty percent of units would need to be kept below market rate at levels identified in Housing Albemarle.

“And the number of affordable units to be required would be calculated prior to applying the density bonus,” Pethia said. “This would provide developers with additional market rate units to help offset the cost of making the affordable units available.

The incentive plan will also address a gap in Albemarle’s current policy by creating a waiting list of people who will qualify for below-market opportunities based on their income.

“It’s really difficult to market the affordable units to income-qualified households and that’s really an important issue,” Pethia said. “It has meant that many of our for-sale units in particular have turned market-rate without being purchased by income-qualified households.”

In public comments before the discussion, Neil Williamson of the Free Enterprise Forum wanted waivers for affordable housing projects to be mandatory rather than at the discretion of staff.

“The reality is that Albemarle’s fast diminishing development areas where the easiest parcels to develop have been developed,” Williamson said. “That means parcels left to develop will likely require a special use permit. While the policy anticipates this reality, the opportunity for staff denial is too great.”

Williamson also said he wanted more robust incentives such as expansion of the development area as well as the county paying the hook-up fees to the Albemarle County Service Authority for water and sewer.

“Considering the importance of affordable housing to the community, certainly providing $20,000 per affordable unit is not too much to ask,” Williamson said.

That would be expensive to the county. Pethia said the recent approval of Premier Circle, Rio Point, and RST Residences created 414 below-market units. If the developers were to be 100 percent reimbursed, that would cost the county $5.6 million.

Supervisors were asked if they supported the idea of an overlay. Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley said she did, but not want to expand past a certain area.

“I for one do not want to see development go into the rural areas and to keep development in the development area,” LaPisto-Kirtley said.

Supervisor Chair Donna Price (Scottsville District) said there will come a point in time when that boundary will be adjusted, but not yet.

“We’re already at the point where we have to fill in more, build up higher, or we have to expand the development areas so it’s important for community members to understand we have to look at ways to try and achieve all of our objectives which includes as long as possible limiting the amount of the development area,” Price said.

Price was also skeptical of reducing parking standards at this time.

“We do not have a comprehensive transportation system that can get everyone throughout the community wherever they need to do,” Price said.

Supervisors approved the Rio Point on 27 acres in late December which will see a total of 328 units in an apartment complex on land that is currently undeveloped. That’s in the Rio District which is represented by Supervisor Ned Gallaway. He had looked at the draft calculation for bonus density.

“So Rio Point, if I’m understanding the answer, would have allowed 1,300 units the way the math was done?” Gallaway asked Pethia.

“That is correct,” Pethia said.

That would be based on provisions in other programs that grant a 45 percent increase in density based on the gross density. The actual calculations will change as the incentive package is further tweaked.

Gallaway suggested having the overlay apply only in certain parts of the county, such as those already identified in small area plans such as the Rio Road plan. However, he added he is not opposed to any ideas at this point in the development of the incentives.

Supervisor Jim Andrews (Samuel Miller District) said he wanted staff to take a deeper look into the results that have happened in other communities that have created developer incentives.

“I would be really interested in hearing more about looking not only at what they’re doing but how successful they are at what they’re doing,” Andrews said. “Loudoun County’s proposals for example, their program I guess has been in place long enough to have a little bit of history. It looks to me like it’s having some success. Those are the ones we want to emulate if we can, if they work for our circumstances.”

Supervisor Ann Mallek (White Hall) said she needed more information and for detail.

“I am very concerned about an overlay that applies to every piece of direct because there is a great difference between the capability of one lot versus another to actually accomplish something and have a product where people would want to live,” Mallek said.

Staff will return to the board with more information at a later date but Supervisor Gallaway pointed out that the package’s adoption will take until after the one year anniversary of the adopting of Housing Albemarle.

General Assembly update

With just over three weeks to go, action is moving fast in the General Assembly, with bills that passed in one house with a close partisan vote now meeting their fate in committee meetings.

These include:

The Senate Commerce and Labor Committee killed a bill yesterday to cap the minimum wage at $11 an hour. The vote was 11 to 4. (HB296)

That committee also defeated a bill to not move forward with subsequent increases mandated by a previous General Assembly. That vote was 12 to 3. (HB320)

A bill to allow employers to pay less than the minimum wage if they have fewer than ten employees was also defeated 12 to 3. (HB1040)

Bills to restrict collective bargaining by public employees were also defeated. (HB336) (HB337) (HB341) (HB883)

The Senate Committee on Education and Health ended consideration of a bill that would made it easier for School Boards to dismiss new teachers by extending probationary periods. (HB9)

The Senate Judiciary Committee defeated a bill that would have reduced penalties for violating the state’s concealed weapon laws on a 10 to 5 vote. (HB11)

On a 8 to 7 vote, the Senate Rehabilitation and Social Services Committee ended consideration of a bill that would have required the parole board to review the transcript of the trial for each incarcerated person up for parole. (HB435)

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We have already been through seven Saturdays in 2022, and this is the eighth. There are 45 left until 2023, but so much more has to happen before we get there. For now, it’s perhaps best to take a breath, take a look at the horizon, and figure out ways to make whatever time we have count. Charlottesville Community Engagement appears to be obsessed with counting, and determined to make sense of as many of the variables as possible. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

Governor Youngkin wants to return $4.5 billion to Virginia taxpayers

The omicron chapter of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to wane as temperatures warm and the days get longer

If you want to report some crimes to Charlottesville police, you’ll have to do it online

Nelson County’s administrator is set to retire after 24 years in the position

A quick look at the General Assembly

First shout-out goes to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting http://campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Pandemic update: Omicron cases continues to recede

A new approach to the public health response to the pandemic is now with us in Virginia, as a new administration continues to undo the previous one had taken to take public steps to try to stop the spread of COVID-19.

On Friday, the waning of the omicron surge is reflected in the latest snapshot of numbers. The seven-day average was 2,846 a day on Friday, down from a high of 26,175 on January 8. As of today, Virginia hospitals report 1,334, down from a high of 3,948 on January 18.

Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia, said omicron is the dominant strain at the moment.

“The majority of people have some level of immunity to it,” Dr. Sifri said. “We can anticipate that we should continue to see this downward trend of cases. The open questions after this are: How long is that immunity? How robust is it? Is there a difference in it if you’ve been infected with omicron or if you maybe have had omicron infection and have been vaccinated? And finally, what other variants may read their heads?”

Another question is if there will need to be a booster for omicron. A lot of it depends on how long immunity will last.

“And that’s going to be not clear and there may be some differences depending on different populations,” Dr. Sifri said. “If the at-risk factor is for severe infections, maybe that is going to be different if you don’t have those risk factors.”

On March 1, new legislation goes into effect that will allow parents of public school students to opt out of mask mandates. Dr. Sifri said as omicron continues to wane, there are multiple mitigation measures such as vaccination.

“I think it really is important to remember that the virus has humbled us along the way but we also understand that two years into this pandemic there is probably a right-sizing that needs to occur as we combat the challenges of this virus,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri acknowledged that vaccination is still not available for people under the age of 5 and the immunocompromised are also more at risk.

On Wednesday, the Virginia Safety and Health Codes Board voted 7 to 3 to rescind workplace safety rules adopted in July 2020 to protect employees. That according to a report from Bloomberg Law. Governor Youngkin issued an executive order on January 15 directing the board to study the rules with an eye toward removing them. Read through the agenda to get a deeper sense of what was discussed. (meeting page)

The death toll from that surge has been slowly increasing. Fatalities from COVID often take some time to be fully recorded. On Friday, the Virginia Department of Health reports there have been 18,016 deaths in Virginia over the past 23 months. On January 18, that number was at 15,822.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, the death toll stands at 386 for its six localities.

When the second anniversary of the pandemic arrives, I’ll still be counting out the numbers.

Youngkin wants to return tax money to Virginians

Governor Glenn Youngkin has sent a letter to the chairs of the General Assembly’s money committees that signals another different approach to government.

“The bottom line is taxes paid to the government are soaring and the revised revenue forecasts estimates the Commonwealth will collect $1.25 billion more in the current fiscal year,” Youngkin wrote to Delegate Barry Knight and Senator Janet Howell.

Knight chairs the House Appropriations Committee and Howell chairs the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee.

Youngkin said that is on top of the $3.3 billion that was added to the state’s revenue forecast in December under former Governor Ralph Northam. An agreement on the budget is needed by March 12, and Youngkin wants the General Assembly to “return” $4.5 billion to taxpayers.

“The stunning amount of money being collected from taxpayers is the direct result of over taxation,” Youngkin wrote.

In all, the economic forecast states that there is around $13.4 billion in unanticipated revenue, and Youngkin said that would still allow $9 billion to “invest in schools, teachers, law enforcement, behavioral health” and other priorities.

Youngkin’s letter also casts doubt on the actual health of the economy and states that these revenue increases should not be seen in a positive light. He made several claims to back this point including:

Virginia has seen a net out-migration of 100,000 over the past eight years, citing the U.S. Census Bureau’s State to State Migration Flows

Virginia has lost 74,000 jobs over the past five years, citing data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis but no specific source.

“Virginia is 42nd in the country when it comes to the recovery” but the claim does not link to a specific source.

“We have a labor shortage due to lack of population growth and too many people sitting on the sideline while there are 300,000 job openings, nearly 100,000 more than when we entered the pandemic,” citing the November 2021 Virginia Job Openings and Labor Turnover report produced by the Virginia Employment Commission.

“Virginia is 30th in cost of living overall,” according to the 2021 Missouri Economic Research and Information Center’s Cost of Living Data Series

There are a lot of statistics that can be used to describe the economy and the people who live and work in a civilization.

Virginia had a 2.9 percent increase in gross domestic product (GDP) between the second and third quarter of 2021, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The nationwide average was 2.3 percent and Virginia outperformed North Carolina, Kentucky, and South Carolina.

Nelson County administrator stepping down

Nelson County is now looking for people to run two of its top positions. The county is already looking for a new School Superintendent, but there’s vacancy at the top of the general government.

County Administrator Stephen Carter will retire on July 31 after 24 years in the position. During that time, two elementary schools and a middle school were built, and the high school on U.S. 29 was renovated. According to a press release, other achievements include construction of the Piney River Water and Sewer project, construction of the Blue Ridge Railway Trail, and establishment of the universal broadband commitment and accompanying involvement in the Regional Internet Service Expansion (RISE) project.

In addition, since 1998 the county has begun paying for some emergency rescue personnel to supplement volunteers, a business park was established in Colleen, and Nelson became the first rural tourism program in the Commonwealth to be accredited by the Virginia Tourism Corporation.

Charlottesville Police Department to adjust service calls

Staffing shortages in the Charlottesville Police Department have led to a decision to change responses to some service calls. According to a release sent out yesterday, people will need to fill out an online form for several non-emergency requests including annoying phone calls, littering, lost property, suspicious activity, and vandalism. Some forms of larceny and fraud will also need to be reported online rather than through a phone call.

“Officers will continue to respond to emergency calls and crimes in progress,” reads the release. “As it relates specifically to past larcenies, officers will still respond in person to larcenies of firearms and vehicles.”

The release states the department is down 24 percent in personnel.

“Shift supervisors are making every effort to manage the resources available and prioritize calls for service based on the severity of the incident and impact on the community,” the release continues.

Meanwhile, officers in the department do continue to make arrests. A review of open data in the past week shows arrests for violation of an emergency protective order, a domestic assault, credit card larceny, burglary, contempt of court, and a fourth incident of a specific individual driving while intoxicated.

Shout-out to the National Sporting Library and Museum

In today’s subscriber-fueled shout-out, if you’re interested in learning more about the birds around us, the National Sporting Library and Museum has a virtual event for you coming up on February 24. Jennifer Ackerman, the author of the Genius of Birds, will explore the brilliance of birds and delve into the mysteries of the avian brain. Ackerman as she shares her global adventures into the genius of birds. Learn how birds make and use tools, teach each other skills, count, navigate, create art, perform astonishing feats of memory, communicate, and even pass along cultural traditions.

The author will be joined by two top officials from the Wildlife Center of Virginia, an organization that has helped nearly 90,000 wild animals from every corner of Virginia. Center President Ed Clark and Senior Vice President Amanda Nicholson will bring along Ambassador Animals. The program is free and available via Zoom or Facebook like. Drop a line to info@nationalsporting.org for a link, or visit the National Sporting Library and Museum on Facebook.

General Assembly check-in

There is less than a month to go before the close of the 2022 General Assembly. Since my last quick check-in, several more bills that passed the House of Delegates have passed the Senate, and Governor Youngkin has signed one additional piece of legislation.

Bills that will go to Youngkin’s desk include:

HB165 would allow issuance of over $100 million in bonds for “revenue-producing capital projects” at Virginia Tech and James Madison University.

Localities would be able to convey real estate with outstanding debts and liens to a land bank under HB298. Currently that land must go to a public auction.

HB971 would bring Virginia’s taxation system into conformity with the Internal Revenue Service.

Governor Youngkin has signed a bill (HB828) that expands eligibility for a program that helps subsidize producers of dairy products.

Several bills have passed the House of Delegates and await action in the Senate.

A bill preventing public school teachers from teaching “divisive concepts” (HB787) passed the house on a 50 to 49 vote. It will now go before the Senate Committee on Education and Health.

A bill that would prohibit drop-off boxes for absentee ballots passed the House on a 52 to 47 vote and will now go before the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee. (HB34)

A bill to reduce the window for voting absentee in person passed the House on a 52 to 48 vote and is also before that Senate committee. (HB39)

A bill to get a patient’s written consent before an abortion passed the House 52 to 48 and is before Senate Committee on Education and Health. (HB212)

A bill to allow religious exemptions to vaccination mandates passed 52 to 45. (HB306)

A bill to exempt religious institutions from state declarations of emergency passed 51 to 46 and will go before the Senate General Laws and Technology committee. (HB775)

A bill to alter the rules for collective bargaining for public employees passed 53 to 47. (HB336)

A bill to allow public colleges and universities to create lab schools passed 52 to 48. (HB346)

A bill to exempt businesses under ten employees from Virginia’s minimum wage requirements passed 54 to 46 and will go to the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee. (HB1040)

A bill that would prohibit public schools from denying participation in extracurricular activities due to nonpayment of school meals passed 75 to 25. (HB583)

A bill to exempt food for human consumption and personal hygiene from sales tax passed the House on 80 to 20 vote. That now goes to the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee. (HB90)

A bill that would create a program to educate hotel operators and staff on anti-human trafficking measures passed unanimously. (HB258)

Bills from the Senate in the next edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Round and round and round we go on this 333rd installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. Where will we stop? In about 16 minutes if you’re listening to the podcast. If you’re reading it, that would depend on your pace, I suppose. Either way, this is February 17, 2022 and we are indeed one third of the way to a thousand editions of this program. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs, and I hope to be here for all three of the years it may take to get there.

On today’s program:

An update on former City Manager Tarron Richardson’s lawsuit against Charlottesville City Council

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District is working on two major housing initiatives

A round-up of what’s happening in TJPDC communities

Louisa Supervisors gets an update on water supply plan for Zion Crossroads

A closed-door group gets an early look at the University of Virginia’s master plan

First Patreon-fueled shout-out goes to the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s first subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes this winter and spring to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. The next event is February 22 at 7 p.m. when tree steward Emily Ferguson will help you look beyond the monotonous winter forest by focusing on the finer details that will help you differentiate between species of trees. Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org. (register for the February 22 session)

And in the second shout-out, there’s still a long-time supporter who wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

Visit infocville.com and click on the Support the Info button to find out how you can support the show and get a shout-out!

Richardson lawsuit update

Both sides in a federal lawsuit filed by a former city manager against Charlottesville City Council have filed extensions requesting more time to file the next round of legal responses.

Dr. Tarron Richardson sued Charlottesville City Council and several individuals by name in the Western District of Virginia last November alleging that the city had denied his first amendment rights by not allowing an op-ed to be published in the Daily Progress months after his resignation in September 2020. In addition to Council, former City Attorney John Blair, current City Attorney Lisa Robertson, former City Councilor Heather Hill, and former Mayor Nikuyah Walker are all named in the suit.

Before resigning, Richardson had signed a release and waiver governing his $205,000 in severance that included a mutual non-disparagement clause.

On January 26, an attorney for Lisa Robertson filed a motion asking for the suit against her to be thrown out. (read the motion)

“The complaint does not state a claim against Robertson, as she did not personally deprive Plaintiff of his First Amendment rights,” reads that motion. “Plaintiff waived his claims against the City, as well as its employees and officials by signing the release.”

The motion also states Robertson has qualified immunity and cannot be sued as a private individual. It goes on to refute Richardson’s claim that his publication of the op-ed was stopped by Robertson. Instead, the motion states the then interim city attorney warned Richardson’s counsel twice in February 2021 that the city could pursue action if he broke the non-disparagement clause.

On February 8, Richardson’s attorneys filed a motion requesting more time to respond to Robertson’s request to be dismissed, a request granted by Judge Norman K. Moon on February 11.

Charlottesville has hired Richard Milnor to represent the city and he filed a motion on January 20 requesting more time to respond to the initial complaint. On February 11, Milnor asked to have until February 28 to respond. Judge Norman K. Moon granted that extension.

Yesterday, the suit turned 90 days old which triggered a notice to Richardson’s attorney that summons have not yet been served to Heather Hill, Nikuyah Walker, John Blair, or Robertson. Only the city of Charlottesville has received a summons.

Land Use, Environment and Planning Committee to meet tomorrow

A regularly-scheduled closed door meeting of planners from Albemarle, Charlottesville, and the University of Virginia is scheduled for tomorrow, and materials are now available from the last meeting.

The Land Use, Environmental and Planning Committee (LUEPC) was created after November 2019 when the public Planning and Coordination Council which consisted of elected officials was disbanded. The group also consists of officials from the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority.

In January, they got two briefings from the University of Virginia’s Office of the Architect. One was an update on the UVA Grounds Framework Plan, which is a master plan for UVA. The public Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization got the same presentation a week later. (view the presentation)

See also:

UVA announces three sites for affordable housing projects, December 14, 2021

MPO Policy Board briefed on the UVA Master Plan, February 1, 2022

The second presentation was a four-slide review of the three sites the University of Virginia has selected as locations for up to 1,500 affordable housing units that would be build in partnership with a private developer. These are at the North Fork Discovery Park, Wertland Street, and the Piedmont site on Fontaine Avenue. Of those three, a rezoning application has been filed with Albemarle County for the North Fork site. (download)

Third shout-out goes to Code for Charlottesville

Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects such as an expungement project with the Legal Aid Justice Center, a map of Charlottesville streetlights, and the Charlottesville Housing Hub. Visit codeforcville.org to learn about those projects.

TJDPC Roundtable: Fluvanna and Nelson both updating Comprehensive Plans this year

To conclude the show today, let’s return to the February 10 meeting of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Let’s start with a couple of staff reports.

The TJPDC will work with a nonprofit partner to help prevent evictions through a pilot program with funding from the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. (DHCD)

“It’s $250,000 for Charlottesville and Albemarle County,” said executive director Christine Jacobs. “That grant actually will have a subrecipient and that will be Piedmont Housing Alliance and that will allow them to hire an eviction prevention case manager as well as a landlord outreach manager which was what we requested in the grant application.”

Last year, the city of Charlottesville used $300,000 from American Rescue Plan Act funding to pay Legal Aid Justice Center to also work in the area of eviction prevention. Jacobs said the TJPDC used that funding as a local match to secure the DHCD grant.

The TJPDC is also administering a $2 million grant from Virginia Housing to actually construct units. Jacobs said requests for proposals have been received and there three entities have been selected to proceed.

“We will then have those three priority applicants submit their formal applications with all of their documentation and then a review panel will look at the feasibility of the project,” Jacobs said.

Jacobs said the TJPDC Commissioners will be shown a recommendation at their meeting in April.

Last year, the TJPDC completed a regional housing plan which has chapters for each of the six jurisdictions. Keith Smith represents Fluvanna County on the TJPDC Board. (plan website)

“We’re starting our comp plan process and it looks like we’re going to be leaning pretty heavily on the work that the Regional Housing Partnership has done,” Smith said.

Greene County Supervisor Dale Herring said his locality continues its separation from the Rapidan Service Authority. That entity did not want to proceed with Greene’s vision to create a new reservoir for an urban water supply.

“For those who don’t know, we’ll stay with it until we actually own our own water authority,” Herring said.

Greene County has recently created its own emergency medical services department and has offered to pay for full time firefighters. However, there may be an issue.

“We had one fire department that has asked originally for four staff members,” Herring said. “They came back and asked for seven.”

Herring said the county continues to hope to supplement fire service with volunteers, but numbers are dwindling.

The TJPDC meetings are also an opportunity for urban communities to brief rural ones on trends that may affect them in the future. City Councilor Michael Payne shared information about the fundamentals informing the creation of the budget for next fiscal year.

“We got our assessment increases and the average assessments were up eleven percent,” Payne said. “We’re beginning budget discussions and to afford everything currently in our budget, on top of that 11 percent increase will require a ten cent real estate tax increase.”

The major driver is the renovations to Buford Middle School as a major plank in school reconfiguration, as well as an $10 million commitment to affordable housing projects.

“So we are going to have to have some difficult, honest, and realistic conversations over the coming weeks about how to get our budget working,” Payne said.

Another difficult conversation will be had when the public process related to the upgrade of the zoning code begins later this year. Planning Commission Chair Lyle-Solla Yates is a new member of the TJPDC and he said Rhodeside & Harwell and internal city staff are working on a review.

“They’re doing an analysis of what we’ve got versus what our Comprehensive Plan says we need,” Solla-Yates said. “It’s going to be a big project and it’s going to be difficult. We should have something I’m recalling, an initial assessment in mid-April and once we have that we will go into public process and people will share their thoughts and feelings on zoning which is always a good thing.”

Nelson County faces a lot of changes and challenges, according to Jesse Rutherford. He’s chair of both the Nelson Board of Supervisors as well as the TJPDC. A Comprehensive Plan review is soon to get underway.

“And trying to figure out it is we can thrive as a community, which leads into the bigger thing which is even more important than the Comprehensive Plan - zoning,” Rutherford said. “How do you define things in rezoning? I think affordable housing has to be radically looked at and radically approached as opposed to pandered by the respective demographics in power. At the end of the day its about making sure that everybody and every income bracket has a place to live.”

Rutherford said Nelson has many more people who are opting to work from home, and the county’s pledge for universal broadband by 2024 could accelerate a trend.

“And we’re starting to see a change in the conversation of what does the future of a rural county look like,” Rutherford said. “Obviously preserving rural is such an interesting thing. Is it preserving trees? Is it water? For some people it’s culture.”

That housing plan also has information for Nelson County. The TJPDC next meets on March 3.

Louisa Board briefed on new intake for Zion Crossroads water supply

Staying regional to conclude this installment. The Louisa County Board of Supervisors got an update this Monday on the efforts of the James River Water Authority to secure a final permit to proceed with a plan to build a waterline between the James and Zion Crossroads for an urban water supply. One site for an intake is seriously contested by the Monacan Indian Nation because it on a major historical site called Rassawek. Archeological work has been conducted on a nearby site.

“[GAI Consultants] who are the Authority’s current archeology consultant is very close to finalizing a phase one archeology report on alternative 1C and they are doing that in conjunction with Gray & Pape who are the Monacan’s selected archeologist so that’s a good team effort and that report is finished,” said Louisa County Administrator Christian Goodwin.

If the Monacans agree, the JRWA will apply for a permit for that location from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as well as the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.

“The attorney for the Monacan Indian Nation attended last week’s JRWA meeting and voiced the Monacan’s intent to continue supporting the project if the conditions are met, and those conditions being that we worked with their archeologist Gray & Pape and that no evidence of burials were found and that appears to be the route we are proceeding upon right now,” Goodwin said.

The JRWA is next scheduled to meet on March 9.

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Speaking of dubious holidays, it’s Do a Grouch a Favor Day which seems quite appropriate for these times. It’s also Innovation Day and National Almond Day, both of which I am skeptical are actual holidays. Who gets to decide? I hope you’ll decide that every installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement is worth spending time on a brief civic holiday. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

While Charlottesville Parks and Rec still working to open one pool, they’re seeking to outsource operations of another

A former Albemarle officials will help administer broadband expansion in her new position at the Thomas Jefferson Planning District

The Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce releases a report touting various collaborations

A committee recommends that Broadus Wood Elementary keep its name

And a quick snapshot of the General Assembly with one month down, one month to go

Patreon-fueled shout-out to LEAP

Climate report: January was sixth hottest on record

This past January was the 6th hottest in 143 years of recorded climate history, according to a new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). January was also the 445th consecutive month with above-average temperatures. The data is collected by the National Centers for Environmental Information. (read the release)

Snow cover in the northern hemisphere is about average as was tropical activity. However, the polar sea ice coverage was at the second-smallest in January in 44 years of record.

Another study from NOAA reports that the United States coastline will see at least a foot rise in seal level by 2050. That amount would usually take a century, but the new Sea Level Rise Technical Report uses the latest data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The report said the increased water level will mean heavier flooding inland and states that reduction in greenhouse gas emissions could slow the rise.

General Assembly: One Day After Crossover

Someone who happened to take a look this morning at the statistics for the 2022 Virginia General Assembly would have seen signs of Crossover Day, the day when hundreds of bills fail because they were not approved by the House in which they originated.

As of 8:25 this morning, 959 out of 2,543 introduced bills have now failed. That number is up sharply from the 351 on Monday morning. The figure will likely shoot up higher now that the Republican controlled House of Delegates will consider bills that passed the Democrat controlled Virginia Senate, and vice versa.

There are 597 House bills pending in the Senate, and 489 Senate bills waiting for action in House committees.

The House has passed one Senate bill. That’s SB739 which would allow parents permission to have their children not wear masks to stop the spread of COVID-19 while on school property. Governor Youngkin is expected to sign that legislation later this afternoon but amended it to state that this new parental power school won’t go into effect until March 1 for those school systems that want to continue the mandate.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,030 new cases today and the percent positivity is up slightly to 11.4 percent.

Chamber of Commerce releases collaboration report

The second anniversary of the pandemic is approaching and almost every organization across Virginia have been transformed in some way. The Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce has released a report highlighting some of the partnerships it has undertaken during the challenging times.

These include Venture Central, a project to help encourage regional entrepreneurship fueled by a $300,000 grant from GO Virginia. Other parties include Albemarle, Charlottesville, and the University of Virginia.

There’s also the Leadership Charlottesville program, where people from different positions come together for a series of lessons and training about the community. The program was not held in 2021 due to the pandemic but will relaunch this September with support from the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia and the Center for Nonprofit Excellence. A sneak peak is being held on March 9 where you can learn more about the application process.

Another Chamber initiative is the Charlottesville Area Development Roundtable (CADRE) which works to influence land use policy. Last year their work was focused on the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan, which was adopted by Council in November. This year that group will work on the zoning rewrite that is now underway.

Other Chamber programs include the Minority Business Alliance, the Hospitality Professionals Roundtable, and the Defense Affairs Committee.

On Friday, the Chamber will present their first ever State of the Community at the CODE Building. Registration has been closed.

Parks update: No date yet for Smith Aquatic reopening

Charlottesville’s Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center has been closed for nearly two years, but not all of that is related to the pandemic. When everything shut down in March of 2020, the facility had been expected to be closed for at least $1.8 million in repairs to try to finally fix lingering air quality issues. Smith had been expected to open back up last year, but the work wasn’t complete. The goal is for it to open this spring. Vic Garber is the deputy director of the Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Department.

“We are still working diligently with facilities maintenance to make sure that all of the boxes are checked and to make sure that once we open that darned thing it is going to be safe, it is going to be a good experience, and I would like to say a magical experience,” Garber said.

Work is also underway to make sure the pool can be staffed. Garber said several new lifeguards have been hired this month. He said there was no date yet for when Smith will open.

Last summer, the outdoor pool at Meade Park was closed due to staffing issues. This Monday, the city issued a request for proposals for companies to take over the operations of the pool.

“We’re striving to get more staff,” Garber said. “We need more than just a handful of lifeguards to get Onesty open. We need 60 to do that safely and effectively.”

If the city proceeds to go in that direction, the vendor would be responsible for hiring that staff and for maintaining the pool.

“There are five or six really well-acclaimed vendors in the nation that do that,” Garber said. “They go in. They actually do it in Fredericksburg. They do it in Asheville, North Carolina.”

This would just be for Onesty Pool, which Garber said is the busiest facility in the city’s pool system.

“Because of all of the whistles and bells that we have and blind spots, we need more guards there than any place,” Garber said.

Proposals are due on March 15. There are renovations underway at Onesty to repaint all of the water features and to update the 13-year-old facility.

There’s been a sharp uptick in usage of the city’s parks in the past two years. Riaan Anthony is also a deputy director of parks and recreation.

“I am looking at creative ways in terms of how do we meet the demand because trends have dramatically shown us that once the pandemic started, people started using the parks more and more and more,” Anthony said. “And the trend has just continued.”

That means more wear and tear on the parks, and Anthony said there’s a need to keep standards up. He’s considering outsourcing several services such as horticulture and landscaping because there is a struggle to fill existing positions.

If you’re interested in a new job or know someone, take a look at the city’s jobs board.

Anthony also said that the city needs to replace several playgrounds as they are over 20 years old.

“According to the [Certified Playground Safety Inspector] standards, 20 is your cut off,” Anthony said. “You need to replace it. That’s like the last end limit and we have a few.”

First up will be Meade Park and Belmont Park. Anthony said public input sessions will be held to get feedback from community members.

A nonprofit group is fundraising to build a playground in Pen Park, as we learn from parks planner Chris Gensic about Bennett’s Village.

“Bennett’s Village, which is a nonprofit group that’s proposing to fundraise and construct and effectively donate to the city an all-inclusive, all ages playground,” Gensic said.

Gensic said there will be a public input process for that as well on March 15. There will be a public input meeting for Tonsler Park on March 22.

Gensic is a member of the stakeholder group planning for a pedestrian and bike bridge over the Rivanna River to connect Pantops and Woolen Mills. The deadline is approaching for an application for Smart Scale funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation and there are two potential sites for where the western end of the bridge will land.

“And we’re discussing pros and cons and getting public input from a variety of people about if it landed at Riverview Park what would be the pros and cons of that that?” Gensic said. “If it landed at Market Street down by the Woolen Mill, what would be the pros and cons of that?”

To learn more about the options, visit the Thomas Jefferson Planning District’s website. You’ll find a survey there. The Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization will hold a special meeting on March 10 at 1 p.m. to review the options and make a selection.

Shoutout to UVA Lifetime Learning

In this subscriber supported shout-out honoring Black History Month, fifty years after the Civil War and Emancipation, there was still a great need to educate Black people in the rural areas in the south, including Albemarle County. From 1912 to 1932, Booker T. Washington and Julius Rosenwald built more than 5,300 schools, including the St. John Rosenwald in Cobham, northeast of Charlottesville. This school educated Black children until 1954, and fell into disrepair but still survives. Efforts to restore the school as a community center are bearing fruit, and on Thursday, February 17, UVA Lifetime Learning will feature two speakers who will help tell that story and the importance of honoring the past while preparing for the future. Join St. John alumna Rebecca Kinney and preservationist Jody Lahendro at 3 p.m. Visit engage.virginia.edu to sign up for this virtual event!

Broadus Wood Elementary School may retain name

A committee that is evaluating whether the name of Broadus Wood Elementary School should be changed is recommending that it remain. In October 2018, the Albemarle School Board directed Superintendent Matt Haas to review all the names in the division to see if they still are consistent with school values.

Broadus Ira Wood was a farmer who donated the land for the Earlysville area school in 1905 and the committee felt “he advanced education opportunities for African American and rural students.”

The Albemarle School Board will consider their recommendation later this month.

Paul H. Cale Elementary School became Mountain View Elementary School on July 1, 2020. Sutherland Middle School was renamed Lakeside Middle School a year later, but Virginia L. Murray Elementary retained its namesake in 2021. The Community Public Charter School is now the Community Lab School. Jack Jouett Middle School will become Journey Middle School on July 1.

Former Albemarle finance official now working for regional body

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District is one of 21 such entities in the Commonwealth of Virginia and is charged with assisting “local member governments, partners, and stakeholders with a variety of technical and program services.” Active projects include the aforementioned Rivanna River bridge as well as the Urban Rivanna Corridor Plan. Last year, the agency adopted a regional housing plan that offered tailored recommendations for each of the six jurisdictions.

The TJPDC is also the lead agency for the Regional Internet Service Expansion project, a $288 million public-private partnership to expand broadband involving several counties, the Rappahannock and Central Virginia Electric Cooperatives, and Dominion power.

The project will be administered by Lori Allshouse, who spent many years as a top management and budget official in Albemarle County.

“Lori is a seasoned and dedicated public administrator who has a track record of building and maintaining partnerships and years of experience working with local, state and federal funded programs, projects, and initiatives,” said Christine Jacobs, the executive director of the TJPDC.

Allhouse said she’s glad to be on board.

“I just want to say throughout my career in Albemarle County I have always been super impressed by the commission, with its staff and the leadership and all its done for its member jurisdictions in the regional community where we all live,” Allshouse said.

Learn more about the RISE project in this article by Allison Wrabel in the Daily Progress.

The work is consistent with the TJPDC’s vision.

“The vision is to be the intersection of ideas, partnerships, and support, creating a cohesive regional community,” Jacobs said. “The comparative advantage of the TJPDC is that we can help bring together different jurisdictions in order to coordinate across jurisdictional lines.”

Other organizations got their start under the TJPDC umbrella. These include Jaunt, the Piedmont Housing Alliance, the Central Virginia Partnership for Economic Development, the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless, and the Jefferson Area Board for Aging.

Support the program!

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A $75 gift card to the Downtown Mall

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There is no holiday today, at least not officially. For the most part, there’s nothing special about today at all, unless you have a lot of love… for local and regional government! If so, this and every other installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement will take aim at your heart, mind, or wherever in your metaphorical sense of self where new information is supposed to go. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs, trying to look whatever the opposite of cherubic is.

On today’s program:

Governor Glenn Youngkin issues a PSA asking people to get vaccinated but stops well short of a mandate

Charlottesville City Council transfers some federal money for a sidewalk to fire prevention measures

A General Assembly wrap-up before Crossover Day

A survey is now available seeking input on two options for a pedestrian bridge across the Rivanna River

A very brief update on Charlottesville’s zoning update

Shout-out to Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards

In today’s subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes winter and spring to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. The next event is February 22 at 7 p.m. when tree steward Emily Ferguson will help you look beyond the monotonous winter forest by focusing on the finer details that will help you differentiate between species of trees. Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org. (register for the February 22 session)

Governor Youngkin asks Virginians to get vaccinated

This morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports an average of 3,783 new COVID cases and the seven-day percent positivity has dropped to 11.1 percent. That’s down from 19.7 percent a week ago. In the Blue Ridge Health District today there were 46 new cases and the percent positivity is at 14.6 percent. The Virginia Healthcare and Hospital Association reports 1,676 patients in hospital with a positive COVID test. That’s down from 3,845 a month ago.

As of today, 70.9 percent of Virginia’s total population is considered fully vaccinated, but a smaller portion of that number has received a booster or third dose. That figure is 2,754,159. Today Governor Glenn Youngkin launched a public service announcement encouraging people to get a vaccine, but that he will do nothing to require that anyone get one.

“In Virginia, there’s a better day right around the corner,” Youngkin said. “I won’t mandate it but the vaccine is the best way to protect our loved ones, our lives, and our livelihoods.”

Youngkin said he and his family decided to get the vaccine.

“While the vaccine won’t completely prevent you from contracting COVID-19, it makes it far less likely that you will be hospitalized or die from the virus,” Youngkin said.

Last week, the CDC released a study indicating that those who have only have had two doses likely have their immunity fade after four months, but more study is needed to determine the efficacy of the booster or third dose.

This morning the University of Virginia Health System announced that additional visitation will be once again allowed at various facilities. A press releases this is due to decreasing COVID cases. Visitors must wear a mask at all times and and cannot have any symptoms or contagious diseases. Public spaces including cafeterias and lobbies remain closed. Visit the UVA Health website for more details.

Route 151 / U.S. 250 roundabout construction

Construction of a roundabout at the intersection of U.S. 250 and Route 151 in Albemarle County is moving ahead. This week, a section of Route 151 in northwest Nelson County will be closed overnight to allow installation of pipes for three waterways to be temporarily diverted during the project’s construction. According to a release, traffic will be detoured using Goodloe Lane and Old Turnpike Road from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. each night.

The project is one of several funded in the second round of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process. Smart Scale is a system that funds projects based on a series of criteria including decreasing congestion and improving public safety. The application lists the reasoning for the project.

“US 250 is not able to handle overflow when incidents occur on I-64 resulting in significant delays,” reads the application.

Other Smart Scale projects funded that year include changes to I-64’s exit 118, conversion of exit 124 to a diverging diamond, and a roundabout at the intersection of Proffit Road and Route 20.

Applications for Round 5 are currently being prepared. For more information on what the candidate projects are, visit the Smart Scale site on the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

Rivanna pedestrian bridge survey open

One of those 5th round candidates is a pedestrian bridge across the Rivanna River to connect Woolen Mills and Pantops. Two choices are being reviewed by a stakeholder committee who will make a recommendation to the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization. A survey is now open through March 4 to gauge public feedback.

Visit the TJPDC’s website for more information.

See also:

Rivanna bridge options narrowed to two, January 12, 2022

Decision point looming for Rivanna bike and pedestrian bridge, February 2, 2022

Charlottesville zoning update

Charlottesville has begun the process of updating the city’s zoning code to reflect both an affordable housing plan and a Comprehensive Plan that seeks to increase the number of places to live within city limits. An internal review by city staff took place on Thursday, according to Neighborhood Development Services Director Jim Freas.

‘We’re slowly building up,” Freas said. “The first product is a diagnostic and approach report. Things will really ramp up once that’s released. We are targeting a mid-April date for the release of that report.”

Mark your calendar. Meanwhile, Albemarle County’s Comprehensive Plan review kicks off this week with three pop-up events and a virtual meeting on Thursday. Read the Week Ahead newsletter for more information.

See also:

Charlottesville zoning rewrite to begin this year, January 12, 2022

A portion of Franklin Street sidewalk funding going to pay for fire prevention kits

Later this week, a task force appointed by City Council to make recommendations for how federal Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds are spent will meet. Earlier this month, Council agreed to reallocate money a previous task force had opted to spend on a sidewalk on Franklin Street in Belmont, but less than staff had suggested. (staff report)

Erin Atak is the city’s grants coordinator.

“On January 14, 2021, Charlottesville was found to be noncompliant for the second consecutive year with CDBG requirements,” Atak said. “The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development] noted that Charlottesville’s lack of spending performance was an issue.”

Atak said the city receives about $400,000 a year in CDBG funding from HUD and they want it to be be spent within a certain time. Based on the recommendation of a task force, Council selected the sidewalk project and its scope was much bigger than originally anticipated. The goal right now is to address the timeliness issue.

“By May, the city is required to spend approximately $227,973,” Atak said.

Atak said the money can be used to address the COVID-19 pandemic. When she sent around an internal request to city departments to see if they had any projects that would fit the bill, the Charlottesville Fire Department had a project to spend $217,200.

“The Fire Department listed several housing maintenance activities which included smoke alarms, carbon monoxide alarms, stove top fire-stop installation and CPR-assist devices, all of which are HUD-eligible, could meet City Council priorities to provide homeowner rehab, and entitlement funding in the Ridge Street and Belmont priority neighborhoods,” Atak said.

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook asked if the balance could be given to Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville for their projects on Nassau Street. Atak said that projects that receive federal funding are subject to much more scrutiny, and the money would not be spent in time.

Snook pushed.

“I mean, is that something where it’s ‘come on, if someone just pushed the pedal to the metal we can make this happen’, or is it ‘come on, this is the federal government you’re talking about.’ In other words, how serious is the risk this doesn’t get done if we suggest the money should go to that cause?”

Two members of city staff responded in unison.

“It’s very serious,” Atak sad

“It’s very serious,” said Alexander Ikefuna, the city’ interim director of the Office of Community Solutions.”

Councilor Sena Magill said she supported this use of funding, especially for carbon monoxide detectors which she said the Fire Department often can’t provide.

“It’s one of those things that keeps getting kicked off down the road and whenever the Fire Department has a little extra somewhere, they try to put it into this,” Magill said. “And keeping houses from burning down is a way to keep them affordable, too.”

Councilor Michael Payne expressed concern about how this information was presented to the elected body.

“I don’t think the process was adequate enough to feel like I was presented with options to choose from,” Payne said. “I feel a little boxed in in terms of being presented only one option and given this point in this process. That boxing in to make one decision. I do feel like this was a wasted opportunity to at least evaluate and look as a policy option for Council at possible expenditures on vitally needed affordable housing needs.”

To that end, Council opted to spend less money than staff had suggested with $140,585.49 to the Fire Department rather than a higher amount recommended. Councilor Payne still voted no.

Shout out to the League of Women Voters Natural Resources Committee

In today’s second subscriber supported public service announcement, the Natural Resources Committee of the League of Women Voters of the Charlottesville Area wants you to know a webinar coming up on Tuesday, February 15, at noon. They’ll talk about Renewable Sources of Electrical Power: Challenges and Promises. How can we develop renewable sources without endangering our ecological systems? The seminar will feature Dan Holmes from the Piedmont Environmental Council and Jeff Hammond with Apex Clean Energy. They’ll address some of the complexities in switching utility scale electric power from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Register for the Zoom and get ready to learn!

General Assembly update

We are one day from Crossover Day in the General Assembly, so let’s check the statistics before the action begins today! This was up to date as of 7 a.m. this morning.

A total of 2,501 bills and resolutions have been introduced, and 351 of them have been killed through various actions. Another 143 will come back in 2023. The Senate’s passed 592 pieces of legislation and the House of Delegates has passed 572.

The Senate has passed four bills from the House of Delegates that have already crossed over, but the House of Delegates has yet to do the same. Those bills include a non-controversial bill that would require the State Registrar of Vital Records to update the Board of Elections once a week of people who have died so they can be removed from the voter rolls. (HB55)

Other bills that have passed the Senate and require House passage include:

A bill to require absentee ballots to be sorted in the precinct where the voter lives as opposed to a central district passed the Senate unanimously, (SB3)

Localities would be required to provide data to the state once a year on emergency sheltering capabilities if SB60 passes. The Senate passed it unanimously.

Martinsville voters will decide whether to revert to town status in a bill that passed the Senate 32 to 8. (SB85) A similar bill (HB173) passed the House on a 82 to 18 vote and is before the Senate Local Government Committee.

The Town of St. Charles in Lee County would be terminated under SB589 which passed unanimously. (SB589)

Sports betting establishments and casinos won’t be able to use the phrase “Virginia is for Bettors” under SB96, which passed the Senate unanimously.

A bill to create the Virginia Black, Indigenous, and People of Color Historic Preservation fund passed the Senate on a 30 to 10 vote. (SB158)

A bill to require those who display a Farm Use tag on their vehicle to get it from the Department of Motor Vehicles passed the Senate unanimously. (SB186) Similar legislation has passed the House of Delegates. (HB179)

Currently several localities in the James River watershed have combined sewer and stormwater systems which results in effluent to be released into waterways. The Senate passed a bill on a 36 to 4 to speed up the deadline to change that from 2035 to 2030. (SB354)

In 2020, the General Assembly passed legislation requiring the creation of a Marcus Alert system that would alert public safety responders of a person’s mental state so that a non-violent response could be made by trained mental health specialists. The Senate passed a blll unanimously to clarify that participation by localities would be optional. (SB361)

Hazing that leads to someone’s death would be a class 5 felony under SB440, which passed the Senate on a 30 to 10 vote.

The Department of Corrections would need to convene a work group to review fees charges to inmates for various services such as telephone use, meals, and medical records if this bill also passes the House. The Senate approved it on a 31 to 9 vote. (SB441)

Under SB491, the Virginia African Diaspora Advisory Board would be established to advise the Governor on ways to increase trade and cultural exchange between Virginia and African nations. The passed the Senate unanimously.

A bill to allow for recall elections for certain officers passed the Senate on a 21 to 18 vote. (SB495)

A bill to create a grant program to help localities develop wildlife corridor plans and implement them passed on a 29 to 10 vote. (SB707)

Now let’s go to the House of Delegates.

Virginia law currently states that elementary and secondary students cannot be considered to be engaged in disorderly conduct if they’re on school property. HB89 would change that to refer to kindergarten through 8th grade, paving the way for high school students to be potentially be arrested for “public inconvenience, annoyance, or alarm, or recklessly creating a risk thereof.” That passed the House of Delegates on a 52 to 48 vote.

Virginia has a shortage of mental health beds. HB105 would study the transformation of Catawba Hospital into a facility for substance abuse treatment and recovery services. This passed the House on a 99 to 0 vote.

Currently, invasive plant species can be sold in Virginia. Under HB314, the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services would need to develop signage to be given to retailers to point out the benefits of native plants and the hazrds of invasive ones. This passed the House 99 to 0.

A bill to allow parks authorities the ability to install electric vehicle chargers passed the House on a 94 to 6 vote. (HB443)

A bill to allow home-schooled children the ability to play in public school sports passed the House 50 to 49. (HB551)

Stealing catalytic converters would be a Class 6 felony under HB740 which passed the House on a 69 to 30 vote.

A bill to require voters to present a photo ID before casting a ballot passed 52 to 48. (HB1090)

A bill to require School Boards to hold a public hearing before adopting cultural competency requirements passed 51 to 48. (HB1093)

Seventh and eighth graders in public school would have to undergo at least one hour of personal safety training in physical education class if HB1215 makes it through. The House adopted it 99 to 0.

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With each passing day, there’s a little more light at the beginning and end of the period in which the sun illuminates our portion of the world. There are 36 days until the time when light and dark is more or less equal. What will happen between now and then? Charlottesville Community Engagement aims to tell you as much as possible. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

It’s free to sign up and get all of the content!

On today’s program:

Legislation to make mask mandates meaningless in schools is poised to pass the Virginia General Assembly

Albemarle County is briefed on the potential threat of the Spotted Lanternfly

Charlottesville City Council is briefed on how floodplains are classified, and then votes to approve a rezoning on Nassau Street to allow more residential density

And Charlottesville Economic Development continues tracking retail vacancies across the city

Shout-out to Camp Albemarle

Located on 14 acres on the banks of the Moorman’s River near Free Union, Camp Albemarle continues as a legacy of being a Civilian Conservation Corps project that sought to promote the importance of rural activities. Camp Albemarle seeks support for a plan to winterize the Hamner Lodge, a structure built in 1941 by the CCC and used by every 4th and 5th grade student in Charlottesville and Albemarle for the study of ecology for over 20 years. If this campaign is successful, Camp Albemarle could operate year-round. Consider your support by visiting http://campalbemarleva.org/donate.

Pandemic update

As the weekend begins, the waning continues. Yesterday the Virginia Department of Health reported a percent positivity of 13.7 percent, down from 23.2 percent eight days earlier. On January 11, that figure was 36 percent.

“We are now in a period of time where we are seeing the highest cases of COVID beginning to come down,” said Dr. Kyle Enfield of the University of Virginia Health System. “And these are the highest cases we’ve ever seen, including among our children. And unfortunately some of these children have had long term outcomes that have been related to COVID as well as deaths.”

In Virginia, there have been eight deaths in people under the age of 10, and 10 deaths of people under the age of 20. There have been 131,327 reported COVID cases in people under the age of 10, and 204,234 under the age of 20.

“And we do know that masking and vaccines have been our best defense at preventing more spread of COVID during all of the pandemic,” Dr. Enfield said.

This week, the Virginia Senate passed a bill on a 21-17 vote that would prohibit localities from requiring students to wear a mask in school. The same bill (SB739) was reported out of the House Education Committee on Friday on a 12 to 10 vote. Here’s what it says:

“The parent of any child enrolled in a public elementary or secondary school, or in any school-based early childhood care and education program, may elect for such child to not wear a mask while on school property,” reads the bill.

Dr. Enfield said that may be premature from a public health perspective.

“While I’m very hopeful for a future where we can stop wearing masks as part of our daily lives, I don’t think the time is there yet,” Dr. Enfield said.

People who are not vaccinated contract COVID at a rate 4.6 percent more than those who have had their shots, according to the latest data from the Virginia Department of Health. Partially vaccinated people contract at a rate two times higher.

Those trends show up close to home, too.

“The most salient thing I think people should take away is that the people that we see in the [intensive care unit] right now, which is about a third of our cases, only one of them was vaccinated and boosted and that person is immunocompromised,” Dr. Enfield said. “I think that speaks to the importance of vaccinations ongoing in preventing serious illness.”

Visit the Blue Ridge Health District’s website for information about getting vaccinated.

Charlottesville vacancy study

The city of Charlottesville has completed its latest analysis of commercial property and has found a vacancy rate of 5.23 percent. That’s up slightly from July when the last report from the Charlottesville Office of Economic Development was compiled.

“The retail property in the City of Charlottesville is showing slight signs of rebounding from the negative impacts felt since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, “ reads the report.

Barracks Road Shopping Center has a vacancy rate of 9.3 percent and the Downtown Mall has increased to 3.7 percent since July. The Corner is at 3.28 percent, Seminole Square is at 12.96 percent. Both Preston Plaza and McIntire Place are both full.

The peak vacancy of 9 percent on the Downtown Mall was recorded in July 2009 and January 2010 at the height of the last recession. Notable vacancies include the spaces that formerly housed Bashir’s Taverna and Fellini’s.

Since the last study last summer, new stores on the way include a new location for Bebedero in the former Downtown Grille space. A restaurant called Botanical Fare will occupy the former Java Java space. Read the report for more details.

Nassau Street rezoning yields four additional units

Charlottesville City Council has taken action on a rezoning on the eastern edge of Belmont, six weeks after asking for more information. The previous Council had held a public hearing for a request to increase the zoning from R2 to R3 on property that some claimed was unsafe for development. They wanted more information about the property’s relationship with the floodplain.

(See also: Council seeks floodplain info before Nassau Street rezoning, December 22, 2021)

On February 7, City Engineer Jack Dawson prepared a briefing for the five elected officials, including two members who just joined.

“There was a fair bit of community members who expressed concern over the flood risk associated with the rezoning including some varying information about floodplain mapping and some other resources about water surface elevation for the one percent annual exceedance event,” Dawson said.

One percent annual exceedance is another way of saying 100-year flood, a term that can be somewhat misleading because such heavy volumes do in fact happen more frequently. Properties that are prone to flooding can still receive insurance through a program monitored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency [FEMA]

“The city agreed to partner with FEMA as floodplain managers when we signed on to the National Flood Insurance Program,” Dawson said. “City property owners get access to insurance through the NFIP exchange and in return we agreed to create a floodplain development ordinance with a series of minimum standards.”

The property on Nassau Street is within the one percent exceedance zone, colored light blue on the city’s GIS viewer. That’s different from the floodway which is marked with red and blue stripes.

FEMA officials determine where those boundaries lie and make periodic reviews, but property owners can appeal based on evidence. This is a process known as the Letter of Map Revision, or LOMR.

“The city is the gatekeeper for determining LOMR validity,” Dawson said. “A LOMR should improve or correct the existing model or improved methods. It’s our job in engineering as the floodplain administrators to make sure it is technically sound.”

An application for this property was made to FEMA in October 2014 and sent it on for the city for their comments. However, Dawson said in this case, the technical comments from engineering were not captured in the revision.

“The 2017 LOMR. whether or not engineering agreed with it at the time, is the model that informs the flood plain,” Dawson said.

He also said that engineering doesn’t usually get involved during a rezoning.

“But when a site plan is submitted, we look to make sure it meets all codes and they can be in the flood plain as long as they’re built one foot above the flood elevation,” Dawson said.

Dawson said there is a risk in building in the floodplain, and many have done so. There are 266 lots that have structures are in the floodplain.

“It’s a high risk area,” Dawson said. “Living there, there’s some implicit risk with that and more people living in the flood plain means there’s more risk taken on as a city.”

Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook said he had had concerns about the process after they were brought up. But, he said he arrived at a conclusion after many conversations.

“The decision that we are being asked by some folks to make here is not a proper decision for us to make at the rezoning phase,” Snook said. “That does not mean that that if we grant the rezoning that it’s necessarily going to pass the site plan review.”

Developer Nicole Scro said that by-right, they would build three duplexes on the property. The rezoning would allow more units to be built, which would bring down the cost of each to the people who will live there.

“The composition of the units is smaller units and we’re doing that to save on construction costs so we can hit lower rents,” Scro said. “That’s the purpose of this rezoning.”

Scro said she understood the concerns, but said she felt confident about the flood risk. The structures will be built at 327 feet above sea level.

“And then we’re going to have three feet of crawl-space and another foot of subflooring so the finished floor elevation will be at 331 approximately,” Scro said.

Council voted 5-0 to agree to the rezoning.

This isn’t the end of the story with flood modeling.

Charlottesville is beginning to develop a new flood model for the Moores Creek watershed to better understand hydrological processes. This is being paid for by the state government with proceeds from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

See also: Charlottesville awarded $153K for flood study from RGGI funds, October 6, 2021

Shout-out for an upcoming talk on birds

Albemarle briefed on spotted lanternfly

As program manager for Plant Industry Services at the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, David Gianino leads the state’s efforts to fight threats to native plants that could harm whole industries if left unchecked.

“And we have many different pest programs where we work with invasive species to mitigate either their spread or their impact here in Virginia, and in 2021 unfortunately Spotted Lanternfly has made its way to Albemarle County,” Gianino said.

That was in July 2021 when a plant inspector found multiple life-stages along the Rivanna River near a railroad.

Gianino told the Albemarle Board of Supervisors on February 2 that the Spotted Lanternfly can severely damage apples and grapes.

“It is a piercing, sucking, mouth-part insect and it sucks phloem and sap from the stems of these trees which can negatively impact yield and can impact the quality of a fruit that relies on lots of sugar content,” Gianino said. “They swarm and feed very intensely in the fall and that can also impact how nice the grapes are, how good a wine it makes.”

The spread of Spotted Lanternfly is due to it being a hitchhiking bug that jumps onto modes of transportation. Originally from China, the bug arrived in Pennsylvania in 2014.

“It doesn’t traditionally fly but it will glide and it jumps on to cars, trucks, gravel, buses, anything that moves it will jump onto and that’s the primary way it gets around,’ Gianino said.

Gianino said the swarms can also affect other property owners because it is unpleasant to be around. He said if not addressed, this can affect agribusiness and especially agritourism.

“The sheer number of insects that pest can create in an environment is astounding,” Gianino said.

The spread of the spotted lanternfly is compounded by another invasive species known either as alanthus or Tree of Heaven.

So far, populations in Albemarle County are not as high as they are in the Winchester area, where a quarantine was established in 2019 and expanded to Clark and Warren counties last summer.

“The quarantine requires business owners to obtain a permit and inspect all materials that are stored outside as well as trucks, trailers and vehicles that travel outside of the quarantine area,” reads a site set up to provide information for Winchester area residents.

“I believe we have opportunities here to prevent this from happening [in Albemarle] because we do now have better tools,” Gianino said.

Gianino said the site in Albemarle was treated with pesticides. Trees were injected with substances to prevent further infestation.

“We’ve placed traps, we’ve scraped egg masses, and we plan to do a thorough survey there next year and continue treatment to try and mitigate this population,” Gianino said.

There are no natural predators here and Gianino said they do not taste very good to other species.

Gianino said early detection is key to addressing any invasive species and people who make a sighting are asked to report it to local extension offices so the extent of the spread is known across the Commonwealth. They also want people to seek out resources:

Best Management Practices for Spotted Lanternfly in Yards and Landscapes

Homeowner Tips and Inspection Checksheet

More on the Plant Industry Services page for more resources

Also, kill it.

“We tell people to stomp, scrape, squish the spotted lanternfly and then report it,” Gianino said.

See also:

January 14, 2021: Charlottesville hires Chip Boyles as City Manager

October 14, 2021: Boyles resigns as Charlottesville City Manager; Friendship Court agreement reauthorized by EDA

Council selects Marc Woolley as the latest interim City Manager

Unite the Right organizers owe millions in damages; Former City Manager Richardson sues the city over disparagement clause

First 2022 bills filed

The General Assembly doesn’t begin for another six weeks, but the first bills have been pre-filed. Two of three bills filed in the House of Delegates are charter requests for two towns to amend their charter to move municipal elections from May to November, and a third would remove the sunset date for a sales exemption on the sale of gold, silver, and platinum bullion.

In the Senate, there are five bills so far. One would require the Virginia Employment Commission to establish a family and medical leave program, one would require school principals to report incidents to law enforcement, and another would require absentee ballots to be sorted by precinct. Another would limit the time a Governor’s executive orders could last under an Emergency Declaration, and another would require votes of the Parole Board to be individually recorded under the Freedom of Information act.

The General Assembly convenes on January 12.

(view pre-filed bills)

Scottsville Holiday Happening

Earlier this year, the General Assembly adopted legislation allowing localities to create Designated Outdoor Refreshment Areas (DORA) where ABC licenses can be granted in the public realm. That means people can move from establishment to establishment while carrying alcoholic beverages in a designated cup.

Several localities across Virginia have passed local ordinances allowing such events. This Saturday, the Town of Scottsville will offer this ability during A Holiday Happening. According to Town Administrator Matt Lawless, this is the third time the DORA has been used.

“I was interested to kind of follow the progress of this setting up in state law,” Lawless said. “It originated with a neat mix of communities around the state from far Southwest to Richmond looking at how they could promote tourism and support their Main Street businesses.”

Lawless said Scottsville has so far held an event to promote an art opening in September.

“We had a Virginia of the Arts grant for installations in vacant storefronts,” Lawless said. “Folks can take out the food and drink and stroll around outside.”

A second event held at Halloween for a puppy parade on Valley Street and Main Street. Lawless said these are not tailgate parties, and people can’t bring their own beer. The permit just allows people to consume beverages off premises.

“So maybe what you’ve seen in the past on these events is like an outdoor event with a strict perimeter defined like with a snow fence,” Lawless said. “We don’t have to do that anymore. The drinks are labeled where they came from in a disposable container. So if we were checking on what is that and where did you get it, you could point to the licensed restaurant where you got it.”

Lawless said sandwich boards suffice to mark the boundaries of the DORA. This Saturday’s event runs from 10 a.m to 8 p.m. with the ABC permit in effect from 1 p.m. to 8 p.m

“If you’re ever visited a European Christmas Market, it might be kind of like that where we’ve got have the special farmer’s market with special arts and craft sales, musicians playing on sidelots, and then hot cider and mulled wine for sale at our restaurants that you can take up and down the street,” Lawless said.

Lawless said a safety plan is created for each event and reviewed by ABC to make sure there are enough people on staff to help with public safety.

In the summer, Charlottesville City Council was briefed on the idea but it was met with a lukewarm response with some Councilors concerned with unequal treatment.

This story came about due to a story in the Cardinal by Megan Schnabel that takes a look at how Danville, Roanoke, and the town of Tazewell have used this ability for events. (read the story here)

Let’s have a second Patreon-fueled shout-out.

Albemarle capital planning

Albemarle County’s budget process for Fiscal Year 2023 continues on Friday with another meeting of the Capital Improvement Program Advisory Committee. The group consists of two Supervisors, two School Board members, a Planning Commissioner, and a member of the public who happens to be a former Planning Commissioner. (view the presentation)

“I suspect that each of us have items on the not-included plan that we’d like to see moved up but it is a balance,” said Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District. “We cannot do everything.”

Perhaps when you think of capital projects, big items like schools and sidewalks come to mind. The next CIP in Albemarle will likely have an item called Core Systems Modernization which will seek to speed up how the county does business. Andy Bowman is the chief of budget in the Finance and Budget Office.

“The technology systems that we use across the county government are disjointed, they’re antiquated, and they don’t allow the community to interact with our government in a way that we expect,’ Bowman said. “Over the next few years, we’re going to be embarking on new financial systems, new human resources systems, and new community development systems related to systems that are connected and enhance our customer and our employee experience.”

The job of the CIP Advisory Committee is to help staff develop the five-year program. There’s a target of about $131 million in funding that may be available through FY2027.

“For funding in Fiscal Year 2023 to 2027, there is a total of $457 million in projects that was requested,” Bowman said.

The budget chief also gave a status report on projects under way.

“There is $151 million in projects that are currently appropriated and underway from prior years that extend into Fiscal Year 2023 and beyond.”

Those projects include sidewalk installation, the Southern Convenience Center in Keene, and upgrades of the county’s General District and Circuit court in downtown Charlottesville.

Future projects that are waiting to be funded include further phases of Biscuit Run Park, future school capacity expansion, and a convenience center in the northern section of Albemarle.

Supervisor Bea Lapisto-Kirtley suggested one item she wanted more information on.

“As far a project, I would like to make sure that at Darden-Towe our soccer fields are taken care of, upgraded, and when I say upgraded, regarding natural grass and putting in what needs to be done there to make sure that that’s a good playing field,” Lapisto-Kirtley said.

Assistant County Executive Trevor Henry said a previous project had anticipated replacing the natural grass fields with artificial turf and adding lighting. Darden-Towe is jointly owned by Charlottesville and Albemarle.

“Eventually that request was discussed in the calendar of 2018 and that was approved and bundled as part of the Parks’ quality of life projects,” Henry said.

Henry said $2.5 million was approved for the project, with $2 million of that going for the installation of turf and the rest for the lighting.

“That CIP request assumed use of cooperative contracts, meaning existing contracts in the state for both the turf project and the lighting project,” Henry said. “On a December 4 meeting of 2019, a concern was raised by a Board member about the procurement methodology and several series of questions around the efficacy of turf, environmental concerns.”

Henry said staff returned with more information later that winter, but the pandemic put a hold on further consideration of the effort.

“The majority of capital projects were paused or deferred,” Henry said.

When some of the projects were unpaused, the Darden-Towe project was not one of them.

“And it’s back in the queue of all the other unfunded projects that have been requested or formally requested through this process,” Henry said.

Since then, the Parks Department request has placed further funding of Biscuit Run as a higher priority. The Parks Department has asked for $8.5 million for the next four years to move into further phases of that future park’s development.

After being told by Henry that the natural fields are well-maintained, LaPisto-Kirtley said she would support continuing that practice.

School Board Chair Kate Acuff made the pitch for funding to modernize the existing high schools, something that she did not see within the draft CIP presented to the committee.

The county in recent years has invested in two high school “centers” rather than a fourth stand-alone facility.

“Because a new high school would be $150 million and we were able to craft this plan that including upgrading all of our schools — Albemarle High School is 70 years old — as well as the Centers for a fraction of that cost,” Acuff said. “It’s disappointed to me to see that has dropped out.”

Acuff also said that over a hundred classrooms are in trailers. She said the county needs at least three more elementary schools.

“We’re over capacity at Baker-Butler [Elementary] which is a northern feeder pattern [school] and construction of Brookhill [Elementary] would address that,” Acuff said.

There are also overcrowding issues at Mountain View Elementary. A 27,000 square feet addition is underway at Crozet Elementary but Acuff said a third school in the western part of the county will be necessary soon.

Of that $131 million, the schools will have access to $77.2 million according to Chief Financial Officer Nelsie Birch. The next meeting of the group will take place on Friday beginning at 1 p.m.

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As of the typing of these words, there are 22 days until the solstice when our portion of the world will slowly begin illuminating a little more each day. This is the 333rd day of this year. What significance might there be in the number 4,444? Stick around for enough editions of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and that figure may one day show up. I’m your host Sean Tubbs, tracking the trivial and monitoring the memorable.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville’s Planning Commission gets a look at the preliminary capital budget for fiscal year 23

University Transit Service buses return to full capacity

More news about the transition team of Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin

Let’s begin today with two Patreon-fueled shout-outs. The first comes a long-time supporter who wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

The second comes from a more recent supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

As the week begins, the Virginia Department of Health reports a seven-day average of 1,377 new cases and the seven-day percent positivity is at 6.1 percent. On Friday, the VDH reported the first fatality of a child from Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 55 new cases today and a seven-day percent positivity of 5.8 percent. There have been two more fatalities reported since Wednesday.

Last week, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library entered into a partnership with the Virginia Department of Health to distribute at-home COVID-19 testing kits. The pilot program offers rapid antigen tests that are guided by a virtual assistant.

“The test kits must be used away from the library, via an internet-connected device with a camera (including smart phones) with digital test results available within 15 minutes,” reads a press release. “Library staff cannot assist with administering tests, and tests cannot be taken inside any JMRL location.”

Today marks the first day in a year and a half that passengers on University Transit Service buses will board from the front door. UTS has ended rules that required riders to board from the middle door. Capacity restrictions have also been dropped, meaning buses will be able to fill to standing. However, masks and facial coverings are still mandatory.

The University Transit Service will also restore service to stops at Garrett Hall and Monroe Hall whenever UTS is serving McCormick Road. Those stops had been dropped to help UTS manage the capacity restrictions. Visit the UTS website to learn more about specific details.

To learn more about transit, consider attending the Regional Transit Partnership’s meeting on Thursday at 4 p.m. On the agenda is a look at the Regional Transit Vision plan that is in development by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. (agenda)

Jaunt buses returned to 100 percent capacity earlier this year.

There are a few local names on what Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin is calling his transition landing teams.

The “landing teams that will coordinate with the cabinet secretaries from the current administration and conduct due diligence across all agencies so that the Youngkin administration will hit the ground running and begin delivering on its promises on Day One,” reads a press release from Wednesday.

Senator Emmet Hanger (R-24) will serve on the Agriculture and Forestry team and Delegate Rob Bell (R-58) is on the Education team. Bell will also serve on the Public Safety and Homeland Security team. Senator Bryce Reeves (R-17) will be on the Veterans and Defense Affairs team. For the full list, take a look at the full press release.

In today’s second subscriber-supported public service announcement: The Charlottesville Jazz Society at cvillejazz.org is dedicated to the promotion, preservation, and perpetuation of all that jazz, and there’s no time like now to find a time to get out and watch people love to play. The Charlottesville Jazz Society keeps a running list of what’s coming up at cvillejazz.org. Sign up for their newsletter today.

The Charlottesville Planning Commission got a look last week at a preliminary budget for the capital improvement program for the fiscal years 2023 through 2027. Council will vote next spring to approve the first year of spending, but decisions for future years would be for future versions of Council. (November 23 presentation) (watch the meeting)

But first, what is a capital improvement program? Krissy Hammill is a Senior Budget and Management Analyst for the City of Charlottesville.

“It’s basically a five-year financing plan that contains infrastructure type projects that usually cost more than $50,000,” Hammill said. “They’re generally non-recurring and non-operational and they generally have a useful life of five years or more.”

Major items are usually funded by debt the city takes on in the form of bond sales. Investors front the money in exchange for a steady and guaranteed return. Like Albemarle County, Charlottesville has a AAA bond rating that is both attractive to investors and has a low interest rate. The latter results in a lower debt-service payment for the city.

“We are actually part of a very small group of localities that have that rating,” Hammill said. “It is the premiere marker of a locality’s financial stability in strength.”

In recent years, Council has increased the amount of spending on affordable housing initiatives, directly funding redevelopment of public housing and Friendship Court. In the past budget cycle, Council expressed a willingness to fund the configuration of City Schools.

“We had a placeholder for that project at $50 million and based on Council’s direction from a meeting in October, that has now been increased from $50 million to $75 million,” Hammill said. “The funding has been moved up from FY25 to FY24. We also know that in doing this there will need to be additional revenue enhancements to pay for the additional debt service that will be required.”

Revenue enhancements can be translated as “tax increase” and Hammill has previously told Council and the public that the equivalent of a 15 cent increase on the property tax rate may be required to cover the cost. There’s the possibility of the next General Assembly allowing Charlottesville voters to decide on a sales-tax increase with proceeds going toward schools.

Even with that possibility, the city may not be able to make any new investments for some time.

“We know that our debt capacity will be exhausted for some period of time,” Hammill said.

In the current fiscal year, debt service is just under five percent of the $192.2 million General Fund Budget. That amount does not include the amount of general fund cash used for capital projects. That number will increase.

“The plan put before you has debt service basically doubling from just over ten million to just over $20 million within a very short period of time, about four years,” Hammill said.

A draft of the next Capital Improvement Program won’t be officially presented to Council until late February or early March. Hammill documented several other revisions to the preliminary budget. At Council’s direction, $18.25 million in city funds for the West Main Streetscape were transferred to the school reconfiguration project as well as $5 million from a parking garage on 7th and Market Street.

In December 2018, a previous City Council signed an agreement with Albemarle County to provide parking as part of a multimillion project to locate a joint General District Court downtown. Subsequent Councils have opted to not build a new parking garage to honor the terms of that agreement. (read the agreement)

“We don’t have any specifics right now,” said Chris Engel, the city’s economic development director. “We’re in the midst of conversation with the county about the fact that we’re not going to build a structure and what the agreement leaves them with regard to their options and trying to figure out what’s best for both parties.”

Pre-construction of the courts facility is underway.

Another adjustment in the city’s preliminary capital improvement program is additional funding for a comprehensive plan for the Parks and Recreation Department.

“This would be to look at Parks and Rec programs,” Hammill said. “This is not the normal master plan for the parks per se master planning process, but more of a programmatic master plan.”

There are also programs for drainage issues at Oakwood Cemetery and McIntire Park as well as funding to assist the removal of dead Ash trees in the city.

Council has also approved a housing plan that asks for $10 million a year on affordable housing initiatives. Hammill said not all of the funding for that initiative would come from the capital improvement program budget. City Council will review the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund at its meeting on December 6.

Another item not in the capital budget is private funding for a sidewalk on Stribling Avenue. Southern Development has offered to loan the city $2.9 million to cover the cost of the project as part of a rezoning in Fry’s Spring area.

The Charlottesville Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on the preliminary CIP on December 14.

Finally today, the second shout-out for today specifically asked you to check out a local news story. Here’s one to begin with. Last week, Carly Haynes of CBS19 reported on the intersection of Preston Avenue and Grady Avenue in Charlottesville. Charlottesville was awarded $7.743 million in a Smart Scale project to alter the intersection. Learn more in this report from November 23rd.

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After today, there are four more Saturdays left in the year 2021. After December 31, there will be only 78 more years in the 21st Century. This perspective brought to you by Charlottesville Community Engagement, a regularly-produced look at happening in and around Charlottesville. I’m Sean Tubbs, the host and producer.

Charlottesville Community Engagement is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

On today’s show:

The Albemarle County Planning Commission gets a look at Comprehensive Plan underway

The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership takes a look at affordable housing challenges in rural areas

Area airports will get money from the recent federal infrastructure funding bill

Daily Progress-owner Lee Enterprises invokes protections against Alden Global Capital’s takeover attempt

Let’s begin with a Patreon-fueled shout-out.

Lee response

The parent company of the Daily Progress appears to want to reject a takeover by the Alden Capital Group. Lee Enterprises issued a press release on Wednesday with the headline Board Takes Action in Response to Alden’s Unsolicited Proposal to Acquire Lee. Specifically, the Iowa-based company’s Board of Directors have initiated a limited-duration shareholder rights plan that issues existing shareholders additional rights in the case of a hostile takeover.

“In adopting the Rights Plan, the Board noted Alden’s track record of rapidly acquiring substantial control or ‘negative control’ positions in other public companies and its seemingly inconsistent disclosures,” reads the press release.

Alden Capital Group asserts they own six percent of the Lee’s shares. Shareholder rights plans are also known as “poison pills” and have been used since the 1980’s to ward off corporate takeovers. Read more about this topic in an article on Editor and Publisher. (learn more on Wikipedia)

Airport investment

The recently adopted Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act provides $15 billion for airports across the nation. Virginia airports will receive nearly $400 million of that amount, according to a press release from Senators Tim Kaine and Mark Warner.

The Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport will receive $15.44 million and Freeman Field in Louisa County will get $790,000. The airport in Orange County will also receive $790,000. Elsewhere in Virginia, Dulles International will get $120.4 million, Richmond International will get $35.6 million, and Roanoke-Blacksburg Regional will get $14.97 million. Lynchburg will get nearly $6.5 million and Culpeper Regional $1.48 million.

I’ll have more information about how Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport will use their funding in an upcoming edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Albemarle PC comp plan update

The review of the Albemarle County Comprehensive Plan is underway, with a lot of behind-the-scenes work by staff before a public kickoff begins in January. The Albemarle Planning Commission got a update on the process at their meeting on November 16. Here’s Tori Kannellopolous, a senior planner with the county, with a reminder of the plan’s purpose.

“The Comprehensive Plan, or comp plan, establishes Albemarle County’s long-range vision that guides growth, development, and change for the next 20 years,” Kannellopolous said. “It assists county staff, appointed committees and boards, and the Board of Supervisor when developing public policies related to private land use activities and use of resources in Albemarle.”

For the past forty years, the major theme of the county’s comp plan has been growth management. Roughly five percent of land in Albemarle is designated for urban development including more dense residential areas and commercial activities. The rest is considered rural.

This time around, Supervisors have directed staff to update the zoning ordinance while reviewing the overall Comprehensive Plan. The process formally got underway when Supervisors adopted a resolution on November 3. (Albemarle Supervisors Kickoff Comprehensive Review)

One of the intents of this review is to streamline much of the content of the plan, which is currently 406 pages. That number doesn’t include the various appendices. (read the current plan)

“For example, the existing implementation chapter includes 70 priorities,” Kannellopolous said. “There is not a clear prioritization of these items and the order in which they should be completed. The chapter includes 80 indicators of progress that are intended to be tracked annually but tracking this data is unsustainable and the sheer number of indicators make it unclear for community members to understand what success looks like.”

This review also provides an opportunity to integrate the various strategies of more recent plans, such as Housing Albemarle, Project Enable, and the Climate Action Plan. In all, there will be four phases, with the first being a review of the growth management policy.

“This includes reviewing, evaluating, and updating the growth management policy as needed using the lenses of equity, climate action, and capacity projections,” Kannellopolous said. “A capacity analysis for housing and economic development in the county is currently underway and this is to understand if we have the capacity in our development areas for the projected growth of our community.”

Phase two will identify topics that will be updated in the comprehensive plan, likely related to transportation and economic development. The county will create its first multimodal systems plan as well. Phase three will review the actions the county will take in the form of written strategies. Phase four will be the finalization of the new plan.

“We will focus our efforts on identifying and eliminating plan inconsistencies across content and we will engage the community and decision-makers on overall plan priorities once all of the content is considered as a whole,” Kannellopolous said.

State code assigns the job of preparing and recommending the Comprehensive Plan to each locality’s Planning Commission. Supervisors have approved a process that includes a working group of stakeholders to guide the process. Rachel Falkenstein is a planning manager in Albemarle.

“The working group is approximately an eight to twelve person group of community members whose role would be to advise county staff on plan recommendations, community engagement approaches, and to support staff’s community outreach efforts by sharing information with their networks, their neighborhoods, or their communities,” Falkenstein said.

The group members have not yet been selected.

“We are going back to the Board of Supervisors with information sharing about the selection process at an upcoming Board meeting in December,” Falkenstein said.

Broad community engagement will come in the form of workshops on the plan. The Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors will play a role in decisions about changes to Albemarle policies.

Planning Commission Chair Julian Bivins noted that the Commission’s input will come later in a process that has already begun. He said he wants the Commission to meet with Supervisors.

“So that we can hear each other and discuss these discussions before we get to an endpoint,” Bivins said.

The review of the zoning code will happen concurrently and is currently underway. Charles Rapp is the county’s Planning Director.

“We have a first phase right now and it’s called modernization,” Rapp said. “Two of those have been brought to you through a resolution of intent that deal with bonus densities and wavers and special exceptions.”

The Supervisors will hold a public hearing on special exceptions at their meeting on December 1. (staff report)

Rapp said another change will be to streamline the list of land use categories.

“I believe our current chart is something like 16 pages long right now with very specific uses and we want to try to tailor that back to something more reasonable,” Rapp said. “We also want to take a look at our setbacks. Our setbacks are quite complicated to figure out with multiple different ways within each zoning classification and we want to try and improve that and make it a little more clear for people applying our zoning ordinance.”

If you’re interested in learning more about how Albemarle’s Community Development Department works, take at the department’s work program in the consent agenda for the December 1 meeting.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Let’s have another Patreon-fueled shout-out:

Charlottesville 350 is the local chapter of a national organization that seeks to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. Charlottesville 350 uses online campaigns, grassroots organizing, and mass public actions to oppose new coal, oil and gas projects, and build 100% clean energy solutions that work for all. To learn more about their most active campaigns, including a petition drive to the Richmond Federal Reserve Bank, visit their Facebook page at facebook.com/cville350

Rural housing challenges

Much of the conversation about the cost of housing has centered on building units in urbanized areas. But what role can non-urbanized areas play? The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership led a panel discussion on November 16 to discuss the challenges. One of the biggest is money. (watch the event)

“When you talk about funding for affordable housing, you think of urban,” said Colleen Fisher, the executive director of the Council for Affordable and Rural Housing.

In fact, the main federal agency most people associate with the topic is called the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Fisher reminded the audience that the U.S. Department of Agriculture also offers federal support through their Rural Housing Service, but the program isn’t funded at high levels.

One step localities can take is an assessment of what’s currently in the rural area.

“We need ample resources to preserve our dedicated affordable housing stock in rural Virginia,” said Jonathan Knopf, the senior research associate for Housing Forward Virginia. “We have a lot of low-income housing tax credit properties that were the first and generation LIHTC properties. And a lot of that stuff is reaching the end of their affordability terms and so we need resources for housing providers to come in and lock in the affordability of that assisted multifamily stock.”

Those credits are issued by the Virginia Housing Development Authority. Knopf said one challenge for rural areas is competition for those credits from urban areas.

“It’s tough to break from this either-or resource conversation and I think we need to move to a both-and framework for housing resources across the Commonwealth so our rural rent relief programs don’t get left behind,” Knopf said.

Taking inventory

Greene County has 146 LIHTC units at four properties. Louisa has 115 units in three developments. Nelson has 159 units in three properties. Albemarle has 1,089 units, most of which are in the urban area around Charlottesville except 34 units reserved for seniors in Scottsville.

There are currently no LIHTC properties in Fluvanna. .

Jesse Rutherford is a member of the Nelson County Board of Supervisors. He says the cost of housing used to be affordable in rural communities, but what he calls overregulation in land use and building codes in the past few decades is a problem.

“You can’t add regulation and expect it to get cheaper,” Rutherford said. “In the last 15, 20, 25 years we’ve seen the collapse of affordable housing in the rural area. I think there’s definitely some low-hanging fruit as it relates to zoning form or some certain by-right density. As we know in the urban context, same as the rural, you can’t use the word affordable without density following it.”

Rutherford wants zoning ordinances to be altered to reduce setbacks, which he said renders land unusable for more housing units.

Knopf said the cost of labor and building materials is drastically increasing the cost of housing and some form of subsidization is required. He said a balance of tools can be used to produce more units and preserve existing ones.

“We don’t need rocket science or fancy things to solve so many of these issues,” Knopf said. “In many cases it’s just dedicating the right funding and fixing our existing policies and regulations especially zoning and a lot of things Jesse talked about to make things work. And try to get the economic side and the supply-chain side and the labor market side at least moving in the right direction to correct some of the paths we’ve been on in the past couple of decades.”

Fisher said members of her organization report construction costs keep rising.

“Just because we’re in a rural area doesn’t mean that things are cheaper and some people have that opinion because you’re building in a rural community that it’s going to cost you less,” Fisher said. “That’s not necessarily true.”

One factor is labor. Keith Smith is the chair of the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership. He cited one statistic from the Bureau of Labor Statistics reviewed by the National Association of Home Builders. (via HousingWire)

“According to national data, we are anywhere between 300,000 to 400,000 thousand construction workers short per month,” Smith said. “We’re going to recover from the material costs. I’ve been building developments for three and a half decades. This goes up and down. It’s going to take many, many decades to work through the labor force.”

To review the rest of the event, you can watch the whole thing on the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission’s YouTube page. Leave a comment either there or here to weigh in.

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Is there a name for the day before Thanksgiving? Feast’s Eve? Blackout Wednesday? Drinksgiving? Food Prepageddon? What about "I hope I didn't forget anything at the store because I'm not going back Day?” In any case, even though it is a holiday week, there’s still time for Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

On today’s program:

A jury has found that the organizers of the Unite the Right rally guilty of a civil conspiracy and awarded damages, but did not reach a verdict on other claims

Governor Northam and the Virginia Service Commission honor two area churches for their COVID testing work since the pandemic began

Former City Manager Tarron Richardson is suing the city

Albemarle County will revisit its 21 year old policy on cell tower placement

Albemarle says goodbye to long-time budget chief, and a Dean at the UVA School of Architecture takes a new job

Sines v. Kessler verdict

After a month-long trial, a jury has awarded more than $25 million in damages to the plaintiffs of a civil lawsuit against organizers and participants of the Unite the Right Rally in August 2017. The jury in Sines v. Kessler held that plaintiffs proved their civil conspiracy case under Virginia law as well as their claim that the defendants engaged in racial, religious, or ethnic harassment.

Under the conspiracy count, twelve defendants must pay $500,000 each in damages and five organizations must pay a million each. On the harassment count, five individuals must $250,000 each to two plaintiffs $250,000 in compensatory damages.

However, the jury did not reach a verdict on a count claiming the defendants “engaged in a conspiracy to commit racially motivated violence in violation” of federal code. (42 U.S. Code § 1985 - Conspiracy to interfere with civil rights) They also deadlocked on a second count on the defendants failure to prevent the conspiracy.

The jury also found that James F. Fields owes damages for an assault and battery claim to specific victims of his deliberate decision to drive into a crowd of people on 4th Street SE on August 12, 2017, as well as another count for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Fields is currently serving time for a criminal conviction on those charges.

Read the full verdict on Court Listener.

Former City Manager sues Charlottesville

Another former Charlottesville official is seeking legal action against the City of Charlottesville. The Daily Progress reports that Dr. Tarron Richardson has filed a federal lawsuit against City Council and four individuals for entering into an agreement that prevented his ability to publicly critique the city after he left his position as City Manager in September 2020.

“The First Amendment expressly forbids government bodies — including city councils — from engaging in viewpoint discrimination and retaliating against people based on the content of their speech,” reads the Nature of the Case section of the suit.

Richardson wants a jury trial. The civil rights suit seeks damages as well as a declaration that a non-disparagement clause in his severance agreement is not enforceable. The suit also individually names City Councilors Heather Hill and Nikuyah Walker as well as City Attorney Lisa Robertson and former interim City Manager John Blair.

The suit revisits Richardson’s tenure as city manager including his enactment of a policy to regulate use of city-issued credit cards and claims some Councilors sought to usurp his authority.

“Because of ridiculous demands and the ongoing chicanery and obstructionism from Walker and Hill that would eventually prevent him from adequately performing his job, Dr. Richardson was constructively terminated,” the suit continues.

The narrative claims that Councilors did not hold up their end of the severance agreement and disparaged him in social media posts and one interview that was later removed from a local media outlet. This past January, Dr. Richardson asked to publish an op-ed in the Daily Progress on race-relations in Charlottesville, but Robertson said the city would keep open the option of suing to compel Richardson to return the severance payment of $205,000.

In all, the suit has four counts including violation of the First Amendment and breach of contract. He’s represented by the Haley Law Firm of Greenville, South Carolina, Keith B. French Law of Pearland, Texas, and Brand Law of Dallas.

Earlier this month, former Police Chief RaShall Brackney announced she was filing a wrongful termination claim with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. That’s the first step toward a potential lawsuit.

After Richardson left, Council appointed John Blair to serve as interim city manager before naming Chip Boyles this past January. Boyles resigned in October, six weeks after firing Brackney. Marc E. Woolley will become the next interim city manager on December 1.

(view the suit on Court Listener)

Richmond HUD award

The agency that owns and operates public housing in Richmond has been awarded a planning grant for the revitalization of a property in Historic Jackson Word. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development awarded $450,000 to the Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority for revitalization of Gilpin Court as part of HUD’s Choice Neighborhoods Initiative.

“Known as “the Harlem of the South," the neighborhood’s once vibrant main street was filled with thriving theaters, stores, and medical practices,” reads a description in a HUD press release. “The historical heart of the neighborhood was all but destroyed by its bifurcation for the construction of Interstate 95/64.”

The intent is for the process to be led by residents, a process already underway at the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. The CRHA had applied for a planning grant in 2010 but was not selected. The agency has not applied since. (list of 2010 applicants)

Outgoing budget chief

The government of Albemarle County is in transition with many long-time staffers having already retired or about to do so. One of them is Lori Allshouse, who served for many years leading up the county’s budget preparation each year. Nelsie Birch joined Albemarle’s executive leadership in the summer of 2020 as Chief Financial Officer and had this to say about Allshouse at the Board of Supervisors meeting on November 17, 2020.

“She’s been the face of all things budget, all things capital projects, capital planning, five-year financial planning, financial policies,” Birch said.

Birch thanked Allshouse for preparing her and the rest of the staff for all of the various budget challenges that have come during the past two years.

Allshouse has worked for the county since 2000. Her last job title was Assistant Chief Financial Officer for Policy and Partnerships in the finance and budget department. Her last presentation dealt with cost allocations for partner organizations in next fiscal year.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time now for another subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement. Since the pandemic began, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society has been offering virtual presentations on all manner of topics. This Sunday at 4 p.m. they’ll present an important topic to the Association for the Study of African American Life and History and the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society.

The ACHS is working on a Race and Sports initiative to tell the story of the “Desegregation of Central Virginia Public High School Athletics.” Dr. Shelly Murphy and other participants will update the Richmond groups on local efforts to collect stories from those who lived through the transition away from segregated schools, when institutions such as Jackson Burley High School vanished. This is part of the Sunday Sit-In series put on by the Richmond groups. Register online for the event, which begins at 4 p.m. this Sunday. (register)

A-School move

An associate dean at the University of Virginia’s School of Architecture is moving on to take a position at Georgia Tech. Ellen Bassett will become the Chair of the College of Design at the Atlanta-based university. Bassett is currently the associate dean for research at the School of Architecture. She’s also served as the chair of the Department of Urban and Environmental Planning and the director of the School of Architecture’s Real Estate Design and Development.

Service awards

Two Charlottesville-area churches are among the recipients of Governor Ralph Northam’s Volunteerism and Community Service Awards for 2021. Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church and Church of the Incarnation have been honored as Outstanding Faith-Based Organizations for their offering of free COVID-19 testing in their respective neighborhoods.

“Located within highly populated neighborhoods, the majority of those tested have been members of the community’s most vulnerable populations who would otherwise be unable to receive free, consistent, and timely testing,” reads the press release for the awards.

Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church is located in the city’s Ridge Street neighborhood and the Church of Incarnation is located off of Hillsdale Drive in Albemarle County.

Albemarle wireless

Albemarle County will review the rules by which cell towers are regulated. A previous Board of Supervisors adopted a policy in December 2000 which among other things requires tall towers to be as invisible to the eye as possible. Several supervisors since then have asked for the policy to be revisited to increase the availability of voice and data service throughout the county. The Board has authorized $100,000 for a study, and Development Process Manager Bill Fritz checked in elected officials on November 17. (2000 Wireless Policy)

“Staff wants to ensure that we put out a [request for proposals] that meets the Board’s expectations for the scope of work in the review of these regulations,” Fritz said. “The policy has never been revisited and changes in the regulations have been largely limited to keep up with changing federal regulations, court decisions, and changes in technology.”

Fritz said the consultant would be charged with taking potential changes through a community engagement process eventually resulting in a public hearing before the Board of Supervisors. Changes might include elimination of some permits having to go to the Board for approval.

“It could include revisions to the ordinance to eliminate the need for special exceptions that have been routinely approved,” Fritz said. “It could include allowance of facilities at greater height or lesser design standard in areas of poor coverage. These are just some ideas.”

Supervisor Diantha McKeel has been asking for the policy to be revisited for many years. She suggested going right to making changes in the county code.

“The policy is so old that to be honest with you I would just start over with an ordinance,” McKeel said. “And let’s get to the meat of it and let’s not worry about this old outdated policy.”

McKeel said the new policy needed to put more emphasis on what she said were the positive benefits of more cell towers, including public safety.

Supervisor Ann Mallek said there are other ways to provide more voice and data service that would not require a wholesale change to the policy.

“This is taking the mantra of the sales people that this is the way to achieve broadband,” Mallek said. “The county has made a dedicated investment and will continue to make a dedicated investment that broadband is delivered through fiber.”

Supervisor Donna Price said the county should explore any methods to expand data service.

“We need to update our policy and acknowledge the changes in technology as well as the needs, not the desires, but the needs for connectivity through all of the mechanisms that are available,” Price said.

The request for proposals has not yet been issued.

END NOTES:

Thanks to Becky Calvert and Jennie More for their assistance in coming up with names for the day.

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It doesn’t seem at this moment like a holiday week, with so many items happening at public meetings before Thanksgiving. But, I’m grateful you are listening to this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, and I’m hopeful that you’ll share it with others.

Most people read the newsletter, but the secret is that each one is produced for audio, as my professional career in journalism began in radio. More than a quarter-century later, I’m glad to be bringing you information as often as I can and this is what I have for November 22, 2021.

Let’s begin today with a Patreon-fueled shout-out!

WTJU is hosting Classical Listening Parties, a series of four free, casual events on Tuesdays in November. These four events are led by Chelsea Holt, pianist, teacher, and one of WTJU’s newest and youngest classical announcers. She’ll guide you through all the eras of classical music and tomorrow night at 7 p.m.: the Romantic period. For a list of the others, visit wtju.net to learn more and sign up!

On today’s show:

Albemarle’s Planning Commission gets an update on the county’s capital improvement budget for the next fiscal year

A hedge fund sets its sights on the Daily Progress and its parent company

The EPA seeks to reestablish jurisdiction in the Waters of the United States

And the University of Virginia seeks a tuition increase for undergraduates

Pandemic update

As the week begins, the seven-day average for new COVID cases is at 1,644 new cases a day and the percent positivity is at 5.9 percent. The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 29 new cases today and a percent positivity of 5.5 percent. Three more fatalities have been reported since Friday for a total of 311 since the pandemic began.

Fatal fire

A fire in an apartment in the 1200 block of Carlton Avenue in the Belmont neighborhood on Sunday has killed one person, according to a release from the Charlottesville Fire Department. Crews began fighting the fire soon after arriving and then looked for anyone trapped. One adult was rescued but died soon after being taken to an unidentified hospital. Fire marshals are investigating the cause. This is the third fatality from a fire this year.

Newspaper consolidation continues

The Charlottesville Daily Progress and most other daily newspapers in Virginia might soon have a new owner. Alden Global Capital has announced in a letter that it will pay $24 a share for Lee Enterprises, thirty percent over the Friday’s closing stock price.

“We believe that as a private company and part of our successful nationwide platforms, Lee would be in a stronger position to maximize its resources and realize strategic value that enhances its operations and supports its employees in their important work serving local communities,” reads the letter.

Alden Global Capital is a New York based hedge fund that owns the Tribune Publishing Company and Media NewsGroup. Among their newspapers are the Chicago Tribune, the Denver Post, the Mercury News, and the New York Daily News. The company already owns six percent of Lee Enterprises.

“Scale is critical for newspapers to ensure necessary staffing and in order to thrive in this challenging environment where print advertising continues to decline and back office operations and legacy public company functions remain bloated, thus depriving newsrooms of resources that are best used serving readers with relevant, trustworthy, and engaging content,” the letter continues.

Lee Enterprises completed the purchase of the Daily Progress from BHMedia in March 2020. BHMedia is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, which purchased the Progress from Media General in May 2012. Media General purchased the paper from Thomas Worrell Jr. in 1995 as part of a $230 million deal. The Progress was first published on September 14, 1892.

Other Virginia papers owned by Lee Enterprises include the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the Lynchburg News Advance, and the Roanoke Times.

Learn more about the potential takeover from Rick Edmonds on Poytner.org or at Virginia Business.

The real question is - who gets the Daily Progress March? In April 2005, the Charlottesville Municipal Band unveiled a tune written by Nellysford composer Paul T. Richards. Check out my news story from that time!

Crozet school redistricting

An Albemarle committee appointed to study scenarios to alleviate overpopulation of elementary schools in the western part of the county has unveiled their recommendation. After meeting four times and holding two public comment sessions, the Crozet-Brownsville Redistricting Committee has suggested a total of 219 students be moved from Brownsville to Crozet Elementary at the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year. By then, Albemarle should have completed a $21.25 million addition to that school which includes 16 new classrooms. (committee website)

Water quality rules

Two federal agencies that regulate land use as it relates to water quality have announced plans to reinstate a more robust definition of what constitutes the “waters of the United States.” Both the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers use that phrase as a basis for enforcement of the Clean Water Act of 1972 which among other things regulates industrial discharges into “navigable waters.”

A rule change made in the previous presidential administration reduced the geographic scope of the definition, potentially limiting the jurisdiction of the EPA and the Army Corp’s reach.

The Southern Environmental Law Center and other conservation groups sued to overturn the rule.

“The prior administration stripped protections under the Clean Water Act from countless streams, lakes and wetlands, leaving thousands of stream miles, many public recreational lakes, and millions of acres of wetlands without protections that have been in place for decades through every other administration and putting our communities and water supplies at risk,” reads a statement issued last week.

The SELC argues that preserving wetlands can help preserve the ability of communities to reduce flooding and deal with extreme weather events. To learn more, visit the EPA’s Waters of the United States website.

UVA tuition

The Cavalier Daily reports that tuition at the University of Virginia could increase between 3.5 percent and 4.9 percent in the each of the next two academic years. That’s according to two representatives from the UVA Finance office who spoke to Student Council last week. Public comment will be taken at a forum on December 2 followed by a vote by the Board of Visitors at their meeting a week later.

Tuition was frozen for the current academic year.

For a sense of scale, the current tuition for most undergraduate student in the College of Arts and Sciences is $14,188 for a Virginia resident and $48,036 for an out-of-state resident. Third-year students pay slightly higher. First-year engineering students from Virginia pay $22,566 for a year’s tuition, with non-Virginians paying $56,730. These figures don’t include fees. Take a look at the UVA website to learn more about how much students are charged for their education. To learn more about the proposed increase, read Eileen Powell’s article in the Cavalier Daily.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Let’s have two more Patreon-fueled shout-outs. The first comes a long-time supporter who wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

The second comes from a more recent supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

Albemarle Planning Commission’s capital budget briefing

Tomorrow afternoon at 2 p.m., an advisory committee appointed to help Albemarle County shape its capital improvement program budget for the next fiscal year will hold its first meeting. Last week, the seven-member Planning Commission got an overview including a reminder that last year was very different. (watch the meeting)

“Last year when we were putting together the FY22 budget, there was no [capital improvement program],” said Andy Bowman, the chief of budget in the Finance and Budget office. “The county was in the middle of the pandemic and there was a tremendous amount of uncertainty and really at that time it was decided instead of focusing on a long-range picture, to focus on the impacts of the pandemic and what might be able to be unpaused from a number of projects that were paused at the start of the pandemic.”

Bowman said the economy has rebounded much better than initially anticipated with outlooks becoming more favorable with each passing month. As the FY23 budget approaches, Bowman said the county is not immune to inflationary pressure, with bids for some capital projects coming in higher than budgeted. The process starts with a review of what’s currently in the works.

“We have a capital program currently underway, before we even start anything from 2023 to 2027, of around $147 million for about 65 projects,” Bowman said. “Of that $147 million, $91 million has been appropriated in the last eleven months now, from what was unpaused in January which included the expansion at Crozet Elementary.”

Bowman noted that over the course of the next five years, the county will adopt a new Comprehensive Plan and the Board of Supervisors will update their strategic plan. Both documents as well as the School Board’s strategic plan will guide future decisions on capital spending. Bowman said the focus this cycle will be on the immediate year to give flexibility on future needs.

The CIP advisory committee consists of Supervisors Bea LaPisto-Kirtley and Donna Price, School Board members Kate Acuff and Jonno Alcaro, and former Planning Commissioners Bruce Dotson.and Cal Morris.

“They’re charged to do a few things,” Bowman said. “First they will review and evaluate a proposal that is recommended by staff as a starting point and then the CIP committee will sort of make a recommendation and modify that starting point.”

Bowman said there will be additional revenue from the cigarette tax and potential revenue from a tax on plastic bags. The county also refinanced its debt earlier this year.

“Given the current market we were able to issue a large amount of [borrowed proceeds] at low interest rates and that will create some capacity that didn’t exist in the prior plan prior to the pandemic,” Bowman said

Bowman said staff is also reviewing through the details of the American Rescue Plan Act to see how that funds can be used to leverage local dollars capital spending. In August, Supervisors used $4.5 million in federal COVID-relief funds for broadband expansion.

One of the biggest items in the capital improvement program is the need for school maintenance and expansion. Rosalyn Schmitt is the chief operating officer of Albemarle County Public Schools. She briefed the Planning Commission on the school’s strategic plan.

“Getting the right resources to educators and students for their teaching and learning is key to our success,” Schmitt said

The school system has a Long-Range Planning Advisory Committee and their most recent recommendations were published on September 9, 2021. The eleven projects have a cumulative cost estimate of $196 million, with most of the projects containing either word “renovations” or “capacity.”

“Adequate capacity continues to be a need for the school division,” Schmitt said. “This is supported by the ten-year enrollment projections and reinforced by both the recently completed development and student yield analysis, and a thirty-year population forecast.”

One item is $40 million for another elementary school in the northern feeder pattern and another would be to purchase land for the western feeder pattern.

“As these schools all reach a saturation point where expansion is no longer practical, we recommend a strategy for land acquisition and the construction of new facilities,” Schmitt said. “I think for the first time in a long time you’ll see several new schools on this list.”

There’s also a recommendation to improve air quality within schools. There is a possibility that federal ARPA funding could be used for that purpose.

“That is a comprehensive program around mechanical improvements that there is some opportunity to have some matching funds from ARPA funding that we are pursuing,” Schmitt said.

Luis Carrazana is the associate architect of the University of Virginia and a non-voting member of the Albemarle Planning Commission. He noted that the recent adoption of the Crozet Master Plan update called for capital infrastructure, as did the relatively recent update of the Pantops Master Plan and adoption of the Rio Small Area Plan.

“And so I’m wondering how we’re looking at those approved master plans with the CIP and putting the same rigor as we seem to be doing with the School Board,” Carrazana said.

Planning Director Charles Rapp said implementation of many projects in the master plans are dependent on lining up ideas with funding opportunities.

“A lot of those infrastructure related improvements, we identify them in these master plans or small area plans or corridor studies and that’s often the first phase of identifying a project,” Rapp said.

The next day, Bowman gave a similar presentation to the Board of Supervisors. This one has more specifics about the developing budget. (watch the presentation)

Supervisors were reminded that there is a significant “positive variance” from the FY21 budget of more than $13 million that can be used for one-time money.

“We are proposing, not really for discussion today but this will come back on December 15, to invest some of the one-time fiscal year 21 funding into the economic development fund,” Bowman said.

At their December 15 meeting, the Board will also be asked for direction on whether to explore tax relief programs. They’ll also be given a review of what additional revenue sources could be pursued in Richmond.

The Board of Supervisors will have a work session on December 1 related to the way the FY23 budget will be developed. Another change this year is the December release of Albemarle’s property assessments for 2022. That will be presented to the Board of Supervisors on December 15, a month earlier than usual.

See also: Albemarle may close FY21 with $13.2M in one-time money, November 9, 2021

Unsolicited fact of the day

Finally today, sometimes there are pieces of information I come across during my reporting, or facts that people tell me that don’t quite make their way into a news story. These facts are not entirely random, but they may seem that way.

First up, the commercial portions of the Stonefield development have paid a total of $841,955 in connection fees to the Albemarle County Service Authority for water and sewer between 2012 and 2020. That’s according to information provided to me by Gary O’Connell, the director of the ACSA.

That figure does not include residential connections. Before anyone can connect to water and sewer in Albemarle, they have to pay a hefty connection fee. For instance, for one commercial unit on Bond Street to connect in 2021, they had to pay $14,280 for water and $13,505 for sewer. Both of these fees include a portion paid to the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority to cover the cost of capital projects to expand capacity.

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Let’s begin today with a Patreon-fueled shout-out.

On today’s program:

The CDC has approved booster shots for all adult Americans

The city fills one position while another became vacant

The Virginia Supreme Court appoints two Special Masters to complete the redistricting process

Members of the Crozet Community Advisory Committee debrief after Supervisors adopt a master plan

COVID update

As the week ended, the percent positivity creeped up slightly to 5.8 percent as reported by the Virginia Department of Health and the seven day average rose to 1,518.

Nearly a million Virginians have received a third dose or a booster shot. The seven day average for doses administered a day was 40,389 on Friday.

Also on Friday, the Food and Drug Administration authorized the use of the Moderna and Pfizer booster shots for all adults, and the Centers for Disease Control followed suit later in the day. Dr. Costi Sifri is director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System, and he said this means anyone who completed their two-dose cycle of Pfizer and Moderna can now get a booster dose.

“We’re at a point right now where that is going to start including a fair number of people,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s clear that boosters are really beneficial in boosting up the number of antibodies.”

Dr. Sifri said there are an increasing number of “breakthrough-cases” in people who were vaccinated over six months ago. Some of these cases have resulted in hospitalizations and Dr. Sifri recommended those at higher risk should schedule their booster.

“I really strongly encourage those people to get a booster especially as we head into the holiday season and as we are starting to see increasing rates of COVID in the nation as well as our community,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri said others should consider getting the third dose, especially if they want to avoid contracting COVID.

“There hasn’t been much of a rush,” Dr. Sifri said. “Right now we understand that about 16 percent of people in our health district who are eligible for a booster vaccine has received one.”

Dr. Reid Adams is the Chief Medical Officer at UVA Health. His recommendation is a little more sharp.

“I think the time is now,” Dr. Adams said. “We have gotten to a lower rate in Virginia but it’s certainly not low enough. If you look around the country, particularly in the midwest and the upper plains, we’re really seeing a surge so ideally folks would get their booster now before that happens here.”

People who want to schedule a booster dose or get vaccinated for the first time can do so at vaccinate.virginia.gov. There are plenty of appointments and shots.

“We have not seen long waits for booster doses here at the medical center,” Dr. Sifri said. “Those are available. In addition there is the availability of getting booster vaccines through local pharmacies and the Blue Ridge Health District.”

Since November 6, over 4,674 children between the ages of 5 and 11 have been vaccinated, or around 25 percent of the eligible population.

Sage Smith disappearance

Today marks nine years since Sage Smith disappeared, having last been seen in the 500 block of West Main Street. The Charlottesville Police Department put out a release this morning stating they are still seeking the whereabouts of Erik McFadden, calling him a critical person of interest in the case. The two had been expected to meet the night of November 20, 2012, but Smith has not been heard from since. McFadden is believed to have left town rather than speak to the police.

“Smith was a beloved family member and friend to many in the Charlottesville and LGBTQ+ communities,” the release reads. “Although [nne] years have passed, CPD is hopeful with the help of the media and continued public interest, we can finally solve this case and bring closure to a family and community that continues to experience anguish.”

A missing persons report was filed for McFadden in June 2019 but multiple leads have not turned up any further developments. For more information, take a look at the release.

Charlottesville personnel update

The city has hired a Minority Business Development Coordinator. Ajoni Wynn-Floyd will take the position within the city’s Economic Development Department. The Minority Business Program was created in 2018 to assist qualified businesses with one-on-one business consulting, start-up assistance, and help registering to be vendors for state and local government.

“The program is focused on increasing the number of minority- and woman-owned businesses that are registered vendors with the City and to encourage more City spending with such businesses,” reads the intake form on the city’s website.

Wynn-Floyd has worked with the Latino Student Alliance and the Diversity Awareness Program board.

Earlier this month, the city’s Tree Commission learned of the resignation of Mike Ronayne, the city’s urban forester. He served in the position for five years. The position has not yet been advertised on the Charlottesville jobs board as of Friday afternoon.

At that November 2 meeting, Tree Commission chair Brian Menard said the city must demonstrate support for urban forestry.

“We need to have more resources, not just financially, but we need more resources in terms of hands that can do this work and support this work,” Menard said. “We recognize that this has not been an ordinary 18 months but even before then it was clear that there’s just a lot that’s put on one person,” Menard said.

Map-drawers selected

The Virginia Supreme Court has appointed two special masters to complete the process of redistricting maps for the General Assembly and the U.S. House of Representatives. Sean P. Trende and Bernard F. Grofman are the selected candidates.

“Though each was nominated by legislative leaders of a particular political party, the Nominees… shall serve as officers of the Court in a quasi-judicial capacity,” reads the appointment order made Friday.

The pair will work on a single map and have 30 days to complete their work.

According to the order, Trende and Grofman must resolve differences in good-faith and are not permitted to consult with anyone except for designated staff at the Supreme Court and the Virginia Division of Legislative Services. They are directed to take into account the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Voting Rights Act.

“In short, the Court expects to receive from its Special Masters redistricting maps that have been drafted using factors that are fully compliant with constitutional and statutory law applied in an apolitical and nonpartisan manner,” reads the order.

Trende was nominated by Republicans and is a senior elections analyst with Real Clear Politics. Grofman is a political science professor at the University of California at Irvine. Read more at the Virginia Mercury.

Crozet update

A month has passed since the Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted an update of the Crozet Master Plan, with some land use aspects included over the wishes of some members of the Crozet Community Advisory Committee. For a good summary of what happened on October 20, read Allison Wrabel’s story in the October 21 Daily Progress. Or Lisa Martin’s story in the November 5 Crozet Gazette.

On November 10, the Crozet CAC had the opportunity to talk about the plan. Chair Allie Pesch didn’t have anything prepared, and neither had Planning Manager Rachel Falkenstein.

The Albemarle Planning Commission had recommended removing the Middle Density Residential designation from a portion of downtown Crozet, but there were four votes on the Board of Supervisors to move forward. White Hall District Supervisor Ann Mallek ended up voting with that majority on the eventual 5 to 1 vote in support of the plan’s update.

“I should have done it differently,” Mallek said. “I should have made the motion I was going to make that adopted the Planning Commission’s route and if that had been voted down we would have been much more clear to the membership in the community what was going on.”

Meetings in Albemarle are still virtual due to the pandemic and Mallek said the logistics of getting that motion moved forward were difficult to accomplish over Zoom. She acknowledged that many landowners in Crozet are concerned about the increased density.

Many CAC members thought their concerns were too easily dismissed.

“I found a fair amount of pretty serious community input ignored at points and I feel that ever since the state abolished the ability to negotiate proffers, developers kind of trump most of the decisions,” said Brian Day.

Day referred to legislation in 2016 that rendered invalid an Albemarle policy that required a cash payment from developers for every new unit authorized by a rezoning. Proffers are still legal if they are deemed reasonable and contribute to the direct impact of a development.

However, the 2016 legislation ushered a cooling off point where localities were hesitant to even discuss the issue. This past week, for instance, representatives of Greystar Development said they would pay a proportional amount toward upgrades on Old Ivy Road.

Michael Monaco, a new member of the CAC, said he felt public input had to be broadened in range. He said Crozet needs more housing and more entry-level jobs so young people can stay.

“I think any process that is guided mostly by homeowners is going to be guided mostly by the financial interests of homeowners, consciously or not,” Monaco said. “Any attempt to counter that would be wise.”

Kostas Alibertis is on his second term on the CAC.

“I think the struggle and the challenge that we had here was the vision of the county versus the vision of the community and I think we’ll always have that unless there is some delineation of where those lines are, and I think that’s what led to all of this frustration,” Alibertis said.

Shawn Bird said the process was hurt by a lack of in-person community engagement meetings due to the pandemic.

“If you remember those meetings we had at the high school, I thought there was really strong turn out, I thought there were people energized by the process, we had a certain momentum behind it,” Bird said. “I saw new people coming out to those things and then COVID hit and we all had to jump on our computers and it just changed the whole dynamic.”

During the process, the CAC took votes indicating a majority were not in favor of the middle density residential category. Those votes are not binding and are only symbolic, but Bird defended the practice as well a 2017 survey (as published in the Crozet Gazette),

“I think the powers that be need to know was this issue 13 to 2, or 8 to 7, by the CCAC?” Bird said. “I think you need to quantify to some degree where the citizens fall on particular issues. In my mind, that’s what makes a survey much more powerful to some degree than anecdotal one-offs by people who have the time to jump on these cools and may have the loudest voices.”

Allie Pesch said the master plan update was revision and not a rewrite. She said an analysis of the update should look at whether existing goals are being met.

“We’ve wanted to increase affordable housing for a while and the solution seemed to be just to increase density and not really look at how that has or hasn’t worked in the existing plan,” Pesch said.

Marc McKenney is in his first term on the CAC and he said many are concerned that Albemarle has not made the investments to support that density.

“There’s been massive growth in Crozet in the past two decades,” McKenney said. “Population went from 2,200 in 2000, to 5,500 in 2010, to 9,500 or 9,200 a decade later. (TRIM) If we cannot show citizens what’s actually been delivered from an infrastructure perspective, I guarantee you there will be a complete loss in faith by citizens to the county that they have their best interest in providing sidewalks, and road repairs, and bridges.”

Some of the current projects in the planning process are:

$1.5 million in improvement to the Square anticipated to be completed in May 2023 (page 26 here),

$21.25 million expansion of Crozet Elementary School expected to be completed in August 2022 (page 28 here)

Sidewalk improvements on U.S. 250 West from Cory Farms to Cloverlawn (page 44)

A revenue-sharing application was submitted to the Virginia Department of Transportation on October 1 to complete Eastern Avenue across Lickinghole Creek to Cory Farms Road (Albemarle transportation priority #8)

Improvements at Crozet Avenue and U.S. 250 West are being considered for Smart Scale recommendations in 2022 (Albemarle transportation priority #21)

The adoption of the Crozet Master Plan happened just before the first phase of the county’s Comprehensive Plan review got underway. A public kickoff meeting will take place in January. Supervisor Mallek urged members of the CAC to become engaged in that process to ensure that Crozet’s voice can be heard.

“While people may feel discouraged about particular outcomes in our process, we all need to be keeping our eyes on this other prize going forward because from natural resource planning to historic preservation to climate change to all slews of things, that is the core book that the Board and the staff refer to and this is our chance to make sure that our local words are maintained,” Mallek said.

One of the items to be discussed during the Comp Plan review will be the county’s growth management policy.

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Let’s begin with a Patreon-fueled shout-out.

On today’s program:

The overall health of the James River has dropped slightly

The Food and Drug Administration approves focused ultrasound to treat some symptoms of Parkinson’s disease

Area transportation officials want your input tonight on the region’s transit future

An update on planning for Smart Scale’s fifth round

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority prepares its annual plan to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

While the number of vaccinated Virginians has increased due to the extension of shots into people between the ages of 5 and 11, the number of cases has been up slightly over the past two days. However the Virginia Department of Health reports Wednesday figure of 2,592 new cases as a technical error that includes counts from previous days. The seven day average is now at 1,475 a day and the percent positivity is at 5.5 percent today.

The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 49 new cases today and the fatality count is at 309.

Do you have something to say about how our area bus systems should work? Tonight you’ll have your chance to weigh in on a Regional Transit Vision that could guide the future. Lucinda Shannon is a transportation planner with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District who briefed a technical committee of the Metropolitan Planning Organization on Tuesday.

“I’m really hoping you guys will all sign up for the public meeting which is Thursday night at 6:30 p.m.,” Shannon said. “There’s also surveys on both of the TJPDC transit projects.”

The TJPDC is also conducting a separate study of the expansion of transit in Albemarle County.

Changes to the Charlottesville Area Transit system have been studied and presented to the public this year, but there is no schedule for when they may go into effect as there are more procedural steps to go through. (story map) (presentation)

This week, the Norfolk City Council adopted a resolution approving a plan called Multimodal Norfolk that seeks to increase frequency of some buses.

“The Recommended Network focuses 70 percent of resources on service that will maximize access to opportunity for most residents and are likely to get high ridership relative to cost,” reads the resolution adopted Tuesday night. “The other 30 percent of resources are focused on service that is not likely to get high ridership but will provide service in areas where there is relatively high need.”

Service in Norfolk is provided by Hampton Roads Transit, which that city pays about $20 million a year to operate service. That includes the Tide light rail system.

Meanwhile, work continues to prepare the next round of applications for the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale funding process. Chuck Proctor is a planner with VDOT’s Culpeper District and he’s assisting Albemarle and the MPO come up with potential submissions.

“Most of them are bike-ped related, a lot of them are multimodal projects like Avon Street, 5th Street, the 29-250 bypass,” Proctor said.

Other projects that could be submitted include the intersection of Old Trail and Crozet Avenue, a recommendation from the ongoing North 29 corridor study, projects on Pantops, as well as various intersections of U.S. 250 east of Pantops.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District can submit up to four applications on behalf of localities. Proctor said he was not aware of what applications the city of Charlottesville might advance. Jeannete Janiczek, the city’s urban construction coordinator. In most cases, Charlottesville administers its own projects without involvement from VDOT.

“I just want to remind everyone this is still early in the process,” Janiczek said. “We have a new City Council coming online. The city does plan to apply for Smart Scale but we haven’t yet decided which projects.”

In four rounds, Charlottesville has been awarded millions for various streetscape projects, none of which has yet gone to construction. In September, Council indicated they would no longer support contributing a local match for funds received for the first two phases of West Main Streetscape. VDOT has not yet been formally informed of any decision, according to spokesman Lou Hatter.

Janiczek said potential Charlottesville projects for Round 5 a fourth phase of West Main Streetscape, or in the East High Street, Rose Hill, and the Preston Avenue corridors. There is no information about any of these potential projects available on the city website. In contrast, Albemarle and the TJPDC have been discussing potential projects since the spring.

In recent years, Albemarle County has increased its capacity to design and build non-vehicular transportation projects. Kevin McDermott is a chief of planning.

“We are now finally after many years in the construction phase for a lot of sidewalk improvements including new sidewalks out on Avon Street Extended, both north and south of the Mill Creek intersection,” McDemott said.

The others are:

New sidewalk along U.S. 250 near the Harris Teeter including a pedestrian crossing

New sidewalk along Rio Road East from John Warner Parkway heading east and south toward Charlottesville

New crosswalk at Mountain View Elementary School on Avon Street Extended

New sidewalk and shared-use path on Lambs Road to the Lambs Land Campus

New sidewalk on Ivy Road between city limits and the UVA Musculoskeletal Center

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the use of focused ultrasound to treat patients with Parkinson’s disease, according to a release from the University of Virginia Health System. Specifically, medical device regulators have authorized medical centers to use something called Exablate Neuro by the company Insightec to treat mobility problems associated with tremors caused by Parkinson’s disease.

“Prior to the approval, available treatments for the Parkinson’s symptoms included drugs, which not all patients respond to, and invasive deep-brain surgeries,” reads the release.” Focused ultrasound, in comparison, does not require incisions or cutting into the skull.”

During the procedure, highly focused sound waves are used to target faulty brain cells and used together with Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), treatment can help ease symptoms. The releases stresses that this is not a cure.

The medical technology has been pioneered at UVA and shepherded by the Focused Ultrasound Foundation. Other potential uses include treatment for essential tremors, uterine fibroids and some forms of cancer.. Research is ongoing. For more information visit the UVA Health website or watch videos on the Focused Ultrasound Foundation’s YouTube page.

Water quality in the James River has declined slightly over the past two years, according to a report card issued this week by an advocacy group that seeks to promote practices to reduce pollution. Since 2007, the James River Association has issued the State of the James and this year’s B- is based on a score of 61 percent. Every two years that score is factored by looking at 18 indicators split into the two categories of River Health and River Restoration Progress. In 2017 the grade was 63 percent.

“The decline that has occurred since 2017 reflects the impact of abnormally high rainfall experienced across the watershed in recent years causing increased polluted runoff throughout the James,” reads the press release. “While oysters and tidal water quality showed promising resilience over the past year by bouncing back from the surge of rainwater and pollution, the river also revealed stalled progress in phosphorus, nitrogen, and sediment pollution reductions, as well as stream health.”

Among the indicators are gauges of how healthy various wildlife populations are. The good news is that the bald eagle scores at 100 percent due to an increase in breeding pairs to 352, indicating the ban on DDT as well as passage of the Endangered Species Act in 1973 has led to the resurgence.

The bad news is that American shad are rated at zero and efforts to stock the James River watershed with hatchery shad have not worked because of the presence of dams, water intakes for water supply, invasive catfish, and fishing nets intended for other species.

“Given the dire situation, Virginia must develop an emergency recovery plan that clearly identifies restoration actions,” reads the report card. “But it will take a long-term and sustained effort to bring American shad back from the brink of collapse in the James.”

To look through all of the indicators, visit the State of the James website and explore their story map. What are you most interested in? Let me know in the comments.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s now time for a second Patreon-fueled shout-out.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners will hold a closed meeting today to discuss a personnel matter.

Last week, the appointed body held a work session on a report the CRHA must turn in to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Kathleen Glenn-Matthews is the deputy director of the CRHA. (FY20-FY21 adopted plan) (FY21-22 draft plan) (FY22-23 draft plan)

“The public housing authority PHA plan is a pretty comprehensive guide to all of our agency’s policies and programs,” said Glenn-Matthews. “We spent a lot of time on our goals.”

There are two parts to the plan, one of which is a five-year review that won’t be due until 2023. The second part is an annual plan with details about what will happen in the next fiscal year. The fiscal year for the CRHA runs from April 1 to March 30, a different calendar than the city, state, and federal government.

HUD classifies CRHA as a “troubled agency” based on the Public Housing Assessment System (PHAS) and the Section Eight Management Assessment Program (SEMAP). Glenn-Matthews said that means CRHA has to give more information in its annual plan.

One of the first items in the draft plan is a listing of the number of public housing units and the number of housing choice vouchers. The number of units has dropped from 376 to 324 due in part to the temporary closure of Crescent Halls due to renovations. The number of housing vouchers has increased due to their use to provide temporary places for temporarily displaced residents.

Those vouchers are separate from a program funded directly by the City of Charlottesville but administered by CRHA to increase their number. The city has had a line item of $900,000 a year in the capital budget for this supplemental program.

Highlights from the past year include the adoption of policies on security cameras as well de-concentration of poverty.

“The PHA’s admission policy is designed to provide for de-concentration of poverty and income mixing by bringing higher income tenants into lower income communities and lower income tenants into higher income communities,” reads a statement in the plan.

Glenn-Matthews said the CRHA wants to build a homeownership program as well as augment the family self-sufficiency program.

“We don’t have funding for it and we’re penalized by being troubled but we are looking at alternate sources for that and it’s definitely a big priority for us,” Glenn-Matthews said.

The draft plan indicates that the CRHA will continue to engage in “mixed finance modernization or development” as well as “demolition and/or disposition” in the coming year. One project is development of between 39 and 50 units at Sixth Street SE. There is also a pending demolition and disposition application for the second phase of South First Street, which would replace 58 existing units with a larger project. Planning for redevelopment of Westhaven is expected to begin in the next fiscal year.

“We want to make sure everything in this plan is there that we want to do this year because if not we’ll have to do an amendment, and nobody wants to go through the process,” Glenn-Matthews said.

The plan also explains how nonprofit companies have been formed to serve to secure funding for redevelopment. There’s also data on who lives in the units.

As of August 31, 76 percent of households had incomes below 30 percent of the area median income, 14 percent are between 30 and 50 percent, and three percent are between 50 and 80 percent. Six percent of households do not have their income data available.

Only one percent of residents are classified as Hispanic or Latino, three percent are classified as Asian, 21 percent are white, and 75 percent are Black.

There are a total of 736 people living in Charlottesville public housing and the average household size is 2.6 percent.

The public hearing on the annual plan will be held on Monday, December 20.

Thanks to Ting for their support in helping this program be produced each day. Today the newsletter ends with a limerick from show supporter Harry Landers honoring Ting for their commitment to match your initial payment to a paid Substack subscription!

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Let’s start today with two more Patreon-fueled shout-outs. The first comes a long-time supporter who wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

The second comes from a more recent supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council adopts a Comprehensive Plan and Future Land Use Map after a long public process and long public hearing

President Biden signs an infrastructure bill

Two area breweries have announced a merger

The Places29-Hydraulic group gets the latest on 490 units planned for Old Ivy Road

After nearly five years of review, Charlottesville City Council has adopted a Comprehensive Plan and a Future Land Use Map intended to increase the number of housing units within city limits. Council’s vote came after a long public hearing that came after a work session held in the early afternoon where Council also discussed economic development and population trends. The public hearing ended at 10:44 p.m. and Council then discussed the matter for another hour before voting to adopt.

Up next will be the rewrite of the zoning code to eliminate legislative barriers to new residential density.

I’ll have more on the adoption of the plan and what is in it in an upcoming edition of the newsletter. Take a look at the adopted Comprehensive Plan and the Future Land Use Map here.

Two breweries in the area have announced a merger via Facebook post. Champion Brewing Company and Reason Beer will join operations in a partnership that will see Hunter Smith remain as the company’s CEO. One of Reason’s founders, Jeff Railenau, will become the Chief Financial Officer. Josh Skinner of Champion will become the Head Brewer and Reason’s Mark Fulton will become Director of Brewing Operations. Champion will relocate its production operations from a facility in the Woolen Mills on Broadway Street to Reason’s headquarters at Seminole Place on U.S. 29.

“We’re excited to announce this partnership with our good friends and esteemed beer minds across town that will bring together two skilled and like-minded teams to streamline operations under one roof,” reads a statement on Champion’s Facebook page.

President Joe Biden has signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which will likely change the landscape for the way all kinds of projects in Virginia and the Charlottesville area are funded.

“This law makes the most significant investment in roads and bridges in the past 70 years,” Biden said. “It makes the most significant investment in passenger rail in the past 50 years. And in public transit ever.”

The bill provides direct funding to specific areas across the entire country. (details from the White House)

$55 billion to expand access to clean drinking water, eliminating lead pipes and cleaning up PFAS chemicals

$21 billion in funding to remediate Superfund sites in rural and urban communities

$66 billion for public transit, including vehicle replacement from fossil-fuel burning to zero emissions vehicles

$5 billion specifically to purchase clean school buses

$17 billion to modernize ports and update machinery to reduce congestion and emissions

$25 billion for airports including efforts to drive electrification and a transition to other low-carbon technologies

Over $50 billion in investments to protect against drought, heat waves, wildfires and floods

The legislation passed the U.S. Senate on a 69-30 vote and the U.S. House on a 221 to 201 vote. Take a look at the full bill here.

“The bill I’m about to sign into law is proof that despite the cynics, Democrats and Republicans can come together to deliver results,” Biden said.

There’s also funding to increase internet access.

“This law is going to make high-speed Internet affordable and everywhere, everywhere in America,” Biden said “Urban, suburban, rural, and great jobs laying down those broadband lines.”

Environmental groups in Virginia are celebrating the signing of the infrastructure bill, which will provide an additional $238 million for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for the Chesapeake Bay Program according to a statement from the Choose Clean Water Coalition.

“These additional funds will help reduce pollution in the Bay and its waterways, especially as we approach the 2025 deadline to have all pollution reduction practices in place as part of the Bay's restoration effort,” said Coalition Director Kristin Reilly.

Reilly refers to something called the Chesapeake Bay TMDL, a framework to reduce pollution across all of the watersheds that feed into the Bay, including the Rapidan, Rivanna, and James Rivers. Investments have been made over the years, including millions to upgrade the Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant to reduce the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus that makes it to the Bay, creating dead zones with no oxygen.

The bill has also been celebrated by the Virginia Transit Association, who sent out a release pointing out that the bill contains $102 billion nationwide in funding for passenger and freight rail, or a 592 percent increase over usual funding levels. That could include $1.4 billion for Virginia.

“Transit will receive about $1.3 billion in formula funding over the next five years, a 34 percent increase over normal funding levels,” said Danny Plaugher, the Deputy Director of the Virginia Transit Association and the Executive Director of Virginians for HighSpeed Rail. “The Charlottesville area will receive about an extra million a year over that period. Virginia will also be competitive on several expanded transit and rail grant programs which could invest billions into our transportation network."

All of Virginia’s Democratic Representatives in Congress voted for the bill, whereas all of Virginia’s Republican Representatives voted against it. But Biden said there was support from industry.

“This law was supported by business groups — the U.S. Chamber of Commerce; the National Association of Manufacturers; the Business Roundtable, representing 200 of the largest corporations in America and other top businesses,” Biden said.

Local governments are watching closely to see what the bill may mean for their bottom line.

“Albemarle County will closely monitor avenues for local governments to apply for funding to advance our strategic infrastructure needs as guidance becomes available from the federal and state governments,” said Emily Kilroy, director of Communications and Public Engagement for Albemarle.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time for another Patreon-fueled shout-out!

A proposed rezoning requested by Greystar Development for about 36 acres of land off of Old Ivy Road will be slightly smaller than the 525 units requested in the first application, but it will still be fairly substantial.

“Our current plan is to have about 490 units,” said Valerie Long, an attorney with Williams Mullen. “We’re still under 20 dwelling units per acre so well within the range that’s permitted.

The Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee got a first look at the Old Ivy Residences project, which is currently not scheduled for a public hearing before the Planning Commission. (watch the meeting)

The land is split between five parcels, with three of them already zoned for 15 units per acre.

“R-15 residential zoning allows for basically any type of residential development whether its single family detached, single-family attached, or multifamily apartments,” said county planner Cameron Langille.

One parcel allows for ten units per acre, and the other is currently zoned for one unit per acre.

The application is to make them all R-15. A previous rezoning approved by the Board of Supervisors in 1985 has a condition that states that the Old Ivy Road corridor needs to have been upgraded to a certain performance level before development can begin.

“The applicant is asking for us to evaluate that and make a recommendation as to whether corridor has been improved to that extent,” Langille said.

The board also approved a rezoning in 1996 for one of the parcels that restricts certain uses. Langille said the applicant wants the Board to drop that condition. There’s also a request to disturb slopes which involves changing their classification from preserved to managed.

The county’s Comprehensive Plan designated three of the parcels as urban density residential, which allows anywhere between 6 units and 36 units per acre. Land along the U.S. 250 Bypass is designated as parks space and currently is the home of a section of the Rivanna Trail. Greystar officials said that would continue.

Staff has conducted one review and the developer is working through the various questions from staff.

John Clarkson is a managing director with Greystar Development, a national developer with projects all across the United States of America.

“There are opportunities in University towns that lack housing opportunities, very important housing opportunities to provide that level of affordability to make those communities sustainable over the long term,” Clarkson said.

Dan Nickerson, a development senior associate with Greystar, is a graduate of the nearby Darden School.

“The number one thing we love about this site is the natural landscape and we’ve done the best job we could and we think we’ve done a really good job preserving the landscape while enabling the density that the Comp Plan allows,” Nickerson said.

Old Ivy Road is a two-lane road that has a one-way underpass near its eastern intersection with Ivy Road without a sidewalk or bike lane. The western intersection as well as a two-lane bridge over the bypass are also constraints. Long acknowledged that traffic congestion is an issue.

“Obviously those issues are existing, have been growing and increasing over the past few decades, but Greystar is committed to continue looking at those challenges and collaborating with [the Virginia Department of Transportation] and the county planning staff as appropriate to work toward identifying solutions,” Long said.

Long said Greystar would be willing to pay a “proportional amount” for some of those solutions.

VDOT’s Six-Year Improvement program includes funds for a $3 million replacement of the bridge over U.S. 250, but the description currently states it will be built with no additional capacity. Preliminary engineering is underway now with construction scheduled for Fiscal Year 2024.

Long said county officials have been able to at least carve out some improvements for the project.

“They were able to include in that project design that there will be a pedestrian lane on the new bridge,” Long said.

Members of the CAC and the public had the opportunity to ask questions and make comments. Sally Thomas served four terms on the Board of Supervisors and lives next door in the University Village apartment building.

“We don’t oppose having neighbors and we are delighted that they are neighbors that care about the environment,” Thomas said. “We also do have a lovely old stand of trees, some over 100 years old, and we want to try to preserve and protect those.”

Thomas said University Village wants to make sure there are pathways that safe and attractive and avoid the trees.

Kathleen Jump of Huntington Village complex said she likes to walk, but said this section of Albemarle is landlocked with many obstacles for pedestrians.

“The eastern bridge is a concern and the pedestrians at that end of Old Ivy Road put their lives in their hands when they cross under that bridge,” Jump said.

Kevin McDermott is a chief of planning in Albemarle who specializes in transportation.

“We have been evaluating both ends of Old Ivy Road as Valerie mentioned also, very recently, to try to see if there are options for improving them,” McDermott said. “Nothing has jumped out as an easy solution right now. Trying to expand that underpass is going to be extremely expensive.”

McDermott said VDOT is working with a consultant to look at both ends of the road to come up with solutions, possibly to inform a Smart Scale application for next year.

Taylor Ahlgren just moved into Huntington Village. He wants the development to do as much as it can to discourage vehicular travel. Here’s what he would like to see.

“Supporting future residents to stay away from using a car and using alternative means of transportation,” Ahlgren said.

The project currently does not have a public meeting scheduled with the Planning Commission. Stay tuned.

Also nearby is the Ivy Garden complex, which the University of Virginia will be redeveloped as a mixed-use community. The UVA Buildings and Grounds Committee got a briefing on that project in June.

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WTJU is hosting Classical Listening Parties, a series of four free, casual events on Tuesdays in November. These four events are led by Chelsea Holt, pianist, teacher, and one of WTJU’s newest and youngest classical announcers. She’ll guide you through all the eras of classical music and tomorrow night at 7 p.m.: Classical. For a list of the others, visit wtju.net to learn more and sign up!

On today’s show:

The Village of Rivanna CAC gets an update on what middle missing housing is

A recap of what’s been dropped off at solid waste centers operated by one of the Rivanna authorities

Work takes places this work to help remediate an industrial waste site in Crozet

Let’s begin the week with a status report on the pandemic. The Virginia Department of Health reports a seven-day average of 1,305 cases a day with 871 reported this morning. The percent positivity is at 5.4 percent, slightly up from 5.3 on Friday. There are 32 new cases in the Blue Ridge Health District and the percent positivity is at 4.7 percent. There have been five new deaths reported in the District since Friday.

Belmont Bridge update

The first major traffic shift of the Belmont Bridge is underway. All vehicular traffic will be routed to the southbound portion of the bridge, according to a project update sent out by the city of Charlottesville. New temporary traffic signals have been installed to control the new alignment. Construction got underway this year after many years of planning. To learn more, visit the city’s website.

General Assembly 2022

The two major parties have nominated their leaders for the next session of the House of Delegates. Republicans have nominated Delegate Todd Gilbert (R-15) as Speaker of the House and Delegate Terry Kilgore (R-1) as House Majority Leader. Republicans picked up five seats in the November 2 election to have a 52 to 48 edge when the General Assembly convenes on January 12. (press release)

Current Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn (D-41) has been nominated as House Minority Leader. Delegate Charniele Herring (D-46) will serve as Chair of the Democratic Caucus. (press release)

Remediating Acme

Crews are working in Crozet this month at the site of the former Acme Visible Records. The company built storage and retrieval equipment for documents from 1954 until approximately 2001. During that time, they directed wastewater into a lagoon that contained multiple pollutants. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a permit in September 2020 to the Wilson Jones Company to mitigate the harm based on a 2019 status report from the Virginia Department of Environmental quality. All of the buildings have been removed. (permit) (basis)

Representatives of the company performing the mitigation sent an update the Crozet Community Association announcing that groundwater samples will be taken between November 10 and November 19. There are also plans this week to dig two wells to inject new chemicals into hazardous areas.

“The wells will be installed to facilitate the completion of a pilot study for the injection of chemical oxidants which will treat the chlorinated solvent impacts in groundwater at the facility,” reads the report from a public relations company working with the Wilson Jones Company.

As part of the permit, the land can never be used for residential purposes, schools, playgrounds, or daycare.

Solid waste drop-off report

The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority’s Board of Directors meets for the final time of 2021 tomorrow. The packet contains data about activity at the Ivy Materials Utilization Center and McIntire Recycling Center, both of which process all manner of recycling and solid waste.

As of late September, 42 containers of paint cans have been shipped out of the facility.

“Each container holds about 4,200 one-gallon paint cans,” reads an operations report. “Therefore, we have shipped about 176,400 paint cans since the program began in August 2016.”

Leftover latex paint is re-processed back into commercial paint and oil-based paints are converted into fuel.

Both September and October were busy months for the compostable food waste collection at the McIntire center, with over 8 tons being dropped off in each month. Commercial customers pay $178 a ton for disposal and residents are not charged.

Over six hundred people participated in a Household Hazardous Waste Day held over two days in late September. Albemarle residents dropped off 22,640 pounds of furniture and mattresses on October 2, and Charlottesville residents disposed of 3,380 pounds.

On October 9 the Ivy MUC accepted appliances and Albemarle residents parted with 6,800 pounds and 160 freon units. Charlottesville residents dropped off 1,400 pounds and 30 freon units. On October 16, unwanted tires had their turn and nearly 49 tons were processed for recycling.

The RSWA continues to work through a permit modification with the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to up the tonnage allowed at the Ivy MUC from 300 tons a day to 450 tons a day.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Interested in learning more about the Ancestral Monacan Homelands in Albemarle and Charlottesville along the Seminole Trail on which our 21st century communities have been built Interested in learning how to document the history, present, and future? Tomorrow the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will hold a two-part event in-person at Northside Library beginning at 5 p.m.

First, UVA Professor of Anthropology Jeffrey Hantman will discuss his work, which includes which includes archaeology and history of the Monacan people, now with a new emphasis on how the Monacans were targeted by the eugenics movement. That will be followed at 6 p.m. with a workshop on cvillepedia, a collaborative encyclopedia. There will be a tutorial and I’ll be on hand to demonstrate how I use the site to keep the community informed.

Professor Hantman’s talk will also be available through Zoom. Visit jmrl.org to learn more and to register for both programs.

Missing Middle

Finally today, on Thursday, the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee will discuss an 85-unit rezoning that developers say will provide “missing middle housing” in the form of triplexes, duplexes, and multifamily units. But what is missing middle? Tori Kanellopoulos is a senior planner with the county.

“Missing middle housing is housing that is between single-family detached housing and larger apartments and is intended to be compatible and scale and form with existing single-family attached,” Kanellopoulos said.

Kannellopoulos said these units tend be smaller and are more affordable because the cost of land is spread across multiple units.

“This is a concept that has gained a lot of attention recently though many of these housing types have existed for decades or longer and actually used to be permitted through many localities,” Kannellopoulos said. “Now localities are relegalizing these units by updating their zoning ordinances.”

In July, Albemarle Supervisors adopted the Housing Albemarle plan, which seeks to encourage the development of more units with the hope that greater inventory will help with affordability. Renters and morgage-holders who pay more than 30 percent of their income on housing costs are considered distressed. That’s in part because Albemarle is an affluent community with a high median income.

“Median home values in the county are about $138,000 higher than the U.S. median and about $83,000 higher than the Virginia median,” Kannellopoulos said. “Forty-two percent of renter households and 18 percent of homeowner households in the county are cost-burdened, meaning they are paying more than 30 percent of their gross income toward housing.”

The situation is perhaps worse when other factors are taken into consideration such as the cost of transportation, child care, health, and food.

To encourage creation of more of these housing types, planners created the Middle Density Residential land use category and debuted this in the Crozet master plan, over the opposition of some on the Crozet Community Advisory Committee.

“The category recommends a density of 6-12 units per acre with up to 18 units per acre by meeting middle density housing types or affordability criteria beyond baseline housing requirements,” Kannellopoulos said.

Most members of the Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee were opposed to the rezoning of Breezy Hill for 80 units on about 76 acres due to it being technically above one unit per acre. VORCAC Chair Dennis Odinov expressed skepticism that allowing more density would translate to more affordable prices.

“These things have good intentions but in reality a lot of times they just over a period of time they just don’t work,” Odinov said. “That’s my concern. I’m no oracle and I may be wrong but that’s my experience and what I’ve seen. I’ve lived a lot of different places.”

Odinov wanted to hear more about why many in Crozet were opposed to the concept.

Details about how this might be implemented can be seen in the appendix of the Crozet Master Plan. Take a look beginning on page 72 of the .PDF

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out, are you a patron of the James Madison Regional Library system who suffers from a plague of library fines? If so, for the next week you can pay off your balance with a food donation that will go to the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank.

To participate in the Food for Fines program, bring a non-perishable item to the front desk and get a dollar off. Do note this does not apply to missing or damaged items. Patrons who are in better standing than me are also welcome to donate an item or many items. For more information, visit jmrl.org. Visit here for a list of the most wanted items

On today’s show:

A look at several upcoming developments in Albemarle County including the second phase for Southwood and a three-story self storage building in Crozet

More than 83 percent of adult Virginians are fully vaccinated

The Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee debriefs after a rezoning vote did not go the way members wanted

Greyhound has a new owner, and Virginia launches bus service from far Southwest Virginia to the nation’s capital

On Friday, Governor Ralph Northam announced that 83 percent of the adult population in Virginia is now fully vaccinated. Also on Friday, the Virginia Department of Health reported the percent positivity dropped to 5.3 percent, on a day when the seven-day average for new cases is 1,328.

But there are hotspots emerging across the country. Vermont is experiencing its worst surge yet, with a record 595 cases on Thursday and 505 cases on Friday according to the website VTDigger.

Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System, said colder parts of the country are beginning to see the increase.

“Just as we’re entering the cold and flu season, we’re also entering the season where we may see increased transmission of COVID just because we’re going into the winter months,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri said COVID still represents a significant risk and he recommended people continue to wear masks in indoor public spaces. Thanksgiving is less than two weeks and Dr. Sifri emphasized caution.

“One thing I’d want to emphasize is the importance of boosters for people who are vulnerable,” Dr. Sifri said.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, ten percent of children between 5 and 11 have been vaccinated during the first week a reduced Pfizer dose has been available.

The Virginia Supreme Court has rejected three Republican nominees to serve as Special Masters in the next phase of the redistricting process. In October, a 16-member redistricting commission failed to reach consensus on maps for legislative districts for both the General Assembly and the U.S. House of Representatives. Senate Democratic Leader Richard Saslaw petitioned the Court to disqualify the three Republican nominees, claiming conflicts of interest due to their previous work on creating maps.

The Virginia Supreme Court agreed.

“The Court intends to appoint Special Masters who are qualified and do not have a conflict of interest,” reads a November 12 letter from Chief Justice Donald Lemons. “Although the Special Master candidates are to be nominated by legislative leaders of a particular party, the nominees… will serve as Officers of the Court in a quasi-judicial capacity.”

Justice Lemons said that nominees must not consult with political parties once they have been appointed. One of the Republican nominees, Thomas M. Bryan, had been hired by the Republican Party of Virginia as a consultant on using 2020 U.S. Census data for redistricting. That information had not been disclosed in the nominating materials.

Republicans have until Monday at 5 p.m. to submit three new names, and Democrats are being asked to submit one more name due to a potential issue with one of their three nominees. For more information, visit the Supreme Court’s website.

The national bus company Greyhound has been purchased by a German firm called FlixMobility. They operate a service called Flixbus which operates in 36 countries in addition to the United States. Greyhound serves 2,400 stops across the country, and has a ridership of 16 million passengers.

“Buses as a sustainable and accessible alternative are now more important than ever,” reads an October 21, 2021 press release. “Fluctuations in the cost of gas, the recent escalation of car prices, and climate change concerns have increased the interest of many consumers in finding alternatives to individual car usage.”

For $46 million cash and $32 million in future payments, Flixmobility will now own the Greyhound name and the bus fleet, but not any real estate or stops. Flixbus has been running buses in U.S. since 2018.

Meanwhile, on Monday the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation will launch the Highland Rhythms service between Bristol and Washington D.C. This is the fourth Virginia Breeze intrastate route to be funded by the state agency, which will be operated by Megabus. A ceremony was held this morning at the Birthplace of Country Music in Bristol (read more in the Bristol Herald-Courier)

Time now to take a look at recent land use applications in Albemarle County.

First, a site development plan has been submitted for a new Chipotle restaurant to be located in Hollymead Town Center. Before the pandemic, there would be site plan review meetings for the public to comment, but those have not been held. However, the Albemarle officials are looking to begin to resume the public process.

“These projects are ‘by-right’, which means that if the proposed plans meet the minimum requirements of the County’s zoning, site plan, or subdivision ordinances, they must be approved,” reads the notice for this application. (take a look)

A TGI Friday’s Restaurant used to operate on the site and the existing building will be replaced and a drive-through window will be installed in the new building.

Another site plan has been filed for a three-story self-storage facility at the intersection of Brownsville Road, Route 240, and Rockfish Gap Turnpike (U.S. 250). The zoning on the site is Highway Commercial and a gas station used to operate on the site. That building and a couple of others will be removed to make way for the structure. (take a look)

Southwood Phase 2

In October, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville filed the second phase of their rezoning for the redevelopment of the Southwood Mobile Home Park. The rezoning would amend the first phase to add 93.32 acres from R-2 to the Neighborhood Model District.

“Phase 2 is planned within the project's existing mobile home park where development will occur in phases so as to limit the impact to the existing residents,” reads the narrative. “The resident planners who designed and wrote the Code of Development for Phase I has provided input in this next phase that the form, density, and uses established with Phase I should continue into Phase 2.”

This phase of redevelopment would include up to 1,000 housing units in a mix of single-family houses, duplexes, townhomes, and apartment buildings. There would also be another 60,000 square feet of non-residential space. (read the Code of Development)

Several blocks in phase one are under construction.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement, and time now for another subscriber-supported public service announcement.

Are you using too many chemicals in your yard and garden? Would you like to learn more about alternatives? The Piedmont Master Gardeners will a free online information session on the topic Monday November 15 at 3 p.m. Participants will learn how to keep their landscapes safe and healthy using Integrated Pest Management. The Center at Belvedere will host the session, which carries the name “Why and How to Reduce Chemical Use in your Yard and Garden.” Learn more and register at thecentercville.org.

Albemarle County staff have begun work on the update of the Comprehensive Plan with a public kick-off expected sometime in January. A major aspect of the current plan is a growth management policy which designates specific areas for density. This plan was last updated in 2015 and since then Supervisors have adopted several other policies, such as the Housing Albemarle plan.

“To accommodate this growth, the County will need to add approximately 11,750 new units to our housing stock over the next 20 years,” reads Objective 1 of the plan, which was adopted by Supervisors in July. “The county must support the development of an additional 2,719 units to fully accommodate projected household growth through 2040.”

One of the growth areas is the Village of Rivanna and their Community Advisory Committee met on November 8. Most of its members are not happy with the Board of Supervisors 4-2 vote in October for a rezoning from rural area to R-1 for an 80-unit single-family neighborhood called Breezy Hill. (staff report) (Village of Rivanna Master Plan) (watch the meeting)

Dennis Odinov is the group’s chair.

“We all know how it turned out and we may be disappointed but what are lessons learned?” Odinov said. “Are there any lessons learned from this?”

Members of the group thanked Supervisor Donna Price for her against the rezoning. Price was joined by Supervisor Ann Mallek.

Southern Development had initially requested 200 units, but scaled back due to community opposition. The Village of Rivanna Master Plan designated the land as Neighborhood Density Residential, and a map describes that as up to three dwelling units per acre. Members of the CAC maintained the plan only allows one dwelling unit per acre.

Neal Means said pressure from the group helped get the number to 80 but he does not have a positive view of Southern Development.

“It just goes to show you that the developers really don’t care about the master plan at all and the arguments they made much later about it should be one unit per gross acre and not net, is just an argument,” Means said. “They’re going to try to get as much as they can any time they want, no matter what the master plan says.”

Gross density is a simple calculation of the number of units divided by the size of the land. Net density subtracts from the size of the land the square footage that would be used for infrastructure or open space. In the case of Breezy Hill, the gross density was 1 unit per acre, but the net density was 1.4 per acres. To Means, that means the system is broken.

“I don’t think the county’s master planning process is functioning well,” Means said. “I think it’s dysfunctional and it needs to be revisited.”

Ultimately, elected officials make their decisions based on interpretation of master plans. Odinov said the current version of the plan was not clear enough to state the wishes of the community.

“We have no language in the master plan that says one unit per acre, net,” Odinov said “We don’t say it in the verbiage.”

The master plan also states that no new developments should be approved until specific transportation projects are built on U.S. 250. However such a directive is not permissible under Virginia law.

In Virginia, localities cannot specifically ask for infrastructure to be built in exchange for a rezoning, but developers can volunteer to pay for projects in something called a proffer.

“I thought it was a slap in the face,” said Paula Pagonakis. “I took it as a slap in the face when the developer said he could not provide any proffers because he would not get enough profit out of the project. I don’t know how much impact that had on the vote by the Supervisors but I felt a bit insulted.”

In Charlottesville, Southern Development has agreed to contribute nearly $3 million upfront for the creation of a sidewalk on Stribling Avenue, a 170 units project on about 12 acres. If Council approves the rezoning, Southern Development will be paid back through the incremental revenue generated.

Supervisor Donna Price voted against the rezoning but said the community pressure to reduce Breezy Hill’s scope resulted in a more palatable project.

“Did we achieve everything?” Price asked. “No. But we came out I think a whole better strategically than if it had been at 160 or 130.”

Price said she supported increased density in Crozet and voted for the 332-unit RST Residences near Forest Lakes.

“Highly dense, but it is also right on a six-lane highway up there,” Price said. “I’ve tried to maintain a consistency of if you get to the periphery of development areas it should be less developed and as you move more toward the center of development it should be more highly developed and more dense.”

An update of the Village of Master Plan is not currently scheduled, according to county planner Tori Kanellopoulos.

“It would need to be on the Community Development work program and we do have the Comprehensive Plan update that just started,” Kanellopoulos said. “That will take up a significant amount of resources.”

I’ll have a report from the Crozet Community Advisory Committee in an upcoming edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

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Happy Not-Really-Pie Day!

November 10 is the 314th day of the year, which is an association that many have not yet made. There have been 241 days since the most recent March 14, which many so associate with a mathematical constant, and there are 124 days until the next 3/14. What does it all mean? Are these correlations, causations, or just random bits of trivia? And who gets to decide? None of this is relevant to the calculus of Charlottesville Community Engagement, but all of it is at least worth puzzling out.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville Planning Commission recommends rezoning for 170 units in Fry’s Spring neighborhood, conditioned on a deal between the city and Southern Development to build a sidewalk

Brian Wheeler is leaving as Charlottesville’s Communications Director

Fire marshals determine a deadly house fire in July was accidental

Highlights from November’s meeting of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission

The city now has another high-level vacancy. Several media outlets are reporting that Brian Wheeler will leave his position as Communications Director later this month on November 19. Wheeler said the city has no further comment on his departure.

There is currently no city manager, but Deputy City Managers Ashley Marshall and Sam Sanders are still in office and will remain so after Interim City Manager Marc Woolley begins work on December 1. In recent months, both the city’s parks director and public works director have left. The assistant economic development director is also leaving the city to take a job in the private sector.

In a follow-up, Wheeler said offers are being made this week for parks, public works, and human resources.

Charlottesville is not alone in job turnover. The Deputy Clerk of Virginia Beach has resigned, citing “toxic energy” within city government. That’s according to a report on WVEC.

Consumer prices in the United States rose 0.9 percent in October. That brings the increase over the past year to 6.2 percent. That’s the largest yearly increase since November 1990.

“The monthly all items seasonally adjusted increase was broad-based, with increases in the indexes for energy, shelter, food, used cars and trucks, and new vehicles among the larger contributors,” reads the press release that accompanied today’s numbers.

The cost of energy rose 4.8 percent, with gasoline increasing 6.1 percent. Energy costs are up 30 percent over the past 12 months, and food costs are up 5.3 percent.

Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin has launched a website with information related to his transition to become the 74th chief executive of Virginia. If you’re interested in a position in the next government, this is where you would go to apply. The website is also where to go for information about the inauguration.

The Charlottesville Fire Department has found that a fire this summer in July at a home in the 1000 block of Cherry Avenue was accidental. The fire on July 21 killed two people and critically injured a third. Fire marshals found that flames started in an unoccupied bedroom and the presence of home oxygen cylinders contributed to the fire’s intensity.

“Every family should have a home escape plan with a specific meeting place outside,” reads the press release. “Practicing your family's plan will ensure that everyone evacuates your home and reunites at the designated meeting place during a fire emergency.”

The two fatalities are the first in Charlottesville since a fire in the summer of 2010.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District will mark its 50th anniversary next year. The public entity’s creation stemmed out of reform in Virginia. David Blount is the deputy director of the TJPDC and he explained the passage of the Regional Cooperation Act in 1968. (state code)

“[Planning District Commissions] and the framework for them is laid out in state code,” Blount said. “It’s encouraging and facilitating not only that local government cooperation, but also providing that link between the state and localities for addressing issues on a regional basis.”

TJPDC formed later than other similar bodies. The body last met on November 4. Executive Director Christine Jacobs said the agency has been awarded $2 million in funding from the Virginia Housing Development Authority to distribute to groups who can build affordable housing units.

“We have cast a very wide net to make sure we are reaching out to potential public, nonprofit, private developers to submit proofs of concept so that we can see what types of projects are eligible under this funding,” Jacobs said.

Applications are due on November 29 and the application can be found on the TJPDC website.

The TJPDC continues to oversee the creation of a “regional transit vision” with a meeting scheduled for November 18.

“We want to make sure we get as much as the public’s voice in that regional transit vision plan as possible,” Jacobs said

To add your voice, there are two surveys you can fill out before participating in that November 18 meeting. (surveys are here)

November Roundtable

TJPDC meetings offer the opportunity for members to share what it happening in their localities. Yesterday I reported on Albemarle’s $13.2 million unaudited surplus from fiscal year 2021. Except, Albemarle doesn’t call it that. Here’s Supervisor Donna Price.

“We don’t really see it as a surplus, but we do see it as a positive variance and that’s really a difference there because when that pandemic first hit we cut back on our spending substantially,” Price said.

The chair of the TJPDC Board of Commissioners is Jesse Rutherford, recently re-elected to another term on the Nelson County Board of Supervisors. He appreciated Price’s distinction.

“You taught me something that I’m going to bring with me to my tax accountant,” Rutherford said. “Positive variance. I’m already texting my account and we’re getting rid of the word net income.”

City Planning Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg noted that the seven member advisory body recommended approval of the city’s Comprehensive Plan update on October 12. He also provided an update on the redevelopment of public housing.

“The very first buildings, the phase one of South First Street building in the empty ballfields, the first two buildings are just about complete structurally,” Stolzenberg said. “They have roofs and walls and are topped out. So they just need to be finished and that means building 3 can start.”

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority will hold a work session on November 11 on the draft annual plan that must be submitted to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. (presentation) (draft plan) (register for 5 p.m. meeting)

2021 began with Chip Boyles as the executive director of the TJPDC, a position he left to become City Manager. He resigned on October 12, citing professional and personal abuse in the wake of the firing of Police Chief RaShall Brackney.

City Councilor Michael Payne reported the news.

“I won’t sugarcoat it,” Payne said. “It’s probably the biggest challenge we face. Just the turnover there. We’re in a maybe unique situation where this internal stuff has a major impact on our ability to execute a lot of the things we want to begin, Comprehensive Plan, housing, climate action planning. It makes it difficult for our ability to do long-range planning as well.”

Rutherford offered the services of the planning district.

“Of course if there’s anything that we can do as an organization to assist in whatever way, we’re here for you,” Rutherford said. “What happens to Charlottesville does have a regional effect.”

Time for a second Patreon-powered shout-out!

Sidewalk progress

A rezoning of 12 wooded acres in Charlottesville’s Fry’s Spring neighborhood moved one step closer to approval last night. The seven-member Planning Commission recommended approval of a project that goes by the name 240 Stribling that would see 170 units.

On September 14, the developer asked for a deferral of a decision following a public hearing. City Planner Matt Alfele has this recap.

“During the public hearing, the Planning Commission heard from 16 members of the public,” Alfele said. “Most speakers raised concern about the safety of Stribling Avenue and how additional dwelling units on the subject property would be detrimental to public safety.”

At that meeting, Southern Development’s vice president and the city’s Economic Development director discussed the details of an agreement in which Southern Development had agreed to pay up to $2 million for sidewalk improvements. City Engineer Jack Dawson said that figure was too low to cover the cost, and in October, he told Council his estimate would top out at $2.85 million. (Council Balks At $850k Cost For Stribling Sidewalks)

“As I stated to Council, it’s not a complete estimate, it’s just an improved upon estimate but it is likely to be higher than that would be my guess,” Dawson said last night.

The city’s Capital Improvement Plan budget is at capacity with expectations of spending millions a year on affordable housing projects as well as tens of millions over the next five years for reconfiguration of the city’s elementary and middle schools.

Southern Development has agreed to increase their upfront funding to $2.9 million.

“Though we feel that this work can be completed for significantly less, we do think it is important enough that we want to make sure our amount jibes with the city engineer’s estimate,” said Charlie Armstrong, vice president at Southern Development.

“We want to get those sidewalks built,” he added. “We want to provide the funding so that it could be put into the [capital improvement program].”

Armstrong said Southern Development is ready to move on the sidewalk project and his team has worked on a survey of the corridor. So has the city engineer.

“There are some differences but I think we have a pretty good idea of a basic what would be needed,” Armstrong said. “There’s a lot of details in the detailed engineering that will come later.”

Southern Development will be paid back by getting the incremental difference between the current value of the land and what it will be like after the units are built.

“Our development obviously significantly increases the value of the real estate at 240 Stribling so the taxes go up,” Armstrong said. “And we’re not talking about just a little bit. They go up a lot. In twenty years, this produces, conservatively, eight and a half million dollars of new tax revenue. And that’s after paying for the sidewalks.”

Armstrong said 25 units would be designated as affordable with rents or sale prices held below market for households with incomes below 60 percent of the area median income. Next up will be a vote by the City Council. The Planning Commission will have a work session on the next Capital Improvement Program budget on November 23.

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Let’s begin with a Patreon-fueled shout-out.

On today’s show:

One of Charlottesville’s former police chiefs wants to sue the city for wrongful termination

Albemarle Board of Supervisors formally begins Comprehensive Plan review

Albemarle may also have a potential budget surplus of over $13 million

ProPublica takes a look at the links between industrial air pollution and cancer

The Virginia Festival of the Book will return to an in-person event next March

Former Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney has filed a complaint with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission alleging she was wrongfully terminated by former City Manager Chip Boyles. Boyles resigned on October 12 citing personal and professional abuse in the aftermath of the firing.

Brackney and her lawyer Charles Tucker held a press conference this morning to announce the complaint as well as a demand for millions in damages. Tucker appeared to make the claim that Brackney is still the chief.

“She’s not here today to talk about an abrupt termination,” Tucker said. “She’s here today to talk about a wrongful attempt at termination.”

Tucker alleged collusion to remove Brackney by Council, top police officials, and former manager Boyles.

Complaints to the EEOC are private and information is only available to be released the individual who files the complain as well as the subject of the complaint. A spokesman for the EEOC told me today he could neither confirm or deny the existence of the complaint. He noted that an EEOC complaint is the first step toward filing a lawsuit.

Learn more about this process on the EEOC’s website. The agency’s authority comes from Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. There’s also a FAQ worth reviewing.

Tucker is employed by the Cochran Firm, a national law firm founded by the late Johnnie Cochran. Cochran was part of the legal team that successfully defended former football player O.J. Simpson on double murder charges in October 1995.

Special thanks to Dori Zook of WINA for providing the audio. Take a look at coverage on NBC29 for more information.

One of Charlottesville’s most popular events will return to some in-person events next spring. The Virginia Festival of the Book was canceled in 2020 and was held virtually in 2021, but will return with a hybrid event from March 16 through March 20. The Festival has also been holding online programs year-round as part of its Shelf Life series. Headlining speakers for the 28th festival will not be announced until January. Review previous programs on the VABook website at vabook.org.

Industrial investigation

An investigation by ProPublica has identified the Radford area in the New River Valley as one of the places in Virginia where residents are more likely to contract cancer due to air pollution. That’s due to the presence of the U.S. Army Radford Ammunition Plant.

“This facility alone is estimated to increase the excess cancer risk for people living within five miles by an average of 1 in 4,100,” reads their summary of the Radford area.

ProPublica’s interactive map also shows pollution hotspots in Richmond and Petersburg. Their work is based on analysis of five-years of data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Learn more in a story on NBC29 that’s part of a collaboration between Gray Communications and ProPublica.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time for two more Patreon-fueled shout-outs. The first comes a long-time supporter who wants you to know:

"Today is a great day to spread good cheer: reach out to an old friend, compliment a stranger, or pause for a moment of gratitude to savor a delight."

The second comes from a more recent supporter who wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

Albemarle Comprehensive Plan process

Two stories from Albemarle today.

First, Albemarle County has formally begun the process of updating its Comprehensive Plan. The Board of Supervisors adopted a resolution on November 3 that kicks off a multiphase process and public engagement plan for the first round. But let’s get a reminder on what this is from planner Tori Kanellopoulos.

“The Comprehensive Plan is a guiding document for the county and is a twenty year plan which includes housing, transportation, land use, economic development, natural and historic resources,” Kannellopoulos said.

The plan influences everything from the Capital Improvement program to decisions on land use such as rezoning. Supervisors last adopted a plan six years ago.

“Since the current Comprehensive Plan was adopted in 2015, there have been a variety of new policies and plans adopted by the Board including the Climate Action Plan, an updated housing policy, Project ENABLE and an updated Strategic Plan,” Kannellopoulos said. “Additionally the Office of Equity and Inclusion was created and the Board adopted the new organizational value of community.”

Since 2015, Kanellopoulos said 4,000 new dwelling units have been built and the population is expected to continue growing. With that comes increased demand for urban services to be delivered by the local government.

The first phase will take a look at the county’s growth management policy, which has been embedded in the Comprehensive Plan for decades. That will include a capacity analysis for the county’s ability to provide new housing, as well as the needs of economic development.

“Phase 2 will identify the main topics of the Comprehensive Plan, evaluate existing conditions for each, and provide updated frameworks using the lens of equity and climate action,” Kannellopoulos said. “Phase 3 will identify recommended action steps to implement the plan and metrics to track progress. And Phase 4 will finalize the document for adoption.”

At the same time, Supervisors have asked for some changes to the zoning ordinance to happen concurrently with the Comprehensive Plan review. The winter holidays are approaching so there will not be a public kickoff for this process until January. Between now and then, a working group of community members and other stakeholders will be assembled to oversee the process.

Supervisor Ann Mallek said the process to update the Crozet Master Plan at times was more difficult due to the lack of institutional memory and history about how that area has been a designated growth area.

“There was a real challenge to help people to get enough background to be able to understand what they were being asked,” Mallek said. “And I think getting that knowledge base will prevent a lot of frustration that happens when people are asked to respond to a survey about which they’re given no information. And they just get mad.”

Mallek also wants more public meetings in places that aren’t government buildings.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said he wants to make sure that the public knows the review is underway.

“It can be frustrating I would imagine for everybody involved where community members maybe come late to the game,” Gallaway said. “We do our best effort to put things out there that this is going to be worked on and the ways to participate are there. And then if they are missed, we get ‘Well, where is this coming from?’ at the 11th hour. Whatever we need to do [public relations] wide to engage the community, we’ll have to do.”

The Albemarle Planning Commission will have a work session on the Comprehensive Plan review at its meeting on November 16.

This is a reminder that I created Town Crier Productions specifically to cover this kind of topic. I have never and will never take any payment from Albemarle County for this service, nor will I take any direct payment for any other level of government. This program is supported by contributions from listeners and readers, and the goal there is to keep this reporting independent and to be transparent when you do hear shout-outs and the like.

Closing out FY21

Our second story from the November 3, 2021 Albemarle Board of Supervisors meeting comes from a fiscal update that came from a briefing from County Executive Jeffrey Richardson on the closing of Fiscal Year 21, which ran from July 1, 2020 to this past June 30. Like all localities, Albemarle was affected by the pandemic.

“The last 20 months have been unlike any in my professional working career and I probably speak for staff when I say our challenges and the kinds of issues and problems we face are unlike any that we have faced in our career,” Richardson said.

The pandemic began officially in Virginia on March 12, 2020 with the declaration of a state of emergency. That happened just as Albemarle was finalizing the budget for fiscal year 2021. A decision was made to rewrite the budget to pause some spending while more was known about underlying economic conditions. Richardson said staff initially assumed the worst case scenario.

“We artificially lowered our budget base so we had to go in and we had to make drastic cuts for fiscal year 21,” Richardson said.

Richardson said the economic outlook did not turn out to be as severe and he detailed the reasons why in his presentation. There has also been federal funding in the form of the CARES Act of 2020 and the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. Here’s one example from Albemarle budget chief Andy Bowman.

“The county was able to reimburse a significant portion of its public safety expenditures which created a one-time savings in the middle of fiscal year 2021 which the Board of Supervisors used to establish a local pandemic reserve,” Bowman said.

Now the time has come to begin preparing for the budget for FY23, which will be adopted by the Board next May. That comes as the fiscal year 2021 budget is audited which will reveal whether there are additional funds leftover that be reprogrammed to achieve the county’s strategic goals.

This is known as “one-time” funds. In FY21, revenues were up 5.3 percent over budget and county spending was down 4.9 percent.

“Unaudited, we expect there to be $13.2 million in one-time funding that can be available to be reprogrammed as the county is heading into the season again of financial planning,” Bowman said.

Richardson told the Board that the local economy is strong, and there are many ways this funding could be used to make further investments in economic development.

“You met recently with your [Economic Development Authority] and I think that we need to consider more and I think now is the time to do more to set ourselves up for the future to help business expansion and to be a catalyst in this community to continue to strengthen our economic foundation,” Richardson said.

Richardson also suggested the Board consider a mid-year salary increase for county personnel could also be an option. The Board will have a work session on “workforce stabilization” on December 1. Other suggestions from staff will continue to come to the Board in weeks to come.

The next immediate step is a meeting of the Audit Committee on November 19. (meeting info)

A major change this upcoming year is that real estate reassessments for calendar year 2022 will be sent out a month earlier than usual due to issues with the post office and potential for delays caused by mail.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Let’s begin the show with the first of two Patreon-fueled shout-outs.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville selects a Pennsylvania administrator as the third interim City Manager in three and a half years

The Fifeville Neighborhood Association seeks a facilitator to help with implementation of the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan

A Charlottesville television pioneer has died

COVID vaccinations for those aged 5 to 11 have begun

And a Louisa County Supervisors wins a seventh term on a four-vote margin

This weekend, vaccinations of children between the ages of 5 to 11 began in the Blue Ridge Health District. According to spokeswoman Kathryn Goodman, there were 127 vaccinations in that range at the Community Vaccination Center in Seminole Square and Pediatric Associates vaccinated 565 children. The Blue Ridge Health District and the University of Virginia Health System begin administering shots today.

“I think this is a really big step forward and the COVID vaccine is one of the most well-studied vaccines at this point in history,” said Dr. Debbie-Ann Shirley, an expert on pediatric infectious diseases at the UVA Health System. “There have been hundreds of millions of doses already given. There have been clinical trials done in adults, young adults, adolescents, and now children in the 5 to 11 age group.”

Federal officials approved the Pfizer vaccine for children last week, which uses a smaller dose than the one given to people 12 and above. Dr. Shirley said that lower dose was suggested through the testing process. Last week, she penned an article on UVA Today outlining the work that has gone into producing the shots.

“Using that low dose vaccine, they still make really high levels of antibody that were comparable to the same antibody levels that we’ve seen in adolescents and older adults who received higher doses,” Dr. Shirley said.

Dr. Shirley said Moderna has submitted their data to the Food and Drug Administration for approval, and Pfizer will soon submit data for a vaccine for even younger children.

This morning the Virginia Department of Health reports another 913 new cases and the seven-day average of new cases at 1,276 a day. The percent positivity has increased slightly to 5.6 percent, up from 5.4 percent on Thursday. The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 42 cases today and there have been five more reported fatalities since Thursday.

The man who started Charlottesville’s first commercial television station in 1973 has died. Harold Wright passed away on Saturday at his home at Lake Monticello. WVIR launched on March 11, 1973 using $500,000 of capital as well as second-hand equipment. That’s according to a story published this morning on NBC29.com. Wright retired from the station in January 2020, not long after it was purchased by Gray Communications in March 2019.

Louisa County Supervisor Fitzgerald Barnes has won re-election to a seventh term representing the Patrick Henry District. A canvas and recount on Friday that included remaining provisional and absentee ballots extended Barnes’ election-night lead of one vote to four votes over challenger William D. Woody Jr. According to coverage on Twitter by Tammy Purcel of Engage Louisa, Woody would have had ten days to ask for a recount but he conceded the race.

Charlottesville’s Fifeville Neighborhood Association and the city government are seeking a consultant to help with a series of listening sessions to help implement the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan. That document was produced by consulting staff at the Thomas Jefferson Planning District and approved as an addendum to the city’s current Comprehensive Plan on March 1. On that same night Council adopted an affordable housing plan as the first milestone in the Cville Plans Together initiative.

The neighborhood association seeks a “third-party facilitator to help co-design and lead up to three Anti-Displacement, Land Acquisition, and Development Working Sessions.” The goal is to move forward with implementation of the plan. (read the request for proposals)

The firm Rhodeside & Harwell will not pursue this request for proposals, according to Cville Plans Together project manager Jennifer Koch. Her team is familiar with the Cherry Avenue Plan.

“We reviewed this plan, as we reviewed other completed Small Area Plans, and looked to support recommendations related to fostering a mix of uses and more housing options/density at levels that respect the current scale of the neighborhood,” Koch wrote in an email this morning. “The affordability framework and anti-displacement mechanisms built into the plan (including, but not limited to, the Sensitive Community Areas) also align with goals in the Cherry Avenue SAP.”

Since adoption of the plan in March, several properties have exchanged hands. In April, Woodard Properties purchased the Cherry Avenue Shopping Center as well as vacant land immediately behind. In July, the company bought a vacant lot in the 800 block of the busy roadway. Also in July an LLC called Project New Life bought undeveloped land on Cherry Avenue at the intersection of 7 1/2th Street.

The Future Land Use Map in the draft Comprehensive Plan calls for Cherry Avenue west of Roosevelt Brown Avenue to be in the new Medium Intensity Residential, which calls for increased housing opportunities “along neighborhood corridors, near community amenities.”

The areas around Nalle Street and King Street north of Cherry Avenue east of Roosevelt Brown are designated as “low-intensity residential (sensitive community areas)” to “allow for additional housing choice, and tools to mitigate displacement, within existing residential neighborhoods that have high proportions of populations that may be sensitive to displacement.”

But will that stop those with wealth from purchasing single-family homes that would then be protected from additional density? In April, a house in the 700 block of Nalle Street sold for $700,000, or 85.83 percent over the 2021 assessment. October’s property transactions will be posted soon for paid subscribers of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time for the second Patreon-fueled shout-out.

WTJU is hosting Classical Listening Parties, a series of four free, casual events on Tuesdays in November. These four events are led by Chelsea Holt, pianist, teacher, and one of WTJU’s newest and youngest classical announcers. She’ll guide you through all the eras of classical music beginning Tuesday, Nov 9th, 7 p.m.: Early & Baroque. For a list of the others, visit wtju.net to learn more and sign up!

At the same time ballots were being counted in Louisa County on Friday afternoon, City Council introduced Marc Woolley as the next interim city manager. Woolley recently resigned as Business Administrator in Harrisburg, the capital of Pennsylvania. The city has U.S. Census 2020 population of 50,099. Deputy City Manager Ashley Marshall and Sam Sanders will remain in place.

“Together with the assistance of staff, Sam, Ashley, and Council, I will be focusing on some key issues currently before Charlottesville,” Woolley said. “Mainly the budget and the completion of the Comprehensive Plan.”

Woolley will begin work on December 1. The process to find a permanent city manager will resume once again in April.

Woolley is a native of Wilmington, Delaware who went to law school at Boston College. He’s worked as general counsel for the Philadelphia Housing Authority, two positions at the Delaware River Port Authority, three positions at the Hershey Trust Company, and the position in Harrisburg. (read his resume)

“I’ve been with the City of Harrisburg for the past four years as the Business Administrator,” Woolley said.

Harrisburg has a form of municipal government where the executive and legislative branches are separate, so a “strong mayor” oversees department heads. The business administrator position is equivalent to a city manager.

“All administration functions flowed through me except for the city solicitor,” Woolley said.

According to an article on Pennsylvania Live, Woolley’s resignation had been expected to begin on November 12, but Mayor Eric Papenfuse made that effective November 1 after learning of the Woolley’s decision to leave Harrisburg. Papenfuse was defeated the next day in his bid for a third term, though he ran as a write-in.

Anticipating questions from the press about Woolley’s careee, Councilor Lloyd Snook led a friendly cross-examination of his career history after resigning from the Philadelphia Housing Authority.

Snook:

“Looking at the next ten years or so of your career it seems like you were often put in a position of having to kind of clean up a mess. Is that an accurate assessment?”

Woolley:

“I think to first assess what the issues were and then accordingly if there were things that needed to be done to implement those policies in order to rectify anything.”

Harrisburg has been considered by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as a distressed municipality since 2010. That requires creation of a Financial Recovery Plan which is called the Harrisburg Strong Plan. The latest financial report for the capital city is from 2019.

Snook:

“When you got to Harrisburg there were shall we say some financial difficulties that you were having to unravel.”

Woolley:

“Some financial difficulties. We are in Act 47 which is for distressed municipalities in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Years before I arrived in Harrisburg there were a number of bond deals that were done and saddled the residents with a lot of debt and turns out they just couldn’t pay it. The city couldn’t pay it back. The state sent in a receiver to develop what they call the Strong Plan. They sold off a lot of assets, almost $400 million worth of assets, applied those to the debt and set up payments for other general obligation debts. When I arrived in Harrisburg, we were rounding the corner. This year and actually starting last year, was able to entertain actually getting back our credit rating. We didn’t have a credit rating. Looking to refinance debt and put out for capital projects. It’s a 180 degree turn from where they were and I think Harrisburg is going to better for it and I think they’re going to get a credit rating. Not as good as Charlottesville, but they’re going to try.”

The city has held a AAA bond rating from Standards and Poor’s since 1964 and a AAA bond rating from Moody’s since 1973. For the past several years, the city has been steadily increasing debt-financing for capital projects, including several million a year for affordable housing projects and $75 million for the renovation of Buford Middle School. The next budget may include a property tax increase to help pay the debt service. Woolley will oversee creation of that next document but acknowledged Council will be reopening the pubic process for a permanent manager next spring. (Routine advice wanted for city bonds, October 26, 2021)

“This is not necessarily the transition,” Woolley said. “The transition will occur when the new city manager is appointed through the process that you’ve described in April but right now there are certain acute issues that need to be taken care of, mainly the budget and the Comprehensive Plan.”

Woolley said his role is to lay the foundation for that person.

While Charlottesville’s government is not considered distressed, the separate Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority is considered a troubled agency by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Watch the whole press briefing which included comments and questions from members of the community. The entire event was just over an hour long and is on the city’s streaming archive. (watch)

Former City Manager Chip Boyles recently took a job as the executive director of the George Washington Regional Commission, the planning district around Fredericksburg.

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Let’s begin today with a Patreon-fueled shout-out!

On today’s show:

More details about the next phase of public housing redevelopment in Charlottesville

Council to make a leadership announcement Friday at 3 p.m.

UVA Health System reports vaccination numbers

Louisa Supervisor Fitzgerald Barnes holds a one-vote lead over his challenger

An overview of the Central Virginia Small Business Development Center

And Louisa Supervisors an update on a plan to bring water from the James River to Zion Crossroads

We begin the day with an announcement of something that’s happening tomorrow. City Council will meet at 3 p.m. for an open meeting with the one word description of “Personnel.” City Communications Director Brian Wheeler explained in an email to me this morning that it will be a leadership announcement. There is no interim city manager in place. What will happen? Leave your guess in the comments. (meeting info)

There’s a very close race in one of Louisa County’s magisterial districts. In the Patrick Henry District, incumbent Fitzgerald Barnes has a one-vote lead over challenger William Woody Jr. Qualified absentee ballots can be counted up until tomorrow at noon.

Thanks to Tammy Purcell of Engage Louisa for the heads-up.

Employees at the University of Virginia Health System had a deadline of November 1 to get a COVID vaccine. Wendy Horton is the CEO of the UVA Health System.

“At this point today, we are at 98.4 percent fully vaccinated or exempt as a health system and this includes UVA Community Health as well,” Horton said.

However, that leaves 173 employees who will either resign or be terminated for non-compliance. Horton said that includes 83 people who directly work with patients and that number includes 43 registered nurses. People who refuse the vaccine will be suspended without pay for a certain period of time for reflection. Those with approved medical exemptions must have a COVID test each week.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reported 1,494 new cases and the seven-day percent positive rate dropped to 5.4 percent. Another 69 deaths have been reported since Tuesday. The Blue Ridge Health District reported 58 new cases today. The percent positivity in the district is 5.1 percent.

Yesterday, the City of Charlottesville held a public meeting for the next phase of redevelopment at the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. Carrie Rainey is an urban planner in the city’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services.

“What we’re looking at right now is a final site for what is currently a by-right project to build a new apartment building with structured parking at 715 Sixth Street SE,” Rainey said.

Riverbend Development is working with the CRHA on this project, continuing a partnership that has also been involved with Crescent Halls and the two phases at South First Street. CRHA has a new redevelopment coordinator in Brandon Collins, formerly with the Public Housing Association of Residents.

“Our resident planners at 6th Street have been working diligently on this plan and I think it really reflects CRHA’s approach to resident-led planning and we’re confident this is the best use of this site,” Collins said.

The project is at the corner of Monticello Avenue and 6th Street SE. Six of the existing townhouse units will be removed in this first phase at this property.

“The reason we’re taking this approach is because we want to ensure that we have a promise and a priority to the residents of public housing that no one will be displaced throughout the redevelopment process,” said Ashley Davies, vice president at Riverbend Development.

In all of these redevelopment projects, the land will continue to be owned by CRHA, but the actual structure will be owned by a nonprofit holding company connected to CRHA. The height of the building has not been finalized.

“It’s going to be a three or four story building,” Davies said, “We’re still working with the resident planners to determine the exact height of the building and number of units, but for now the site plan shows this as a three-story building and 39 units.”

The current zoning is Downtown Extended which would allow for that height. There would be at least 40 parking spaces in a structure beneath the building. The goal is to get the site plan approved in order to help qualify an application for Low Income Housing Tax Credits from the entity formerly known as the Virginia Housing Development Authority.

Davies said a master plan is in development for the entire four-acre site, but there is no timeline for how that will proceed.

“Those conversations are really just beginning to understand what the overall needs are for that area,” Davies said

Comments brought up during the site plan conference included landscaping, parking requirements, and pedestrian safety. The community garden maintained and operated by the Urban Agriculture Collective will be removed to make way for the new units.

NDS staff will make comments on the site plan and submit those back to the development team later this month.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time for the second of two Patreon-fueled shout-outs:

Do you suffer from Classical Music Insecurity Complex? That is, you like classical music you hear, but you feel intimidated by all the stuffy etiquette and specialized knowledge? Suffer no more!

WTJU is hosting Classical Listening Parties, a series of four free, casual events on Tuesdays in November. These four events are led by Chelsea Holt, pianist, teacher, and one of WTJU’s newest and youngest classical announcers. She’ll guide you through all the eras of classical music beginning Tuesday, Nov 9th, 7 p.m.: Early & Baroque. For a list of the others, visit wtju.net to learn more and sign up!

The seven-member Louisa County Board of Supervisors got an update on Monday on the water supply plan for Zion Crossroads, but they also got a pitch from the Central Virginia Small Business Development Center (CVSBDC). The entity is partially funded by the Small Business Administration.

“We’re funded by the [Small Business Administration] and the localities that we serve to provide business advising services to individual localities,’ said Greg Dorazio, the assistant director of the CVSBDC.

The CVSBDC covers ten counties stretching from Nelson County to Culpeper County from its headquarters in Charlottesville. The idea is to level the playing field for small businesses through counseling.

“We have access to research and resources including capital, access to technical experts,” Dorazio said.

Last year, the Charlottesville Investment Collaborative became the small business center’s fiscal partner.

“Their microloan program is one of the best ways for small businesses to get capital and a lot of folks don’t really know about it,” Dorazio said.

Last year during the pandemic, the small business center provided more than double the number of hours of working with clients from around 2,200 hours to over 5,000. That’s in part because of the transition to virtual meetings.

“When we’re talking about the client service time, that’s one-on-one with a business owner,” Dorazio said. “We’re really helping them figure out what is the problem they’re facing right now? What are the decisions they need to make? And what do we need to do to help them get the resources they need to make good decisions about their business and continue to grow and move forward?”

Dorazio was before the Louisa Board of Supervisors to ask for referrals for businesses as well as $21,249 in funding for the next fiscal year. That decision will come during the budget cycle.

The Louisa Board of Supervisors also got an update on progress to build a waterline from the James River to Zion Crossroads. Louisa and Fluvanna are both members of the James River Water Authority, an entity that exists for the purpose.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will have to grant a permit for the project and the James River Water Authority was about to submit one that included an intake at the site of Rassawek, an important site in the history of the Monacan Indian Nation. Justin Curtis is with Aqualaw, a firm hired to prepare and submit the permit.

“At our request, that application has been put on hold while we evaluate an alternative a site a couple of miles up the river,” Curtis said. “We’re doing that in coordination with the Virginia Department of Historic Resources (VDHR) as well as the Monacan Indian Nation.”

Curtis said the decision point for the James River Water Authority will be whether to pursue the alternative, or proceed with the Rassawek site. That could come in December or January.

The Rassawek site was selected in 2013 and two of three required permits had been granted. All of the planning work had been conducted.

“That site had been selected because it was the shortest, it was the least expensive, and it followed a bunch of existing corridors and lines which is utility siting 101,” Curtis said. “Fewest number of landowners affected and it had the right water quality and quantity to meet our needs.”

Curtis said the Monacans had been consulted, but their stance changed as the granting of the permit drew closer. The federal government recognized the tribe in January 2018. (Learn more about Rasswak from Cultural Heritage Partners)

“To get the final permit we needed from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, we have to go through this process where have to mitigate any impacts to historical or cultural resources and that involves consultations with the tribes and certain other agencies and that added a lot of time and expense to the regulatory process,” Curtis said.

Curtis said Alternative 1C, also known as the Forsyth site, is the preferred site for the Monacans.

“And we ended up reaching an agreement which was memorialized in writing in January of this year and what we came to an agreement on was that if JRWA went and did a new archaeological study of that alternative site and that study did not find any evidence of buried human remains or historic burial sites, then the Monacans would not oppose the project and they would support the project and help us work through the remainder of the permitting process,” Curtis said.

The first phase was completed in August and while historic materials were found, none of them were human remains. The second phase started on Monday and will be concluded the week of December 6. The results will be discussed at the next meeting of the James River Water Authority on December 8.

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Elections bring changes, and fundamental changes will likely come to the way Virginia is governed as Republicans appear to narrowly win all three statewide seats and regain the House of Delegates. Closer to home, Democrats continue to hold all of the seats on the City Council and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. What will the landscape be like as 2022 begins? That’s for another day, for this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement is solely about election returns:

In this newsletter:

Republicans narrowly win all three statewide seats

An incumbent is ousted in the Charlottesville City School Board race

Graham Paige fends off a write-in candidate

Bob Babyok is defeated in Louisa County, while two Nelson incumbents hold on

But first, a Patreon-fueled shout-out.

As of this writing, the Virginia Department of Elections website has recorded 2,723 of Virginia’s 2,855 precincts have reported and Republican Glenn Youngkin has 50.68 percent of the vote to 48.55 percent for Democrat Terry McAuliffe. The difference is around 57,000 votes.

These results are considered incomplete because qualified absentee ballots can be accepted through noon on November 5 and the results will be certified on November 15. These numbers will change but probably not very much.

While none of the results here are technically complete, the Associated Press called the race for Youngkin after midnight last night and he took the stage in victory.

“Alrighty Virginia, we won this thing,” Youngkin said.

McAuliffe also appeared before supporters but did not offer a concession speech but appeared to continue his campaign for a return to the Governor’s mansion.

“When Ralph and I were elected eight years ago, we had made our state open and welcoming but the fight continues,” McAuliffe said.

McAuliffe then listed several pieces of his platform.

“We are going to continue that fight tonight and every day going forward,” McAuliffee said

Youngkin takes over a Commonwealth that appears to be in good financial shape. Unemployment has dropped for sixteen months straight to a September figure of 3.8 percent. Virginia had a $2.6 billion surplus at the end of fiscal year 2021.

In his comments, Youngkin called his victory a defining moment that will change the trajectory of the state.

“Friends, we are going to start that transformation on day one,” Youngkin said

More on that transformation later on in the newsletter

If the results hold up, Youngkin will be sworn in on January 15. The 2022 General Assembly will convene three days before. The Republicans appear to have retaken the majority of the House of Delegates with 51 to 49 seats, according to information tallied by the Virginia Public Access Project. (VPAP)

The Lieutenant Governor presides over the Senate which did not have an election yesterday and will remain under Democratic control with a majority of 21 seats of 40 seats.

Republican Winsome Sears will be the next Lieutenant Governor with 50.82 percent of the vote with Democrat Hala Ayala at 49.08 percent. Sears is the first Black woman to be elected to statewide office in Virginia and she said her victory is the embodiment of the American dream.

“When my father came to this country, August 11 of 1963, he came at the height of the civil rights movement from Jamaica,” Sears said “He came and I said to him, it was such a bad time for us. Why did you come? And he said because America was where the jobs and the opportunities were.”

For Attorney General, Republican Jason Miyares has 50.49 percent of the vote to incumbent Democrat Mark Herring at 49.43 percent.

The Republican ticket carried most localities across rural Virginia.

Youngkin carried Nelson County with 55.58 percent of the electorate with all but absentee ballots counted. The Governor-elect also carried Fluvanna with 56.86 percent of the vote. Louisa County also went for Youngkin with 66.28 percent of the vote. The Republican’s margin in Greene County was even higher at 71.86 percent

The story is different in Albemarle and Charlottesville. McAuliffe carried Albemarle with 61.86 percent of the vote and Charlottesville with 82.87 percent of the vote.

Local races

Now let’s look at local races. In Nelson County, Central District incumbent Democrat Ernie Reed fended off a challenge from Republican Pamela Brice with 50.78 percent of the vote. North District Incumbent Tommy Harvey defeated Democratic challenger Mary Cunningham. Harvey was first elected in 1984. (Nelson results)

In Louisa County, incumbent Robert Babyok Jr. appears to have been defeated by challenger Rachel Jones. Jones has 53.2 percent as of production time. (Louisa results)

In Albemarle, all three Democrats on the ballot for Supervisor won because they had no opposition. Graham Paige retained his seat representing Samuel Miller on the Albemarle School Board with 73.84 percent over a write-in candidate. (Albemarle results)

In the Charlottesville City Council race, Democrat Juandiego Wade got the most votes with 11,582 before the absentee ballots are counted. Democrat Brian Pinkston got 10,041 votes. Independent Yas Washington secured 3,407 votes and withdrawn incumbent Nikuyah Walker got 1,916. (Charlottesville results)

In the School Board race, four-term incumbent Leah Puryear came in fourth, meaning she will not serve a fifth. Incumbent Lisa Larson-Torres got the most votes with 7,329, followed by newcomer Emily Dooley with 6,633, and newcomer Dom Morse with 6,500. Christa Bennett placed fifth with 4,488 votes.

In Greene County, Abbey E. Heflin has a close lead over Tina A. Deane in the Stanardsville District race at 960 to 917 votes. Bill Martin opted not to run for re-election. (Greene results)

There were no contested races for Supervisor in Fluvanna County. (Fluvanna results)

Preparing for the Youngkin administration

Back to the Governor-elect. Between now and January 15, Youngkin will appoint candidates to the Secretariats ranging alphabetically from Agriculture and Forestry to Transportation. A new governor will shape the entire tone of state and local government. Youngkin’s victory speech called for new spending.

“We will invest the largest education budget in the history of the Commonwealth,” Youngkin said. “We’re going to invest in teachers, new facilities, special education. We’re going to introduce choice within our public school system.”

For Youngkin, that means more charter schools and giving parents more control over what is taught in public schools. But the call for spending also came with a call to reduce revenue that comes into the state.

“Friends, we will reduce our cost of living on day one,” Youngkin said. “On day one, we will declare the largest tax refund in the history of Virginia.”

Among taxes Youngkin wants to reduce is an increase in the Virginia gas tax that passed the General Assembly in 2020, as well as increasing deductions. He also called for more spending on salaries for law enforcement.

“We’re going to comprehensively fund law enforcement because they stand up for us and we’re going to stand up for them,” Youngkin said.

Younkin also said he would replace all members of the Virginia Parole Board.

The governor-elect also promised investments in economic development. This past July, CNBC named Virginia as the number one state in the nation to do business.

“We’re going to get this economy moving again, growing 400,000 new jobs, fostering 10,000 start-up,” Youngkin said. “Friends, Virginia will be open for business.”

Here’s a quick look at the legislative races that touch Albemarle County:

Republican incumbent Chris Runion defeated Democratic challenger Jennifer Kitchen in the 25th District with 62.36 percent to 37.51 percent.

Democratic incumbent Sally Hudson fended off Republican challenger Philip Hamilton in the 57th District with 78.37 percent to 21.41 percent.

Republican incumbent Rob Bell defeated Democrat Sara Ratcliffe in the 58th District with 63.4 percent of the vote.

Republican incumbent Matt Farris won against Democratic Ben Moses with 64.64 percent of the vote. Moses raised over $600,000 in the campaign.

Pre-filing for the 2022 General Assembly begins on November 15.

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Let’s begin today with two Patreon-fueled shout-outs. One person wants you to know "We keep each other safe. Get vaccinated, wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

And in another one, one Patreon supporter wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, WINA, or some other place I’ve not mentioned - the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

On today’s show:

COVID update from Dr. Denise Bonds of the Blue Ridge Health District

Charlottesville Council indicates support for Charlottesville Food Equity Initiative, but funding decisions will come in the months to come

A quick look at commercial office space in the Charlottesville area

Charlottesville’s public housing agency is owed $52,000 in unpaid rent

Two million for affordable housing projects

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is seeking applications from private, public, and nonprofit developers for projects to increase affordable housing stock throughout the region. The TJPDC received $2 million from the entity formerly known as the Virginia Housing Development Authority for the purpose of building actual units. The first step is for applicants to submit a proof of concept.

“This proof of concept will be issued to collect key details about the proposed project, including number of proposed units to be constructed, partner development experience, and location of development,” reads the release. “The requested proof of concept will serve as a precursor to a more detailed formal project application.”

The funding is part of a $40 million statewide initiative. Proposals are due on November 29 at 5 p.m. Visit the TJPDC’s website to learn more about the application.

Sixth Street site plan

Tomorrow, the city of Charlottesville will hold a site plan conference for the next public housing project to be redeveloped by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. Plans for 39-units at Sixth Street will be reviewed. The CRHA Board of Commissioners’ got an update on this topic at their meeting on October 25. Brandon Collins is now the redevelopment coordinator for CRHA. (read his report )

“Resident-led planning continues and to update you all in case you don’t know, the plan is in the space along Monticello Avenue where the garden currently is we’re going to knock down six apartments on the end of the garden to get a little extra room and build an apartment building,” Collins said.

Collins' redevelopment report for October states that a three-story building had been originally, but architects suggested a fourth story would make the project more competitive for Low Income Housing Tax Credits.

“Residents seem to be generally in favor of that,” Collins said. “There’s a lot of process questions that we’re all going to work through to get a decision on that.”

The site plan conference begins at 10 a.m. on Wednesday. (meeting info)

Former Planning Commissioner Lisa Green resigned from the CRHA Board of Commissioners on October 5. No reason was given but Green had been on the Redevelopment Committee. Council is seeking applications to fill the vacancy as well as other open positions on boards and commissions. Take a look at the list on the Charlottesville City Hall website.

At the CRHA meeting, Executive Director John Sales reported that some tenants owe tens of thousands in back rent. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development currently considers CRHA a “troubled” agency which requires additional scrutiny from the federal agency including increase inspections.

“A big item that we should always discuss is the delinquency account for tenants,” Sales said. “We’re currently at $52,000. That is probably our biggest concern in terms of exiting out of troubled status. The $52,000 represents about a hundred tenants.”

Sales said that represents about a third of public housing residents. He said there is a CRHA staff member working on rental assistance to help cover the back log and to find out what barriers are in place to paying the rent.

Office space check-in

The Charlottesville office market had a vacancy rate of 4.9 percent in the second quarter of this year according to an analysis from Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer. That’s less than the same period in 2020, but below the forecasted amount. The report states that office space remains high in demand.

“Absorbency in the market was down for the quarter but that is more a reflection of large new deliveries than lack of demand and remains net positive for the past 12 months,” reads the report. “In fact, 87 percent of the nearly 380,000 square feet of office space under construction is already pre-leased and since Q1 2020 there has been more space delivered than in prior decades.”

The report states that rents continue to rise. The current average is $27.52 per square foot, a 55 percent increase over the 2015 average.

Pinkston’s bounty

Election results will come tomorrow. One final piece of information before the votes are tallied.

Brian Pinkston’s campaign for one of two seats on City Council received a last-minute contribution of $3,000 on Monday from the Democratic Party of Charlottesville.

COVID update

The number of new COVID cases reported each day continues to decline.

“If you look at the trend over the past couple of weeks here, a month or so, it’s really been on a downward trajectory indicating that we may be past the worst with regards to the Delta virus,” Bonds said.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,245 new cases today, and the Blue Ridge Health District reports 41 new cases. There have been 12 deaths reported in the district since October 25.

Since Dr. Bonds last addressed Council, booster shots are now available for all of the three major vaccines. The Moderna booster is available for those over the age of 65 or those with some underlying condition or situation.

“If you got [Johnson and Johnson] as your first one, it’s a little different,” Bonds said. “Anyone who got J&J as their first vaccine for COVID is eligible as long as you’re over the age of 18.”

Bonds said anyone who got the J&J vaccine can also opt to switch to the Moderna or Pfizer as a booster.

“Really the best person to talk to about this would be your physician,” Bonds said. “There are some reasons to think that mixing and matching may be beneficial. You get higher antibody levels with the rMNA boosters but there’s some evidence that if you get J&J it activates more of a different part of your system called T-cells.”

Vaccines are available at the Community Vaccination Center at the former Big Lots in Seminole Square Shopping Center. Visit the Blue Ridge Health District website to learn more.

Dr. Bonds said the district will have a limited quantity of Pfizer doses for children between 5 and 11 when they are available next week.

“It’s going to one third of the amount that anyone 12 and over gets,” Dr. Bond said.

Because there is a limited amount, the District is prioritizing shots for the most vulnerable children, working with school districts and pediatricians to identify those people and schedule shots.

“There will be a small amount of vaccine that is available at our Community Vaccination Center,” Dr. Bonds said. “It is by appointment only and those vaccines.gov should be out and available by Friday of this week we believe.”

In all, the District will get an initial distribution of 6,300 doses.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Dr. Denise Bonds spoke at the City Council meeting last night. The meeting was overseen by the two deputy city managers in the wake of the resignation of former City Manager Chip Boyles on October 12. That meant it was up to Sam Sanders to provide responses from previous comments for the public.

Who maintains the mall side streets?

“The first item was in regards to side street maintenance near the Downtown Mall and I did check in with staff in regards to who is responsible for maintaining those side streets and that is a function of Parks and Recreation,” Sanders said. “They have been short-staffed and struggling to keep up with everything that needs to be done is what I am hearing at this moment.”

The second item dealt with a request to install a four-way stop on Rose Hill Drive at Burley Middle School, which is owned and operated by Albemarle County Public Schools.

“There is a speed study underway and its in relation to the configuration that’s being proposed for Walker Upper Elementary, “ Sanders said. “Even though it is not the same impact area, they will be able to take a look at what is happening on Rose Hill Drive.”

Sanders said the last study of the area around Burley dates back to 2004 and some traffic calming efforts were installed in the second half of the decade. He referred people interested in the topic to the city’s Traffic Calming Handbook as well as the petition to begin the process.

Food Equity discussion

The main item last night was a report on Charlottesville’s Food Equity Initiative. The nonprofit group Cultivate Charlottesville has been the recipient of city funding for the past three years and seek additional money for years to come. They also want two percent of the meals tax to go a new Food Equity Fund.

“We believe that food is a human right and we operate from that perspective that everyone, all Charlottesville residents, deserve access to fresh produce and high quality food,” said co-executive director Richard Morris.

Morris said food equity is an outcome where all residents have access to food that meets nutritional and cultural needs.

Earlier this year, Council was presented with a Food Equity Initiative Policy Platform which seeks to serve as a strategic plan to fund a variety of initiatives, and they’ve sought support for funding through an online petition. Much of this work is also finding its way into the draft Comprehensive Plan which Council will consider on November 15.

One challenge is that the Urban Agricultural Collective has lost or soon will lose control of land it has used for community gardens. Land at the public housing site at Sixth Street SW is slated to be used for redevelopment.

“The overall budget for the Food Justice Network has been about $400,000, $155,000 of what was the Food Equity Initiative contributed,” said co-director Jeanette Abi-Nader. “And you’ll note that the majority of the budget goes toward staffing.”

The group is seeking a multiple year commitment, despite the fact that elected bodies in Virginia cannot appropriate money beyond the next fiscal year. The request comes outside of the budget cycle, as well as the Vibrant Communities process through which nonprofits apply for funding. That process used to be conducted jointly with Albemarle County.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker praised the report submitted with the funding request, but had concerns.

“If we are adding this as a three-year item, that the way other nonprofits have to compete for funding, I have some reservations there,” Walker said.

Abi-Nader said Cultivate Charlottesville did not apply for Vibrant Community funds in the past two years because they had been funded by Council outside of that process. She explained how she thinks the current request is different.

“We see the Vibrant Communities funds as really about programs that impact the community, like direct support programs and engagement, and this program is seen as a support for a function of city government,” Abi-Nader said.

Walker noticed there have been several groups funded outside of the budget cycle and the Vibrant Community fund, such as the B.U.C.K. Squad and Peace and Streets.

“I think our whole process needs to be reviewed and if there is a list of community partnerships that are doing the work the city thinks is essential that can’t be done without that partnership, then that needs to be a separate list from the Vibrant Communities but the way things are set up now, I don’t think it’s a fair process,” Walker said.

Councilor Lloyd Snook appeared to agree that the resolution as presented was not appropriate.

“Franky it appears to me to be an attempt to circumvent the budget process,” Snook said.

Misty Graves, the interim director of the city’s Human Services Department, said the resolution came up because the initiative was a creature of City Council.

“So I think that’s why it’s coming to back to City Council for whether or not it is a renewed commitment and if this is still a priority of City Council,” Graves said.

Next year will be the fourth year of the initiative. The $155,000 will be built into the general fund budget that will be introduced by whoever will be City Manager early next March. The vote was 3 to 2 with Walker and Snook voting against and the resolution does not guarantee funding for FY23.

The other request was for two percent of the meals tax proceeds to go to a Food Equity Fund. In Fiscal Year 2020, the city collected $12.6 million from the meals tax, which would have generated just over $250,000 for this purpose. (Charlottesville’s 2020 annual report)

Abi-Nader said this fund would cover infrastructure to support food equity goals.

“And by infrastructure, I mean that informally, not like literally always physical things, but infrastructure support for our city to move from a foodie city to a food equity city as an overall goal,” Abi-Nader said. “There are things that go beyond what an individual nonprofit can do.”

One idea is a cooperative grocery store to be located near subsidized housing. Another is to build a new community garden in a section of Washington Park.

“There’s space there to sight a quarter-acre park,” Morris said. “We’re talking about 10,000 square feet which from a growing perspective that’s a space that can grow a lot of food.”

Councilors did not commit to the idea at this point in the budget cycle, but there was general support for the initiative.

“For the record, I really support this group,” said Vice Mayor Sena Magill. “What they are doing is amazing work and it’s greatly needed work. I know I’ve been learning from them for the last three years now.”

Another issue worth continuing to track into the future.

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Time for the first of two Patreon-fueled shout-outs:

Do you suffer from Classical Music Insecurity Complex? That is, you like classical music you hear, but you feel intimidated by all the stuffy etiquette and specialized knowledge? Suffer no more!

WTJU is hosting Classical Listening Parties, a series of four free, casual events on Tuesdays in November. These four events are led by Chelsea Holt, pianist, teacher, and one of WTJU’s newest and youngest classical announcers. She’ll guide you through all the eras of classical music beginning Tuesday, Nov 9th, 7 p.m.: Early & Baroque. For a list of the others, visit wtju.net to learn more and sign up!

On today’s program:

Development updates from Albemarle’s Pantops Community Advisory Committee including an update on transit expansion

Home sales were down slightly in the third quarter of 2021 according to the Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors

Statistics on early voting in the Charlottesville area

The Charlottesville Fire Department will deploy drones

And the 5th and Avon CAC gets an update on Albemarle’s future Biscuit Run Park

Early voting results

Election Day is tomorrow, and the time for early voting is over. While the result aren’t in, there are some significant numbers to review.

In Charlottesville, 6,241 ballots were recorded in early voting. That’s according to data made available by the Virginia Public Access Project. There are 33,549 registered voters.

And the rest of the area:

Albemarle has 18,545 early votes recorded. There are 81,738 registered voters.

Louisa has 5,170 early votes recorded. There are 28,177 registered voters.

Fluvanna has 5,790 early votes recorded. There are 20,282 registered voters.

Greene County has 3,442 early votes recorded. There are 14,394 registered voters.

Check out the Virginia Public Access Project for a comparison of how that compares with early voting in 2017.

Resources:

Department of Elections page with registration statistics

VPAP Early Voting page

CAAR report

Home sales were down slightly in the region in the third quarter of 2021, but sales prices continued to increase with a median increase of 12 percent. That’s according to a report out this morning from the Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors, which covers Albemarle, Charlottesville as well as Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson counties.

There were 1,393 homes sold between July 1 and September 30, a four percent decrease from the same period in 2020. The median sales price was $365,000, $38,000 more than in 2020. The report notes inventory is limited.

“There were 643 active listings across the CAAR footprint at the end of the third quarter, 30

percent fewer listings than this time last year,” reads the report.

When looked at by jurisdiction, transactions in Charlottesville were up 28 percent with 187 residential transactions. Albemarle saw 598 sales, or a three percent increase. Sales in Louisa were down 18 percent and sales in Nelson were down 28 percent.

I’ll have an anecdotal summary of Charlottesville’s transactions coming up in a future edition for paid subscribers to this newsletter. Check out September’s here.

More municipal drones

The Charlottesville Fire Department will begin to use drone aircraft in their responses to public safety calls. In a release today, the department announced that several of its employees have completed a three-day drone pilot certificate at the Piedmont Virginia Community College.

“As a 21st-century all-hazards department, CFD is now prepared to implement [Unmanned Aerial Vehicles] to support building inspections, firefighting operations, swift-water rescue, response to trails, and other emergencies,” reads the announcement.

The next step will be to update procedures to incorporate the drones into operational policies. The department will be using DJI Mavic 2 drones which including thermal imaging cameras.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time for a second Patreon-supporter shout-out.

In today’s subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes and events this fall and winter to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. This week there is a three part class on Winter Invasive Plant Identification and Treatment. The first begins tomorrow virtually with identification. A field session will be held at Azalea Park this Saturday. Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org. (register for Tuesday’s session)

For the rest of today’s newsletter, development updates from Albemarle County.

We start first with the October 25 meeting of the Pantops Community Advisory Committee. Supervisor Bea LaPisto Kirtley had the task of providing the new information, such as the next tenant for the former Malloy Ford building on the north side of U.S. 250. (Watch the CAC meeting)

“The old Malloy Ford site, that is being renovated and there are permits for signs for Flow Automotive, Flow Volkswagen,” LaPisto Kirtley said.

Plans for a new hotel to be built in the parking lot of the Rivanna Ridge Shopping Center have been through two sets of review.

“There is an associated special use permit to remove a previous condition for a landscaped buffer where the hotel is planned for,” LaPisto Kirley said.

An additional community meeting will be held on the Overlook Hotel project in the future.

Albemarle transit expansion

Discover Transit Month may be over, but the input period for Albemarle County’s Transit Expansion Study is still underway. Boris Palchik is with Foursquare ITP, one of the companies hired to conduct the work.

“The expansion study is meant to identify short-range opportunities to expand transit service in key population employments in the county,” Palchik said.

These are the U.S. 29 north corridor, Pantops, and Monticello. The study comes at a time when Charlottesville Area Transit is also reviewing its opportunities in the U.S. 29 north area.

“While there are a lot of different ways to provide transit service and to improve transit service, each of those ways that we are considering has its own ideal operating environment and when we look at fixed-route transit service which is what CAT operates today, fixed route transit service is really dependent on density,” Palchik said.

Another key factor is a functional sidewalk system that allows people to get to and from stops.

Palchik said initial work in the study has reviewed existing land use patterns. Fixed-route service is recommended when there is a density of five people or five jobs per acre. Currently the north side of U.S. 250 on Pantops falls short of that threshold, but that could change in the future. The preliminary study recommends an additional fixed-route service in this area.

“This additional route, additional fixed-route would serve the growing residential population up there as well as some of the key destinations like the Social Security office,” Palchik said

Charlottesville Area Transit has prepared route changes which would eliminate Route 10 service on Stony Point Road. However, there is no date set for when those changes would be made.

The preliminary study does not indicate who would run that service but it would require at least one additional vehicle.

Another recommendation is study a demand-response service.

“Demand-response-service is buses that can come to a passenger wherever they are, sort of a a point to point service that can take them to their home,” Palchik said.

This can also be provided by the private sector but micro transit technology is seeking to extend that convenience with public transportation.

“The main difference between Uber and Lyft and what we call micro transit in the transit industry is that micro transit has a dedicated fleet of vehicles so you have purpose-built vehicles that are designed for transit service, designed for share rides,” Palchik said.

Fares on micro transit would be regulated and more predictable than the cost of private sector rides.

The study recommends two vehicles to be operating at any one time.

A survey to get additional input is open through November 18. There’s an English and a Spanish version. (take the survey)

Biscuit Run Park

Let’s go back in time for a bit further back to the October 21, 2021 meeting of the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee. They got an update on planning for the county’s Biscuit Run Park from the Albemarle planners. The county has a long-term ground lease with the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation to operate and build what had been expected to be a state park. Tim Padalino is the county’s parks planner. (download his presentation)

“In 2018, the final park master plan was reviewed by the Board of Supervisors at a public hearing and adopted with DCR’s endorsement and blessing,” Padalino said.

Currently, the park is not open to the general public. Padalino said that’s because the county does not have the staff to do the necessary maintenance.

“And in terms of public safety, there’s no signage and there are no maps for a large, relatively wild and undeveloped landscape, and there’s incomplete cell phone coverage,” Padalino said.

The land is mostly undeveloped, which means its serving as a piece of green infrastructure almost entirely covered by forest.

“And that’s effectively a carbon sink that’s purifying the air and sequestering carbon dioxide in a way that is supporting the climate action plan,” Padalino said.

Work to open the first phase is underway. That includes an entrance into a parking area off of Route 20 about 500 feet south of the southern end of Avon Street Extended. There will be a parking area and bathrooms.

“It is one of the county’s top strategic plan goals as identified by the Board of Supervisors, and that’s apparent in that this is a fully-funded project through the county’s Capital Improvement Program,” Padalino said. “The budget is about $2.1 million.”

Padalino said if all approvals are granted, construction of this could be completed by the end of next summer.

Planning for trails is also underway. There are about nine to ten miles of existing trails. Tucker Rollins is the county’s trail maintenance supervisor.

“What we’re hoping to create is a trail system that will make lots of different users happy,” Rollins said. “We’re expecting lots of hikers, trail-runners, mountain-bikers, bird-watchers, lot of native plant folks. So we’re trying to create something that will allow all of these different types of people to get in there and spread out and be happy.”

Rollins said the park’s size can accommodate about 35 miles of trails while leaving lots of space to be left untouched. Parks staff has been working with the Charlottesville Area Mountain Bike Club on a multi-use loop that would be open around the same time the parking lot opens. Planning is also under way for dedicated mountain bike trails, one of which will be funded by CAMBC.

Watch the whole 5th and Avon CAC meeting to review the whole presentation. (watch)

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Let’s begin today with a Patreon-fueled shout-out!

Should Amtraks’s Northeast Regional train make a stop in Bedford?

The Charlottesville-Albemarle tourism bureau gets an update on hotel happenings

Residents of the Barracks / Rugby neighborhood will go without water on Monday

Monday begins a nearly two-week total shut down of Emmet Street at Ivy Road

Vaccinations are coming for children between 5 and 11

If you live in the Barracks / Rugby neighborhood in Charlottesville, be ready for a planned water outage on Monday. A contractor will be working on water infrastructure between Barracks Road and Preston Avenue. City crews will place door hangers on properties that will be affected. The shutdown will be between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. (learn more)

Monday also marks the beginning of a two-week shut down of Emmet Street at Ivy Road for the installation of a massive piece of stormwater infrastructure.

Sunday is the second Halloween of the pandemic, but local health officials aren’t concerned that a return to trick-or-treating will see return of another surge.

“It’s really important to recognize and understand that the outdoors in always safer than indoors and so those outdoor activities are really fantastic,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System.

Dr. Sifri said people probably don’t have to disinfect any received treats, but recommended frequent hand washing. He also recommended having children avoid large indoor gatherings and wear masks indoors.

Yesterday the Food and Drug Administration Approval approved the Pfizer vaccines for people between 5 and 11. More details on that roll-out will be rolled out next week.

“Logistics are being worked out but there’s going to be emphasis of trying to make sure the vaccines that are offered are going to be in places that are child-friendly,” Dr. Sifri said.

On Friday, the Virginia Department of Health reported a seven-day average of 1,431 new cases a day and a seven-day percent positivity rate of 5.8 percent. On October 1, that last figure was 8.8 percent. Virginia has also recorded 1,101 COVID deaths in October today. The next new metrics won’t be available until Monday morning.

Tourism is one of the region’s largest industries, and the pandemic has shown just how important the sector is to the municipal bottom line. Russ Cronberg has been general manager of the Boar’s Head Resort for the past five years. He gave a presentation on October 25 to the Board of Directors of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau. The CACVB markets the region as a tourism destination and is funded by a portion of the transient lodging tax.

“We have 3,891 hotel rooms roughly give or take a room or two in our market currently,” Cronberg said. “Our annual occupancy is around 65 percent.”

Cronberg said most hotels need between 50 percent and 60 percent occupancy in order to break even, so an average of 65 percent is a sign of health. He said in a given year, over 1.8 million people stay in hotel rooms in the area.

“That is not timeshares, that’s not bed and breakfasts, it’s not our AirBnB’s,” Cronberg said. “That’s strictly just our hotel community.”

In the year before the pandemic, Cronberg said hotels brought in nearly $14 million in revenue for Albemarle and around $9 million in Charlottesville. The sector is still slowly rebounding after a time when most travel stopped for a while, and the hotel industry lost millions.

“Thankfully for many of the grant programs and other government funding that has helped, city funding, we’ve only lost two hotels to permanent closure but actually we have a couple more than are going to reopen,” Cronberg said.

The labor shortage is affecting all sectors, including hospitality. Cronberg said the Boar’s Head over 90 job openings in September, forcing the resort to limit the number of guests. He acknowledged that low wages are part of the problem.

“One thing that I’m proud of that has come out of this is that it really has opened the eyes of ownership and maybe operators to really speed up the increases in our industry,” Cronberg said. “And I think it’s a really good thing to get back to more equitable wages.”

Cronberg said when he began at Boar’s Head in 2016, housekeepers were getting $8.50 an hour. That’s now been increased to $17 an hour. But to keep that going, the economy still has to make it through the pandemic.

“The current COVID environment has continued to provide [difficulties] to navigate, but we in the hotel industry have continued to remain flexible with the priority of security and safety of our team as well as our guests,” Cronberg said.

Cronberg said the Charlottesville will have to compete with other destinations around Virginia.

“In order to do that, I really think and speaking with operators and other GMs and other hotel owners, we really have to look at the CACVB funding model. It’s not just giving the funding and saying thank you, here you go, but measuring those successes and making sure the thing we are doing are driving occupancy to our area, are driving tourism dollars into the arts and into the historical communities.”

Later in the meeting, the CACVB discussed the possibility of changing the representation on the Board of Directors to include more representatives from the industry. Such a move would have to be approved by Charlottesville City Council and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. Read more about that story in Allison Wrabel’s October 25, 2021 article in the Daily Progress.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement and time for a second Patreon-fueled shout-out!

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At the same time the CACVB seeks to compete with other areas within driving distance, another community along the Amtrak line between Roanoke and Washington wants in on the action as well. A group in Bedford has been lobbying for a stop on the service. This past week, officials with the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation reviewed a study on whether that’s feasible and what it would cost.

Emily Stock is the manager of rail planning at DRPT.

“Our focus is the movement of people and goods throughout the Commonwealth and our primary areas of activity are rail, public transportation, and commuter services,” Stock said.

The DRPT began funding regional service in Virginia in the late 2000’s, and the Northeast Regional Service between Lynchburg and Washington’s Union Station began in the fall of 2009. In 2014, DRPT reached agreement with Norfolk Southern to extend passenger service to Roanoke.

At that time, the Bedford / Franklin Regional Rail Initiative launched. The Town of Bedford hired a consultant to produce a report in 2016, and the DRPT studied whether there would be enough ridership to support a stop. On October 25, Stock presented the latest report. (watch)

“Fast forward to now and we’ve had a few years now under our belt of Roanoke service which has been very helpful to us in projecting potential ridership for Bedford also,” Stock said.

But before ridership is considered, the station has to be located on a section of a track within certain parameters.

“Norfolk Southern, the host freight railroad, does not allow adjacent high level platforms to their main line tracks,” Stock said.

A stop in Bedford would likely be a “caretaker” station and located downtown. Two sites have seen the most study, including the site of a former train depot near the Courthouse. Stock said what would be needed.

“A platform with a canopy,” Stock said. “A station building. We’d need enough room for that. Also room for parking, for rental cars, for auto and taxi pick-up drop off.”

The courthouse site was dropped from consideration because an at-grade vehicular crossing would have to have been closed to address safety concerns. The alternative is located about a mile west outside of downtown Bedford.

“Our cost to construct here would be almost $11 million in 2025 construction dollars and that includes a 40 percent contingency which is standard for this level of design,” Stock said.

One consideration while looking at potential ridership is how close Roanoke and Lynchburg are to Bedford. One forecast has found the stop would have 25,400 ons and offs per years, but some of that would take away from nearby stations. The net new riders to the system would be 10,500 per year generated by the Bedford station. The good news for proponents of a Bedford station is that the freight hauler that owns the lines do not have technical objectives.

“What we found Norfolk Southern was that they did not see any new material delay for Norfolk Southern operations as a result of a stop in Bedford which is very good news,” Stock said.

The report is due to the General Assembly by November 15. Next steps will include federal review under the National Environmental Policy Act and working with the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority on a grant application for the federal funding.

“Other good news is that we do expect to start an Amtrak Thruwaybus as a first step,” Stock said. “You may recall that for Roanoke there was a Thruway bus that was operating before any rail service went to Roanoke.”

That Thruway service is expected to begin next spring, though a location for the stop has not yet been determined.

This service will eventually be extended to Christiansburg, where work is underway to design a passenger rail station to serve the New River Valley.

Thanks again for reading!

Now, what about supporting the program? Town Crier Productions is open seven days a week to keep up to date with all manner of items. This is the 269th installment of this program, not counting the Week Ahead newsletters. Research is underway to bring even more information to you and the rest of the community.

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In today’s first subscriber supported public service announcement, one person wants you to know about another community litter cleanup event in Albemarle, this time on October 30 in the southern part of the county.

The latest Love Albemarle event will take place between 8:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. at sites in Esmont, Keene, Scottsville, and North Garden. Around fifty people showed up for a similar event in Esmont this past spring, and organizers want to double that amount. Organizer Ed Brooks is seeking to get children involved, so if you’re a parent or guardian and want to spend the morning cleaning up road-side litter, register now!

On this installment of the program:

More campaign finance numbers in advance of Election Day

A preview of a film on Stan Brock, the founder of the Remote Access Medical Corps

The Chickahominy River has elevated levels of forever chemicals known as PFAS

And a quick look at the wonderful world of wastewater can help track the scope of the PFAS problem

Virginia flags will be at half-mast for the next 30 days to mourn the passing of former Governor Linwood Holton. Holton was elected in 1969 as the first Republican governor of the 20th Century, though he would later endorse Democratic candidates for statewide office. Holton was born in Big Stone Gap in 1923 and died at his home in Kilmarnock yesterday. (Wikipedia)

While in office, Holton and his wife sent their children to public schools. Governor Ralph Northam noted that in a statement yesterday.

“If you want to know what American strength looks like, look at the famous photographs of Governor Holton—smiling, as he walked his children to Richmond’s public schools during the tensest moments of desegregation,” Northam said. “He faced down Virginia’s demons and enabled this Commonwealth to look ahead.”

In the most recent letter, we took a look at campaign finance for local candidates in Albemarle County, Charlottesville, and Nelson County. Election day is just a few days away. Today let’s look at House of Delegates races. Albemarle County currently has four different districts within it boundaries.

Let’s start with the 25th House District, which stretches from Albemarle into Augusta and Rockingham Counties. Democrat Jennifer Kitchen is challenging incumbent Republican Chris Runion. Kitchen began the October reporting period with $108,930 on hand, raised an additional $29,673, and spent $37,189.

Runion began October with $77,655, raised an additional $37,837, spent $39,320 in cash, and recorded $16,314 in in-kind donated expenses.

The 57th District includes all of Charlottesville and some of Albemarle. Incumbent Democrat Sally Hudson began October with $29,158 on hand, raised $24,469, spent $7,482 in cash, and recorded $2,499 in in-kind expenses. Hudson’s Republican challenger, Philip Hamilton, began the month with $2,917 in the bank. He raised $495 and spend $1,468.

The 58th District consists of eastern Albemarle, all of Greene County, and parts of Fluvanna and Rockingham counties. Incumbent Republican Rob Bell began October with $354,466 in the bank and raised $89,293 in the first three weeks of the month. Bell’s campaign spent $164,137 during the period and recorded $21,435 in expenses.

Bell’s challenger is Democrat Sara Ratcliffe. Ratcliffe began October with $14,035 in the bank and raised $48,668 in the period. She spent $28,618 in cash and marked $24,928 in in-kind expenses.

Southern Albemarle is within the 59th District, which also includes portions of Appomattox, Buckingham, Nelson, and Campbell counties.

Republican Matt Fariss is the incumbent and he began the month with $29,671 in the bank. His campaign raised $18,285 in the period and spent $38,201 in the first three weeks. Farris had $9,755 in the bank on October 21.

His Democratic challenger Ben Moses began the month with $84,215 and raised an additional $102,505. Moses spent $76,789 in cash and recorded $61,231 in in-kind expenses. Moses has raised $603,138.01 during the campaign. (report)

Independent Louis Scicli began October with $207, raised no money, and spent no money.

Special thanks to the Virginia Public Access Project for their work in making this information accessible.

Before the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972, it would be commonplace for factories to discharge pollutants into rivers and streams without any consideration of the effect of the natural world.

Nearly fifty years later, there is a system of permits and regulations in place to improve water quality. The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority is working with certain industries in the community to pre-treat industrial waste before effluent is released into the ecosystem.

Patricia Defibaugh is the laboratory manager for the RWSA.

“The purpose of this program is to protect the sewer system and wastewater treatment plants through limits on industrial waste discharges,” Defibaugh said. “This is a requirement of the [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] and the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.”

This is part of the Virginia Pollutant Discharge Elimination System and an annual report is due to the DEQ by the end of every January. The goal is to remove as many fats, oils, greases as well as metals, nutrients, and acidity as possible by working with industries who create those waste products.

“The ones we’re concerned with are the significant industrial user, and that’s either a categorial user which is metal finishing, or semiconductor manufacturers,” Defibaugh said. “Or non-categorical which discharge more than 25,000 gallons per day or had a potential to adversely affect our treatment processes.”

The types of businesses of concern include restaurants, breweries, wineries, dentists, and dry cleaners. None of the breweries connected to urban water exceed the 25,000 gallon threshold. Gary O’Connell, executive director of the Albemarle County Service Authority, said there is a program that seeks to remove cooking oil from the wastewater process.

“There’s an active [fats, oil, and grease] program that goes on,” O’Connell said. “I know in our case it’s about 260 grease traps that we inspect.

On the more industrial level, the RWSA has three companies that are in the pretreatment program. These are Virginia Diodes, Mikro, and Northrup Grumman.

For more information on this topic, visit Henrico County’s Industrial Pretreatment Program.

PFAS concerns

Fifty years after the Clean Water Act, there are concerns about other pollutants that are not easily seen.

In 2020, the Virginia General Assembly passed legislation requiring the Virginia Department of Health to study the level of polyfluorinated substances in drinking water (PFAS). These are chemical byproducts of the processes used to make non-stick cooking utensils, fire-fighting foam, food packaging, and other uses They are known as “forever chemicals” because they do not break down. The health effects are being studied. (CDC fact-sheet on PFAS).

The industrial pretreatment work will be used to help identify the scope of the problem.

“DEQ is going to be sending out a survey to Rivanna’s significant industrial users to confirm their use and manufacture of PFAS compounds,” Defibaugh said.

Yesterday, the DEQ announced that elevated levels of PFAS have been found in the Chickahominy River. They found out from a report from the Newport News Waterworks (NNWW) and now the DEQ will work with the VDH to further study the issue.

“NNWW is continuing to monitor source waters in coordination with state agencies and has assured residents that the water it provides to its customers is safe to drink and has consistently shown PFAS levels well below the lifetime health advisory from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),” reads the press release.

Last week, the EPA announced a national strategy will be undertaken to confront the PFAS problem.

“EPA’s Roadmap is centered on three guiding strategies: Increase investments in research, leverage authorities to take action now to restrict PFAS chemicals from being released into the environment, and accelerate the cleanup of PFAS contamination,” reads a press release from that initiative.

Next up, a quick Patreon-fueled shout-out!

Fall is here, and with it, more moderate temperatures. While your HVAC takes a break, now is the perfect time to prepare for the cooler months. Your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep comfortable all year round! LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents, so, if you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

The 34th Annual Virginia Film Festival is underway today and runs through Sunday, Halloween. In all there are dozens of films being screened in Downtown Charlottesville and at other various locations. Some of the films provide glimpses into topics of things that may not be working.

One of those is Medicine Man: The Stan Brock Story, a documentary about one person's attempt to bring healthcare to various places across the United States of America where regular care is hard to come by.

Brock is a British-born adventurer who founded Remote Area Medical, a nonprofit that holds pop-up free clinics in remote places across the world. Earlier this week I spoke with Paul Michael Angell, the director of the documentary which screens this Sunday at 1:30 p.m. at the Violet Crown. Take a listen to the podcast version to hear the interview. Or, take a look at the video interview on YouTube.

Do sign up for the podcast on Spotify, Apple Music, Audible, Amazon, or however you get your podcasts!

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Let’s begin today with two Patreon-fueled shout-outs. One person wants you to know "We keep each other safe. Get vaccinated, wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

And in another one, one brand new Patreon supporter wants you to go out and read a local news story written by a local journalist. Whether it be the Daily Progress, Charlottesville Tomorrow, C-Ville Weekly, NBC29, CBS19, the community depends on a network of people writing about the community. Go learn about this place today!

On today’s show:

The latest campaign finance reports are out a week before Election Day in Virginia

Area planning and housing directors provide updates on projects across the region

Charlottesville’s seeking a firm to help with financial advice related to long-term debt

And Piedmont Virginia Community College is extending a tuition assistance program

We’ll begin today with a quick update from three newsletters ago. On Saturday’s program, I wrote about the suspicious package found Friday night by the federal courthouse. The Virginia State Police bomb squad was called and the item was deemed to be no threat to public safety. Over the weekend, city communications director Brian Wheeler confirmed to the Daily Progress that the suspected threat was a “personal item.” (article)

Jury selection began yesterday in the Sines v. Kessler trial, as well as the defeat of a motion from defendant Christopher Cantwell to sever himself from the case. Cantwell is representing himself in the civil rights suit which seeks damages and an injunction on further events such as the Unite the Right Rally from August 12, 2017. Read Tyler Hammel’s coverage in the Daily Progress to keep up to date. (Day 1 coverage)

Last campaign finance report before the election

Election Day is one week away and the latest campaign finance reports have been submitted to the Virginia Department of Elections.

Charlottesville

In the Charlottesville Council race, Democrat Brian Pinkston began October with $14,400 and raised only $25 in contributions. He loaned himself $1,815 and spent $1,816 in the period leaving a balance very similar to where he started. Pinkston has raised $111,122 in the campaign (info).

Ticket mate Juandiego Wade began the month with $15,201 on hand and raised an additional $140. He spent $175 leaving a balance also similar to where he started. Wade has raised $81,375 this cycle. (info)

Independent Yas Washington raised no money and spent no money and had a balance of zero on October 21. She’s raised and spent a total of $415 in the election cycle. (info)

Albemarle County

None of the Supervisors races in Albemarle County are contested, but there was campaign finance activity. Jack Jouett incumbent Diantha McKeel raised an additional $100, spent $6,473, and had a balance of $22,815 on October 21. (VPAP)

Rio District Incumbent Ned Gallaway raised no money and spent $3 on parking in downtown Charlottesville according to his campaign finance report. Gallaway began the 2021 campaign with $7,293 on-hand and has raised $10,150 in total this year. He had an ending balance of $14,086 on October 21, 2021. (info)

Newcomer Jim Andrews raised no additional money in the first three weeks of October, spent $2,503, and had a balance of $19,281 on October 21. Andrews has raised a total of $38,117 in the campaign cycle.

Nelson County

There are two contested races for the five-seat Board of Supervisors in Nelson County. Democrat incumbent Ernie Reed faces a challenger in Republican Pam Brice.

Reed began October with a balance of $10,965 and raised an additional $275. He spent no money during the period. (info)

Brice began October with a balance of $2,430, raised an additional $325, and spent $1,316 in the first three weeks of the tenth month. She had an ending balance of $1,439. (info)

In Nelson’s North District, incumbent independent Thomas D. Harvey has been in office since 1984 and is being challenged by Democrat Mary Cunningham. No online records of Harvey’s campaign finance reports are available. He’s filed an exemption from reporting requirements, according to Nelson County Registrar Jacqueline Britt.

Cunningham began October with $1,450 on hand and received $550 in contributions. Her campaign spent $420 and finished this reporting period with $1,580 on hand. Cunningham has raised a total of $7,132 this year. (info)

More from this cycle of campaign reports in the next installment of the program.

Routine advice wanted for city bonds

Charlottesville has issued a routine request for proposals for a firm to provide advice with financial services related to the city’s capital improvement program as well as the issuance and administration of debt. The city’s request details the city’s existing $207 million in outstanding debt which includes a total of $17.8 million in debt service for the current fiscal year. (read the RFP)

Charlottesville sells municipal bonds each spring for the CIP as well as four utilities that are all separate accounts. This year the city issued $20.8 million in bonds, $8.22 million of which is for new debt. The city has held a AAA bond rating from Standards and Poor’s since 1964 and a AAA bond rating from Moody’s since 1973.

The RFP comes at a time when the city is anticipating sharp increases in capital spending to pay for $75 million in upgrades at Buford Middle School as well as a $10 million a year commitment to affordable housing projects.

In September, Council signaled to budget staff that they no longer want to pursue local funding for the West Main Streetscape, a multi-phase project that also included funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation. Council was told in September that the additional spending will require additional tax resources.

Assistance extended

Piedmont Virginia Community College announced this morning that a tuition assistance program will be extended into the spring semester. The PVCC4U 100%! initiative covers one hundred percent of tuition and fees for qualifying students.

“During the current fall semester, the PVCC4U. 100%! program has made it possible for 431 students to receive $508,842 in additional funding to cover the full cost of their tuition and fees,” reads a press release. “For the full academic year, PVCC estimates $1.4 million in funding for over 700 students.”

To be eligible, participants must be a Virginia resident, go through the financial aid process, and have a household income of less than $100,000 a year. Alternatively, the student could have been laid off or furloughed due to COVID-19. The student must also enroll in at least six credit hours. Learn more and apply at the PVCC4U 100% page.

Albemarle building efficiency

Finally in our news round-up, a correction. In the last newsletter, I identified Albemarle Deputy County Executive Doug Walker under an incorrect title. To make it up, why not a quick soundbite from Mr. Walker in which he highlights an item from the recent report from the county’s Facilities and Environmental Services Department. (read the report)

“I want to draw your attention specifically tonight today to the energy management program update which includes a report on the very real and meaningful savings the county has been able to realize in building operations through this program which tracks and optimizes energy consumption in your buildings,” Walker said.

Energy consumption at the Scottsville Community Center, the Crozet Library, and Northside Library has been reduced to 25 percent of FY2017’s figures due to the program.

“At Crozet Library the issue had been a missing sensor in the building,” Walker said. “In Scottsville there were relatively minor repairs needed and operational adjustments made. And at Northside, programming adjustments helped to realize those savings.”

Walker said in addition to saving money, these reductions will also help Albemarle meet its greenhouse gas reduction goals.

In today’s second Substack-fueled shout-out, Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects with the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department, and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. Visit codeforcville.org to learn about those projects.

The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership was created by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District to serve as a regional clearinghouse for issues related to places to live. Last week, the partnership held the first in a series of fall and winter seminars on the topic which held up to that spirit. (watch the video)

Representatives from four localities gave their perspective, including Alex Ikefuna, the former city planning director who is now the interim director of the Office of Community Solutions.

“Local action alone is not going to be enough to address the affordable housing crisis so there is an outlook now that regional cooperation, partnership, and collaboration is going to be a critical component of addressing the affordable housing,” Ikefuna said.

Jim Frydl is the planning director and zoning administrator for Greene County and he said the partnership’s assistance has been helpful.

“We’re in the process of developing and refining our Comprehensive Plan and the public input and the support and the networking and the data from the Regional Housing Study that we have received are all invaluable as planning tools going forward,” Frydl said.

Frydl referred to the Planning for Affordability report, adopted by the TPDC in August. The report has a chapter for each of the six localities in the planning district.

“As a region, we’re tied together economically which means people commuting back and forth between jobs,” Frydl said. “The housing issue is a regional issue because affordability in Charlottesville impacts Fluvanna and impacts Greene and vice versa.”

Frydl said between 700 and 800 housing units will come on line in Greene within the next year.

“It’s a mixture of market rate apartments, senior-restricted apartments, independent living apartments, townhomes,” Frydl said. “There’s a lot more multifamily or missing middle housing that Greene County hasn’t had in the past.”

The partnership also provides potential for dialog between communities of shared interest such as the urban ring around Charlottesville. Stacy Pethia is Albemarle’s Housing Policy Manager.

“Often those conversations have been disconnected so this is a great way to bring everyone to to the same table,” Pethia said.

Douglas Miles has been the director of Community Development in Fluvanna County since the summer of 2019. Fluvanna is also undergoing a Comprehensive Plan update to plan for places to live.

‘We’re about 96 or 97 percent single-family housing here and we have projects that are coming on board now such as Colonial Circle with 124 apartments, things like that,” Miles said. “We’re entering kind of this new era for us which is great for getting affordable workforce house type requests.”

Colonial Circle is at the corner of Route 53 and Lake Monticello and also includes single family homes. The apartments are being built by Pinnacle Construction and will be targeted at households making between 50 percent and 70 percent of area median income.

“This proposed development will be very similar to Brookdale in Albemarle, so that’s the model and that’s the style of the apartments with the clubhouse and the pool and the [recreational] areas,” Miles said.

A performance agreement will be worked out with the Fluvanna Economic Development Authority, the developers, and the Fluvanna Board of Supervisors.

Fluvanna and Louisa also share the Zion Crosswords growth area and Miles said that area will become residentially dense as water and sewer service is connected.

Ikefuna said Charlottesville is ground zero for affordable housing, and many projects are underway.

“We got a massive redevelopment initiative by the housing authority, a wholesale renovation of Crescent Halls which is about 100 units plus,” Ikefuna said.

According to an October 21 update from CRHA Redevelopment Coordinator Brandon Collins, the waterline break from this past June has altered the construction schedule. All residents will eventually be moved out of the building and into other housing covered through vouchers for the duration of construction. Read the update for more info on public housing construction, which is being backed by millions in city taxpayer funds. The current five-year Capital Improvement Program anticipates $13.5 million in funding. (report)

City taxpayers are also helping finance the Piedmont Housing Alliance’s redevelopment of Friendship Court.

“That is a massive project,” Ikefunda said. “Four phases. At build out you will be looking at between 450 and 480 units.”

The current CIP budget anticipates $15.9 million in taxpayer funds for all four phases. Construction has not yet been scheduled for the first phase.

Ikefuna said the draft Comprehensive Plan seeks to increase residential density by allowing more units on individual lots. The extent of how many and where will be up to the rewrite of the zoning ordinance as well as development of an inclusionary zoning policy.

“We’re expecting that it’s going to be done early next year and that will help with the rewriting of the zoning ordinance,” Ikefuna said.

City Council is expected to have a first reading of the ordinance on November 15.

The full video for the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership meeting can be viewed on YouTube.

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Let’s begin with a Patreon-fueled shout-out!

On today’s program:

A review of economic development efforts in Albemarle County

Jaunt owes the state of Virginia nearly a million for false ridership numbers

Charlottesville’s Home to Hope program gains national recognition

A closed-door group of planners gets several interesting presentations related to climate adaptation

Let’s begin with a quick look at COVID cases in Virginia coming out of the weekend. The seven-day average of new cases has dropped to 1,545 as of this morning, with 943 reported by the Virginia Department of Health. The percent positivity has fallen to 6.3 percent. That figure was 8.8 percent on October 1.

The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 50 cases and the percent positivity is 5.7 percent. The district will hold a town hall meeting Wednesday on COVID vaccinations for children between the age of 5 and 11. Approvals are pending. (Facebook link)

Employees at the University of Virginia will be required to be vaccinated by December 8. That’s according to a Cavalier Daily article. Provost Liz Magill and Chief Operating Officer J.J. Davis set an email to staff Thursday notifying the requirement is necessary to comply with federal regulations. The article states UVa’s vaccination rate was 95 percent as of Thursday.

Home to Hope honored

An international group that promotes excellence in local government has honored a new Charlottesville program created to help formerly incarcerated people return to society. The International City/County Management Association honored the Home to Hope Program, which was proposed by Mayor Nikuyah Walker in 2018 to provide support to a vulnerable demographic.

Four full-time employees serve as peer navigators to help people find employment, housing, and reliable transportation. According to a write-up in the ICMA’s latest newsletter, the program has served 389 individuals.

“Of the 389 enrollees, only seven have returned to custody, and only three of those were actively involved in the program,” reads the article on page 34 of the newsletter. “That represents a recidivism rate of 1.8 percent, well below the 38 percent across the region.”

The honor is part of ICMA’s Program Excellence awards under the Community Sustainability section. (read more)

LUEPC meeting

A routine closed-door meeting of key planning officials in Albemarle, Charlottesville, and University of Virginia was held last week on October 15. The Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee (LUEPC) had four presentations on items related to climate adaptation.

Paul Zmick, Director of Energy and Utilities at UVA, gave a presentation on the school’s efforts to develop a strategy for thermal energy use. That’s one way UVA hopes to become fossil-free by the year 2050. A recent study evaluated dozens of potential ways to reduce reliance on old technology. Some strategies are recommended to be dropped from further analysis such as solar thermal, biomass, and deep geothermal. (presentation)

Lance Stewart, the county’s director of facilities and environmental services, gave a presentation on the recent publication of the 2018 Greenhouse Gas Inventory. That tool will be the primary way Albemarle measures its programs toward emissions reduction goals. The next milestone is to reach 45 percent of 2008 levels by 2030. (presentation)

“Emissions estimated to have decreased by nearly 10% between 2008 and 2018,” reads one slide in the presentation. “To achieve the County’s 2030 target, we need to reduce emissions by 39 percent from 2018.”

The presentation also states that the effectiveness of the Albemarle’s Climate Action Plan won’t be known until after the 2022 inventory is published in 2024.

Bill Mawyer of the Rivanna Water & Sewer Authority briefed LUEPC on a program to recover methane gas that is a byproduct of the wastewater treatment process. The Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant generates 32 million cubic feet of methane each year that is captured as biogas and used internally in plant operations to produce biosolids which are shipped to Waverly, Virginia for eventual use as fertilizers. (presentation)

Albemarle County’s Bill Fritz gave a presentation on “Large Scale Solar opportunities being studied and deployed for Albemarle County.” That is the only of the fourth that was not posted to the LUEPC website.

Jaunt audit

The transit agency Jaunt owes the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation nearly a million dollars due to alleged misreporting of ridership figures by former CEO Brad Sheffield. Sheffield resigned last November after the Jaunt Board requested his departure. The Daily Progress first reported from an October 6 letter from DRPT officials regarding a review of Jaunt’s financial report for fiscal year 2020.

“The findings of this review are troubling and indicate a pattern of misinformation and inaccurate reporting by JAUNT leadership that resulted in the over-allocation of state and federal resources to Jaunt from FY19 to FY22,” reads the letter from DRPT director Jennifer Mitchell.

In 2019, DRPT moved to a system where funding was based on performance. The audit compared reported numbers to Jaunt’s scheduling software and found that overall ridership was overstated by 19 percent in FY19. The total amount overpaid to Jaunt was $968,640 and allocations for the current fiscal year will be reduced. The DRPT has also canceled the capital purchase of 23 vehicles.

The DRPT will also require Jaunt to provide a new transit development plan. Read Allison Wrabel’s story in the Daily Progress for more context.

In today’s second subscriber supported Public Service Announcement, one person wants you to know about another community litter cleanup event in Albemarle, this time on October 30 in the southern part of the county. The latest Love Albemarle event will take place between 8:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. at sites in Esmont, Keene, Scottsville, and North Garden. Around fifty people showed up for a similar event in Esmont this past spring, and organizers want to double that amount. Organizer Ed Brooks is seeking to get children involved, so if you’re a parent or guardian and want to spend the morning cleaning up road-side litter, register today!

For the rest of the show today, we take a look back at highlights from the Albemarle Board of Supervisors from the last week. Let’s start with an update on Project Enable, the county’s strategic plan for economic development.

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority administers grant and bond programs that seek to encourage businesses to expand in Albemarle or to locate their operations there. On October 19, 2021, the seven-member EDA Board of Directors formally authorized their role in a performance agreement for the firm Bonumose to open a demonstration facility in the former State Farm Building. That came at a joint meeting with the six elected members of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors.

Doug Walker is the Deputy County Executive.

“These two bodies work in collaboration with each other,” Walker said. “They are considering the same projects, the same agreements, and they do them in concert with each other.”

Many of these discussions are held in closed session, as a provision in Virginia’s open meeting rules allows for the public to be excluded from conversations where “Discussion concerning a prospective business or industry or the expansion of an existing business or industry where no previous announcement has been made of the business' or industry's interest in locating or expanding its facilities in the community.” (Virginia code)

These packages are often given code names and Walker said the following represent exceed $136 million in private investment which then enters the local economy.

“Turtle. Daffodil. Macintosh. Proton. Patriot. Bronco. 49ers,” Walker said. “Those projects are actually Woolen Mills, WillowTree, Potter’s Craft Cider. Afton Scientific. Barnes’ Lumber. Castle Hill Gaming. Albemarle Business Campus.”

Walker said those projects have resulted in nearly 600 new jobs in Albemarle. Another key performance agreement is one with Habitat for Humanity for the provision of affordable housing units at Southwood, as well as one with Pinnacle Construction for the Brookdale apartment complex off of Old Lynchburg Road.

“And then there are other active pending projects that we can’t talk about by name but we can talk about by code,” Walker said. “Project Gadget, Project Puma, Project Baja, just illustrating that the work continues.”

The EDA also works to help build infrastructure to help industrial sites more accessible and attractive. The University of Virginia Foundation’s North Fork Research Park is considered a Tier 4 site by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership. Recently the Foundation paid to extend Lewis and Clark Drive to Airport Road in order to provide an additional entrance. (go look!)

“It’s the county’s only tier 4 site so the Foundation provided more than $6 million toward that infrastructure improvement,” said J.T. Newberry in the Economic Development Office.

Newberry said the economic development office is working with the Foundation to elevate the North Fork park to a Tier 5 site. He also said the firm Kimley-Horn will provide a long-awaited study for the county as part of the Comprehensive Plan update.

“A long desired piece of information for us is an inventory of our commercial and industrial properties,” Newberry said.

Watch the rest of the video to see the whole presentation on the Board of Supervisors’ website. (watch)

Supervisors also met on Wednesday, October 20, for a full meeting. At the very beginning, Chair Ned Gallaway said he recently attended a meeting earlier this month welcoming more than 250 families from Afghanistan to the area. The International Rescue Committee is seeking assistance from the community.

“Things like if you’re a landlord or somebody that has housing or space available, to contact the IRC, the International Rescue Committee to help,” Gallaway said. “Employers in the area, helping these folks find employment. And then obviously just assisting with the transition, just navigating simple things like how to get around the community can be daunting coming out of a very stressful and traumatic experience for these folks.”

Visit the Welcoming Greater Charlottesville page to learn more about how you can help.

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Second month of Ting service for free

A $75 gift card to the Downtown Mall

Additionally, Ting will match your Substack subscription to support Town Crier Productions, the company that produces this newsletter and other community offerings.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s first subscriber supported Public Service Announcement, one person wants you to know about another community litter cleanup event in Albemarle, this time on October 30 in the southern part of the county. The latest Love Albemarle event will take place between 8:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. at sites in Esmont, Keene, Scottsville, and North Garden. Around fifty people showed up for a similar event in Esmont this past spring, and organizers want to double that amount. Organizer Ed Brooks is seeking to get children involved, so if you’re a parent or guardian and want to spend the morning cleaning up road-side litter, register today!

On this edition of the program:

A host of development updates in Albemarle County, including a mixed-use development in the Broadway Blueprint

The Virginia Chapter of the American Planning Association releases its annual awards

Emmet Street at Ivy Road to be closed for nearly two weeks for stormwater project

Chris Greene Lake reopens to dogs after a month’s closure

A suspicious item is found at Charlottesville’s federal court

Fire crews and police officers responded last night to reports of a suspicious item at the Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse in downtown Charlottesville, but the item was determined by the Virginia State Police to be of no threat. The area was closed from 6:45 p.m. to around 8:30 p.m. according to a release from the city’s communications office.

The incident comes just three days before a trial gets underway in the federal cases against multiple organizers involved in the August 12 Unite the Right rally. The lawsuit was filed four years ago and seeks damages based on an 1871 civil rights law as well as a prevention of future rallies. Defendants include Jason Kessler, Richard Spencer, and Christopher Cantwell, among others. The trial begins Monday morning. (read more in the University of Michigan’s Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse)

The water at Chris Greene Lake Park has been reopened to dogs and people. Albemarle issued an advisory in late September after tests reported elevated levels of harmful algae. There have been two consecutive tests which have indicated water quality has returned to normal levels. A release announcing the reopening went out Friday afternoon.

Emmet Street will be fully closed between Ivy Road and Rothery Road for nearly two weeks between November 1 and November 12. Traffic will be detoured along Massie Road and Copeley Road. According to a release, the roadway will be shut to allow for installation of a large stormwater utility structure across Emmet Street. Pedestrians, cyclists, motorists, and transit-riders are warned of potential delays.

“Please expect traffic backups along the detour route and if possible, utilize Rt 250 or other city streets to bypass the area,” reads the release. “Pedestrians will be detoured through the UVA site along the parking garage service road.”

The school superintendent in Nelson County has announced she will step down next June 30. The Lynchburg News Advance reports that Martha Eagle has plans to retire after a 32-year career in the Nelson school system. Nelson County has 1,520 students and more than 300 employees. (read the article)

The Virginia Chapter of the American Planning Association has released its awards for 2021 at a hybrid conference in Roanoke.

Senator Lynwood Lewis (D-6) received the Cardinal Award for his role as a legislator, singling out key pieces of legislation that were signed into law in the from the past year.

SB1350: Requires the Commonwealth Transportation Board to incorporate resiliency into project selection process

SB1374: Establishes a carbon sequestration task force which must report before 2022 General Assembly

SB1389: Requires landowners whose properties are prone to flooding to report that risk to potential buyers

SB1404: Adjustments to the Stormwater Local Assistance Fund to clarify intent to reduce nitrogen and phosphorous reduction

Fairfax County won the Commonwealth Plan of the year for its Zoning Ordinance Modernization Project, which cut the length of those regulations in half.

“The new streamlined ordinance is half the size of the previous Ordinance from 1978, which was accomplished through elimination of repetition and use of easy-to-understand language, graphics, and figures,” reads the award’s write-up.

The city of Norfolk won three awards for three projects. OpenNorfolk is an initiative that helped businesses connect with customers during the pandemic. Norfolk also created a Missing Middle Pattern Book to explain how additional density could be achieved in single-family neighborhoods.

The Norfolk Thrive plan presents a vision for how to extend urban development in the coastal city from the Harbor Park ballpark to Norfolk State University. The latter won the APA’s Resilient Virginia Community of the Year.

Other awards include:

Williamsburg Planning Director Carolyn Murphy won the Outstanding Service Award

The Edge District between York County, James City County, and the City of Williamsburg won the Holzheimer Economic Development Award

Frederick County won the Commonwealth Connectors Award and planner John Bishop won the Outstanding Service Award for the Crossover Boulevard project, which is a new four-lane roadway in Winchester

In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. The leaves have started to fall as autumn set in, and as they do, this is a good time to begin planning for the spring. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

Time now for a round up of various developments in Albemarle County.

Developer Alan Cadgene has filed plans with Albemarle County for a mixed-use development to be built on a 1.36 acre property just to the northwest of the redeveloped Woolen Mills factory. The proposal is for a 2,500 square foot manufacturing buildings with 13 dwelling units. The project is being submitted by-right.

“[That] means that if the proposed plans meet the minimum requirements of the county’s zoning, site plan, or subdivision ordinances, they must be approved,” reads the public notification for the project.

The county’s Comprehensive Plan designates the land as Neighborhood Density Residential which calls for between three and six units per acre. According to the project application, the residential density on the site be 9.55 units per acre. An existing structure on the property would remain. This is within the scope of the county’s Broadway Blueprint planning area. That’s being run by the county’s Economic Development Office.

Elsewhere in the county, plans have been filed for 250 units along Rio Road near Four Seasons. Andy Reitelbach is a senior planner with the county.

“So the application is called the Heritage on Rio,” Retelbach said.

The property is within the jurisdiction of the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee, which had a community meeting on a rezoning application for the project on October 18.

“Sometimes the current zoning and the future land use designation do not always line up so that is one reason why a property owner may choose to request a rezoning of their property,” Reitelbach said.

In this case, the request is to go from R-6 zoning to a customized zone known as a Planned Residential Development. That would allow up to 35 units per acre as well as some commercial uses.

The buildings have not been designed, according to attorney Valerie Long with the firm Williams Mullen. The Architectural Review Board will also weigh in on the project as Rio Road is an entrance corridor.

“The project is proposing that 15 percent of the rezoned units will be affordable to those making up to 80 percent of the area median income,” Long said.

By-right there could be 50 units on the property, so that translates to 15 percent of 200, or 30 units.

The Places29-North Community Advisory Committee met on October 14 and one topic was an update on the Brookhill development south of Forest Lakes and north of Polo Grounds Road. Cameron Langille is another planner in Albemarle. (watch the meeting)

“Brookhill was rezoned by the Board of Supervisors in 2016,” Langille said. “Brookhill totals 277.5 acres so it is a pretty large project. It’s going to be developed in multiple phases and the rezoning referred to each of those phases as blocks.”

Brookhill is a mixed-use development that must have at least 552 residential units and a maximum of 1,550 units. These include apartments, townhomes, and single-family homes. Langille said the developer could have constructed many more under the Comprehensive Plan but opted to go at a lower density. Final approval so far has been granted for 535 total dwelling units

Block 1 is the center of the development.

“There’s going to be also a public park and a plaza gathering area, and that is going to be the primary focal point for non-residential uses in this project,” Langille said.

Some blocks have been approved and constructed, while others are working their way through the review process. Block 8A consists of a 179-bed assisted living facility which is nearing opening. Block 1A and Block 8B consist of multifamily units that look like townhomes but contain more units.

A site plan had been submitted for a hockey rink in the town center.

“That plan got to the final site plan stage which is basically the last thing they have to do application wise before they get final approval,” Langille said. “We were reviewing that back in 2018 and from what the developer has told me it’s not going to be build in that block any longer. They are still working with the folks who are looking to do that ice rink and they are potentially going to relocate it a little further north on the north side of the town center area.”

Allison Wrabel of the Daily Progress reported in February 2020 that the park had been delayed. A group called Friends of the Charlottesville Ice Park had been fundraising for the project. The website for the group has expired.

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Second month of Ting service for free

A $75 gift card to the Downtown Mall

Additionally, Ting will match your Substack subscription to support Town Crier Productions, the company that produces this newsletter and other community offerings.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out, are you interested in picking up some new fibrous friends? On Saturday, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library invites you to Gordon Avenue for a front porch plant swap. Bring a healthy plant or a cutting on October 23 between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. and exchange it for another in an event that also includes a selection of plant-related library resources, including plant care cards with QR codes to help your new friend develop deep roots. That’s the Front Porch Plant Swap at the Gordon Avenue branch of the library. Visit jmrl.org to learn more.

On today’s show:

A company that wants to take a shot at a male contraceptive gets a shot of funding

Boosters are authorized for the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson Vaccine

Regional updates from the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission including information about broadband expansion

Ground is broken for the School of Data Science at the University of Virginia

It’s been a few days since a newsletter, so let’s catch up first on today’s COVID numbers. The September surge is now in the past with new case numbers continuing to decline in Virginia. The seven-day average is currently 1,688 new cases a day. Compare that to 3,486 a day as registered on September 22. The seven day percent positivity has declined to 6.5 percent.

In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 50 new cases reported today. The percent positivity is 5.5 percent. Though numbers are currently on a downward trend, that may not remain the case.

“We’re all hopeful that we’re on the back side of this Delta wave right now,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia. “I think we also do recognize that we’re heading into colder drier times right now and that we’re going into to respiratory virus season, the so-called cold and flu season, and cold, flu, and maybe COVID season.”

Dr. Sifri said people need to continue to keep their guard up against community spread by continuing to wear masks, to wash hands, and all of the preventative measures that have been recommended over the course of the pandemic.

This week, the Centers for Disease Control cleared the way for booster shots of the Modern and the Johnson and Johnson vaccines. The Moderna third dose is for people over the age of 65 and those with underlying health conditions.

“For Moderna it’s similar to the Pfizer dose, it would be a third dose,” Dr. Sifri said. “For both the Pfizer and the Moderna, the booster eligibility is six months after the completion of your primary series, that initial two dose series. There is a difference in the dose for the booster dose for the Moderna vaccine. It’s a half dose compared to what was used for the primary series.”

The Johnson and Johnson booster is a second dose that Dr. Sifri said will be available for anyone over the age of 18, regardless of underlying health conditions.

“I can tell you here at UVA and I’m sure at the Blue Ridge Health District as well and local pharmacies, we are gearing up to provide those vaccines through local resources,” Dr. Sifri said.

A Charlottesville-based company that wants to bring a male contraceptive to market recently announced the securing of $10.7 million in new capital financing. Contraline will use the funding to begin a human trial of ADAM™ , a hydrogel implant.

“The ADAM hydrogel is injected into the vas deferens through a quick and minimally invasive outpatient procedure, where it’s designed to block the flow of sperm,” reads a press release making the announcement.

The trial will take place in Melbourne, Australia and has been sanctioned by the Human Research Ethics Committee there. The press releases states this is the first human trial for a male contraceptive in a couple of decades. (Hat tip to the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council!)

Ground has been broken for construction of the new School of Data Science at the University of Virginia. According to UVA Today, officials marked the occasion with a ceremony Thursday. The new building is within the 14 acre Emmet / Ivy corridor, which will also include a hotel and conference center as well as other uses that have not yet been announced. The school is being funded in part through a $120 million gift to UVA from the Quantitative Foundation and Merrill and Jaffrey Woodriff.

This week, Governor Ralph Northam’s press office sent out a message announcing that Virginia’s government and the private sector have teamed up on over $2 billion in investments in broadband. The goal is to have the state on track to have universal broadband access by 2024. The work is coordinated through the Virginia Telecommunications Initiative, or VATI.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has made one of 57 applications from across Virginia for $943 million in available funding in the latest round of VATI funding, Those applications will leverage $1.15 billion in private funding. The program is run by the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.

“These applications are all posted online so other services providers are able to see those applications to see what the projected service areas to be covered are and if they believe that they already have service or provide the opportunity for service in a particular area, then they can indicate they want to challenge the application or that portion of the application,” said David Blount, deputy director and legislative liaison at the TJPDC.

Challenges are due October 24. The TJPDC’s application is part of the Regional Internet Service Expansion project, or RISE. The private aspect is Firefly Fiber Broadband, Dominion, and several electric cooperatives. The public aspect includes thirteen counties as far south as Campbell County south of Lynchburg. (read the application)

TJPDC’s request is for $85.9 million for a $307.8 million project. Localities have put up $35.3 million in local matching funds.

“The application proposes putting 4,300 miles of fiber either in the air or underground passing over 40,000 total locations,” Blount said.

Blount said TJPDC’s role would be to administer the project. He made his comments at the October 4, 2021 meeting of the TJPDC’s Board of Commissioners.

At the same meeting, Dale Herring of the Greene Board of Supervisors reported that short-term rentals are no longer allowed in that county’s residential districts.

“Unfortunately or fortunately depending on which side of the fence you are on, that was voted down after about three years,” Herring said. “It turned out that a lot of investors were beginning to buy properties in R-1 zoning and that definitely created an issue for the homeowners in those areas.”

The TJPDC meetings always include a roundtable where representatives from the different localities are able to give updates on what’s happening. Tommy Barlow is on the Louisa County Board of Supervisors.

“It looks like to me that every meeting we are dealing with mid-year appropriations that weren’t expected such as Sheriff’s Department raises to keep up with other counties,” Barlow said. “We just lost our deputy county administrator so we’re looking to hire another one.”

Employment was also on the mind of Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price, who said a thorough review of compensation will soon get underway.

“We are facing loss of some critical people primarily because of compensation packages from other governmental entities that are extremely difficult for us to match,” Price said. “I would just as one Supervisor speaking anticipate that we’re going to have to put some more money into our labor expenses in the county in order to avoid losing some of our better people.”

Tony O’Brien is on the Fluvanna Board of Supervisors. He agreed that the cost of paying people to do government work is increasing.

“Because Louisa raised their pay rate for the Sheriff’s office, Fluvanna had to follow in turn, too,” O’Brien said. “Obviously Sheriff’s compensation and deputy’s compensation is an issue for many many counties as recruitment is increasingly difficult.”

O’Brien suggested a regional compensation study be conducted.

As part of her report, TJPDC Executive Director Christine Jacobs reminded the board that City Council has extended its local COVID emergency due to a high number of cases.

“How that affects us here is that we will continue to hold our public bodies, partnerships, and commissions virtually to ensure that we are keeping it as safe as possible for people,” Jacobs said.

The chair of the TJPDC is Jesse Rutherford of Nelson County. Rutherford said Nelson is considering a recreation center and a business park, among other things. He also had this news.

“I’m excited to announce Lovingston is getting its brewery here soon after our vote on Tuesday,” Rutherford said.

According to the Lynchburg News Advance, supervisors voted unanimously on October 12 for a special use permit for the Outback Brew House to operate at the site of a former church on U.S. 29. Rutherford told the News Advance that this may begin to alleviate pressure on Route 151, which has seen multiple alcohol related businesses spring up over the years. Outback Brew House will be a microbrewery.

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On today’s show:

A quick update on campaign finance in Albemarle and Charlottesville

Charlottesville City Council gets an update on sidewalks at Stribling Avenue

More funding is available for Virginia school systems to begin to replace their bus fleets with cleaner vehicles

Let’s begin with a quick COVID update and the continuing downward trend. The Virginia Department of Health reports 1,617 new cases today, and the seven-day average for new cases has dropped to 1,983. On October 1, those numbers were 2,552 and 2,780 respectively. Since October 1, there have been 732 deaths reported. The percent positivity has dropped to 6.8 percent, down from 9.1 on September 30.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are 66 new cases reported today, This afternoon, the district announced changes to COVID tests they offer. Specifically, you can now register for a PCR test on the BRHD website. Antibody tests are not available for this service, which takes place at various places. (link)

The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality has announced $10 million in grant funding for school systems to use to purchase replacements for diesel school buses. The money comes from Virginia’s share of the Volkswagen Environmental Mitigation Trust, a result of that company’s lying about the emissions ratings of their vehicles. In August, the DEQ announced the award of $10 million to 19 school districts, allowing for the replacement of 83 buses including two in Albemarle.

This time around, localities can apply for either $300,000 for each electric bus and its charging infrastructure, as well as $15,000 for every propane bus. DEQ will hold webinars on October 26 and November 4. Applications are due February 1.

Campaign finance reports for September

The latest deadline for campaign finance reports from candidates in Virginia were due Friday, and the results are in. None of Albemarle County’s three candidates for three seats the Board of Supervisors raised no funds between September 1 and September 30. All three races are uncontested, including newcomer Jim Andrews for the Samuel Miller District.

The two Democrats in the Charlottesville continued to raise funds. According to data pulled together by the Virginia Public Access Project, Brian Pinkston raised an additional $20,589 in September with 26 contributions of over $100 including $2,500 from the Realtors Political Action Committee of Virginia. Pinkston spent $23,437 in September and had $14,399 on hand as the month concluded. Pinkston has raised $109,280, a record amount for a City Council campaign.

(details on VPAP)

Juandiego Wade raised an additional $14,636 in September, including a $4,500 check from the Realtors Political Action Committee of Virginia. That was among 29 contributions over $100. Wade spent $8,019 in the period and had a balance of $15,201 at the end of the month. Wade has raised a total of $96,400. (details on VPAP)

Independent Yas Washington raised $100, spent $100, and ended the month with no money on hand. (details on VPAP)

Campaign finance reports are also required for School Board candidates. There are five candidates seeking three seats in Charlottesville. Let’s start with the three newcomers.

Christa Bennett began September with $2,575.79, raised $60 in new funds, spent $611.67, and ended the reporting period with $2,024.12. (report)

Emily Dooley began the period with $9,112,60, raised $2,375 in new funds, spent $903.40, and finished the month with $10,584.20. (report)

Dom Morse started September with $5,342.32 in the bank, raised $1,783.35, spent $3,519.60, and concluded the reporting period with $3,606.07 in the bank. (report)

Now the two incumbents.

Leah Puryear had no campaign funds at hand on September 1, but raised $1,375 during the period. Her campaign spent $821.46 and had $553.54 on September 30. (report)

Lisa Larson-Torres had $3,345.47 on hand at the beginning of the month, raised $50, spent $1,099.86, and had a balance of $2,295.61.

Three of Albemarle’s magisterial districts have School Board races this year, and the at-large seat is not one of them. Unlike the Board of Supervisors, there are seven seats for the School Board.

In the Rio District, Kristin Callsen is running unopposed.

In the Jack Jouett District, Kate Acuff is running unopposed.

In the Samuel Miller District, Graham Paige is running unopposed on the ballot, but there is a write-in candidate. Randy Zackrisson began September with $9,349.81 on hand and raised $5,587.72 and spent $2,462.87 to end the month with $12,474.66 on hand. (report)

Paige began September with $1,721.69 and raised $5,984 but spent no funds during the month. That left him with $7,705.69 on hand as October began.

The next campaign finance reports are due on October 25 for the reporting period between October 1 and October 21.

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Charlottesville City Council held a work session yesterday on how to cover the costs of sidewalk improvements for Stribling Avenue to support a 170 unit development on about 12 acres of undeveloped land. James Freas is the director of the city’s Neighborhood Development Services department.

“So, as many as you know, there’s a [Planned Unit Development] proposed for 240 Stribling Avenue,” Freas said. “The proposed project includes a mix of apartments, townhouses, two-family units.”

Freas said Southern Development will proffer 15 percent of the units to be affordable or for-sale to 60 percent of the area median income. That means rent or the mortgage would be capped at 30 percent of those household’s monthly budget.

“A critical issue and consideration of whether to rezone this property or not is the status of the sidewalk of Stribling Avenue itself,” Freas said. “Stribling Avenue does not currently have any sidewalks on it. It sees a fair amount of traffic and is a relatively narrow street as it exists today.”

Southern Development has also offered to pay up to $2 million to cover the costs of building the sidewalk and worked with the economic development office to come up with an agreement on how to be paid back through using the incremental tax revenue that would be generated by the increased value of the property after development.

In September, city engineer Jack Dawson said the cost estimate would be slightly higher. The work session was intended to provide an analysis of the estimate, but not a finalized estimate for many reasons. (Dawson’s analysis)

“This has not gone through community engagement and stakeholder meetings which can add significantly to a project as you may be aware,” Dawson said. “And then projects of this type are not insignificant undertakings nor are they cookie cutter in design typology or execution. A sidewalk is not just a sidewalk.”

Dawson described how additional right of way would need to be purchased by the city, how the drainage system would need to be built, and how many on-street parking spaces and trees would need to be removed. All of that adds up.

“The original cost amount was $1.2 million with a 25 percent contingency of $1.5 million,” Dawson said. “And then after I did the analysis, I adjusted all of those things and it went to $2.4 million almost with a 20 percent contingency bringing it to $2.8 million.”

The scope of the project does not include upgrades to Stribling’s intersection with Jefferson Park Avenue Extended. Upgrading the pedestrian crossing there would be a separate project that Dawson said is being undertaken by the city using existing funds.

Vice Mayor Sena Magill asked if Stribling could be turned into a one-way road that would connect back to Fontaine Avenue along land in Albemarle County. Dawson said that would be tough and expensive.

Outgoing City Manager Chip Boyles did not attend the virtual Council meeting, so it was up to Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders to sum up the button line.

“Where we are is that we’re looking at the moment an $850,000 gap based on what the proffer that we have received is and what we have come up with our estimate,” Sanders said. “We have 170 units that are being proposed by the developer with 15 percent, so 25 units being offered up for rental for 10 years and ownership for 30 years at 60 percent of AMI.”

Sanders asked Council if that investment would be worth it to achieve that level of affordability.

“Because of the stresses that we face with the decisions that we have to make regarding schools and all of the various priorities that we have, that’s a tall order of coming up with that $850,000,” Sanders said.

Councilor Michael Payne was not sure the return on investment was worth it.

“It seems realistically like that $850,000 just is not really feasible in terms of being ahead of other priorities,” Payne said.

Payne said investing in Piedmont Housing and other entities would be a better use of funds.

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he favored the use of incremental tax financing for projects, but also said the $850,000 was too much for the city to cover at this time.

The rezoning application will return to the Planning Commission at a later date.

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In today’s subscriber-supported public service announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes and events this fall and winter to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. On October 19, there’s a free class on the Selection, Planting, and Care of Trees from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. (register) In early November, there is a three part class on Winter Invasive Plant Identification and Treatment. Information on all the classes and the group can be found at www.charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

On today’s show:

The Charlottesville Planning Commission recommends approval of the update of the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan

A start-up seeking sugar substitutes secures funding for expansion at the State Farm Building

The Charlottesville Tree Commission looks forward to the future and a little ReLeaf

We begin today with an economic development announcement in Albemarle County. Specifically at the former regional headquarters for State Farm on Pantops. Governor Ralph Northam was on hand to announce that the firm Bonumose will partner with the Hershey Company to research and develop reduced or zero sugar chocolate.

“This is a $28 million investment that Bonumose is putting forth in the Commonwealth of Virginia,” Northam said.

Ed Rogers is the chief executive officer and co-founder of Bonumose, which was formed in 2016 and currently operates out of the University of Virginia’s North Fork research park.

Using a $256,000 grant from the Commonwealth’s Opportunity Fund and $300,000 from the Virginia Investment Performance Grant program, Bonumose will move to a portion of the State Farm site.

“It’s an important milestone, 36,000 square foot building,” Rogers said.

Bonumose is betting that its technology can provide a healthy sugar substitute that can be produced at a price that can be affordable. Rogers said there’s a lot of hard work to do to prove that the tech will pay off.

“We are not so full of hubris that we think that’s going to be easy,” Rogers said. “I mean, sugar is great. Who doesn’t love sugar? I mean even if you hate sugar, you probably love sugar also. It’s the gold standard of sweeteners. It’s natural. It tastes great. It is functional. It provides structure to foods. It helps depress the freezing point so you have creamy ice cream. It caramelizes. It does all of these things in food so when you’re talking about replacing sugar, it’s just not a matter of replacing the sweetness.”

Current sugar substitutes do not work as well in cooking, and can be much more expensive than the real thing. Rogers said the product Bonumose will make s based on tagatose, a naturally occurring sweetener.

The Pantops facility will serve as a demonstration project and will provide at least 64 new jobs. Rogers said this only came about because the county’s Economic Development office approached the company with options on how to expand. Soon after the pandemic, State Farm said they would shift entirely to a teleworking model and would not return to the 365,000 square foot building.

Economic Development Director Roger Johnson is fond of using code names for various projects that they are working on before the deals can be announced.

“Albemarle County had begun working with Bonumose well before the state die and we named this project internally Project Leopard, after Def Leppard’s hit song Pour Some Sugar On Me,” Johnson said.

This is a story I’ll continue to monitor in the weeks, months, and years to come.

New grant program

The City of Charlottesville has launched a new grant program intended to encourage job creation. The GO Hire program run by the Office of Economic Development will be adapted as part of the city’s pandemic recovery efforts. The position must pay $15 an hour. (learn more)

“Grant funds can be used for City based businesses hiring a new employee that is a City resident,” reads the application for the program. “[The Office of Economic Development] will reimburse 50 percent of the wages for the initial eight week hiring period.”

Grants are capped at $5,000, but the positions are eligible for the Virginia Return to Earn Initiative operated by Virginia Career Works.

Comprehensive Plan milestone achieved

After four years and ten months of review, the seven member Charlottesville Planning Commission has voted unanimously to recommend approval of an updated Comprehensive Plan as well as the Future Land Use Map. They did so after a long public hearing in which dozens of community members spoke about the plan, which has been drafted by the firm Rhodeside & Harwell as part of the Cville Plans Together initiative.

James Freas has only been Charlottesville’s director of Neighborhood Development Services for one month, but had the honor of introducing the public hearing.

“The result of this process to date is the draft plan that you have before you tonight which is itself only a first step as we move on to the implementation actions and rulemaking through the zoning ordinance project,” Freas said.

That’s the third step in the Cville Plans Together project, but Freas said the Planning Commission had to take into consideration all of the chapters of the Comprehensive Plan.

“As we move into implementation, we will be considering this entire plan,” Freas said. “While there has been discussion of the land use map, the strategies in this plan call for environmental protection, historic preservation, recognition of neighborhood context, addressing climate change, and providing affordable housing among many other issues and all of these will go into crafting a new zoning ordinance.”

Freas said that densities called for in the future map may be adjusted in places where it is not suitable. He said he is excited to join the team just as this next phase gets underway.

Update on Climate Action Plan

After a presentation on the plan, Commissioners got the chance to ask questions before the public hearing began. One yielded an update on the Climate Action Plan from Kristel Riddervold, the city’s environmental sustainability and facilities development manager.

“There’s been sort of some competing priorities that the city has worked on and so we have in some ways given some deference to the comp plan process,” Riddervold said. “There’s been a lot of ground work and climate protection related supporting work that’s been going on for the past year. There is still fully a commitment to develop a climate action plan because that is consistent with Council’s commitment with the Compact of Mayors.”

Bill Palmer works in the Office of the Architect at the University of Virginia. He said he supported goals in the draft Comprehensive Plan that refer to the role UVA plays in the community.

“And the acknowledgement of UVA’s influence on many aspect of Charlottesville both positive and negative,” Palmer said. “I think continuing the collaboration and cooperation between the city and University is very important and [Albemarle] County as well.”

Public hearing

The public hearing lasted nearly two hours and featured competing visions. Some are concerned that additional density in the map could worsen the phenomenon of gentrification.

“The process that got us to this point has been incredibly flawed and is now barreling toward a forced premature conclusion,” said Julia Whiting.

One former Planning Commissioner agreed with that sentiment.

“It feels like we’re driving drunk at night,” said Bill Emory. “Kind-hearted developers will not address our shortage of affordable housing.

Third-year UVA student Chloe Estrada said she supports a plan which will hold landlords accountable.

“Earlier this year, we conducted a survey of students who have lived off-Grounds to learn more about their housing experiences with specific regard to treatment they have received from landlords,” Estrada said. “Broadly, only 43 percent of student renters were satisfied with their off Grounds housing experience.”

One supporter of the plan wanted the implementation phase to begin quickly.

“I recommend that you not slow down the process and that you go ahead and adopt this map as a guide for creating new zoning,” said Kathryn Laughon. “We know that changes in status quo are going to create a lot of backlash.”

On Monday, Council and the Planning Commission held a two-hour question and answer period on the plan. Kevin Hildebrand had listened and it cleared up one aspect of the plan.

“I was encouraged listening to yesterday’s meeting that the up to 12 units is not a by-right development in medium density,” Hildebrand said. “Heretofore that has not been made clear and perhaps the allowable density will be based on lot size.”

Commission review and adoption

Dozens more people spoke over the next hour or so before the Commission got to their deliberation. There were many discussions of tweaks, and quite a few amendments. Some of this came down to what language should be used. Here’s an interchange about bonus density for providing affordable housing in “sensitive” areas.

“I got a new wording,” said Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg. “Consider allowing additional units and height under a bonus program or other zoning mechanism with greater and deeper affordability than non-sensitive areas.”

“Is it ‘consider’ or just ‘allowing’ because ‘consider’ means that maybe you can, maybe you cannot,” said Commisioner Taneia Dowell. “‘Allowing sounds like something can happen.”

“I don’t think we know yet whether that it should be considered,” said Commissioner Liz Russell. “That’s I think the point.”

“In my opinion we can change it to allow and then we can figure out the number in that bonus program,” said Commissioner Karim Habbab.

Going forward, NDS Director James Freas will be leading the discussions. If this were a role-playing game, he’s sort of like the dungeon master.

“When we say consider, what we mean is that the planning board and the City Council would be the ones doing the considering at the time when you’re moving forward with the adoption of the zoning,”

Council will have to take a vote and some of the amendments suggested by the Planning Commission need to be fleshed out by the consultants with more information and specifics. Shortly before the vote, NDS Deputy Director Missy Creasy listed four changes that would be made. One of them was the language we just heard.

Here is another:

“Require that zoning changes preserve and enhance historic and cultural resources,” Creasy said.

Another is to further outline what is meant by a “sensitive” area.

“And number four, recommend that sensitive area delineation should continue to be defined and additional means and metrics beyond Census block data need to be considered,” Creasy said.

The next step will be the first reading by City Council, scheduled for November 15.

While Charlottesville does not yet have a specific Climate Adaptation Plan, the draft Comprehensive Plan has several references to the importance of trees to the city’s overall goals. In 2015, a measurement found that the city’s tree canopy was at 45 percent of the land cover. The 2021 draft Comprehensive Plan features more calls for preservation requirements including Goal 6 of the Environment, Climate, and Food Equity chapter which includes many strategies for increasing tree canopy, especially in areas that experience the urban heat island effect due to a lack of shade.

“The Comprehensive Plan when it is finally done is going to have significant statements about supporting trees, adding trees, and the environmental health of the city,” said Planning Commissioner Jody Lahendro at the October 5 meeting of the Tree Commission.

The Tree Commission was created in 2010 to advocate for those types of policies, and to recognize specific trees. At the beginning of their meeting on October 5, Chair Brian Menard noted that a landmark tree in Maplewood Cemetery crashed to the ground the weekend before.

“There is significant damage to the fabric of the cemetery,” Menard said. “There are a lot of stones damaged, some surely beyond repair.”

Menard said the sudden death of the tree has caused an impact and points to the importance of celebrating trees.

“Just watching people through the neighborhood react to this, it reminds me that for the last year or so we have especially stressed the functional benefits of trees, the health benefits, the environmental benefits,” Menard said.

To help with education about those benefits, a group called Charlottesville ReLeaf has formed to lead efforts to help spread the word and to plant trees in strategic areas. Peggy Van Yahres is one of its members. (learn more)

“What we want to do is get kids and families excited about trees and the green industry, so we’re really starting with some educational events,” Van Yahres said.

Van Yahres said the group is working on developing a website. One idea is to develop materials that can demonstrate the heat differences between different playgrounds. The one at Venable Elementary features a bit of shade, whereas most others do not.

Menard said the Tree Commission should be playing a role in making sure that new public projects will include new trees.

“We need to know who and where and when plans are being made to make changes to city property so that we’re in early enough on the conversation,” Menard said. “So whether that is with Public Works or with the school division or whoever.”

The Tree Commission also got an update on municipal tree planting on public property. The current capital improvement program has set aside $75,000 for that purpose. Mike Ronaybe is the city’s arborist and he said staff needs to be in place to do the planting and to make sure planted trees are regularly watered.

“We usually hire 17 seasonals that work at parks in the summertime,” Ronayne said. “I think we are able to fill three of those positions so that’s just seasonal staff. Our full-time staff we’re down about a third from where we need to be for full-time positions.”

In the 2020 State of the Forest report, Ronayne stated there is a city planting goal of 200 trees a year, but that has not been met for four years. The Tree Commission discussed ways to encourage other ways to help meet the goal.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. The leaves have started to fall as autumn set in, and as they do, this is a good time to begin planning for the spring. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Manager resigns, citing personal and professional attacks from Nikuyah Walker

The Charlottesville Economic Development Authority reauthorizes a performance agreement with the Piedmont Housing Alliance for the redevelopment of Friendship Court

Charlottesville moving forward with planning for climate adaptation

The Charlottesville Economic Development Authority has reauthorized a performance agreement with the Piedmont Housing Alliance for a loan for the redevelopment of Friendship Court. Piedmont Housing Alliance would pay the money back through the incremental tax revenue the city would get from a more intense residential development. Here’s Economic Development Director Chris Engel. (staff report)

“Typically, our performance agreements are done to encourage business development, job creation, capital investment that creates office space or an industrial building,” Engel said. “In this case, the public good if you will is the rehabilitation and addition of not public housing, but affordable housing that would be owned and managed on a long term basis by the Piedmont Housing Alliance.”

The city is currently considering using this tool to finance improvements to Stribling Avenue. This is also the same mechanism that was proposed by the owner of the skeleton Landmark hotel.

In this case, the 11.75 acre property is assessed at $8.185 million this year, which yields $77,714 in property taxes for the city. When the first phase of redevelopment is completed, the value is projected to be over $20 million, which Engel said would bring in an additional $190,000. Piedmont Housing Alliance would get that increase through a transfer from the Economic Development authority.

“This is a very complicated, complex deal to get this to all come together,” Engel said.

This is separate from the nearly $16 million in capital funds city taxpayers will contribute to all four phases of redevelopment. Under this agreement, Piedmont Housing Alliance would collect the funding up to $6 million.

“There’s not a profit making opportunity here for anybody but it’s an opportunity to see additional affordable housing added to the city again and an old site that needs rehabilitation,” Engel said.

The EDA approved the reauthorization with little debate. The original agreement was written up by former city attorney John Blair before he became the acting city manager after former city manager Tarron Richardson resigned.

Engel said the Piedmont Housing Alliance is ready to begin construction. Their website has not been updated with information about redevelopment since last October when a December start-date for construction was expected. More information as it comes in.

Charlottesville’s efforts to create a Climate Adaptation Plan move forward this month with a community forum to get input on potential threats from more extreme weather patterns. The October 25 event will be the first steps for the city to complete a Climate Vulnerability Assessment.

“As part of the city’s climate action effort, it has committed to developing a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to prepare and respond to our changing climate,” said Susan Elliott, the city’s climate protection program manager..

Participants are being asked to review a webinar recorded on October 7 where representatives from ICLEI described Charlottesville’s projected climate hazards and gave an overview of the process.

Another pre-forum webinar will be held on October 15. (register) The Community Forum on October 25 will begin at 5:30 p.m. (register)

Charlottesville City Council will have to appoint someone to serve as City Manager as of Monday, November 1. The five-member elected body held an emergency closed session Tuesday afternoon to discuss “Urgent Personnel Matters.”

“I move that we accept the resignation of Chip Boyles, effective October 29, 2021 per the letter that he has sent to Council,” said City Councilor Heather Hill as she read a motion coming back from closed session.

Council voted 5-0 to accept the resignation, but there was no sense of who would take over as city manager. There are two deputy city managers who were hired by Boyles, both of whom have a collective tenure of seven months. Ashley Marshall has been Deputy City Manager for Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion since May and Sam Sanders has been Deputy City Manager for Operations since August.

Before we get back to Boyles, there was also news of another person leaving city government. In an earlier motion, Hill disclosed the departure of the city’s Information Technology department, Sunny Hwang. He’s served in that position since September 2018 according to his LinkedIn profile, which has not yet been updated. There are also vacancies at the tops of the parks department and the public works department.

Back to Boyles. Boyles was hired in January to replace John Blair, who served as interim city manager after Dr. Tarron Richardson resigned in September. In his resignation letter, Boyles said he had been hired to help the organization get back on its feet after a “time of turbulence and organizational instability.”

“This success was disrupted with my decision to to change the leadership of the City Police Department,” Boyles wrote. “I continue to support my decision taken on this matter, but the vitriol associated with this decision of a few vocal community members and the broken relationship with Mayor Walker have severely limited my ability to be productive towards the goals of City Council.”

Boyles said personal and professional attacks from Walker and others were beginning to hurt his mental health. He resigned to protect himself and his family.

To recap, Boyles terminated the contract of Chief RaShall Brackney on September 1, 2021, triggering a ferocious outcry from Walker. She spent much of the September 7 meeting using her privileges as Mayor to force a conversation about the topic. For context, go back and listen to the September 8 edition of this newsletter.

The soundbites for the read of the newsletter today come from the October 4, 2021 meeting of Council, and the last hour or so of the meeting. The agenda listed a formal discussion of the matter at the conclusion of other business. Boyles defended his decision, which was his alone to make under the city’s charter.

Boyles’ explanation

Boyles said Brackney had moved the department toward being a more just and fair system, but said surveys conducted by the Police Benevolent Association indicated low morale.

“It became to me evident that some type of change needed to be made that while we had been making strides in one area, the implementation into the department itself was in jeopardy,” Boyles said.

That soundbite comes from about an 11 minute explanation that Boyles gave. For some more background, I refer you to the August 20 “response from the city” to those PBA surveys. The statement also describes the resignations of two members of the SWAT team and the termination of a third. (read the statement)

What followed were questions from the rest of the Council. Councilor Michael Payne said he was concerned about the timing of the incident.

“It has to be stated that, one, the PBA is an organization that is one that is not friendly to reform,” Payne said. “Those organizations across the country are not friendly to officers being disciplined and held accountable for mistreatment.”

Vice Mayor Sena Magill said she wanted Boyles to write down his vision for the city.

“I have seen the team that you are building in City Hall and I believe that you are focused on a team that wants to bring Charlottesville into 21st century practices on a lot of things including a teamwork environment,” Magill said.

Councilor Heather Hill.

“We’re not condoning any of the behaviors that were rightfully dealt with in the police department and that we are committed to a very way of policing in the city of Charlottesville,” Hill said.

In his comments on October 4, Councilor Lloyd Snook referred to a closed session from mid August after the disciplinary actions described in the statement were made.

“When Chief Brackney explained to use in closed session on August 16 I believe it was what the evidence was of the SWAT team officers conduct, showed us a few snippets of video,” Snook said. “Every Councilor in the room, every senior management person in the room was satisfied with the chief’s decision.”

Snook said the City Manager has the right and power to fire the police chief.

“The only issue for us quite frankly is whether we fire the city manager for firing the police chief,” Snook said.

On October 4, Snook said the answer was no.

But for Mayor Nikuyah Walker, the answer was not no.

Walker’s cross-examination

Walker used her time to ask Boyles a series of pointed questions, including this one about internal surveys.

“How did you arrive from looking at the survey that the Chief was the issue based on those surveys,” Walker asked.

“Most of the survey was built around the command staff and answers were regarding the individual command staff but it was just an overall leadership from both the questions that were included in the survey and then the chance for the officers to comment,” Boyles said.

Let’s skip ahead a little to another section.

“So these issues arose and you didn’t afford her a conversation to talk with her about the issues that you had come to learn and create a plan with her to rectify those issues,” Walker said.

“I did,” Boyles said. “And one of our meetings after a lot of this started becoming evident, I asked her about preparing a plan to try to address some of these items. The response was that a plan wasn’t needed and what did I have in mind to put into a plan.”

Boyles said that was not his area of expertise. Let’s skip ahead. Walker quoted from the September 17 op-ed Boyles wrote for the Daily Progress.

“So, in the immediacy of the decision in the op-ed piece that you wrote that the CPD was ‘gripped in chaos’,” Walker said.

“Yes, it was my understanding that some of the leadership positions were not going to be staying if Chief Brackney were staying,” Boyles said.

This line of questioning continued. Walker said her information said only two of six members of the command staff were set to leave.

“So, you consider two of six people to be chaos?” Walker said.

“No, I think it extends beyond,” Boyles said. “It’s the statements from the survey of people looking for other jobs, wanting to be out of the police department. There is no smoking gun in this.”

Walker went through many of the comments and read through them out loud. She also wanted to pin down Boyles on what conversations he had with regional leaders about policing issues. Boyles said those were conversations were private and in confidence.

“Okay, Chip, so since all of these people are secretive and you think that’s okay, because what you want us to do on whether or not you want to stay here or not based on some random conversations we had without talking to you about?” Walker asked.

”That’s a decision you all will make,” Boyles said. “As I stated earlier, I’m here to fulfil the direction of Council. I took this job knowing. I think I’ve even stated for me there’s a job evaluation every other meeting. I accept that.”

The questioning continued. At one point, there was to have been a press conference after the release of the August 20 statement.

“And then, Chief Brackney arrived at a meeting, right, Chip? And you had changed course by that time that there’s no longer going to be a press conference,” Walker said.

“Yes,” Boyles responded. “We had a disagreement over wanting to show the videos that you all saw in your closed session.”

A little later on in the cross-examination, Councilor Hill brought a specific incident related to how former Police Chief Brackney responded to feedback. Go back to the tape to learn more about that but Walker asked Hill to read the email in question.

“Okay, do you want to pull that email up?” Walker asked

“I’m happy to find it, but I don’t think it’s necessary right now,” Hill said. “I’m just saying you are trying to pick specific examples. I don’t want to go down this path with you.”

“I’m not,” Walker said, her voice rising. “I was open to whatever you all presented. I asked and allowed you all you to talk first because I’m just trying…”

“We were trying to be respectful,” Hill said.

“Excuse me?” Walker asked.

“We were trying to be respectful of the process,” Hill said. “This is not the appropriate forum to get into all of this.”

“You were not trying to be respectful of any process,” Walker said. “I have been on this Council and I know how you operate.”

“I’d like for us to move on,” Hlll said.

The conversation went back to that meeting after the August 20 press release. Boyles explained the dynamic that was leading him to make a decision.

“That meeting was a good indication similar to what Councilor Hill was just talking about when we began to disagree over the videos and other issues, Chief Brackney just left the meeting which again gave me concern of being able to work with that type of interaction, with that type of relationship,” Boyles said.

Boyles acknowledged that Brackney had told him that she had felt targeted by members of the community as well as internally.

“My knowledge of that comes from what she’s told me and I certainly believe it to be true,” Boyles said.

Walker was clear she was not going to let Boyles forget his decision to terminate Brackney.

“I can go on about every city manager that has been here, and you are never going to, I told you this, Chip,” Walker said. “You’re never going to live past this decision.”

Soon after, Walker quoted from the book White Rage to make part of her point and chastised her fellow Councilors for trying to control her.

“Have I made 100 percent of the right decisions?” Walker asked. “No. Have you all made 100 percent of the right decisions? No. You haven’t. But again, your white gaze gets to determine who wins in a situation like this.”

Earlier this year, Walker wrestled with whether to seek a second term before announcing in May she would be a candidate. She withdrew from the race on September 8, citing the racism of her fellow Councilors. Walker raised no campaign funds this year.

The conversation on October 4 continued, and the rest of the discussion is available to watch. Now it’s perhaps a better use of our time to think ahead to Council’s next meeting on October 18, as well as the four regular meetings of the year. Two new Councilors will join in January when Walker and Hill’s terms are up. Who will be the city manager? Who will be mayor? Who will be running the city

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On today’s show:

The Charlottesville City Council and the Planning Commission spend two hours asking questions about the Comprehensive Plan in advance of tonight’s public hearing

Albemarle’s Board of Supervisors gets an update on transportation projects

A new tenant signs on for a new office building in downtown Charlottesville

The summer and September COVID surge in Virginia continues to wane, but community spread continues. The seven-day percent positive rate has dropped to 7.8 percent and the seven-day average is 2,443.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are 205 new cases reported and the percent positive rate is 5.8 percent. There have been eight more fatalities reported since October 4.

The Blue Ridge Health District will have a town hall on October 13 and one of the topics will be vaccination in pregnant people. Register in advance.

Today is the last day to register to vote in the November 2 election, which is three weeks from today. Local registrars will take in-person registrations through 5 p.m. Registrations submitted via mail must be postmarked with today’s date in order to be accepted. You can also register online up until 11:59 p.m. You will need an ID issued by the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles in order to register in that fashion. (Department of Elections online portal)

The last day to request a mail-in ballot is October 22. The last day to vote early in-person is October 30. Charlottesville’s Office of Voter Registration will have additional hours on October 23 and October 30.

There are several makeshift memorials to people who died in crashes on 5th Street Extended in Charlottesville. Yesterday, a city-sanctioned memorial to Quintus Brooks was unveiled with a family ceremony. Brooks died on October 1, 2020 and yesterday would have been his birthday.

“A new application process is being launched for roadside memorials at the site of deaths resulting from automobile, bicycle or pedestrian accidents that occur on public streets within the City of Charlottesville,” said city Communications Director Brian Wheeler in an email announcing the event.

Charlottesville has hired a Nevada firm to provide pest control services in two prominent locations. In September, the city sent out a request for proposals for a firm to provide pest suppression for the 135,000 square feet of the Downtown Mall and the 30,000 square feet of the Corner.

“The Contractor will be responsible to provide a program to control rodents such as, but not limited to, rats, mice, squirrels, snakes, all insects (roaches, flies, bees, ants – including fire ants, cockroaches, moths, crickets, silverfish, all spiders, termites),” reads the proposal.

Pestmaster Services has been awarded the contract. These areas include outdoor dining spaces, including locations where tables are set up near tree wells.

Another tenant has been announced for the new 3-Twenty-3 building in downtown Charlottesville. General Atomics Commonwealth Computer Research will lease just under 50,000 square feet in the building.

“With projects ranging from optimizing the world’s largest container port to predicting future asymmetric warfare events, CCRi has no shortage of experience in diverse client expectations,” reads a description of the company on their website.

The 3-Twenty-3 building is being developed by Insite Properties and marketed by Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer. A press release describes the building as a five-story office building on top of a four-story, 200 space parking garage.

There’s about 27,000 square feet left to be leased in the 120,000 square foot structure, according to leasing agent John Pritzlaff. McGuireWoods and Manchester Capital are already in their spaces, and Williams Mullen is starting building out now.

Tonight, the seven-member Charlottesville Planning Commission and the five-member Charlottesville City Council will hold a public hearing on the Comprehensive Plan, the second task performed by Rhodeside & Harwell as part of the Cville Plans Together initiative. That includes a Future Land Use Map which increases residential density across most of the city.

Yesterday, the elected body and the appointed body spent two hours asking questions about the plan. Councilor Lloyd Snook went first.

“A common criticism which I personally believe to be based on ignorance… is that the Future Land Use Map and the suggestions of higher density have not taken into account either… the effect of the University of Virginia, the effect of the student population, and the distorting effect on the poverty data for the student population,” Snook said.

Jennifer Koch with Rhodeside & Harwell said her team began their work based of a housing needs assessment conducted in 2018 by the Form-Based Code Institute and Partners for Economic Solutions. (download)

“There was a fairly robust discussion in that document about how students may or may not play into various impacts on affordability in the city,” Koch said. “The other way we are looking to include considerations for students in this plan is in looking at potential intensity near UVA, for example Jefferson Park Avenue, Fontaine Avenue area. We’ve included additional intensity in those areas and we’ve included a discussion of potential intensity in those areas as we move through zoning.”

The first step in the Cville Plans Together initiative was adoption of an affordable housing plan. The next step after adoption of the Comprehensive Plan will be a rewrite of the zoning code.

The University of Virginia is working on an initiative to identify space on land it or its real estate foundation owns to build up to 1,500 below-market units. In September, a top official at UVA told the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership that the work is slightly behind schedule. (UVA housing initiative website)

Other topics at the two-hour meeting included assumptions about population growth and the links between increased density and affordability requirements. Watch the whole thing in advance of tonight’s hearing, which begins at 6 p.m. (watch)

And time for another Patreon-fueled shout-out:

At their meeting Wednesday afternoon, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will get an update on the Rio Corridor Study, an effort to reshape the public realm along Rio Road on stretches of the roadway in Albemarle’s Places29-Rio growth area. Opponents of recent rezoning applications in the area cited transportation concerns for why the Board of Supervisors should vote against more intense residential density.

But last week, they got an update on other transportation projects from Kevin McDermott, a planning manager in Albemarle. Though the applications aren’t due until next summer, work is underway for the next round of Smart Scale projects. (Albemarle transportation report)

Right now the top candidates that the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization might submit are:

A roundabout at District Avenue and Hydraulic Road

Avon Street Corridor Bicycle and Pedestrian Improvements between Druid Avenue and Avon Street park and ride

5th Street Extended multimodal improvements between the future (and funded) 5th Street Trail Hub to Harris Road

Rivanna River Bike and Pedestrian bridge from South Pantops Boulevard to the Woolen Mills area

Right now the possible candidates Albemarle County might submit in the 5th Smart Scale round are:

Avon Street Extended multimodal improvements from Mill Creek to Peregory Lane

5th Street Extended bicycle and pedestrian improvements between Albemarle Business Campus and the Southwood community

U.S. 250 corridor improvements between Peter Jefferson Place and Hansen Road

U.S. 250 / Route 22 / Milton Drive intersection improvements

Belvedere Boulevard / Rio Road improvements

Hillsdale Drive extension and realignment from Mall Drive to Rio Road

U.S. 250 West interchange with U.S. 29 / 250 bypass

U.S. 250 West and Crozet Avenue intersection improvements

Albemarle has recently turned in an application for VDOT Revenue-Sharing Funds for Eastern Avenue South, a project that has been in Crozet Master Plan since it was adopted.

“That goes from the Westhall area, across Lickinghole Creek, to Cory Farms, and connects to U.S. 250,” McDermott said.

In most cases, it takes several years for transportation projects to go from project approval to construction. A project to upgrade the intersection of U.S. 250 and Virginia Route 20 at Pantops was funded in 2018.

“They are currently in design for that and we will hopefully be seeing some construction out there in about two years or so,” McDermott said.

Another VDOT revenue-sharing project is to extend Berkmar Drive to Lewis and Clark Drive, which would complete a north-south roadway parallel to U.S. 29 from Fashion Square Mall to the University of Virginia’ North Fork Research Park.

“We’ve got a lot of economic development going on up there, a lot of new development also,” McDermott said. “This would also provide that parallel facility to U.S. 29 so it can take some of that traffic off of 29 and remove it from some of those intersections that are experiencing some delays like Airport Road and U.S. 250.”

McDermott said construction of that project is expected for 2025.

Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District noted the length of the report as well as its detail.

“I really appreciate the way you explain some of these so that it differentiates between a study and a proposal,” Price said. “We get a lot of communications from people in the community that are to the effect of ‘I can’t believe you’re even considering’ [a project],” Price said. “But when you’re looking at transportation, if you don’t look at the various options, then you’re really going in with a narrow-minded approach. We appreciate your wide approach of looking at all of the different possibilities before narrowing down what really appears to be the best course of action.”

Special announcement! Today’s the first day of a new promo with Ting! Are you interested in fast internet? Visit this site and enter your address to see if you can get service through Ting. If you decide to proceed to make the switch, you’ll get:

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Listen now (24 min) | Each and every day is a chance to catch up with local government in and around Charlottesville

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In today's subscriber-fueled public service announcement: Lovers of used books rejoice! The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will resume the tradition of their annual Fall Book Sale this October 2nd through October 10 at a new location! The Friends of the Library sale will take place at Albemarle Square Shopping Center from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. each day. Half-price days on October 9 and October 10. Questions? Visit jmrlfriends.org for more information.

On today’s show:

Locals weigh in on how redistricting would treat Albemarle when new legislative districts are approved

Albemarle County’s Board of Supervisors get an update on the Comprehensive Plan

Investment firm takes majority stake in Apex Clean Energy

Jaunt hires Tulsa’s top transit official

A company called the Ares Management Corporation has acquired a majority stake in the Charlottesville-based Apex Clean Energy, according to a release on Business Wire.

“The transaction will provide Apex with additional equity growth capital as it seeks to transition to a pure-play renewable energy independent power producer (IPP),” reads the release.

Apex has over $9 billion in utility-scale energy projects across the country. Ares has already been an investor on projects such as the construction of the largest single-phase, single-site wind facility in the country.

“Through origination, construction, and operation of utility-scale wind, solar, and storage facilities, distributed energy resources, and green fuel technologies, Apex is expanding the renewable frontier across North America,” reads the description of Apex Clean Energy in the release.

The same management team will remain in place. The company has over 300 employees. Construction continues on their new headquarters in downtown Charlottesville.

Jaunt has hired the head of the Metropolitan Tulsa Transit Authority to be its next chief executive officer. Ted Rieck will start work on December 6 and interim CEO Karen Davis will continue on as chief operating officer. In Tulsa, Rieck oversees a public transit fleet that serves five communities and has a $23 million budget.

According to the agenda for the most recent meeting of the authority’s seven-member board, Rieck has faced many of the same challenges facing transit agencies in our area such as a shortage of people willing to be drivers as well as COVID testing employees. According to the minutes of the August meeting, Rieck had announced his retirement from Tulsa to the board. (September meeting packet)

This is of course Try Transit Month and this morning there was a stakeholder meeting for the Regional Transit Vision plan under way. I’ll have more on that in a future installment of the program. But all of the local transportation providers have banded together to produce a series of videos about how you can discover transit. The first one is called Calling In. Take a look and if you share it, use the hashtag #busorbust on Twitter when you share it with all of your friends. (watch)

Remembering Middleditch

When the Albemarle Supervisors met on Wednesday, Supervisor Ann Mallek noted the passing of Leigh Middleditch, a lawyer with a long history in Charlottesville affairs, at the age of 92.

“People of his and my parents’ generation worked in so many different ways to build community here,” Mallek said. “He was always focused on collaboration and finding solutions with people of all comers, all ages, all neighborhoods, all locations.”

Mallek said that Middleditch organized an effort to improve transportation funding in the area in the mid-2000’s.

“He also founded the Planning and Coordination Council to bring city, county, and UVA together to find solutions to local problems from the water supply plan to roadway to all sorts of things that are local group is dealing with today,” Mallek said.

The Planning and Coordination Council was disbanded in 2019 in favor of a closed-door body known as the Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee. There was an update on their efforts on the Board of Supervisors’ consent agenda. (LUEPC update)

Supervisor Liz Palmer noted Middleditch was actively engaged in efforts to make this year’s redistricting less partisan than in years past under the OneVirginia2021 initiative.

“He also was instrumental in the Virginia 2021 redistricting revisions and getting that going,” Palmer said.

In a bit, we’ll hear more about redistricting. Read more on Middleditch’s legacy in any one of these articles:

In Memoriam: Leigh Middleditch ’57, Sorensen Institute Founder Who Worked To End Gerrymandering in Virginia, UVA Law

From the newsroom: We say goodbye to civic leader and Charlottesville Tomorrow board member Leigh Middleditch, Jr., Charlottesville Tomorrow

Middleditch, activist who fomented change in state and region, died at 92

Comprehensive Plan update

In yesterday’s newsletter, we heard about the beginnings of fire engine service from a fire station on Pantops at station 16. I had hoped to get a quote in from someone at the Board of Supervisors meeting when this was announced, and here it is from Supervisor Chair Ned Gallaway.

“Having a full fire engine along with an ambulance stationed at Pantops, which is our second busiest area in the county not only helps the immediate area of Pantops, but this impacts our entire system,” Gallaway said. “So now that other places that are just as busy as areas don’t have to get pulled out and over to [Pantops], they can serve as the secondary or the backup to Station 16.”

For decades, Albemarle County has planned for growth and investments such as the Pantops public safety station by concentrating residential development into designated areas. That’s codified in the county’s Comprehensive Plan which was last adopted in July 2015. Michaela Accardi is a senior planner with Albemarle County.

“The Comprehensive Plan or the comp plan establishes Albemarle’s long-range vision that guides growth, development, and change for the next 20 years,” Accardi said. “The Comprehensive Plan serves as the basis for land use development regulations and decisions, such as rezoning and special use permits, capital improvements, new county programs and the distribution of county budget dollars to programs and agencies.”

Earlier this year, the Board of Supervisors directed the next plan review to take place at the same time changes are made to the county’s zoning ordinance. Accardi said the Comprehensive Plan needs to be updated to reflect new initiatives and policies adopted by the county, many of which are summarized in a strategic plan adopted by the Board in 2018. (download the presentation)

“The Board’s strategic plan includes climate action planning, economic development, infrastructure planning, revitalizing aging neighborhoods, and expanding broadband,” Accardi said.

Economic development is codified in the Project ENABLE plan. The Climate Action Plan was adopted last October. Housing Albemarle was adopted this past July. Now, the Comprehensive Plan has to be updated to reflect this general direction for the county.

“Finally, to further the county’s commitment to providing the highest level of public service and enhancing the quality of life for all its residents, the county’s Office of Equity and Inclusion was created in 2018,” Accardi said.

Accardi said staff hopes to take from best practices in planning to integrate all of these into a new plan. One cited is Minneapolis 2040.

“Which reviewed the city’s land uses to identify opportunities for a mixture of housing types and levels of affordability,” Accardi said.

Others include Richmond 300: A Guide for Growth and Memphis 3.0. The latter has the tag line “In our third century, Memphis will build up, not out.”

Phased approached to zoning review

Rachel Falkenstein, a planning manager with Albemarle, said the zoning review will take place over many phases with adoption of several steps at a time.

“Phase 1 will be focused on simplification and clarity of a few topics such as use classification and setbacks and work on this phase has already begun,” Falkenstein said. “Phase 2 of the zoning update will be intended to focus on resource preservation topics such as dark skies, tree preservation, and historic preservation.”

Phase 3 would look at street standards in commercial and industrial zoning districts and Phase 4 will update residential and mixed-use zoning districts.

Most of the presentation dealt with the scope of the Comprehensive Plan update. The first phase will take a look at the central cornerstone of the plan for decades.

“Phase 1 is called Growth Management Policy and Plan Framework and the goal of this phase is to review, evaluate, and if needed update the growth management policy through the lens of equity, climate action, and county capacity projections,” Falkenstein said.

Work is underway on this phase. The second phase will look at what other topics should be highlighted in the plan and a review of the existing plan. Phase 3 will see the creation of action steps for implementation.

“In Phase 3 we also intend to detail out each of our topics and determine how the topic goals should be implemented and we’ll identify metrics for each of our topics so that we can track progress moving forward,” Falkenstein said.

Phase 4 will bring the draft document together. Falkenstein said the goal is to have an updated document ready for adoption in the middle of 2024.

More details will return to the Board at their first meeting in November when the Board will have a work session on how community engagement for the plan review will take place.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel supported the approach.

“I do like the targeted look at specifics rather than try to do a broad Comprehensive Plan all at one time,” McKeel said. “I think this is absolutely the way to go.”

Supervisor Liz Palmer sought more specifics for what specific changes needed to be reviewed in the zoning ordinance as part of this process. Falkenstein had this answer.

“Our zoning map does not match our comp plan land use map in a lot of places and that’s an additional step we could take to prioritize,” Falkenstein said.

In another public service announcement, want to take a tour of Secret Charlottesville? On October 15, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will lead a tour based on author Marijean Oldham’s new book Secret Charlottesville: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure. The tour begins at 7 p.m. and is free, though donations are welcome. The book is available at New Dominion Bookshop. Email the ACHS to reserve your spot.

Locals weigh in on redistricting

The Virginia Redistricting Commission next meets tomorrow after a week of public hearings in which participants were asked to weigh in on two different maps for both the 40 seats in the Virginia Senate as well as the 100 seat House of Delegates.

The 16-member commission was able to reach consensus between different versions produced by Democratic and Republican consultants. Yesterday, it was the Charlottesville area’s turn to weigh in on the different maps. Here’s Commissioner Sam Kumar of Alexandria, who chaired yesterday’s public hearing.

“The most recent House of Delegates maps are A7 and B6,” Kumar said. “The most recent Senate maps are A5 and B4.”

You can take a look at the maps here to follow along.

Under the A7 Statewide map for the House of Delega tes drawn by the Republican consultant, Albemarle County is split into three legislative districts. Northern Albemarle would be in the 74th District along with all of Greene and some of Orange County. Charlottesville would be in the 75th District along with much of Ivy in Albemarle County. Southern Albemarle would be in the 76th District along with all of Amherst and Nelson counties. (A7 map comment page)

Under the B6 Statewide Map for the House of Delegates drawn by the Democratic consultant, Albemarle is in two districts. Charlottesville would be in the 80th district with central-eastern Albemarle. All of Albemarle County would be in the 81st District along with a portion of eastern Augusta County. (B6 map comment page)

Former Charlottesville Mayor Kay Slaughter went first during the public comment period to object to how Albemarle County was treated under both plans.

“The Republican plan divides it into three districts,” Slaughter said. “The Democratic plan makes it one district which crosses the Blue Ridge to August County, and while Augusta County and Albemarle County may share these beautiful mountains they are not a community of interest. Neither does Albemarle share interest with the Lynchburg area an hour to the south.”

Slaughter urged the Commission to redraw the maps to include parts of Nelson, Fluvanna, or Greene because they are all are part of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

Currently, Albemarle’s House delegation is split into four legislative districts. Albemarle County resident Michael Rodemeyer asked for a less fractured map.

“My plea to you is pretty simple,” Rodemeyer said. “Keep Albemarle County together. Taken together, Albemarle County and Charlottesville almost make up enough of population for two House of Delegate districts. We only need about another 12,000 to 13,000 people for there to be a complete district.”

Tim Hickey ran as a Democrat in the 59th district in 2019. He urged the Commission to support a major theme in map B6.

“Map B6 keeps Albemarle County as unified as possible by keeping us into two districts,” Hickey said. “Not three, not four, but two, and that needs to be non-negotiable.”

Hickey suggested that Albemarle be included with Nelson rather than Augusta, but that Amherst has nothing to do with either despite the presence of U.S. 29.

“I have spent a lot of time on that stretch of road,” Hickey said. “People in Amherst largely use it to go back and forth to Lynchburg and people in Nelson largely use it to go back and forth to Charlottesville. When I was campaigning, people south of Nelson County, the voters, would routinely ask me if I were in the right place. They would say ‘we’re not in the same district as people in southern Albemarle.”

Edgar Lara of the group Sin Barreras said he could see a Congressional district that included Albemarle and Augusta County. His family has lived in the Waynesboro era for over twenty years and he lives in Albemarle.

“My community is primarily one of immigrants or children of immigrants with us speaking Spanish as our first language and working the same types of jobs, we have a similar culture and experience many of the same challenges in our communities of Virginia,” Lara said.

Pete Costigan of Ruckersville also said that Augusta and Albemarle don’t share enough interests to be in the same district.

“Greene County residents have more common interest with Albemarle County than they do with either Page or Rockingham,” Costigan said. “Specifically, Greene County residents largely drive to Albemarle for shopping or medical care.”

Under the A5 statewide map for the Senate drawn by the Republican consultant, Albemarle and Charlottesville would be within the 31st District along with Nelson, Fluvanna, and Buckingham counties. (A5 Senate map)

The B4 statewide map drawn by the Democratic consultant is similar, but the 31st District would include Greene rather than Nelson. (B4 Senate map)

The Virginia Redistricting Commission meets tomorrow at beginning at 9 a.m. Visit virginiaredistricting.org to learn more. (view maps and plans)

Thanks for reading! If you’d like to support the work, please consider a subscription through Substack, a contribution through Patreon, or send it on to someone else you think might be interested. Everyone gets a personalized thank you, as every new subscriber or patron makes me work that much harder.

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In today’s subscriber-supported Public Service Announcement:The Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards continues to offer classes and events this fall and winter to increase your awareness of our wooden neighbors and to prepare for the future. On October 19, there’s a free class on the Selection, Planting, and Care of Trees from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. (register) In early November, there is a three part class on Winter Invasive Plant Identification and Treatment. Information on all the classes and the group can be found at www.charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

On today’s show:

Updates on regional transportation studies and issues from the Regional Transit Partnership

A 250-unit apartment complex is in the works along Rio Road in Albemarle County

Materials are available for the October 12 Cville Plans Together hearing

Charlottesville has been awarded $153,000 in RGGI money for flood mitigation along Moores Creek

The percent positivity for COVID-19 has further dropped to 8.3 percent, but the number of new cases reported increased by 3,919. Another 50 new deaths were reported over night for a cumulative total of 12,999 since the pandemic began.

There are another 100 cases reported in the Blue Ridge Health District today.

Plans have been submitted in Albemarle County for a 250-unit apartment complex on Rio Road. According to the application for a rezoning prepared by Collins Engineering, the Heritage on Rio would consist of seven buildings and a clubhouse on 8.23 acres of land. The properties are all zoned R-6 and the application is for a rezoning to Planned Residential Development (PRD). There are currently four single family homes that would be removed to make way for the development.

“At just over half a mile from the Route 29/ Rio Road intersection, the proposed community would be within walking distance to many conveniences, including the numerous retail shops and offices in the Berkmar Crossing commercial area, several grocery stores, the Northside Library, and the large number of destinations surrounding the Rio/ 29 Intersection, including CVS Drugstore, Fashion Square Mall, Rio Hill Shopping Center, and Albemarle Square Shopping Center,” reads the application.

The developer is G W Real Estate Partners. The project will also have to go before the county’s Architectural Review Board because Rio Road is an entrance corridor.

Materials are now available for the October 12 public hearing for the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan, one of three tasks the firm Rhodeside & Harwell is conducting for the city as part of the Cville Plans Together initiative. The City Council and Planning Commission will hold a joint hearing on October 12, but now they’ll also hold a two hour discussion on the plan update the day before from noon to 2 p.m.

The draft Comprehensive Plan and the Future Land Use Map are available for review now. The document is 118 pages long and this is the first time the entire draft has been put together with its eleven chapters and several appendices. Take a look at the materials here.

The professionalization of fire and EMS calls in Albemarle County reached a new stage Monday when the Ivy and Pantops stations began 24-hour service and two other milestones were met.

“An ambulance moved to the East Rivanna station to implement cross-staffing, and a daytime fire engine went into service at the Pantops station on Mondays,” wrote Abbey Stumpf, Albemarle’s public safety information officer, in a press release this morning.

The Pantops fire engine will be the first to operate out of a station that was built on land donated to the county earlier this century.

For the past 18 months, Albemarle has been implementing an initiative to hire more personnel funded in part through a $1.9 million grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency as well as investments approved by the Board of Supervisors. In all, Albemarle has hired 22 public safety workers in the past 18 months.

Earlier this year, Virginia joined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a multi-state program that places caps on the amount of carbon emissions for many industries. If companies exceed their limits, they have to purchase credits. Revenues go to state governments for programs such as the Virginia Community Flood Preparedness Fund, which is to receive 45 percent of the RGGI funds. So far, Virginia has received $142 million over three auctions.

Charlottesville will receive $153,500 from the fund to pay for a plan to prepare the Moores Creek Watershed for the floodings. That’s part of $7.8 million in grants announced yesterday by Governor Ralph Northam. The funds are distributed by the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, an agency that is also working on a master plan for coastal resilience in Virginia.

Most of the funding is going to localities either on the coast or much closer. However, Charlottesville is not the westernmost recipient. The city of Winchester will receive $65,040 for a resilience plan and Buchanan County will receive $387,500 for “plans and capacity building” and that’s enough money for them to hire a consultant.

Charlottesville will use the money to create a two-dimensional hydraulic model for the Moores Creek watershed within city limits. Andrea Henry, the city’s water resources protection administrator.

"2D modeling has the ability to identify drainage issues for our inlets, pipes, ditches, and streams across the entire City using the same methodology and analyses for a variety of storm scenarios," said Henry. "We can use the results of this model to predict when our streets, sidewalks, homes, businesses, and critical infrastructure will be susceptible to flooding with the types of storms we see now and may see in the future due to our changing climate."

Speaking of the draft Comprehensive Plan, water resources protection is covered in Goal 3 of Chapter 7, Environment, Climate, and Food Equity.

“Charlottesville will be an environmental leader, with healthy air, water, and ecosystems, as well as ample, high-quality, and accessible open space and natural areas, and a preserved and enhanced tree canopy,” reads the community vision statement for the chapter. “The Rivanna River and other waterbodies will be celebrated and protected, and environmentally-sound community access will be enhanced.”

Read the rest of the recipients here.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement.

We are now six days into Try Transit Month, an effort to encourage people to consider using fixed-route or on-demand service to get around the community. It has now been 13 days since the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership met on September 23 Since October 2017, the advisory body run by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District has served as a clearinghouse for different providers.

Karen Davis is the interim director of Jaunt and she stated one of the biggest challenges facing all bus fleets.

“The driver shortage continues,” Davis said. “Jaunt is going to move to match [University Transit Service] and [Charlottesville Area Transit’s] recruiting and retaining bonus programs to try to entice more people into the door.

Jim Foley, the director of pupil transportation for Albemarle County, could not give an update at the meeting because he was driving a school bus.

Becca White, the director of Parking and Transportation at UVA, said ridership is rebounding following the pandemic.

“We are up to about 8,000 riders a day on our system,” White said. “Three thousand of those are employees and the rest are students.”

That’s down from pre-COVID levels of around 12,000 to 15,000 a day while school was in session.

“During the height of COVID it was 3,000 to 4,000 passengers a day.” White said.

One of the steps UTS has taken to make efficient use of their drivers has been to eliminate bus trips on McCormick Road through the heart of Grounds during the day. White said that might be one reason numbers have not rebounded as high.

“We need to concentrate our transit trips from the end points in given the limited resources that we have,” White said.

The free trolley-style bus operated by Charlottesville Area Transit has returned to McCormick Road. CAT has been fare-free since the beginning of the pandemic. CAT Director Garland Williams said he is hoping to keep it that way by applying for a Transit Ridership Incentive Program grant.

“We applied for the TRIPS grant program with the state to keep CAT zero-fare for an additional three years,” Williams said.

Williams said the planned route changes will not take place until January due to the driver shortage. Under the new alignment, Route 11 will go to the Center at Belvedere and there have been requests to make that change sooner. Williams said that would present problems.

“If we were to make the adjustment to the Center now prior to making all of the adjustments, we would run the risk of individuals who are using the 11 missing their connections because it does take longer to get to the Center and get back,” Williams said.

Williams said the timing will be correct when the changes are made.

On September 1, the Afton Express began operation from Staunton to Charlottesville with a month of fare-free ridership. The service is operated by Brite, the transit service in the Staunton-Augusta-Waynesboro They’re now charging $3 each way. For the first three weeks, the service only carried about a dozen to 18 passengers each day, according to RideShare manager Sara Pennington.

“We’re still looking to creep those numbers up but is still nice and early,” Pennington said.

Pennington also discussed what the regional services are doing for Try Transit month. One thing is the usage of the hash tag ion Twitter #Busorbust.

Albemarle County and the TJPDC are continuing work on a transit expansion study. The latest milestone is publication of a market and service analysis FourSquare ITP and Michael Baker International. (market and service analysis)

“Ripe for service expansion, the US-29 corridor is the second busiest transit corridor in the region,” reads an overview of the study areas. “The Albemarle County Comprehensive Plan, adopted in 2015, outlines goals for increasing the supply of affordable housing for households with incomes between zero percent and 80 percent of area median income, through rezoning and incentives to developers.”

The study also covers Pantops and Monticello.

There will be a stakeholder meeting on October 22 from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. and a public meeting on October 21st from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

“Those will be going over the new alternatives or the draft alternatives that they are working on for each of the study areas,” said Lucinda Shannon, the TJPDC’s transportation manager.

The TJPDC is also conducting a regional transit vision study. There’s a stakeholder meeting for that tomorrow at 9 a.m. The meeting can be watched live on their YouTube page. (watch)

“And that’s going to be asking people to identify community goals around Charlottesville and what the community values and what they want to see,” Shannon said.

You can also offer your views as part of a survey that’s on the project website.

Before we go, let’s look at the draft Comprehensive Plan one more time. Transit is embedded in many chapters of the plan, including the land use chapter. But take a look at Chapter 6 and goals 5 and goals 6. Williams’ attempts to help CAT become fare-free are specifically embedded in Strategy 13.2:

“Ensure that transit is financially accessible to all residents and those who work in the city, including low-income populations, the elderly, and those with disabilities.”

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

On today’s show:

A private vendor will be setting up a community vaccination center at the Big Lots in Seminole Square

VDOT’s hired a new engineer to run the Culpeper District that includes our community

Planning is underway to replace a machine that helps with paper and cardboard recycling in Albemarle and Charlottesville

City Council votes to join a regional tax board and to give $50,000 to a community policing effort

Pandemic update

The Virginia Department of Health reports 1,428 new cases of COVID-19 this morning. Last night, the head of the Blue Ridge Health District had the beginnings of good news to report to City Council.

“We’re beginning to see a slight downturn in our current infection rate,” said Dr. Denise Bonds. “For the first time last week we did not have any triple-digit days with regards to cases. They were all below 100.”

Dr. Bonds said most of the cases are the delta variant and there are currently no signs of any other new strain.

There is currently no universal recommendation that vaccinated individuals get booster shots, but they are available for people who had the Pfizer vaccine and who are older than 65 or people with underlying medical conditions.

“We do ask that you schedule an appointment so we have enough Pfizer on board but they are available everywhere that we are vaccinating,” Bonds said.

Beginning next week, a new site at Big Lots location in Seminole Square in the location where the University of Virginia was providing vaccines.

“This is actually a vendor-run vaccination clinic,” Bonds said. “It’s a contract that our central office at [the Virginia Department of Health] has with an emergency response organization called Ashbritt.”

An official announcement will be forthcoming regarding the new community vaccination center. Later this month on October 14 and October 15, a Food and Drug Administration panel will review data regarding the possibility of boosters for Moderna and Johnson and Johnson vaccines. (meeting announcement)

“This will be emergency use authorization again and it will still even if its approved on that date will have to go to the CDC advisory committee,” Dr Bonds said.

Dr. Bonds said the FDA has tentatively scheduled a meeting for October 26 to consider use of the Pfizer vaccine in children under the age of 12.

New VDOT leader for Charlottesville area

When the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization’s Policy Board next meets, there will be a new person representing the Virginia Department of Transportation. Sean Nelson will become the new district engineer for VDOT’s Culpeper District, which spans nine counties.

“I am honored to return to Culpeper District as the district engineer and look forward to working with our talented teams and valued community partners,” Nelson is quoted in a September 30 press release. “I was born and raised in Louisa and am now raising my family there. I am proud to come home and am committed to making a difference in this region.”

Nelson’s last post was as the maintenance engineer for VDOT’s Richmond District. In the new job, he will be in charge of “construction, maintenance and operations maintenance, project development and business functions of nearly 10,500 lane miles.”

VDOT manages road construction projects in all of those counties, including six projects being designed and built under one contract in Albemarle County. However, Charlottesville manages its own construction projects and has been the recipient of multiple projects under Smart Scale.

Last month, Council signaled it would likely forgo $3.25 million in VDOT funds for the first phase of the West Main Streetscape and $4 million for the second phase. Both required a match of local funding, funding which will now be transferred to a $75 million project to renovate Buford Middle School.

This summer, the Commonwealth Transportation Board approved $10.8 million for the third phase of West Main Street, which requires no match. It is unclear if that phase will move ahead. All of the phases were designed as part of a $2.85 million planning study overseen by Rhodeside & Harwell.

Construction on the Belmont Bridge finally got underway this summer after many years of planning. There are many other open VDOT projects in Charlottesville that have not gone to construction.

Council round-up

Last night, Charlottesville City Council voted 4-1 to join a regional board that would administer cigarette taxes generated in outlying counties. Until this year, only cities have been able to levy such a tax, which generated $641,494 for Charlottesville in fiscal year 2020. The city gets $0.55 a pack.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker voted against the item partially out of a concern it would penalize people who are low-income.

“I know we discuss it from a public health platform but most people are not going to stop smoking because there’s an increased tax on it,” Walker said.

The tax board would be administered by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. David Blount is deputy director.

“And right now we have six counties that have so far agreed to establish this board,” Blount said. “We know of one additional county in our region and even one in our town that is showing some interest in participating.”

Counties can not charge more than 40 cents a pack.

Council also agreed to donate $50,000 to the B.U.C.K. Squad for their community policing efforts on a 3 to 2 vote. Councilor Michael Payne joined Mayor Walker in voting against the measure out of concerns raised by the Public Housing Association of Residents and the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

“The B.U.C.K. Squad program is something really important, that model,” Payne said. “But I would just want to have very clear lockstep assurance that CRHA and PHAR are all on the same page regarding in terms of what they’re doing and not being 100 percent assured of that I’m going to vote no for that reason hoping that partnership can evolve and become successful.”

Council also voted to establish a ground lease for the Botanical Garden of the Piedmont to operate in a section of McIntire Park. The group will be responsible for raising the funds to construct improvements called for in their schematic plan.

“It’s very important for the nonprofit to obtain a lease so that they can complete their fundraising efforts,” said City Manager Chip Boyles. “The city does not have any funds in the [capital improvement program] for this project and therefore this would not be a project that would go under construction under city management.”

The vote was 5-0.

Time for another shout-out from a Patreon supporter!

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At the end of their meeting last night, Charlottesville City Council held another lengthy discussion about the termination of Police Chief RaShall Brackney. I may or may not make it back to that item in a future installment of the newsletter.

In addition to the police chief, Charlottesville continues to have many high-profile vacancies.

The position for Director of Elections is being advertised through October 15, 2021. Other openings include the director of Parks and Recreation as well as the Director of Public Works. The person who most recently held the latter position is David Brown, who only worked for Charlottesville for a year. Brown was honored by the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority at their meeting on September 28. Here’s the chair, Mike Gaffney.

“And what is that old saying? David, we hardly knew ye,” Gaffney said.

RSWA seeks tonnage increase

Let’s stick with the Rivanna Authorities for a moment. The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority has been experiencing higher volumes of tonnage received at the Ivy Materials Utilization Center. Material is sorted before sent out to other landfills. As a result, the RSWA is asking the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to increase the amount it can transfer each day to 450 tons, up from 300 tons.

“We believe that by increasing our facility limit to 450 tons per day will not result in a great deal more traffic, but rather allow us to accept the few, large load, customers that are bringing us material from infrequent large projects (like the field turf replacement project or a UVA building demolition project that we’ve seen in the past couple of years,” reads the executive director’s report for the September meeting.

RSWA Solid Waste Director Phil McKalips said that many times his agency does not know material is coming until it shows up.

“We tend to find out about these projects when they come across the scale, so our ability to impact the planning of a project is usually far down the pipeline by the time we see it,” McKalips said.

McKalips said the RSWA has received a lot of waste material from the Southwood project in recent weeks. Recently an area where household waste had been discarded over the years was cleared and sent to the Ivy Materials Utilization Center. The increase would help on days when they exceed the 300 ton a day limit.

“Whoever cleared the site mixed a lot of debris in with the soil so they had to bring it all out to us for disposal,” McKalips said. “We didn’t know that was coming ahead of time and all of a sudden we have 140 tons in a day to deal with.”

McKalips said this material is not to be confused with areas that may have been contaminated with oil that leaked from storage tanks under trailers. That will be going through a separate process monitored by the DEQ.

RSWA to conduct engineering study on new paper-sort facility

Planning to reduce greenhouse gas emissions takes many forms. Albemarle County’s Climate Action Plan has a whole chapter on “sustainable materials management” which has multiple strategies to divert items from landfills. Strategy 5.1.3 is to “identify if there is a need to local additional paper/cardboard balers in Albemarle County.” That item is under review by the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority and McKalips gave a briefing.

The RSWA operates a facility on Meade Avenue that sorts paper material brought to the Ivy Materials Utilization Center and the McIntire Recycling Center.

“People put their recyclable materials in there and we take those back to the paper sort facility and we by and large bale all of those products,” McKalips said. “That allows us to save a lot of shipping costs in getting them to our vendors.”

However, there are access issues with the site that have to be addressed. The property on which the facility is located on Meade Avenue is leased from Woolen Mills Self Storage but RSWA can only access it on property leased by Gerdau Metals Recycling. An access agreement has a 90-day termination clause and the bailing equipment is over 20 years old.

“The thing has been well used and it’s getting near the end of its service life,” McKalips said.

That’s prompted McKalips to see if there’s another option for the future. For instance, there’s not enough covered storage space to keep the material protected from rain and moisture that would make it unusable for recycling. The RSWA also collects paper material from other private collection sites such as at Kohl’s and Wal-Mart. That creates logistical issues with what to bale and when.

“So this facility gets a lot of cardboard,” McKalips said. “That cardboard isn’t conducive to pushing that back into a trailer and pulling it out later so we leave it out front and then that’s one of the earliest products to get bailed. Having said that though, we have all [these] materials that need to be pulled back out, driven around the cardboard, and baled.”

So with a future need, McKalips presented three options for the future. The first would renovate and expand on site and would have have a $2 million capital cost. The second would be to skip the local baling facility entirely and ship out to other entities. That would include no capital costs, but increase operating costs of $550,000 in the first year and $300,000 each year after. The third would be to build a new paper sort facility with two bailers.

“Obviously this is going to be the most expensive option,” McKalips said. “It was looking to be about $4.3 million in the feasibility study.”

If the third option is pursued, McKalips said the next step is to work with Albemarle and Charlottesville to identify a potential site for the new location. They’ll need about three acres of land.

Lance Stewart, Albemarle’s Director of Facilities and Environmental Services, said that he is hopeful to be able to work with city government to develop an approach to move forward with a new facility.

“I think it’s a complex set of issues that hopefully we can come together on,” Stewart said.

The presentation comes just as Albemarle and Charlottesville are about to start their budget cycle. The RSWA Board reached consensus to direct staff to move forward with the engineering study for a new facility.

Thank you for reading! Please send on to someone else you think might be interested, and please let me know if you have any questions!

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Let’s begin today with two Patreon-fueled shout-outs. One person wants you to know:

"We keep each other safe. Get vaccinated, wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

On today’s show:

A local nonprofit that focuses on water quality releases a report card for the Rivanna River

The legislative redistricting process continues this week with a public hearing scheduled for Thursday

The September surge of COVID-19 cases continues to slow down, but there’s still cause for concern

I try to take transit to a campaign forum!

The summer COVID surge continues to wane in Virginia, with a seven-day average of new cases at 2,748 and the seven-day positive test rate is 8.5 percent, down from 10.9 percent three weeks ago. The number of COVID deaths continues to increase with 819 fatalities reported since three weeks ago.

The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 69 new cases today with a percent positivity rate at 7.2 percent. There have been 17 deaths reported since September 13.

Case counts are trending downward but are still higher than at the beginning of the summer.

“There are a lot of factors that play into that,” said Dr. Kyle Enfield, an assistant professor of internal medicine at the University of Virginia. “One is that as lots of people have been infected, there are fewer people that are susceptible to Delta at this point in time. We have seen locally based on data that was collected through social media that mask usage has gone up and there was an uptick in vaccination that has probably contributed to this.”

However, Dr. Enfield said behavioral changes that come with seasonal transitions could push case counts back up.

“If we look at what happened in October and November and December of last year, we saw increased spread as people moved from the outdoors into the indoors more often so I think there is still some thought and some pause in the epidemiology community that we could see that surge again,” Dr. Enfield said.

A COVID-19 model developed by the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute currently shows a downward trend in cases. Dr. Enfield said epidemiologists remain concerned about the emergence of a new variant, and the best way to reduce the risk of that taking hold is for people to get vaccinated and to continue to wear masks.

If our collective efforts to guard the health of the Rivanna River were graded, we’re doing about average. The Rivanna Conservation Alliance has presented their first Rivanna River Report Card by sifting through five years of data from the 50 monitoring sites they have throughout the watershed to look for the presence of E. coli bacteria.

“A stream’s biological health is measured by catching, identifying, and counting the different small organisms that live in it,” reads the report card.

The RCA has been monitoring water quality since 2003 when part of it was known as StreamWatch. Monitoring sites closer to developed areas tend to register as poor or fair.

The RCA further breaks the watershed down into five subwatersheds. The Lower Rivanna in Fluvanna county scored the highest with a health rating of 63.7 and South Fork Rivanna subwatershed #1 in western Albemarle scored second at 62.4. Anything over 60 meets the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality’s water quality standards.

The South Fork Rivanna subwatershed #2 is at 57.8. The North Fork subwatershed covers portions of Greene and Orange counties as well as northeastern Albemarle and is at 54.9. The Middle Rivanna which includes Charlottesville and southern Albemarle is at 51.9.

To learn more about the RCA’s monitoring efforts, visit their website at rivannariver.org.

If you live in the 804 or 276 area codes, you will soon need to dial ten numbers when making a phone call. That’s because of a need to prepare for the launch next year of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. Beginning on July 16, 2022, people in crisis will be able to call 988 to connect with mental house counselors. Both the 804 area code for Richmond and the 276 area area code for southwest Virginia have exchanges that start with 988, hence the need to switch to ten-digit dialing. For now if you or anyone else need to access the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, you can do so at 1-800-273-8255. Learn more about the transition at the Federal Communication Commission’s website.

Public hearings are underway today for maps for new legislative boundaries in Virginia with virtual events for northern Virginia and southwest Virginia. Over the weekend, the 16-member redistricting committee worked to finalize maps for the 100-member House of Delegates as well as the 40-member Virginia Senate. They did not reach consensus, and four sets of maps are still under consideration.

On Saturday, they discussed two approaches to how the Charlottesville area would be redrawn. We are in the Central Region and the public hearing for the area is Wednesday at 4 p.m. Register here.

Under the A7 Statewide map for the House of Delegates drawn by the Republican consultant, Albemarle County is split into three legislative districts. Northern Albemarle would be in the 74th District along with all of Greene and some of Orange County. Charlottesville would be in the 75th District along with much of Ivy in Albemarle County. Southern Albemarle would be in the 76th District along with all of Amherst and Nelson counties. (A7 map comment page)

Under the A5 statewide map for the Senate drawn by Republican consultant, Albemarle and Charlottesville would be within the 31st District along with Nelson, Fluvanna, and Buckingham counties. (A5 Senate map)

The B4 statewide map drawn by Democratic consultant is similar, but the 31st District would include Greene rather than Nelson. (B4 Senate map)

The Redistricting Commission did not reach consensus on how to proceed with the House of Delegates before the public hearings began. The Commission next meets on October 8. Watch Saturday’s six hour meeting here.

In another sign that the pandemic is loosening its grip on the delivery of some government services, walk-in service will begin tomorrow at Virginia Department of Motor Vehicle customer service centers across the Commonwealth.

“At the direction of the General Assembly, DMV is integrating walk-in service back into its operations in addition to appointments,” reads a press release sent out this morning. “Based on research, surveys, experience, and the ongoing pandemic, DMV developed a hybrid service model to offer options and flexibility.”

Walk-in service will be available Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Appointments are required for Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The release states that masks are required and long wait times should be expected. Appointment service began in May 2020 after a two-month closure due to help stop the spread of COVID-19 in the early days of the pandemic.

October is Try Transit month, and anyone who follows me on Twitter knows I have a real passion for getting around the world without driving alone. Maybe it was those old Greyhound ads, but I’d rather leave the vehicle maneuvering to someone else.

So, over the next month I’m going to take a little time in some of these newsletters to document my attempts to get to various places without getting in a car. Some context. I own a car, but it’s at a point where I need to make a repair before I can use it again. I do plan to do that in the near future, but for now I’ve been using the new Charlottesville Area Transit app. Again, anyone who’s followed me on Twitter the past few years knows I like to document my regular journeys.

The new app presents an opportunity for me to describe a little bit about how I personally use it to try to get around. I am not an advocate and none of this is intended to persuade any policy decisions. I’m simply going with what I have. (download the app)

So, in a future installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, you will hear clips from a Charlottesville City Council campaign forum that my company Town Crier Productions held with the Free Enterprise Forum. This in-person event was to be held at the Hillsdale Conference Center on Hillsdale Drive just over the border into Albemarle County. For some context, a friend of mine asked if she could store a car in my driveway, and I had permission to use it. But, as our audio story begins, with no further narration outside the moment, I was determined not to use it.

Yesterday’s newsletter, however, was delayed by a total crash of the work I’d put into the podcast close to the end of production. I had to take an hour to recreate things.

I’ve been using the new SPOT app which makes it easier to see where the buses are in relation to each other. The app I had before just told me the estimated times before a bus would show up at a stop. That was not enough information to be able to rely on to get to where I am going.

This app, though? After you get used to it, it’s easier to see where the buses are in relation to each other. In the past few weeks, I’ve been using it to time my trips to the grocery store. I’ve gained a new appreciation for the Willoughby Shopping Center, which is currently a de facto hub for the southern end of Charlottesville. I’ve seen a lot, and don’t yet know how to report it all.

So, this is the first of a series of trips I hope to record and document. It’s October, but in the late afternoon of September 30, 2021, I was still trying to complete a newsletter. My intention had been to be done early, but… fate intervened. I still wanted to try to use the bus to get to the campaign forum, and this is an attempt to document that journey.

Newsletter readers: You’ll have to listen to the rest to find out how I got to the event. I did get there, and you can watch the forum on YouTube.

But if you want to skip to the end, watch the video conclusion of my journey, also on YouTube.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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On today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:Fall is here but some days of summer heat may be in the days to come. Either way, tour local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep comfortable all year round! LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents, so, if you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

On today’s program:

The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership updates its members on grants for eviction prevention and affordable unit construction

Planning continues for a train station in Christiansburg at the future terminus of Amtrak’s Northeast Regional service

The city’s newest indoor pool will remain closed for the rest of the year

September ends with a downward trend away from the COVID surge that’s overtaken Virginia and much of the country. Today the seven-day percent positivity is down to 8.9 today, down from 10.3 on September 1. The seven-day average for new cases has decreased to 2,828. There have been 889 fatalities reported in Virginia since September 1.

The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 89 cases today and the seven-day percent positivity has dropped to 6.8 percent.

Charlottesville’s Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center will remain closed through the end of the year. Since opening in 2010, the facility has been plagued with ventilation problems and work is finishing up on a renovation project with a $2.2 million cost.

“Our goal is to provide a safe, healthy, and inviting aquatic environment for the community and a safe work environment for our staff,” said Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders in a press release that went out on September 27.

Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center had been expected to close for repairs in the spring of 2020, but the pandemic shut down all Parks and Recreation facilities. When they began to gradually reopen this year, staffing shortages kept Onesty Pool in Meade Park closed for the entire summer. Smith is now expected to open on January 3.

Work continues to build a train station in the New River Valley to be ready when the Amtrak Northeast Regional Service is expanded to that location in 2025. On Monday, the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors got a briefing on Monday about progress to form an authority to finance and construct the station. The New River Valley Regional Commission is hoping to create that body by the end of the year.

In May, Governor Ralph Northam signed legislation allowing the formation of the authority. The group will work off efforts to bring passenger rail back to Christiansburg, including a ridership study from 2015 that projects a ridership of 40,000 a year. (read the study)

According to a presentation to the seven-member Montgomery BOS, the MPO Policy Board for that area has selected a site near the Christiansburg Aquatic Center. Now the authority will work to convince localities in the region to chip in to the debt services to cover the cost of the station, estimated to cost $4.25 million.

An Italian company that specializes in cured meats will set up its first operation in the United States in Rockingham County, according to an economic development announcement from Governor Ralph Northam. Veronesi Holding S.p.A. expects to provide about 150 jobs over the next four years in the county’s Innovation Village research and technology park.

“The company plans to explore the possibility of working with smaller Virginia farms for its American production needs,” reads a press release about a $3.8 million grant from the Commonwealth’s Opportunity Fund.

Veronesi Holding had over €3.1 billion in sales in 2020 and 9,000 employees. The company can get benefits through the Port of Virginia Economic and Infrastructure Development Zone grant program, and tax credits through the Majority Business Facility Job program.

In today’s second Substack-supported public service announcement: The Charlottesville Jazz Society at cvillejazz.org is dedicated to the promotion, preservation, and perpetuation of all that jazz, and there’s no time like now to find a time to get out and watch people love to play. The Charlottesville Jazz Society keeps a running list of what’s coming up at cvillejazz.org.

As the newly confirmed executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, one of Christine Jacob’s first jobs will be to secure the financial footing of a regional advisory body created a few years ago to encourage production of more residential units in the region.

“Composed of an overarching consortium of housing interests, the Partnership enhances regional coordination and effectiveness to address the housing needs of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District’s region, with a focus on housing production, diversity, accessibility, cost, location, design, and increasing stability for the region’s residents,” reads the website for the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership.

One of their products so far is a regional housing plan called Planning for Affordability which includes strategies for each of the six localities. Charlottesville’s chapter echoes the Affordable Housing Plan adopted by Council in March of this year.(download the regional plan).

At the partnership’s meeting on September 22, Jacobs told the partnership’s board members that a sustainable budget is required going forward. The FY22 budget has been reduced from $95,000 to $65,000. (watch the meeting on YouTube)

“Originally what we had was that the TJPDC would contribute from its per capital regional fund $25,000 and we would be asking an immediate one-time ask from our local governments but pro-rated per capita,” Jacobs said. “We would be asking of you all partners within the CVRHP to contribute and then also seeking grants and scholarships.”

Jacobs said asking local governments for funding out of the budget cycle is unusual so the idea of asking for funding was dropped.

“It is assuming that we will run a very lean FY22 year focusing the majority of our energy and staff time on strategic planning,” Jacobs said.

However, this is the beginning of the FY23 budget cycle for most localities, so this is a good time to make a request for ongoing funding. Jacobs is aiming for a $72,000 budget for the year that runs July 1, 2022 though June 30, 2023.

Staff with the partnership are finalizing their work on implementing a $20,000 planning grant to help prevent or reduce evictions. Ian Baxter is the staff member for the regional housing partnership.

“That’s the Virginia Eviction Reduction Pilot planning grant, it’s kind of a mouthful,” Baxter said. “What we’re doing with now is we’ve contracted services from the UVA Equity Center to create a comprehensive eviction database to sort of determine where evictions are happening and which property companies are evicting the most people or bringing the most judgements or cases.”

Baxter said the TJPDC will apply for a follow-up grant to implement some of the recommendations. In the meantime, some of the work involves the city of Charlottesville.

“We’re working with the city of Charlottesville who are donating some staff time to do some focus groups with tenants, landlords, and judges here in the region and really thinking about what some of the best practices are in terms of reducing eviction in our region,” Baxter said.

Implementation could include stabilization services, rental assistance, financial counseling, or other ways to keep people in the homes they are renting.

Another grant the regional housing partnership will administer is direct funding from Virginia Housing for actual construction of units.

“We ended up receiving $2 million to develop at least 20 units of affordable housing by June 2023,” Baxter said.

Baxter said the process for how the choices will be made is still being developed and a draft will be circulated by the end of October.

There were other updates at the partnership including one from Thomas Haro, the executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless. He said that while there are at least some more permanent shelters due to his agency’s use of the Red Carpet Inn in Premier Circle, there are not enough as winter approaches.

“We’re trying to figure out how to get additional shelter capacity this winter,” Haro said. “So focusing on that with some community partners and trying to figure out the best way to bring that through.”

As the partnership prepares a strategic plan, Haro said he would like to see language to ask developers to consider building units in new developments for homeless individuals.

“There are ways to incorporate units specifically designated for people experiencing homelessness, particularly chronic homelessness,” Haro said. “There are ways to make it really sustainable. It works. The data is really supportive if you have supportive services in the picture. But without really specially holding aside those units for people experiencing homeless, it is difficult for people to get into units.”

Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel said she sees an opportunity in the strategic plan.

“If we could think about how we might better communicate and educate the public about affordable housing and what it really means or what it is,” McKeel said.

Jessie Ferguson of the Nelson County Board of Supervisors agreed with McKeel and said it is time to stop demonizing those on government or philanthropic support.

“It’s your neighbor, it’s the guy at the grocery store, it’s your police officer, actually,” Ferguson said. ”People don’t realize how personal this is.”

Ferguson he hopes Nelson County will allow more residential units to be built by-right.

An update on UVA’s housing initiative

The University of Virginia continues to work toward its goal of working with a private developer to build up to 1,500 affordable units on land that either UVA or the UVA Foundations. The company Northern Urban Real Estate Ventures has been hired to come up with a plan through their community engagement efforts.

Colette Sheehy is UVA’s Senior Vice President for Operations and State Government Relations.

“We continue to work with our consultant and try to offer some educational videos for the public,” Sheehy said. “There are two of them up on our website currently.”

The titles of these videos are Zoning and Matter of Right Development and The Development Process and Financing Overview. There will be more videos in the series and can be seen here.

Sheehy shared one piece of feedback the consultant has received so far from members of the community.

“It’s important to them that we consider the economic opportunity that a project like this would offer to the community and therefore try to use local businesses and local contractors to the degree that that’s possible,” Sheehy said.

Sheehy said the idea had been to circulate a list of potential sites by the end of September, but they are not quite ready to do so. More on that in future installments of the show.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. It’s not too early to think about next spring! Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s program:

A rezoning in Fry’s Spring for 170 units hinges on how to pay for a sidewalk on a road that would be more traveled

The Weldon Cooper Center compares its population estimates to the Census count

A quick lesson redistricting in Virginia

The Foxfield Fall Races will benefit Habitat for Humanity this year and for the next four

On this upcoming Sunday, Foxfield Races will hold their annual fall Family Day events at the tracks on Barracks Road west of Charlottesville. This year, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville will be the nonprofit group that will receive a portion of the proceeds as part of a five-year partnership. The races are held on land under conservation easement.

“We are focused on preserving open space to enable the broad diverse Charlottesville community to use Foxfield,” said Foxfield Executive Director Kelsey Cox in a Habitat press release. “We are overjoyed to create a long-term partnership with Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville and look forward to welcoming new and returning attendees on race day to further support this partnership with Habitat.”

Mark Lorenzoni of the Ragged Mountain Running and Walking Shop penned an article in the September 25 Daily Progress that provides a lot of background and perspective as we wait for the 43rd annual fall races at Foxfield. Visit the Foxfield website at foxfieldraces.com for details and to purchase tickets

The Virginia Redistricting Commission met again this morning. They’ve been meeting this month to finalize a map for the 100-seat House of Delegates and the 40-seat Virginia Senate. The sixteen members consisting of eight legislators and eight citizens must finalize their maps this Saturday in time to meet one of several deadlines in the Virginia code.

The Commission’s work began as soon as the U.S. Census Bureau released population counts from 2020. Further meetings are scheduled for this Friday and Saturday, with the public hearings beginning on Monday. Coverage of what will be in those maps will come up in a future edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

The Commission must submit maps to the General Assembly by October 10. Virginia Code also specifies nine criteria for Congressional and legislative districts. You can register to speak at the public hearings at the redistricting website.

It’s now been almost two months since the U.S. Census Bureau released the official population count for the country. That’s given the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia the time to make some observations about how the results compare to the annual estimates and regular projections their demographers make.

“Our projections were higher than the actual counts in 66 localities, and lower for 67 cities and counties, indicating well-balanced results,” writes Shonel Sen in the latest edition of the Stat Chat blog that Weldon Cooper produces.

The article explains the methodology used to calculate estimates and projections. Thirteen localities were in excess of a margin of error of five percent, including Charlottesville at 8.9 percent. Weldon Cooper’s 2020 estimate for Charlottesville was 49,447, but the Census count was 46,553. (2020 Weldon Cooper estimates) (Charlottesville Census quickfacts)

An explanation in the footnotes of the blog post states that many college towns are perhaps undercounted due to students leaving the area at the start of the pandemic. Weldon Cooper’s 2020 estimate for Harrisonburg was 54,049, whereas the Census was 51,813. The Census Bureau’s 2019 estimate for Harrisonburg had been higher at 53,016, and 47,266 for Charlottesville.

For more information, go back to the August 21, 2021 edition of this newsletter for an interview with Hamilton Lombard of the Weldon Cooper Center. (link)

A quick Patreon-shout out before we continue.

A concerned Charlottesville parent wants to make sure the community participates in the Middle School Reconfiguration process that is currently underway. After years of discussion, concrete plans are being put forward. You can learn more and contribute at the City of Charlottesville Schools/VMDOs information page" at charlottesvilleschools.org/facilities.

(For my latest story on the topic, go back to the September 16, 2021 edition of this newsletter.)

If the population projections put out by the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia are to be believed, the area will continue to grow for many decades.

The act of planning as well as the art of land development both take place in response to anticipated needs for places to live, seats in classrooms, and ways for people to get around. In many cases, it takes a legislative decision by elected officials to approve larger residential complexes.

“I personally live in an area where many apartment units have gone up and they fill quickly,” said Ned Gallaway, the chair of the Board of Supervisors. “The question is whether the infrastructure is there to support the density.”

On September 15, 2021, the Board of Supervisors voted 5-1 to approve a rezoning off of U.S. 29 for 332 units on property where the county’s Comprehensive Plan has long anticipated growth and along a stretch of U.S. 29 where a $61.3 million road project was completed in October 2017. The firm RST Development agreed to restrict 75 percent of the units to households below a certain income percentage.

“We talk a lot about how we are an inclusive and welcoming place to live and this is an opportunity to create a place for people to live that have not been able to live in our community,” said Supervisor Diantha McKeel.

“It is part of our primary development area, and when you’re looking at the development area, it is the area where there should be a larger concentration of lower-cost and more affordable housing,” said Supervisor Donna Price.

A similar conversation took place in Charlottesville the night before on September 14, 2021. That’s when the Charlottesville Planning Commission held a joint public hearing with City Council on a rezoning at 240 Stribling Avenue in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood.

Southern Development seeks a rezoning to Planned Unit Development to build up to 170 units on about 12 acres of wooded land. That came after a directive at an earlier work session for the firm to increase the units in the development.

“The Planning Commission told us very clearly that you wanted to see something less dense and more suburban,” said Charlie Armstrong, vice president at Southern Development.

Last year, the Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association voted on a resolution to support the rezoning if sidewalks and other infrastructure on Stribling could be built to handle the additional traffic. The current Comprehensive Plan designates the land as low density residential, which is one reason a sidewalk there has not been prioritized in the city’s limited Capital Improvement Program budget.

Southern Development’s proposal would set aside 15 percent of those units for either rental or homeownership to households making below 60 percent of the area median income. They also worked with the city’s economic development team to come up with a financing structure to pay for the roadway improvements on Stribling. However, this novel approach points to a potential disconnect in the process.

Armstrong negotiated an agreement with the city’s Office of Economic Development to where Southern Development would make a $2 million loan for the city to build those improvements. The city would then pay Southern Development back over a period of years out of the increased property taxes that it will receive.

“I do want to be clear that this agreement is not part of the rezoning request but it does impact the area nearby and certainly of interest to many in the neighborhood,” said Economic Development director Chris Engel. "In its simplest form this agreement that the developer provides up to $2 million in funds to construct the needed improvements in a timeframe that is likely contemporaneous with the PUD development.”

The cost estimate provided by Southern Development for the upgrades is around $1.6 million. City Engineer Jack Dawson only saw the agreement or the two days before the hearing and said that amount would not be enough because it did not contemplate the full extent of work required.

“My concern is that probably that estime is a little light, to probably very light,” said Jack Dawson. “It isn’t just a sidewalk. It’s essentially a streetscape because when you touch a road you need to bring it up to code.”

Code requires a 20 foot right of way which Dawson said would likely require the taking of private property for curb and gutter drainage, which would add to the cost. Dawson cited an internal estimate created within City Hall of $2.9 million.

However, Armstrong bristled at the cost estimate provided by Dawson.

“That’s not a number that I’ve ever seen published or have ever heard and we’ve been talking with the city and been in this review process with the city for months and years so I would have hoped that might have come up,” Armstrong said.

Under the terms of the agreement, the city would have to pay anything in excess of $2 million but finding those funds will be difficult.

Earlier this month, Council opted to transfer funding allocated for the West Main Streetscape to the $75 million reconfiguration of Buford Middle School. Budget staff said when added to the existing capital improvement program, reconfiguration will require a 15 cent tax increase next year, or less depending on how the 2022 property assessments come in.

“Right now, every penny we are going to have in capital funds until we figure out something else every penny is going to get allocated for school reconfiguration,” said City Councilor Lloyd Snook.

The co-president of the FSNA appreciated the work that went into the agreement but said it was not yet enough to satisfy his concerns.

“There is a potential to find a solution here but there is a big but,” said Jason Halbert. “It’s about safety on that street and the JPA intersection.”

Halbert said the agreement had not been fully reviewed by the appropriate staff. He asked for the project to be delayed while the details of the agreement are worked out.

Commissioner Hosea Mitchell said he liked the project over all but agreed it might not be ready.

“I think it could use a little more baking,” Mitchell said. “There would be value in sitting with the engineers and the economic development people and working out the details and logistics so that we know exactly what it would like before we’re going to move on it.”

Another commissioner suggested the city has to do a better job of communicating better internally about coming up with innovative ways to support density.

“It’s endlessly frustrating to me the degree of dysfunction within the city where the economic development is negotiating this agreement and isn’t even telling [the city engineer] about it literally two days ago,” said Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg.

The issue comes at a time when new city management is just finding its feet. Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders has been on the job less than two months, and new planning director James Freas has been in his job for less than two weeks. At the same time, the city is debating a new Comprehensive Plan. The current draft encourages more density across the city.

“There’s no way to support this project without having a firm grasp of how we’re going to provide these infrastructure improvements to the neighborhood,” said Councilor Heather Hill.

But which comes first? The rezoning or the infrastructure? And whose cost estimate is to be believed? Southern Development’s $1.6 million, or $2.9 million from the city engineer?

City attorney Lisa Robertson had this advice.

“Leadership needs to put their heads together and talk about what’s realistic in terms of whether or not from inside City Hall a number can be developed that builds upon the work that Mr. Armstrong’s team has done, or clarifies it,” Robertson said. “Another function that really needs to be updated is the process by which we develop the city’s capital improvement program.”

Robertson said the CIP cannot be a wish list of aspirational projects. More developed projects with more concrete estimates would provide more certainty.

At the hearing, the question was whether an updated performance agreement could be completed to further scope out the project. Armstrong asked for an indefinite deferral while the agreement is worked out.

What’s happened in the past two weeks?

“The City is continuing to discuss the project with the developer while looking to confirm the cost estimate for the sidewalk project,” wrote Brian Wheeler, Charlottesville’s Communications Director.

Before you go, a plug for a campaign forum I’m co-hosting with the Free Enterprise Forum. Here’s the media advisory:

On Thursday September 30 the, three candidates for Charlottesville City Council will appear in person to answer questions posed by Town Crier Productions President Sean Tubbs and Free Enterprise Forum President Neil Williamson in a candidate forum sponsored by The Hillsdale Conference Center.

The event will also be live streamed via Zoom webinar. Register here!

WHO:

Candidates: Brian Pinkston, Juandiego Wade, Yas Washington

Moderators: Sean Tubbs, President, Town Crier Productions

Neil Williamson, President, Free Enterprise Forum

WHAT:

Candidates will explore their vision for the city including their views on the Future Land Use Map (FLUM), proposed tax increases, affordable housing, equity issues, organizational issues, and Economic Development.

WHEN:

Thursday, September 30 th 7:00 pm

WHERE:

Hillsdale Conference Center Ballroom, 550 Hillsdale Drive, Charlottesville, VA 22901.

MASKS REQUIRED – SOCIAL DISTANCING ENFORCED.

WHY:

Election Day 2021 is now. Early voting has already begun. Learn where the candidates stand before casting your ballot.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

WTJU 91.1 FM is a different sort of radio station. It's dedicated to sharing the transcendent experience of music while raising funds from listeners across the world. From October 4th through 10th, WTJU airs its annual Jazz Marathon. Tune in for a deep dive into everything from bebop to blues. WTJU's Volunteer DJs will play the spectrum jazz – from Billie Holiday to Cannonball Adderly to Pharaoh Sanders. Plus live, local jazz performances throughout the week. Visit the Jazz Marathon schedule now to plot your listening schedule!

On today’s show:

Catching up with Charlottesville City Council with info on the police chief search, a lease for a garden in McIntire Park, and more

A major convenience store franchise is pursuing a fourth store in Charlottesville’s urban area

An update on the pandemic from Governor Ralph Northam

Since the last newsletter on September 23, 2021, COVID’s late summer surge in Virginia is showing signs of slowing down. The seven day average of new cases has decreased down to 3,003 and the seven-day percent positivity is down to 9.1 percent. That figure was 9.7 five days ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there have been 392 cases reported today since the last newsletter and and another four fatalities. The seven-day percent positivity is 7.2.

Governor Ralph Northam held his first pandemic press briefing in some time yesterday and said this trend is encouraging.

“In the past few days, case numbers have started to move down and hospitalization numbers are leveling off and that is a hopeful sign,” Northam said. “But the numbers are still way too high.”

Northam reminded Virginians that at one point at the beginning of the summer, there was a day with less than a hundred new cases.

As of today, 60.1 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated and 71.5 percent of the adult population is now fully vaccinated.

“The data show that nearly everyone who is getting COVID is unvaccinated,” Northam said. “I want to repeat that. Nearly everyone who is getting COVID is unvaccinated.”

You can check the data here.

The Delta variant began widespread transmission in early June and Northam said the current surge could have been avoided if people had gotten their shot or shots. He said the cost of hospital care for this summer’s surge is $5 billion and rising. Northam said at this point, there is little he can do to urge people who refuse to get the vaccine, but he brought up his personal experience contracting COVID.

“Believe me, you don’t want to get it,” Northam said. “My case was back in September, and a year later I still can’t smell anything or taste anything and now the COVID variant that’s going around is a lot worse than the one in September.”

You can watch all of Northam’s briefing on YouTube. He has updated on booster shots and more. (watch)

Albemarle County will soon begin a search to find a new county attorney. Greg Kamptner has been in the position for nearly six and a half years and will retire next year, according to materials for Wednesday’s closed door meeting of the Board of Supervisors.

Kamptner began working for the county in 1995 and became deputy county attorney in 2007. If you’re interested in land use law in Albemarle and Virginia, Kamptner literally wrote the handbook. (Land Use Law Handbook)

A site plan has filed for a Wawa gas station within the city of Charlottesville on 5th Street Extended. If approved and constructed it would be either the third or fourth franchise within the urban area around Charlottesville. Plans have also been filed for a Wawa at the corner of Route 29 and Greenbrier , just over the line in Albemarle.

The property in Charlottesville is currently a Hardee’s restaurant. A virtual site plan conference is scheduled for October 20. Materials for that meeting sent to neighborhood associations do not identify the 5,300 square foot gas station as a Wawa, but the agenda for the September 14, 2021 Planning Commission identifies Wawa as the subject of a future consideration by the Entrance Corridor Review Board. That will be the only legislative approval required for the project as the property is zoned for Highway Mixed Use Corridor.

In today's subscriber-fueled public service announcement:

Lovers of used books rejoice! The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will resume the tradition of their annual Fall Book Sale this October 2nd through October 10 at a new location! The Friends of the Library sale will take place at Albemarle Square Shopping Center from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. each day. Half-price days on October 9 and October 10. Questions? Visit jmrlfriends.org for more information.

To celebrate my high school reunion this weekend, I took a few days off last week. That means there will be a lot of segments this week about a lot of different meetings I missed. There’s a lot to get through so we’re all caught up.

Let’s go back first to the City Council meeting from September 20, 2021. City Manager Chip Boyles brought up an op-ed column he wrote for the Daily Progressregarding his decision at the beginning of this month to fire former Police Chief RaShall Brackney.

“While standing firm on the decision I did make, the fact is I could have handled the decision quite differently,” Boyles said. “I could have and should have engaged Council and my leadership team in more deliberating and on my intended actions so that I not only had their input but also had a broader perspective of the community’s response.”

Boyles said he could not talk about all of the reasons for the firing at this time due to confidentiality but did say he did meet with representatives of the Police Benevolent Association about their survey. He said the August 20 press release that went out unsigned was approved by him, and that the briefly retired Major Jim Mooney will serve as assistant chief only until an interim police chief is hired.

“Procedures are in place to create a committee for both the interim police chief search and to fill the permanent police chief position,” Boyles said.

That will consist of one City Councilor, representatives from the city manager’s office, the Police Civilian Review Board, the Human Rights Commission, and three other members of the public.

Later, Council voted 4-1 on a resolution to approve the report for how the city spent its Community Development Block Grant and HOME funding for fiscal year 2020 which ran from July 1, 2020 to June 30 of this year. Mayor Nikuyah Walker voted against what’s known as the Consolidated Annual Performance and Evaluation Report (CAPER). (staff report)

“The CDBG and the entitlement portion of what’s in here, I think there are some things we could do differently,” Walker said. “And I have questions that I have expressed the entire time I’ve been here about the HOME funds are used and whether the citizens are receiving the best services possible.”

After that, Council held the first reading of entering into a ground lease with the Botanical Garden of the Piedmont, a nonprofit that has been working with the city to use a portion of land in the northeast corner of McIntire Park.

“Documentation previously approved at the Council level goes back to September of 2012 with a master plan of McIntire Park,” said City Manager Boyles. “There have been conceptual designs, resolutions for agreement, a [memorandum of understanding] with the McIntire Botanical Garden, and then most recently in 2017 a final site plan approval for McIntire Park.”

Under the terms of the MOU, the Botanical Garden of the Piedmont would cover the costs of any buildings or structures in the site. Under the terms of the lease, they would have to begin construction within five years of it being signed.

“This would be a landlord/tenant lease and not a partnership with the botanical garden,” Boyles said. “The city is not asked to contribute any financial resources to this other than once complete, Parks and Recreation would be asked to maintain the parking lots and the sidewalks of the parking area.”

The project will include a stream restoration and a pedestrian trail through the area. The proposed ground lease will be updated to provide more clarity on this item before the second reading and public hearing on Council’s October 4 meeting. There will be no cost to visit the park but there will be a fee to reserve function space. (9/20 edition of the ground lease)

Next, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority (CRHA) briefed Council on the way several public housing construction projects are being financed.

But, we’re going to hold off on that one for today until a future installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. This week I’m hoping to get one out each day so I can get caught up with what I’ve missed. I hope my writing continues to be of benefit to you.

Please send it on to someone else you think might be interested!

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

Fall is just around the corner, but the summer heat is sticking around a bit longer. Your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep comfortable all year round! LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents, so, if you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

On today’s show:

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors gets an update on Habitat’s redevelopment of Southwood

The Blue Ridge Health District holds a town hall on the continuing pandemic

Several new historic markers are on the docket today at the Virginia Department of HIstoric Resources

All of Virginia’s 132 school divisions are now open in person, according to a press release from Governor Ralph Northam. First Lady Pamela Northam just concluded a statewide tour of schools and the release includes a link to COVID-19 safety resources for parents and students. Most schools systems continue to list the number of COVID cases, including Amherst County, which was closed for part of September due to a high positivity rate.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,767 new cases and 54 new fatalities. The percent positivity has decreased to 9.7 percent. There are another 128 new cases reported in the Blue Ridge Health District and an additional COVID death.

Last night, the Blue Ridge Health District held a town hall to talk about continuing resources in the days of Delta.

“As we all know, it’s much more transmissible than previous variants than what we’ve experienced with COVID,” said Ryan MacKay, director of policy and planning for the district. “It’s also sort of coincided with the expiration of a lot of the mandates that had been in place for masks, distancing, limiting numbers at social gatherings, so we’ve had this combination.”

MacKay said health officials meet with schools each week to minimize risk as much as possible. That involves case investigations to understand how further transmissions may have occurred. MacKay said this is also the time of year when there are other ailments that are very similar to COVID.

“As we enter flu-season and we enter into what traditionally is more disease-spreading in congregate settings such as in schools, it’s going to make that a little bit more difficult,” MacKay said. “So the reason we’re asking schools and pediatricians to really work with families to really identify what is causing the illness. It’s critical because that minimizes the risk of spread and makes sure we can keep children where they need to be which is in classrooms and schools.”

That means that children with any symptoms should stay home until COVID is ruled out. If the diagnosis is positive, 14 days of quarantine with no school activity or interaction with anyone.

The Blue Ridge Health District is currently offering third-dose boosters to those who qualify.

“Third doses for people who are immunocompromised began on August 13,” said Dr. Denise Bonds, director of the Blue Ridge Health District. “You don’t have to bring in any proof. You can self-declare and the best person to speak with is your primary care physician who can help you make that determination that you need that third dose.”

Around the same time as the town hall, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorized booster doses of the Pfizer vaccine for anyone over the age of 65 and well as those at high-risk of severe COVID. (press release)

There is not yet a recommendation for those who got the Johnson and Johnson shots. More as we continue.

Several proposed historic markers in the area are being considered today by the Board of the Virginia Department of Historic Resources at their meeting at Montpelier.

One would recognize a 1950 court case that forced the University of Virginia to admit a Black man who had been denied a space because of his skin color. A three-judge panel heard the Swanson V. University of Virginia case in the former federal court on Market building that now houses the Central Branch of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library. That’s where the marker will stand.

Another is at Jackson Burley High School on Rose Hill Drive. The building opened in 1951 to unify several Black high schools across the area.

“The 26-classroom building reflected an effort to provide “separate but equal” facilities in an era when lawsuits frequently challenged poor conditions in Black schools,” reads the proposed text. “The 1956 football team was undefeated and unscored on.”

Jackson P. Burley High School was nominated for the National Register of Historic Places last year.

The DHR Board will also consider a marker for Dr. W. W. Yen, the first international national to attend the University of Virginia. The Chinese national graduated in 1900 and went on to a career as a diplomat. His nomination is part of a contest held as part of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Read the full nominations here.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time for two quick Patreon-shout-outs.

One person wants you to know "We keep each other safe. Get vaccinated, wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

This summer, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville has been updating various committees in Albemarle on their efforts to redevelop the Southwood Mobile Home Park as a mixed-use community. The Board of Supervisors approved the first phase of a rezoning in August 2019, and they got an update at their meeting on September 15. There are a lot of details, and if you want all of them, I recommend watching the full presentation. (watch)

But here is a summary beginning with planner Megan Nedostup with the basic info.

“Habitat acquired the property in 2007,” Nedostup said. “1,500 residents live there in 341 mobiles homes.”

Supervisors adopted a resolution to work with Habitat on redevelopment in 2016 and an action plan in 2018 that included financial contributions from the county.

“Involved with that approval we appropriated $675,000 to Southwood to assist with the rezoning application,” Nedostup said. “In 2019 the performance agreement was approved. $1.5 million for construction of 75 affordable units. $300,000 for 80 or Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC). And $1.4 million over ten years in tax rebates.”

The rezoning approved a total of 458 housing units on undeveloped land along Old Lynchburg Road. Site plans are coming in for each of the 12 blocks in this stage of the development. Piedmont Housing Alliance is building the LIHTC units and aim to exceed the total by constructing 121 apartments in three buildings.

Nedostup said Habitat has met one milestone of the performance agreement and has received $100,000 for planning work. Another $300,000 payment for securing the LIHTC credits is being processed.

“Milestone 1C included $200,000 when Habitat demonstrates it has secured funding for 57 affordable units and that one is in process,” Nedostup said.

Other milestones are also in the process of being met. Outside of the performance agreement, Albemarle County also partnered with Habitat on a $1 million Community Development Block Grant (CDBG).

In his presentation, Habitat CEO Dan Rosenweig showed a fly-through video of what the development will look like when it comes together. The idea has been to build a new community along new roadways.

“We worked closely with Atlantic Builders to design a new product typology so that this streetscape created a really great walk from deeper into the neighborhood toward the neighborhood downtown,” Rosensweig said. “[These are] townhomes that are two stories in the front and then they take advantage of the grade to be three stories behind so what it appears are townhomes that are really human scale.”

Rosensweig reminded the Board that the Planning Commission had had concerns about whether there would be enough affordable units in the first phase.

“There was concern among Planning Commissioners about the ultimate amount of affordable housing in phase one and whether that would be enough housing to take care of the residents who exist at Southwood now as we move phase by phase but also to create new affordable housing in the region,” Rosensweig said.

“I think we’ve done a pretty good job with 335 total units in phase one with 207 of them affordable,” Rosensweig said. “Habitat is going to build 86 of them. That’s going to be almost exclusively homeownership but there are some residents who will not LIHTC and who will not want to purchase a home, so we’ve committed to making some deeply affordable rentals available interspersed in the neighborhood as well.”

Rosensweig said he estimated about 100 families will be rehoused as part of the first phase. Unfortunately, some families have had to be moved on a temporary basis due to poor environmental conditions that he said Habitat has inherited from the previous owner.

“Instead of one or two mobile homes hooked up to a septic tank there were ten, and so those leach fields are extending into the areas of construction so out of an abundance of caution and safety for residents we are in the process of moving the first 25 families from the area immediately adjacent to the construction site to the other side of the mobile home park in trailers where there are served by sewer,” Rosensweig said.

There are about fifty more families that will need to be rehoused due to the next phase of construction. Rosensweig said a rehousing task force has been formed to identify solutions. There are other environmental issues.

“There’s also a remediation task force that has formed to deal with some of the things that were a little bit hard to dig,” Rosensweig said. “For example, the mobile home park has been on electric for many years but originally there was an oil tank installed under every trailer. As we started to move them, we expected one in ten to leak. If they were decent material to start with, they wouldn’t leak. But all ten of the first ones that we dug up leaked, which suggests to us that all 341 are going to be removed.”

Rosensweig said Habitat has worked with Albemarle and the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to remove the damaged sections of soil where it has been encountered.

“It’s kind of like cutting out a tumor,” Rosensweig said. “You remove the bad stuff and also dirt around it, stockpile it, and remove it. The site is pristine now but it has cost a lot more than we expected.”

Rosensweig said the Board of Supervisors can expect to see the next phase of the rezoning. Habitat will ask to extend the rules for the existing zoning and its code of development across the whole park.

“More like a zoning amendment than a rezoning,” Rosensweig said.

The goal is to submit the application by mid-October.

Supervisor Liz Palmer has been on the Board since 2014 and wanted to make sure all of the steps of the performance agreement are tracked.

“I’m wondering going forward on future projects how we compare what we’re getting for the amount of money that we’re putting in because these numbers are hard to keep track of overtime.”

Stacy Pethia, the county’s housing coordinator, said it is too early to be able to break down a cost-per-unit, but that will be available as the projects go through the many variables involved in a construction project.

“The cost as we’ve learned over the past year continues to significantly change and has a significant impact on the project,” Pethia said.

Rosenweig had an exact figure for the roughly $4 million in Albemarle’s investment.

“That works out to about $19,000 a unit,” Rosensweig said. “The cost for each of our homes on average is probably looking because of COVID price spikes in the mid $200K’s and so your funding represents a little less than ten percent of each of the units.”

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Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Rivanna Conservation Alliance. What are you doing on September 25? That's the day when RCA staff and volunteers will spend the day at the second annual Rivanna River Round-Up, a community watershed clean-up event. Last year, nearly a hundred people helped remove sixty large bags of trash from waterways that feed into the Rivanna as well as over 120 discarded tires. The Rivanna Conservation Alliance will also accept specific areas that you might want to clean as part of the Round-Up. More information as well as registration can be found at rivannariver.org.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville Fire Chief Hezedean Smith explains changes to the EMS dispatch system to City Council

UVA’s new hotel will have a rooftop bar

The area’s regional planning body will be run a familiar face

The COVID-19 pandemic continues with another 3,737 cases reported today by the Virginia Department of Health. In the past seven days there have been another 239 fatalities reported in Virginia. The seven-day testing positivity has fallen to 9.8 percent from 10.5 percent a week ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 112 cases reported today and the percent positivity is at 7.1 percent. There have been four more fatalities reported since the last edition of this newsletter on September 16, 2021.

The Blue Ridge Health District will hold a virtual town hall on the pandemic tonight at 7 p.m. If you have questions, you can send them in advance when you register to be on the Zoom call. (register)

The person who has been serving as the interim director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District has been given the job on a permanent basis. Christine Jacobs has been serving in the position since February and was hired after an extensive search. Jacobs took over the position from Chip Boyles who has been serving as Charlottesville City Manager. The TJPDC is a regional planning body that covers the city and the counties of Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa and Nelson.

When the University of Virginia’s new hotel and conference center opens on Ivy Road, there will be a rooftop bar. The Buildings and Grounds Committee of the Board of Visitors will meet Thursday to approve a change to the design for the six-story structure which is part of the Emmet/Ivy Corridor. Another future building is the Institute of Democracy and the Committee will consider design guidelines for that structure as well as a renaming proposal to the Karsh Institute of Democracy. They’ll also consider a proposal to name a new McIntire School building Shumway Hall and will consider the expansion of the Encompass Rehabilitation Hospital at the Fontaine Research Park. The latter had been originally proposed as a new structure at the North Fork Research Park, but the decision was made to expand in place.

“The proposed project will renovate and update nearly 50,000 SF in the existing hospital and construct a 16,400 SF addition, allowing the hospital to convert from 50 beds in semi-private rooms to 60 beds in private rooms,” reads the staff report for the item. (meeting packet)

Charlottesville Fire Chief Hezedean Smith has been on the job nearly ten months and he had the opportunity Monday to talk about the department as well as to explain changes to the way the fire department dispatches ambulances. Earlier this month, representatives from the Charlottesville Albemarle Rescue Squad critiqued the new “proximity dispatch” system. (Story from September 8, 2021)

“I’m appreciative of the many years of contributions from CARS for over 60 years and for our Fire Department for over 165 years and agree that working together collaboratively, we’ll be able to create a model system framework in this region based on 21st century concepts and strategies,” Smith said.

In this community, emergency calls are routed through the Charlottesville-UVA-Albemarle Emergency Communications Center. Smith said there are initiatives underway to make the system more efficient.

“This medical priority dispatch system will replace an almost 25 or 30 year old system that’s being currently used to triage calls that are sometimes not necessarily 100 percent accurate because it requires on information from the 9-1-1 caller,” Smith said.

Smith said EMS services across the nation are working to implement something called EMS Agenda 2050 which seeks to position public safety calls as people-centered.

“It talks about how EMS personnel must have immediate access to resources that they need for patients including health care providers, social services, and other community resources,” Smith said.

In his tenure, Smith said he has realigned the command structure of the Fire Department to better meet those goals and others. One of those is the Neighborhood Risk Reduction program which seeks to inform residents about the specific hazards that face specific demographics and geographic areas. A StoryMap on this program is available online:

“So for example if you want to look at 10th and Page, what’s going on in 10th and Page, you can see what the community profile looks like and this is a compilation of various data sources that are out there,” Smith said. “This neighborhood is first in cardiac arrests. Third for structure fires, diabetic emergencies, cardiac emergencies, falls.”

Smith said knowing that information can help with preparations and community outreach.

As it relates to the dispatch system, Smith said everyone wants a system that works but there are disagreements about whether the recent change to the proximity dispatch system has been beneficial. Chief Smith said he is in frequent conversations with Albemarle Fire and Rescue Chief Dan Eggleston.

“Chief Eggleston and I have the same vision for this system delivery in this region so we have conversations about what the future should look like in this system,” Smith said.

Smith said while he intends to collaborate with CARS but if they cannot meet a desired level of service, the city will provide the service instead with professional crews whose salaries are covered by tax dollars.

At issue is how to get service calls to get to the scene more quickly with a travel time target of four minutes. Also at issue is the difference between Advanced Life Support (ALS) and Basic Life Support (BLS). Here’s Deputy Chief Mike Rogers with an explanation.

“The basic life support level is emergency medical technician basic,” Rogers said. “That’s a requisite for the jobs that the firefighters here at the Charlottesville Fire Department have and that’s the basic level. Bleeding wound care, CPR to the basic life support level, basic anatomy and physiology of being able to take care of the patient.”

Advanced Life Support requires more training to allow care at a trauma level.

“And essentially that allows the EMT to begin to place IV’s, give some limited amounts of medication,” Rogers said.

Chief Smith said the system that has been in place is due for a replacement to increase the chances of a patients’ survival by ensuring all calls have the chance of receiving ALS.

“The triage protocols that are in place are greater than 20 years old so the move to a 21st century protocol and electronic framework is underway currently,” Smith said. “Oftentimes the basic life support if all you have is an EMT who cannot execute any advanced skills, that patient does not have getting anything done pre-hospital unless there’s a call for the Fire Department to come and provide ALC which oftentimes delays care even more.”

The proximity dispatch system uses algorithms to dispatch calls using automatic vehicle localities and the global positioning system. Chief Smith acknowledges that that the system has caused concerns, but also notes that Albemarle County initiated proximity dispatch in recent years. He also presented evidence that shows how the system is working to increase response times in some neighborhoods. In all, he gave an hour-long lecture that is a must-view for anyone interested in this topic. (watch on BoxCast)

During his hour-long presentation, Chief Smith said that “what can be measured can be improved.”

“Seventy-one percent of the time in FY21, the first arriving CARS unit on the scene met the performance benchmark for turnout and time,” Smith said. “Not bad. Actually decent! But there’s opportunities for improvement.”

However, CARS’ performance on more advanced calls were much lower. Chief Smith said CARS met these calls on time ten percent in FY21. But here’s where the need for better metrics comes in.

“The system is designed in a way that the numbers for ALS versus BLS are not necessarily clearly defined because the protocols vary in how the system was set up but essentially there are opportunities for improvement,” Smith said.

Smith said the Charlottesville Fire Department’s results on more advanced calls could also use improvement.

“Here we have a 58 percent metric that we’re not doing well,” Smith said. “There’s opportunities for improvement here for CFD as well,” Smith said.

During the public comment period, UVA trauma surgeon Forest Calland took the opportunity to ask Smith a series of questions and to question the idea of sending ALS units to as many calls as possible.

“There’s just simply no evidence pointing to the benefit of having response teams under four minutes for BLS calls and there’s no evidence that sending paramedics to BLS calls is of any benefit,” Dr. Calland said.

Last year, Charlottesville a federal grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to hire additional firefighters. Dr. Calland said he is concerned by prioritizing ALScalls, the city will lose the financial benefit of volunteer labor.

“Your system is going to cost $2.5 million additional per year once your grant runs out,” Calland said. “Is the City Council prepared to take this money out of the taxpayers’ pockets when CARS has been providing this service for free for the last 50 years?”

Chief Smith said his presentation was to prepare for the future, and not debate the past. In addressing the questions, he said the SAFER grant was to ensure firefighting capacity and he acknowledged a need to address capacity issues.

“I will not be satisfied having insufficient firefighters on the fireground and potentially risking losing a firefighter,” Smith said. “Ultimately the staffing limits will have to be addressed.”

Chief Smith said he would be willing to meet with CARS officials when the time is appropriate.

“But the idea is to have a conversation because what we have done for the last 60 years or what we’ve done for the last 165, if we continue to do that I don’t think we will move forward with meeting the needs of this community,” Smith said.

Charlottesville’s arrangement with CARS is in a memorandum of understanding that has both an operational and a budgetary component. City Attorney Lisa Robertson had suggested that Chief Smith not meet with CARS management while disputes were ironed out.

“I think the two issues were conflating and they need to be separate,” Robertson said. “The financial relates to the other but they’re two separate issues. In both issues, both the city manager and the fire chief will have to sit down with CARS and work through both sets of issues. It has absolutely not ever been by intention to tell anyone that you can’t sit down and talk to each other because of legal issues. These are almost purely operational and financial issues.”

If you want to know about how emergency services operates in the area do take a look or listen to the whole discussion. (watch on BoxCast)

Thanks for listening! Please forward this on to others, and please ask questions in the comment section below!

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The first of two Patreon-fueled shout-outs!

Visit wtju.org to learn more.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council discusses the costs of reconfiguring Buford Middle School and make a decision on West Main Street

Early voting in Virginia begins tomorrow, and a look at voting as it stands in Albemarle and Charlottesville in 2021

Rio Hill Shopping Center has asked Charlottesville Area Transit to stop stopping there

And a new job for Charlottesville most recent planning director

Another day, another large number of new COVID cases. That number is 4,181 and the percent positivity is 10.6. There are another 145 new cases in the Blue Ridge Health District and one more fatality reported. That person lived in Greene County.

The COVID-19 model created by the University of Virginia Biocomplexity Institute currently projects that the Charlottesville area will reach a peak of 2,245 new cases a week in mid-October.

“Models can help us understand the potential course of COVID-19, but they are not crystal balls,” reads a statement on the website for the model. “Most models struggle to project policy changes, changes in human behavior, or new and rare events.”

With the pandemic raging, many indoor venues are now requiring proof of vaccination before admittance. To make showing that proof more convenient, the Virginia Department of Health announced today they are offering QR codes.

“As more and more employers and businesses respond to calls by President Biden and Governor Northam to require that employees and customers be vaccinated,” reads a press release. “QR codes will help improve the consistency and security of vaccination information while protecting individual privacy.”

Visit vaccinate.virginia.gov to obtain a QR code. Virginia is the fifth state to adopt protocols developed for SMART Health Cards.

Early voting in Virginia begins tomorrow as acting Charlottesville Registrar Taylor Yowell explains.

“Under Virginia election law, voters can vote up to 45 days early in-person or absentee,” Yowell said. “So with that 45 days in advance of an election, that is 33 actual days that you can come into our office and vote.”

Yowell made her comments this past week at a Sunday seminar held by the League of Women Voters of the Charlottesville Area. Yowell said mail-in ballots will be distributed beginning this week. (listen to the whole event)

“In order to receive a mail ballot, you must fill out a mail ballot application and that can be submitted online, in-person to our office, mailed in to us,” Yowell said. “We do have a lot of voters and say ‘hey, I don’t have availability to get online and fill one out’ so we will send them the application with a return envelope so they can be added to the list.”

Once registrars across Virginia receive ballots, there is a process known as curing that validates the vote. According to the instructions on voting absentee in Virginia, there’s an A envelope, and a B envelope.

“Whether this is by mail, whether you drop to our dropbox, whether you drop into our office, we take it inside and it will be automatically opened up and we check to make sure every component on your B envelope… this is where your name, your address, your signature, your witness signature, the day you filled out the ballot… this is where we make sure everything is correct. And we have three days after we receive a ballot to notify you if there’s something that needs to be cured, so that way your ballot can be accepted and processed in our office,” Yowell said.

In 2020, the state of emergency related to the pandemic temporarily waived the requirement for a witness signature. That will be required again this year. Yowell said voting early in-person is just like voting on Election Day.

“No results are pulled until 7 p.m. on Election Day, just like at the precincts, because no one will know and no one can prior to 7 p.m.,” Yowell said.

Now, what if someone requested a ballot via mail, and then shows up in person anyway? Yowell said in that case, the person is asked to sign an oath.

“It’s just a gold piece of paper saying ‘I have lost or not received my ballot’ and it’s pretty much an affirmation signing that you will not attempt to vote twice,” Yowell said. “If you do, it will be turned over to the Commonwealth’s Attorney.”

The last day for in-person voting before Election Day will be October 30.

Charlottesville Area Transit Route 5 will no longer serve the Rio Hill Shopping center, according to a release from the bus agency. The release states the property owner has requested the change, and that means two stops within the shopping center will become dormant. The 31 acre property is owned by SCT Rio Hill LLC, a firm associated with the retirement system for employees of the state of Connecticut.

The manager of the Rio Hill Shopping Center said in June 7 letter to the city that planned renovation implements a vision that does not involve public transit.

“Not only are the buses a safety hazard for the customers crossing the main drive lanes to get to the stores, but the weight of the buses is also causing significant damage to the asphalt resulting in wear and cracking,” wrote Jim Paulus, the center’s manager.

The planned route changes that have not yet been fully approved had already taken the request into account. In addition, Route 5 will no longer terminate at the Wal-Mart but instead will stop at Fashion Square Mall. Route 7 will instead travel to Wal-Mart and the plans show the alignment as missing Rio Hill Shopping Center. There is no date for when the transit changes will be made. H

The Regional Transit Partnership meets next Thursday.

Previous coverage:

February 6, 2021: Catching up with Albemarle's Comprehensive Plan, Entrance Corridors, Rio Hill Shopping Center renovation

July 4, 2021: Preparing for Charlottesville area's transit future; Water authority gets update on cybersecurity, capital projects

Now that Charlottesville has a new director of Neighborhood Development Services, the person who last held the position now has a city post in a newly created city department. Alex Ikefuna is the interim director of the Office of Community Solutions.

“The Office of Community Solutions will reside in CitySpace and the team will concentrate on our housing priorities, commercial redevelopment interests, federal entitlements/investments coordination and management, and neighborhood constituent services,” said city communications director Brian Wheeler in an email.

Ikefuna will oversee the Office of Housing, which will report to Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders.

“The vision for this office is to expand and deepen the City’s approach to a variety of community-based efforts, especially related to addressing our affordable housing crisis,” Wheeler continued.

Last night, the Charlottesville City Council got the latest details on the plans for reconfiguration of the city’s middle schools. Go back and read/listen to the September 14, 2021 edition of the show for the details.

Since that was posted, a Community Design Team that has been shepherding the work of architectural firm VMDO has made their final recommendation. Here’s Wyck Knox of VMDO with the latest information. (presentation from September 14, 2021 CDT meeting)

“The unanimous choice by the CDT was Option 3 that builds in the bowl and gives a new look to the school and the most square footage and the most variety of outdoor spaces to the new building,” Knox said.

This is also the most expensive option at an estimate of $73 million.

The five-year capital improvement program budget has a $50 million placeholder for reconfiguration. If Council agrees to proceed with the project, they’ll need to approve a budget with actual numbers in order to calculate how many millions of dollars in bonds need to be sold to pay for the capital costs. (FY22 adopted CIP)

For the Council meeting, the city’s budget office presented funding scenarios all of which include an increase in the property tax rate to cover the cost of the additional debt service to pay the bond proceeds back. These hinge on whether the city proceeds with a long-planned and multi-phased project to upgrade West Main Street that grew out of a $350,000 planning study requested in 2012 by the PLACE Design Task Force.

While the currently adopted CIP does not include any additional funding for the $49 million project, Council has previously allocated $20.54 million in local money to match state funding for the first two phases. That’s according to a slide presented to Council back in February. Council could opt to transfer that to the school project.

The tax increases were initially to have been phased in gradually at two cents a year to cover the five-year plan as adopted by Council in April. For the purposes of these scenarios, the tax increases are shown happening next year all at once, and include an additional five cents to cover the additional cost to finance the reconfigured schools.

“If you want to start construction in FY23, which is next year, then we have to have the money to sign a contract, so that means all the money all at once,” said Krissy Hamill, the city’s budget performance analyst.

Option 1 would cover just the cost of that $50 million placeholder and would include the West Main project. This would result in a 15 cent tax increase next year to a rate of $1.10 per $100 of assessed value.

“Option 2 would decrease the amount of tax increase that would be required if West Main Street were removed,” said City Manager Chip Boyles.

That would be a 13 cent tax rate to $1.08 per $100 of assessed value.

The next two options raise the reconfiguration cost to $75 million. Option 3 keeps West Main Street with a 18 cent tax rate increase. Option 4 drops West Main and is also a 15 cent tax increase.

Those actual rates could be different depending on the results of the 2022 assessment. That’s why you see the phrase “tax rate equivalent” in the options.

There will be no room for any additional capital projects for at least two years under these scenarios.

“There are a lot of variables in this,” said Boyles. “This is making the assumption that there is no sales referendum and no sales tax increase.”

Boyles estimates the one percent increase in the tax would bring in an additional $12 million a year.

The current sales tax is 5.3 percent, but Charlottesville only gets one percent of that amount. The budget for the current fiscal year anticipates the city will collect $12 million a year. In Fiscal Year 2020, the city collected $11.4 million according to data compiled by the Auditor of Public Accounts for the Commonwealth of Virginia. That’s up from $9.3 million in 2010.

The capital budget for FY22 includes $1 million for a parking structure at Market Street and East High. Earlier this year, Council opted to wait a year on that project and wait until next year to spend the remaining $7 million. So far, the options presented to Council did not factor in what happens if the project is dropped but that project cannot get totally zeroed out. (FY22 adopted CIP)

“What we have been looking at is reserving at least a couple of million if we had to create surface parking on the properties that we own,” Boyles said. “I would say definitely $5 million could be transferred if needed.”

However, Hammill said that would not affect the projected tax rates because the capital budget already assumes bonds will be sold to cover the cost of paying projects.

The housing plan adopted by City Council calls for $10 million a year to be dedicated to affordable projects.

The current five-year capital improvement program anticipates $13.5 million on public housing, $925,000 a year on the city’s affordable housing plan, $900,000 a year for housing vouchers, and $11.4 million in city funds for the redevelopment of Friendship Court. (FY22 adopted CIP)

There was no specific decision point on the agenda last night but Knox said he wanted to know what Council is thinking. There will be an information item presented to Council on October 4.

A decision on West Main?

Mayor Nikuyah Walker wanted to know where Councilors stood on the West Main Street project. The results were pretty clear.

“The only way I can see West Main Street surviving is if we get this one [percent] sales tax for the school reconfiguration,” said vice mayor Sena Magill. “That’s it.”

“I would definitely fully support reallocating the West Main project to schools,” said Councilor Michael Payne. “I can see West Main continuing as just as Hail Mary of if Congress passes the stimulus bill and there’s no local city money required.”

“I would prioritize this ahead of West Main,” said City Councilor Heather Hill. “Projects like West Main had a lot of revenue come in from other sources and I’ve said before that it’s a hard one to swallow but I think we’re at a point where there’s not another option.”

“As probably maybe the last defender of the West Main project, I also agree that whatever option we end up taking is going to have to be an option that does not include the West Main project,” said City Councilor Lloyd Snook.

Much of the Virginia Department of Transportation funding for West Main Street comes in the form of Smart Scale, which requires projects to be completed within six years. In the current round, the city was awarded $10.4 million for the third phase. None of that funding requires a local match. The University of Virginia committed $5 million to the West Main project as well.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

In today’s show:

Several odds and ends from the Charlottesville Planning Commission meeting

The Virginia Film Festival will return to movie screens in Charlottesville this October

Your input is requested on thoughts and concerns about future natural disasters

We begin today again with today’s COVID numbers. Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 4,066 cases today. The number of COVID deaths since the beginning of the pandemic in Virginia is now at 12,170. Since September 1, there have been 309 reported, with 52 reported today. That does not mean all of those fatalities happened within a 24-hour period, as that number is tallied as death certificates are reported to the VDH.

When natural disasters strike, governments across the region often cooperate with each other to lend a hand in the emergency response and recovery efforts. Before they strike, there is a federally-mandated document intended to provide direction on how to prepare to lessen their impacts.

“The purpose of the Regional Natural Hazard Mitigation Plan is to prepare for natural disasters before they occur, thus reducing loss of life, property damage, and disruption of commerce,” reads the current plan, which was put together by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

The last plan was adopted in 2018 and it is time to put together the next one as required by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Virginia Department of Emergency Management. The TJPDC wants your input in the form of a survey which is now open. Participants are asked if they’ve ever experienced a natural disaster and if so, what the specific impact was. You’ll also be asked what hazards you are concerned about, ranging from dam failure to winter weather. (take the survey)

The Virginia Film Festival will return to in-person events this October when the long-running series returns for action. Last year the event pivoted to drive-in and virtual screenings, but will return to the Violet Crown, the Culbreth Theatre, and the Paramount Theater.

“The Festival will also continue its very popular Drive-In Movies series at the beautiful Morven Farm in Eastern Albemarle County.” said festival director Jody Kielbasa in a release. “As always, the Festival will work to create the safest environment possible for its audiences, requiring masks at all indoor venues.”

The festival will run from October 27 to October 31, and the full program will be announced on September 28. Tickets will go on sale on September 30. A major highlight this year will be the screening of an episode of Dopesick, an upcoming series on Hulu about the nation’s opioid epidemic. The series is based on the work of former Roanoke Times journalist Beth Macy and the event at the Paramount will be presented in partnership with the Virginia Festival of the Book. For more information, visit virginiafilmfestival.org.

Albemarle Supervisor Ann Mallek is one of 16 elected officials from around the United States to be appointed to an advisory panel of the Environmental Protection Agency. EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan made appointments to the Local Government Advisory Committee and its Small Community Advisory Subcommittee, and Mallek will serve on the latter.

“From tackling climate change to advancing environmental justice, we need local partners at the table to address our most pressing environmental challenges,” Regan said in an August 25 press release.

Kwasi Fraser, the Mayor of Purcellville in Loudoun County, is the only other Virginian appointed to either of the two groups.

Speaking of appointments, last week Governor Ralph Northam appointed several Charlottesville residents to the Virginia Board of Workforce Development. They are:

Rich Allevi, Vice President of Development, Sun Tribe Solar

John Bahouth Jr., Executive Vice President, Apex Clean Energy

Tierney T. Fairchild, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Resilience Education

Antonio Rice, President and Chief Executive Officer, Jobs for Virginia Graduates

The Virginia Board of Workforce Development will meet next week for a special briefing. The board’s executive is Jane Dittmar, a former member of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time for two quick Patreon-shout-outs.

One person wants you to know "We keep each other safe. Get vaccinated, wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

For the rest of the show today, highlights from last night’s City Planning Commission meeting. I want to state up front that this newsletter does not feature the meeting’s main event, which was a public hearing for 240 Stribling in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood. That conversation that focused on a novel method of funding infrastructure improvements to support additional vehicular and human-powered traffic. I’m going to focus on that in an upcoming newsletter, but I want to get one concept on your mind.

Let’s get some legal guidance from City Attorney Lisa Robertson about that mythical beast known as a “proffer.”

For large developments that require a rezoning or a special use permit, you may also see the applicant offer cash or specific improvements as a required condition if their desired land use change is accepted.

“Proffers are really to deal with impacts generated by the development itself and to provide cash for infrastructure that’s more directly sort of connected to or necessitated by the development,” Robertson said during the Commission’s pre-meeting. “In this situation as evidenced by the fact that the Stribling Avenue need for sidewalks has already been documented for a number of years in the city’s master plans and [Capital Improvement Program].”

Southern Development is the applicant behind 240 Stribling had wanted to make its willingness to fund some of the infrastructure improvements in a proffer, but Robertson asked to pursue the matter in a different way because proffers are not two-way agreements. What happened with that? We’ll come back to that tomorrow.

Highlights from the meeting

At the top of the actual meeting, the Commission elected Lyle Solla-Yates to serve as the body’s Chair. Solla-Yates was appointed to the seven-person body in March 2018 and succeeds Hosea Mitchell, who will remain on the commission.

“Thank you very much Chair Mitchell for your two years of excellent service and for this honor and attempting to follow you,” Solla-Yates said. “Remarkable opportunity.”

Next, Commissioners gave various reports on the various committees they are on. This is a good way to find out quickly a lot of things that are going on. Commissioner Mitchell said he and Commissioner Jody Lahendro with city Parks and Recreation officials reviewing a major problem in McIntire Park.

“The drainage in McIntire Park is also creating a violation of the Department of Environmental Quality, their standards,” Mitchell said. “That is going to be a top priority and that’s going to be about $350,000 that we will be asking Council to approve but this is a must-do. We are in violation if we don’t fix that.”

Mitchell said repairs to bring the outdoor Onesty Pool back next summer will cost about $400,000. There’s a lot of erosion and standing water at Oakwood Cemetery that will cost about $52,000.

“And the last must-do thing is a comprehensive master plan,” Mitchell said. “We haven’t had anything like that in a number of years and our future is going to be relentless for Parks and Rec if we don’t do that and that’s going to be about $150,000.”

Mitchell said the Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center is not expected to open now until late fall. Smith has been plagued with air quality problems since it opened in 2010. The facility shut down for several weeks in 2015 to install new exhaust pipes and has been closed since the spring of 2020 for at least $2.25 million in repairs. At least, that’s what Council approved as a capital improvement program budget line item in the Fiscal Year 2021 budget.

In any case, Mitchell also announced that Todd Brown will be leaving his position as director of the city parks and recreation department to take a position in Fredericksburg.

Bill Palmer, the University of Virginia’s liaison on the Charlottesville Planning Commission, reminded the Commission that UVA is working on an update of its Grounds Framework Plan. Palmer did not have much specific information but the closed-door Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee got a briefing at their meeting on July 23.

“The Plan will be underway from Summer 2021 to Fall 2022 and includes a robust engagement process with the University and regional community,” reads a presentation made to LUEPC.

The Grounds Framework Plan is intended to guide planning and development over the next 20 years with an emphasis on sustainability, resiliency, and equity. Some guidance in the presentation is to “capitalize on the potential of existing and new facilities” and “holistically consider Grounds as an integrated campus of mixed-use buildings and green spaces.”

The firm Urban Strategies has been hired to conduct the work, which will build on smaller plans developed in the past several years ranging from the 2015 Brandon Avenue Master Plan to the 2019 Emmet Ivy Task Force report.

UVa is also undertaking an affordable housing initiative to build up to 1,500 units on land that either UVA or its real estate foundation controls.

The community also got a first look at Jim Freas, the new director of the City’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services.

“Today is my second day so still finding my feet and learning my way around the building,” Freas said on Tuesday.

Freas comes to the position from a similar one in Natick, Massachusetts. Natick consists of over 16 square miles in Middlesex County and has a population of 37,000 according to the U.S. Census.

Thank you again for reading today. Want one of those shout-outs? Consider becoming a Patreon supporter. For $25 a month, you get four shout-outs spread across the various programs. That price will increase in the near future. Questions? Drop me a line!

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City School Board is briefed on details of reconfiguration project

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority learns about the CvilleBiohub

Crutchfield files plans to expand their warehouse space near the airport

The seven-day average for new COVID cases in Virginia has increased to 3,689 a day, with 3,659 reported this morning by the Virginia Department of Health. The percent positivity dipped slightly to 10.8 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 139 cases reported today and one more fatality. The percent positivity in the district is 8.2 percent.

The Crutchfield Corporation has submitted plans with Albemarle County to expand their warehouse space near the Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport. The company filed a site development plan to add nearly 61,000 square feet. The warehouse currently is at 84,872 square feet. Crutchfield was formed in 1974 to sell car stereos and has expanded to all manner of electronic equipment. The company website states there are now over 600 employees. Crutchfield is listed as Albemarle’s sixth largest employer in a profile put together in April by the Virginia Employment Commission. (review the site plan)

On Wednesday the Charlottesville School Board and the Charlottesville City Council will meet to discuss the various options that have been put together by VMDO Architects for the reconfiguration of Charlottesville’s middle schools. The multimillion project seeks to bring 6th grade to Buford Middle School and convert Walker Upper Elementary into a pre-K facility. This summer, a Community Design Team has been going through the various options. They meet again today at 6 p.m. (register)

The School Board got an overview of the project at their meeting on September 2 including cost estimates. Wyck Knox is an architect with VMDO who led the presentation and he began with a recap. (9/2 School Board presentation)

“The direction from the working group was to look at schemes that tried to spend $60 million all at Buford, to stay within the 140 to 150 square feet per student range,” Knox said. “The state average for a new middle school in the Commonwealth of Virginia is 151 square feet.”

Knox said the project is aiming for a construction start at Buford of 2023.

“Mostly to fight inflation and to be giving two or three million to inflation,” Knox said.

The plan for Walker is to renovate one of the buildings for pre-K with minimal investment while preparing the overall campus for eventual construction of a new facility for that purpose in the future. Cost estimates for the two detailed schemes are in the mid-$20 million range, and the estimate to move pre-K at Walker in the short-term is $1.35 million. The cost to add furniture to all of the elementary schools is $425,000 in 2026 dollars.

There are three options for Buford and all three are in excess of the $60 million placeholder given to Knox’s team.

There are currently four buildings at Buford. A is the main academic building and includes the cafeteria on the lower level. B is the auditorium and performing arts space. C is the gymnasium. D is a smaller academic building that would be demolished under three design scenarios.

One option with the working title “Renovate More, Build Less” has a current cost estimate of $65.14 million and would keep A, B, and C. There would be 147 square feet per student.

“Option two gets rid of C and builds more new [space] and we call it the ‘Big Room’ because there’s an idea of doing a big basketball court for all sports that’s also part of the school,” Knox said. “It would be adjacent to the dining commons and use that as a function space for big gatherings.”

Option two has a cost estimate of $66.79 million and would also be at 147 square feet per student.

Option 3 is called “Build in the Bowl” and would see construction in a green area between Buford and the Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center. Remember that the Boys and Girls Club also operates a facility in the area.

“So we looked at an option of building there which also helps us get a new architectural presence at the front door or the school,” Knox said.

This is the most expensive at $68.2 million but it would raise the square-foot-per-student metric to 151.

There are commonalities between the three options.

“All of them connect all of the buildings via indoor space,” Knox said. “All of them take the admin suite and take it to the entry level where it makes more sense. All of them expand parking. All of them keep a gym down at the field level.”

All would move the bus lanes to the rear of the building. The Schoolyard Garden would also need to be relocated.

With all of the options, Knox said there could be savings through strategies such as having a power-purchasing agreement for solar panels on school roofs. Another would be to delay some of the renovations.

“We’ve got a bunch of options that have an ability to get as low as $50M and could go up to as high as $70 million and averaging somewhere around $64 million to $65 million,” Knox said.

Another choice will be made on what level of renovation to occur. VMDO is recommending the heavy renovation option to ensure thermal comfort, air quality, acoustic quality, electric lighting, and daylighting.

City Council and the School Board will likely see an updated design that will come out of tonight’s Community Design Team meeting. The basic recommendations will be to start construction at Buford in 2023 and to move 5th graders to elementary schools by August 2026.

Wednesday’s joint meeting is a work session. Council will be asked in October to select an option for VMDO to proceed with further engineering and design.

“I think this is a pretty easy yes to say to at this point because we’ll just continue to study it up until March where we will have even more accurate pricing and then we really have to decide if we’re going to do this project and fund it, or not,” Knox said.

That coincides with the budget development process for Fiscal Year 2023.

Between now and then, there will be two new City Councilors. Between now and then, there is also the possibility of legislation action to approve a new source of revenue.

“The other thing that comes up is this one percent sales tax option,” Knox said.

That refers to a provision in state code that allows localities to enact a one-percent sales tax for the specific purpose of constructing or renovating schools. Charlottesville would have to get approval from the General Assembly to be added to the list of localities that can levy the tax.

“And then in November of 22, if the General Assembly passes the one percent, it would also have to be passed by a local referendum,” Knox said.

The project also assumes a five-cent increase in the tax rate. One of the people who will likely take a vote on that is Juandiego Wade, who is currently on the City Council.

In today’s second subscriber supported public service announcement, want to get the latest update on Virginia’s efforts to expand passenger rail? Tomorrow at 1 p.m you can hear directly from the two top officials responsible at a virtual town hall held by Virginians for High Speed Rail. The guests are:

Jennifer Mitchell, the director of the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation

D.J. Stadtler, executive director of the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority

The event is free. Register today and for more information visit Virginians for High Speed Rail at vhsr.org.

Today at 4 p.m., the Charlottesville Economic Development Authority will get an overview of the work undertaken by the CvilleBiohub. The nonprofit “serves to strengthen the regional biotechnology industry through engagement, resourcing and advocacy.” The same overview was given to the Albemarle Economic Development Authority’s Board of Directors at their meeting in August, shortly after Stephany Oettinger became the new executive director. (watch the meeting video)

“I have recently assumed the executive director position to focus on the organization and moving it forward in terms of our community building, programming aspects,” Oettinger said.

The founding executive director, Nikki Hastings, has moved to the position of Entrepreneur-in-Residence where she will continue to work to seed new companies. Oettinger said she will build on Hastings’ leadership.

“We have been a recognized leader across the state for our industry clustered development, specifically in biotechnology and life sciences through our key programs,” Oettinger said. “We were started in 2016 as a mission driven organization for networking, education, and resourcing.”

In December 2019, CvilleBiohub received a $548,000 grant from an economic development initiative known as Go Virginia to create the entrepreneurship-in-residence program.

“We currently have three entrepreneurs in residence with Nikki’s addition,” Oettinger said. “So we’re really humming along in terms of our service to early-stage concepts. We regularly host pitch reviews for companies who are looking to hone in their storytelling and their pitch as they look for angel and seed funding.”

A lot of the work is aimed toward increasing career opportunities in the sector.

“We’re now at more than 2,000 jobs and growing which I’ll highlight in a moment,” Oettinger said. “With quite an amplifying effect. $300 million in wages and $1.2 billion in industry output.”

This year, CvilleBiohub placed 19 interns across 11 companies. The organization has served 117 businesses to date.

“We’ve retained, created, or attracted a total of 15 companies to the area,” Oettinger said. “There have been more than 335 jobs created in the region since January 2020.”

Oettinger said one thing the industry needs is additional space for research, and CvilleBiohub works with the EDA to help companies find places to grow. For instance, they helped Rivanna Medical purchase a larger space within Albemarle County. They also worked to retain a presence for the company PRA Health Sciences after they were acquired by a larger firm.

“When companies come to us us, we’re very aware of movement and we work really hard to make sure to fill that space as companies moving around but the bigger picture we are all talking about is the need for more wet lab space in the region,” Oettinger said. “So we developed a wet lab incubator model that included the Broadway District as the key development site.”

The Broadway District refers to an area of Albemarle County that is entirely landlocked by the city of Charlottesville at the end of Carlton Avenue. The redeveloped Woolen Mills is considered an anchor and the EDA and Albemarle County have made investments in that program.

At the end of her presentation, Oettinger made a pitch for $25,000 in additional funding from the EDA to continue their efforts to strengthen the biotech industry.

“We have a very ambitious goal to double the industry sector by 2030 and our well on our way and we need a collaborative partner to house these growing concepts and growing companies,” Oettinger said.

The EDA approved the request contingent on CvilleBiohub receiving a grant from the Virginia Innovation Partnership Authority. A similar request is being made to the Charlottesville EDA.

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In today’s show:

Development updates from Pantops and the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committees

A look at the Thomas Jefferson Solid Waste Report

A quick round-up of timely information

The seven-day average for new COVID cases is now 3,452 according to data collected by the Virginia Department of Health and the percent positivity rate is now 10.9 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are 81 new cases reported today. Since September 8, there have been three more fatalities reported in the district. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors will get an update from the Blue Ridge Health District late Wednesday afternoon. They sent out an information email on Friday night.

“Since September 4, 713 people have tested positive for COVID in our district,” the newsletter read. “Ninety-six percent of all of these cases are the highly contagious Delta variant.”

As of September 4, the Virginia Department of Health reports that 4.89 million Virginians were fully vaccinated on that day.

“Of these people, 0.4 percent have developed COVID-19, 0.0017 percent have been hospitalized, and 0.0038 percent have died,” reads the VDH’s website that breaks down cases by vaccination status.

A motorcyclist struck a pedestrian walking on U.S. Route 250 near Hansen Road earlier this morning, killing the person on the site. The person operating the motorcycle was taken to the University of Virginia hospital. Albemarle police sent out a release with the information this afternoon, but have not yet released the identity of the pedestrian. There have been six fatalities on public roadways in Albemarle this year.

The Charlottesville Police Department has arrested an Albemarle County man in conjunction with an altercation and a shots fired incident on West Main Street. According to a release, an officer witnessed a “verbal disorder” in the 1000 block of West Main Street. Two men were in an argument, and one of them shot into the windshield of the car the other was in. Roy Willard Gray has been charged with malicious wounding.

The Pantops Community Advisory Committee got an update on development projects within their jurisdiction at their meeting on August 23. Let’s go through them real quick. There’s a new car wash building coming to the Pantops Shopping Center, according to Principal Planner Rachel Falkenstein. (watch the video)

“It’s about a 1,000 square feet and it’s at the rear of the shopping center near where the Little Caesars used to be,” Falkenstein said.

A Hampton Inn on State Farm Boulevard is also under site plan review and is awaiting further information from the developer, meaning there is no timeline for when construction might begin.

“A lot of that is really on the applicant and the developer and as soon as they can get their final easements recorded we can approve it but that can take weeks or months,” Falkenstein said. “It just depends on how motivated or how much of a hurry they are in, or how long it takes the signatures they need on those easements.”

The former Malloy Ford dealership will be replaced with another automotive showroom with a new 4,000 square foot service building on the site.

“Still don’t know who the end user is going to be but it indicates it will continue to be an automotive dealer,” Falkenstein said.

There’s another site plan in the initial stages for a new 1,500 square foot automotive service facility in the southwest corner of the Pantops Corner development.

“And that’s where the Wa Wa and the Holiday Inn express and the storage facility development are on the north side of U.S. 250,” Falkenstein said.

There is also an initial site plan in the works for the South Pantops Townhomes on a property that had previously had a project called the Vistas at South Pantops which was withdrawn.

“And this project is proposing 40 single-family attached townhomes which would be density of about three units per acre,” Falkenstein said.

There’s also a proposed hotel in an undeveloped part of the Rivanna Ridge Shopping Center that would require a rezoning. A community meeting was held for this project this past January.

“The applicant in this has since gone through two reviews with staff and the last review was completed in May,” Falkenstein said. “There were still some outstanding questions and comments from the reviewers and it sounds like it’s the reviewers’ understanding that the applicant does intend to submit for a third review. At this time we don’t have any public hearings scheduled with the Planning Commission.”

The Pantops CAC has requested that the application come back to them as part of the review of the third plan, but there is no obligation for them to do so.

One member of the CAC asked if there was any way to attract a hardware store to Pantops. Falkenstein said she would be on the look-out.

In today's second subscriber-fueled public service announcement: Lovers of used books rejoice! The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will resume the tradition of their annual Fall Book Sale this October 2nd through October 10 at a new location! The Friends of the Library sale will take place at Albemarle Square Shopping Center from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. each day. Half-price days on October 9 and October 10. Questions? Visit for more information.

A few days earlier on January 19, the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee held their month. They also got an update on projects under review from planner Victoria Kanellopoulos. A major mixed-use project at the intersection of Old Lynchburg Road and Fifth Street Extended is called the Albemarle Business Campus. (watch the meeting on YouTube)

“This was approved with a rezoning to Neighborhood Model District so mixed-use, and it’s kind of split into two main sections by [a] part of Old Lynchburg Road,” Kanellopoulos said. “It’s across from the County Office Building at 5th Street.”

Included in the project is a 130,000 square foot self-storage facility and restaurant. There’s also a site plan for 128 apartment units across five three-story buildings.

Another recent rezoning was for over five dozen homes at Galaxie Farm between Route 20 and Avon Street Extended. This was to the Planned Residential District.

“So the rezoning allows up to 65 units which is what they are proposing,” Kanellopoulos said.

Also nearby is Avon Park 2 next to Avon Park along Avon Street Extended.

“That will be 28 townhouses and then the two existing hours [will] remain,” Kanellopoulos said.

On Wednesday, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will get a preview of the Southwood redevelopment that was organized by Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville. Supervisors approved the rezoning in August 2019.

“There are several site plans under review,” Kanellopoulos said. “The site plans are in the phase 1 rezoning area adjacent to the existing Southwood neighborhood.”

Habitat is working with the Piedmont Housing Alliance, Southern Development, and Atlantic Builders to construct the 335 units in the first phase.

Kanellopoulos also had an update on the Granger property, a 69-acre property south of the Fontaine Research Park. Earlier this year, Riverbend Development submitted a subdivision request to create 73 lots for single-family homes on the property, utilizing existing zoning.

“The preliminary plat was denied,” Kanellopoulos said. “That doesn’t mean it can’t actually happen or won’t get built.” (read the August 6, 2021 disapproval letter)

In this case, reviewers across all levels of county staff still have a lot of outlying questions before they can sign off. These include the Virginia Department of Transportation. fire and rescue, stormwater, and other issues.

The Southern and Western Urban Neighborhoods Master Plan calls for a Sunset-Fontaine Connector road, but there are no active plans for it to go forward due to high costs and the likelihood of the Granger property developing by-right. (read the SWUN master plan)

One CAC member observed that there were a lot of developments in the area.

“We’re reaching sort of a tipping point here that our neighborhoods in this part of the county, the northern part of the county, the western part of the country are all very popular destinations for people and people with families,” Storm said.

Storm said school capacity is an issue with trailers being built at Mountain View Elementary to accommodate overcrowding. He predicted tough decisions ahead about how to pay for the capital projects.

“There may have to be a look at what the tax rate is if we’re going to really provide the services,” Storm said.

Supervisor Donna Price told the CAC she felt consideration of an increase in the tax rate is on the table.

“We do have a lot of things that we want to get done and as a rapidly developing county, we’re not a rural county, we’re not Nelson County,” Price said. “The Scottsville District has almost as many people as Nelson County in its entirety.”

In the second quarter of 2021, 45 percent of the building permits issued in Albemarle were in the Scottsville district. When you look at the certificates of occupancy, the White Hall District led the way with 36 percent of the 156 units cleared to be lived in, with 28 percent in Scottsville.

To conclude today’s meeting, a quick item from the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission from September 2, 2021. We’re closer to today’s date, at least!

In any case, one of the items was a review of a draft Solid Waste Report that the TJPDC will send to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality in October. Shirese Franklin is a planner with TJPDC. (review the Solid Waste Plan)

“The solid waste and recycling plan for our region consists of Albemarle, Charlottesville, Fluvanna and Greene,” Franklin said.

Nelson County works with the planning district commission around Lynchburg and Louisa County manages and maintains their own municipal landfill. Solid waste planning units have to submit a plan every five years.

“The plan aims to address regional collaboration and how the region reduces, resuses, and recycles,” Franklin said. “We also within this plan want to encourage education around those things.”

Every year, the TJPDC submits a recycling rate report to the DEQ.

“We have to make sure that we are over 25 percent in our recycling rate,” Franklin said. “This year we haven’t received our final result from the DEQ. When I sent it, I believe we are at 43 [percent], but it depends on what they give in the final say of what we actually are.”

Interested in specific parts of the plan? Section 2.5 deals with “markets for the reuse and recycling of materials. Section 3 reviews all of the landfills in the community that are now closed. Section 4.1 projects how much waste is expected to be generated by 2045. Section 4.4 explains how that recycling rate is calculated.

Franklin said she needed to add additional data to the plan before it will be completed. The TJDPC will take another look in October.

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Death. Taxes. Should we add rising global temperatures to the list of the inevitable, or is there something that can be done? Is that thing adaptation? A massive behavioural shift? These are the questions that come to mind as we begin this September 10, 2021 edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out: Help support black-owned business in the Charlottesville area. Check out the Charlottesville Black Business Directory at cvilleblackbiz.com and choose between a variety of goods and services, ranging from beauty supplies, professional services, and e-commerce. Visit cvilleblackbiz.com as soon as you can to get started!

On today’s show:

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors is briefed on the county’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to address climate change

Lessons in adaptation from officials across the mid-Atlantic from the recent Resilient Virginia conference

It has been about a month since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes issued an update on progress toward efforts to keep the average global temperatures from rising above 1.5 degrees. Achieving that ambitious goal will take coordinated action at all levels of government, including the county-level in Virginia.

Earlier this month, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors learned the county is not currently on track to meet a goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent of 2008 levels by the year 2030. A second goal is to become at net-zero by the year 2050. To get there, the county has a Climate Action Plan that Supervisors adopted in October 2020. (read the plan)

“This report increases certainty in what we’ve already known,” said Gabe Dayley, Albemarle’s climate program coordinator. “Greenhouse gas emissions from human activities like burning fossil fuels, deforestation, and other sources of greenhouse gas emissions are causing climate change.”

Dayley said the IPCC report also links increased instance of extreme weather with climate change. He said there is a sense of urgency in the report and the Climate Action Plan is intended to document the various ways emissions can be reduced.

“The climate action plan has 135 actions,” Dayley said. “They run across five chapters on transportation, buildings, renewable energy, waste management, and landscape/agricultural/natural resources.”

The plan will help guide investment in various programs. So far, Albemarle has provided funding to the Albemarle Home Improvement Program and LEAP to install energy-efficient improvements in homes of people with lower incomes.

“That program has gone really well in the first six months of this year,” Dayley said. “We’ve had 15 homes that were retrofitted with better insulation, with improved appliances to help reduce homeowners energy bills and then of course the weatherization to help folks who are losing a lot of heat.”

Dayley said the county is working on an assessment to determine who and where in Albemarle is most vulnerable. That work has been funded by the Piedmont Environmental Council and a report is due in mid-November.

But about those emissions targets? To get a sense of where Albemarle currently is, a greenhouse gas inventory was conducted based on data from 2018.

“We calculated that in 2018 the community wide emissions for the county where 1,419,367 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent,” Dayley said. “We calculate that we saw a ten percent decrease in community-wide emissions between our last inventory in 2008 which is the baseline for the county’s targets.”

Dayley said that happened despite an increase in population, which generally leads to an increase in emission. He said explanations include greater fuel efficiency, the increase of carbon-neutral or lower-carbon energy sources, and more efficient heating and cooling systems.

However, to hit the 2030 target, Dayley said the community needs to cut reductions by another 40 percent. The next inventory will come out in two years based on data from 2020.

The University of Virginia, Charlottesville, and Albemarle County are working together to implement various action plans. Supervisor Diantha McKeel wanted to know how that work would influence various policies, such as how to move transit fleets away from fossil fuels.

“We have five transportation systems in this community of somewhere around 150,000 people using diesel buses right now,” McKeel said. “And I understand that there’s a change in Albemarle County Public Schools towards electric school buses and that’s all great. But what is our outreach to [Charlottesville Area Transit] and the University of Virginia all working together? Where is that connection happening?”

McKeel referred to a statement made earlier this summer that CAT is continuing to study the right way forward and is pursuing a study of compressed natural gas.

Dayley said that transportation is the largest sector of emissions and there is a high priority to address the issues. He hoped that further program development of the climate action plan will help to facilitate those conversations.

“One of my next steps is to reach out to them and hear in a little bit more detail about how that’s going and how the climate program team can help advance that effort,” Dayley said.

Lance Stewart, the county’s director of facilities and environmental services, said a closed door group consisting of UVA, Albemarle, and Charlottesville staff have “touched upon climate” at their meetings. The Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee (LUEPC) last met on July 23 and discussed the University of Virginia’s plans to comply with an executive order from Governor Ralph Northam to reduce single-use plastics.

(disclaimer: Both PEC is one of my sponsors and LEAP contributes through a $25 a month Patreon contribution. I am not involved with either organization beyond these transactions and the occasional copy)

Let’s go back in time a bit to last month’s conference on adaptation from Resilient Virginia. The nonprofit organization seeks to build awareness of available resources to plan and build for a world where the weather has warped. All over the country, scientists and planners are turning resilience from an abstract concept into policies

Amanda Martin is the Chief Resilience Officer for the state of North Carolina, which is based within their Department of Public Safety.

“We were created in 2018 after Hurricane Florence when this additional massive infusion of federal recovery funding and I say additional because we had just Hurricane Matthew in 2016,” Martin said. “It became clear that the state needed some new administrative capacity to handle disaster recovery funds.”

One result of the department’s formation has been the creation with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality of a North Carolina Resilience Plan. Part of its purpose is to coordinate activity across multiple state agencies, and to define working regions. (read the document)

“The scale of community and the scale of region is really important to address resilience challenges,” Martin said. “That’s both because of the legal and regulatory authority that local government has but also because of the regional nature of our climate impacts. A lot of them are bigger than a municipality but smaller than a state.”

Martin said in North Carolina, cities are taking on the resilience work in regions and one concern is that rural areas may be left behind. The plan seeks to address that balance.

In Virginia, much of the focus has been on coastal resilience where Rear Admiral Ann Phillips is the special assistant to Governor Ralph Northam for coastal adaptation. Phillips said Virginia is not as far along as North Carolina in terms of preparing.

“We are just starting down this path,” Phillips said. “We have taken some substantial steps through the course of a number of gubernatorial administrations but have been kind of challenged to get over the hump to actually get started and get moving because there was no direct funding focused in this area within the Commonwealth’s budget or fiscal plan.”

Phillips said Virginia has been fortunate to not have received a direct hit from a major hurricane in recent years, but preparations are underway to know how to respond.

In Virginia, the Secretary of Natural Resources is the chief resilience officer and that’s been Matthew Strickler since action by the General Assembly in 2020. (HB1313)

“My position was created by the 2018 General Assembly,” Phillips said. “I do not effectively have a direct staff or a budget. That is still the case. However, with Virginia joining the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) and creating in 2020 a Commonwealth-wide flood resilience fund, we now have capacity to do statewide studies of significance.”

A master plan for coastal adaptation is underway and is expected to be ready for review in November. (learn more)

So far, Virginia has received over $89 million from proceeds from auctions of carbon credits for companies likely to exceed their emissions limits. (RGGI auction results)

“I should note that of the RGGI funds, 50 percent go to a Department of Housing and Urban Community development energy efficiency fund, 45 percent go into this community flood preparedness fund,” Phillips said.

The rest goes for the administrative costs. The Department of Conservation and Recreation administers that flood preparedness fund. Phillips said around 6 million of Virginia’s population of 8.5 million live within eight coastal planning district commissions.

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative covers most of the mid-Atlantic. Shaun O’Rourke serves two roles in the the managing director of the Rhode Island Infrastructure Bank and the chief resilience officer for the state. He’s held that position since September 2017 and helped create the Ocean State’s first resilience plan called Resilient Rhody.

“We were looking at all of the natural hazards and impacts the state was facing with regard to climate change and to be able to propose solutions across a number of themes — critical infrastructure, natural systems, emergency preparedness and so on — that could better Rhode Island,” O’Rourke said.

Resilient Rhody suggested 61 actions for state government to take including what the municipal role would be.

“One of the things that I say all of the time is that better prepared municipalities are going to equal a better prepared Rhode Island,” O’Rourke said. “And that’s exactly why we established a municipal resilience program as an outcome of our Resilient Rhody strategy.”

O’Rourke said the infrastructure bank is lined up to fund projects to support adaptation efforts, prioritized by a number of factors. The bank has funded over $2.5 million of action grants in its first two years for stormwater management projects and infrastructure upgrades.

“They are often times very targeted specific projects that they know they need to get done now and stormwater management very much falls into that category,” O’Rourke said. “We’re seeing roads and bridges and parking lots flooded all the time. We’re addressing those issues, that low-hanging fruit that demonstrates progress and momentum, and then working with these municipalities on the larger more complicated projects that may not have permitting and design as a technical assistance follow-up.”

Since O’Rourke and the others spoke, Hurricane Ida caused dozens of deaths across New England, and some parts of Rhode Island received up to ten inches of rain.

We’ve heard from North Carolina and Rhode Island. The major difference in Virginia is that cities and counties are independent of each other. Here’s Rear Admiral Ann Phillps with an explanation.

“We have 38 independent cities in the Commonwealth of Virginia and then 95 counties, and the independent city moniker is quite unique,” Phillips said. “There are 41 in the country, and 38 in Virginia, ten in Hampton Roads. So what that means is that cities are responsible for their own destiny.”

Phillips said regional cooperation will be crucial in Virginia’s efforts to adapt.

“The state’s role is to try to align efforts so that we can move forward collectively to try to make progress,” Phillips said.

How much coordination is occurring at this local level? This is a question that Charlottesville Community Engagement seeks to answer. Your homework, should you choose to accept it, is to visit the Climate Action Together website to see what Albemarle, Charlottesville, and the University of Virginia have done and might do. And then, let me know what questions you have? What steps have you taken? Or, is climate change something you don’t think will affect your life? I’m curious to know. Leave a comment below or drop me a line. You can just reply to the newsletter.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s show:

Charlottesville’s Fire Department releases an annual report and the chief defends critiques of a new dispatch system

City Council discusses the firing of Police Chief RaShall Brackney

An incumbent drops out of the race for Charlottesville City Council

Nikuyah Walker is withdrawing from the 2021 election and will be a one-term City Councilor. Walker made the announcement in a Facebook post this morning in which she stated that another Black candidate in the race is being used by the Democratic Party. She said racism she experienced at last night’s City Council meeting was “the final straw.”

In the Facebook post, Walker blasted Council for being advocates of white power and called for reform of the city’s city-manager form of government. More on that at the end of today’s newsletter.

Walker has so far raised no money during the campaign process. Democrats Brian Pinkston and Juandiego Wade have raised about $70,000 each. Independent Yas Washington has raised $315. The next campaign finance report is due next Wednesday. (VPAP data)

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 4,474 new cases of COVID today, with a seven day average of 3,364. There have been 406 deaths since August 9. The seven-day percent positivity has decreased to 10.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 92 cases reported today. There have been a total of 239 fatalities in the district with 146 of them reported in the current calendar year.

Those seeking to file new unemployment claims in Virginia will now have to wait a week after enrolling with the Virginia Employment Commission. The VEC issued a release today to notify people that a temporary suspension of “Waiting Week” first made at the beginning of the pandemic is now over.

“In March 2020, Governor Ralph Northam waived the waiting week policy for all Virginia UI claimants as part of the COVID-19 pandemic emergency declaration,” states the release. “The reinstatement coincides with the end of temporary Federal benefit programs on September 4, 2021.”

For more on Waiting Week, visit the VEC’s website.

The Charlottesville Fire Department has released its annual report for the fiscal year that ended on June 2021. In the past year there is a new chief in Hezedean Smith, recruited 22 new firefighters, and boosted work in community risk reduction. There are 114 total employees in the fire department, including six civilians. There were 5,717 calls for service, with 2,105 of those for fire calls and 3,612 medical calls.

Last week, the fire department issued a press release announcing a process change made in July called “proximity dispatch” where automatic vehicle locators and the global positioning system are used. Council will have a work session on this change on September 20.

“When an emergency prompts a 911 call, the region's Emergency Communications Center activates an automated process that immediately finds the closest emergency resources,” reads the release. “Based on the proximity of the vehicles and the city's roadway network, the emergency communication center dispatches the closest units.”

At last night’s City Council, Dr. Forest Calland spoke out in objection to the new system. He’s a trauma surgeon at the University of Virginia Health system concerned that Charlottesville - Albemarle Rescue Squad (CARS) units are not being used efficiently.

“The system that has been designed and implemented is not well-conceived,” Dr. Calland said. “Survival in an urban EMS system is inversely proportional to the number of paramedics that are deployed out in the city.”

Later on in the meeting, CARS chief Virginia Leavell gave a specific example of how the new system is not working. There are a lot of acronyms in this soundbite to explain first. ALS stands for Advanced Life Support and offers advanced care for critical patients. BLS stands for basic life support.

“On July 27, two fire engines and a CARS BLS ambulance were dispatched to an ALS level chest pain call because [Charlottesville Fire Department]’s ALS unit was on a BLS call and unavailable,” Leavell said. “CARS had three BLS ambulances in service and available within 1.2 miles of that BLS call at the time of dispatch.”

Chief Leavell said CARS should be handling those basic calls.

“The new dispatch protocol is an ineffective system in the city,” Leavell said. “It has not resulted in improved patient care. In fact it puts those at the highest risk in jeopardy.”

Leavell said she has attempted to meet with Fire Chief Smith but has not been able to do so. In this year’s budget cycle as well as the last, Leavell and others made the claim that the fire department was not holding up its end of a memorandum of agreement related to funding.

“I raised the concern last year that I thought what was happening last year to the rescue squad and their budget was grossly unfair to them,” Snook said. “I’m concerned that this year —I don’t know the details but I would like to know more — I’m concerned that we appeared to be headed toward a situation where the present EMS providers to not value the contributions of the rescue squad, which has really been a beloved institution in this town for many, many years.”

Remember that quote. We’re going to need it later on.

Later on in the meeting, Chief Smith was asked to comment.

“Ultimately the enhancements that have been adopted are appropriate for the ten square miles in a city and it is used in other regions that provide EMS and fire services,” Smith said. “We don’t have to look far as it relates to proximity dispatch. Albemarle County right next to us has implemented proximity dispatch since 2016 or 2017. Proximity dispatch ensures that our residents and visitors get the closest appropriately staffed ambulance and or first response vehicles based on established national standards and best practices.”

Smith said the changes have lowered response times to the Tenth and Page neighborhood. The conversation on September 20 will shed more light on what may become a legal issue. City Attorney Lisa Robertson said a meeting was to have been held between Chief Smith and CARS, but a string of correspondence from CARS attorney led to that being delayed.

Thanks for reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out.

The Charlottesville City Council meeting on September 7, 2021 was dominated by one of its members’ opposition to the termination on September 1 of former Police Chief RaShall Brackney. No official explanation has been given.

Council selects one of its own every two years to serve as Mayor, a position held since January 2018 by Nikuyah Walker. At the beginning of the meeting, a fellow Councilor requested to add an item for discussion that was not previously on the agenda.

“Madam Mayor, I would like to ask to add one thing to the agenda,” said Councilor Lloyd Snook. “It would be to move to add the discussion of an appointment of an acting [Americans with Disabilities Act] coordinator.”

“And I would like to also request to add the discussion of the termination of the police chief,” Walker said.

Snooks’ request was granted on a unanimous vote, but Walker could not get a second to add her discussion to the official agenda. But her opposition would be felt throughout the entire meeting including a few minutes later when she used the Proclamations section of the meeting to thank Brackney for her three years of service to Charlottesville.

“I would just like to thank Chief Brackney for her leadership and apologize on behalf of the city for a termination that has tarnished her reputation when she was doing exactly as someone who sat around a table to hire her and was able to participate in that democratic process which as apparently has changed,” Walker said.

The powers of City Council are outlined in Chapter 2, Article II of the Charlottesville city code and further detailed in the City Charter. Council appoints a city manager to serve as an executive, and also appoints a finance director and a clerk. Council plays no official role in selecting a police chief.

“All departments of city government, including the fire department and police department, shall be under the general supervision of the city manager,” reads Section 5.01 of the charter.

The charter is also clear that all Councilors have the same powers.

“The mayor, or vice-mayor when performing the duties of the mayor, shall be entitled to a vote on all questions as any other councilor, but in no case shall they be entitled to a second vote on any question,” reads a portion of Section 9.

Brackney terminated on September 1

City Manager Chip Boyles opted to terminate Brackney’s contract on September 1, 2021 and immediately placed her on administrative leave through November 1, the end of a 90-day period of notification. (read the press release)

During the proclamations period, Walker took nearly nine minutes to talk about Brackney’s firing, and to tell future employers that she was treated poorly. She spoke of the need to address systemic racism and to tell Council why the termination was the wrong choice. None of the other Councilors responded and the body moved on to the consent agenda, which Walker voted against.

The meeting proceeded with updates from City Manager Chip Boyles.

“Staff has developed a formal application process to create roadside memorials along certain city streets for family members of those fatally injured in auto accidents,” Boyles said. “This program should be available by October 1.”

Then Council moved on to one of two public comment periods known as Community Matters, where several members addressed the issue. Attorney Jeff Fogel called Council rude for not responding to complaints the firing.

“We expect an answer,” Fogel said. “If you meet me on the street and ask me a question on the street, dammit I’m going to answer it? You got a problem? Get off the Council.”

Melvin Burruss thanked Walker for speaking out about the firing, and said it was all based on hearsay related to an informal survey conducted by the Police Benevolent Association. An unsigned statement in response to the survey was posted on the city’s website on August 20 shortly after 5 p.m on a Friday.

Addressing Boyles, Burruss accused Councilor Snook of acting to remove the chief.

“I’m really disappointed there wasn’t an investigation,” Burruss said. “Snook counseled you and he was part of it with you on the termination. You didn’t go to the Council and discuss it with all of them because they are acting… if you did, they are acting kind of ‘I don’t know what happened.’ Or that’s the conveyance they are giving to us. You should do better than that, Chip. We thought better of you when you took over this position.”

When it was Council’s turn to speak, Snook wanted to respond why he did not second Walker’s desire to place Brackney’s termination on the record. Virginia’s open meetings law allows for elected bodies to discuss personnel in closed session. (code)

“I asked the question when we were in closed session what would be the ground rules if we did so,” Snook said. “Nobody could answer. I am concerned that if we have a public discussion without any ground rules, recognizing that there are libel, slander, other procedural issues that may come up, that we’re opening ourselves up for more problems and I just don’t know what the ground rules are.”

Councilor Michael Payne said the timing of the firing created doubt in the minds of the community.

“What are we going to do to ensure and ensure for the public that we do not go backwards on reform and that is a real concern,” Payne said. “Has this sent a signal that it is time to go back to the old ways of doing things? I desperately hope that it’s not.”

Payne said city leadership must demonstrate that Brackney’s firing was not motivated by a sense that reform was going too far in the department.

Councilor Heather Hill said she also did not feel comfortable discussing the matter in public.

“These are personnel discussions and I am really sensitive to how much we will discuss publicly at this time without really understanding what the scope of that discussion would be,” Hill said.

Vice Mayor Sena Magill did not comment.

In rebuttal, Walker took issue with the comment Councilor Snook made about the Charlottesville - Albemarle Rescue Squad.

“You used the words ‘grossly unfair’,” Walker said. “So maybe you don’t know how to monitor yourself but that would be a good time to do that. You would need to find out more information without critiquing employees publicly when you and Councilor Hill already have a lot of information because you’ve been meeting with them.”

To be clear, Snook did not mention the names of any employees of the fire department. Council is to have a work session on these issues. Walker said she hoped the process would be fair. But back to the termination. Walker noted that Dr. Brackney was on the call and willing to have a public conversation.

“And so if there’s any questions about whether there is a willingness to have that conversation and if it’s about personnel, then we can ask her that question,” Walker said.

“It would also involve personnel discussions of other people than Chief Brackney,” Snook said.

“Well the other people were not terminated,” Walker said.

“Doesn’t matter, “ Snook said. “They still have rights to confidentiality that we are bound legally to respect.”

In another back and forth, Walker pressed Hill on whether she was involved in the decision to terminate Brackney.

“I have not influenced this process,” Hill said. “I found at the same time at the rest of this Council. That decision has been made. Do I support that decision? I do.”

Walker said the time has come for reform of the way Charlottesville is governed.

“I know there’s been a lot of discussion about one-fifth means, and I know there’s been a lot of confusion about the fact that I’m a strong Black woman and people don’t like that,” Walker said.

Walker said the city manager position should be elected.

“Not because I see myself in the position,” Walker said. “But because of the power of that position. I hope the community is understanding that while that is not something that today, this is your community and deciding whether you want someone who doesn’t have to answer your questions to be able to make a decision this important behind closed doors and never answer.”

The last time the topic of elections came up was in 2004 when an election study task force was commissioned. Review the results here.

Walker asked each Councilor to say if they supported the decision. Vice Mayor Magill went on the record.

“I feel that this is a decision of the City Manager, and we hired the City Manager and this is his job,” Magill said. “It is his job to run the city under our overarching policies. I feel like he talks to us, I feel he communicates with us and fundamentally this is his decision and I’m behind him on it, period.”

Walker accused the rest of the Council of speaking with Boyles before the termination.

“Mayor Walker, one of your fundamental premises is correct,” Snook said. “I have never recommended to Mr. Boyles that he fire Chief Brackney and I’ve told you that.”

Walker has more questions

After that, Council moved on to other business, business we’ll cover in a future newsletter. After that business concluded, Walker had several questions about what happened with the police chief. Some dealt with comments made by Bellamy Brown, the chair of the Police Civilian Review Board, related to the Police Benevolent Association survey.

“The August 20th press release was also unsigned and that was a concern, where people thought this was something the chief forced out,” Walker said. “I would like a public response to who worked on that survey and why their name was left off of it. Specifically, for the city manager. Why wasn’t your name on it?”

Walker also wanted to know when the decision was made to place Chief Brackney on leave. Walker also wants to know if Assistant Chief James Mooney will receive special dispensation after rescinding his retirement in order to lead the department in the interim.

In the second public comment period at the end of the meeting, Michael Wells of the Central Virginia Chapter of the Police Benevolent Association thanked Boyles for terminating Brackney.

“Unfortunately for Dr. Brackney, the Police Benevolent Association climate survey is largely focused not on policy but internal procedural justice issues,” Wells said. “I just want to tell you guys that you have a real issue in Charlottesville City. You have a few people that speak up all the time and those people garner your attention all the time. Now I’m going to be one of those people. Because I’m involved, I want to be involved. I want the city to have a good chief. I wish it had worked out with Dr. Brackney but it did not.”

When he was done, Walker took the opportunity to question Wells. That exchange is fully documented in the audio version of this newsletter. Here is some of it:

Walker: “Do you think that internal procedural justice is important than healing the wrongs that have been done by policing in this community?”

Wells: “I think if you want your police officers to take on other policies and procedures that you have to have buy-in from them.”

Walker: “So, 21st century reform, you think our focus should be getting buy-in from police officers?”

Wells: “I think your focus should be safe streets because about every other night you have shootings now, so I think your focus needs to be on supporting your officers.”

Walker: “So you think throughout the history of policing that there hasn’t been a need for reform?”

Wells: “No, I think it’s important for officers to have confidence in their command in order to be most effective, and effective officers are what you need and deserve… you can’t afford a police department with limitless internal distractions and non-existent morale. There’s work to be done.”

Walker: “They surveys talked about the reform was causing that low [morale].”

Wells: “No, you’re wrong. You’re wrong. You’re wrong. How long have you been a cop?”

Walker: “I’m telling you what I read. Your survey also said that both the citizens of the community and the command were a problem.”

Wells: “That’s right. They need support from the community…. the community is what’s most important and that means everyone, every race and color and not just Black and brown. Everyone.”

Walker: “So the community that’s most affected by policing practices, you don’t believe…”

Wells: “Where are your facts about racist policing? Where is that? Provide it?”

At this point, a report on 21st Century Policing came up. Have you read it? Here’s a link to a 36-page document with its results. (report)

Another resource that was not discussed was the Disproportionate Minority Contact report from January 2020. (report)

Walker: “Why did President Obama institute that task force?”

Wells: “I think we know why.”

Walker: “Tell me!”

Wells: “Good day, Mayor.”

Walker then addressed Council.

“That’s what you just signed on for and you all should be ashamed because as I told you in closed session, they’re not coming for your kids.” Walker said. “They’re not going to target you.”

To conclude today, I want to draw your attention to legislation that passed the General Assembly in a special session held in the summer of 2020. Localities in Virginia are subdivisions of the state government. Legislation in that session included:

Officers are now required to intervene if they see a fellow officer using excessive force

Law enforcement agencies are no longer allowed to purchase surplus military gear

Police civilian review boards received additional oversight powers

Neck restraints are explicitly banned

Attorney general obtained more power to pursue civil suits against law-enforcement officers

Department of Criminal Justice required to add implicit bias training to uniform curriculum for sworn officer

Creation of the Marcus Alert system to create reform of how government first-responders operate in mental health crises

Some of this legislation was discussed in the pilot episode of a new program on Radio IQ that I helped produce. William Fralin moderates a discussion of police use of force with guests Claire Gastañaga, formerly of the Virginia ACLU, and Chief Maggie DeBoard, of the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police. Take a listen.

What’s next in Charlottesville? Not sure. As you can hear in this newsletter, the community faces a lot of problems. This newsletter intends to try to track as much of it as I can and I appreciate your reading and listening. I do not know the answers and my role is never to tell you what to think. Thanks for reading.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

On today’s show:

Charlottesville Public Schools hires Royal Gurley as the next superintendent

Albemarle’s Board of Supervisors discusses legislative priorities for the next General Assembly session

An update on the pandemic

There are 4,070 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia reported today by the Virginia Department of Health. Since Wednesday, there have been 361 new cases reported in the Blue Ridge Health District. Tomorrow the University of Virginia men’s football team will play and attendees will be required to wear masks in any indoor spaces, though outdoor use is strongly recommended. (UVA update)

“People who are not vaccinated are also required to wear masks outside on UVA property so there’s not a process of checking who is vaccinated or not,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at UVA Health. “The delta variant can cause breakthrough infections so in this setting with 30,000, 40,000 people in close proximity to one another, wearing a mask during the game is advised.”

Dr. Sifri said the delta variant is fueling the recent spike in cases and modeling data indicates that infections will continue to rise.

“What’s more difficult to tell, I think, is when is the surge going to occur, and at what level, but I think it’s clear we’re on the upsurge right now,” Dr. Sifri said.

Virginia has now administered more than 10 million doses of vaccine, and 57 percent of the total population has been fully vaccinated and 68.1 percent of adults are fully vaccinated. Yet, the increase in cases has caused UVA to go back to higher mitigation measures.

“Back to universal masking, decreasing visitors and other folks in the institution to try to minimize the virus coming in and out,” said Dr. Reid Adams, the chief medical officer at the University of Virginia. “I think probably the biggest difference is the mask recommendation rather than a mandate throughout the Commonwealth. That’s probably the biggest different from the prior part of the pandemic.”

Another change is that public schools are in session five days a week with attendance by anyone who chooses to be back for in-person instruction.

For now. Amherst County Public Schools are closed until at least September 13 due to a high number of positive tests at a community-wide testing event held this past Tuesday.

In their first action item at their September 2, 2021 meeting, the Charlottesville School Board filled an important leadership position. James Bryant is the body’s vice chair.

“Madam Chair, I would like to make a motion to move for the acceptance of the appointment or Dr. Royal A. Gurley Jr. for Superintendent of Charlottesville Schools,” Bryant said.

Gurley will take the reins on October 4 as he finishes up his time as assistant superintendent for academic services in Dinwiddie County southwest of Petersburg. (press release)

“Leading Charlottesville City Schools is not something that I take lightly,” Gurley told the Board after signing his four-year contract. “I believe as Superintendent I must continue to create opportunities for our students and help them to reach their fullest potential.”

Gurley succeeds Rosa Atkins, who retired at the end of May after fifteen years in the position.

Later this month, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will take up a rezoning for 332 housing units off U.S. 29 in Hollymead. In June, the Planning Commission voted six to one to recommend approval of the RST Residences project. That advisory body appeared not ready to make that recommendation in March when they saw a slightly larger version. (listen to March 5 podcast)

Last week, one member of the Board of Supervisors met with the Forest Lakes Community Association, a homeowners group whose Board of Directors have opposed the project.

“I listened to their concerns regarding development that is coming up and it was a good opportunity to meet with a lot of the residents and I really appreciated that,” said Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District.

The proposal states that 75 percent of the units will be within the county’s affordability guidelines. To learn more about the Planning Commission’s action, read Allison Wrabel’s coverage in the Daily Progress. The item goes to the Board of Supervisors on September 15.

Now time for the second Patreon-fueled shout-out:

What’s your perfect holiday weekend in Charlottesville? Hanging with friends outside... Great live music... Maybe breaking a Guinness world record? Then mark your calendar for WTJU 91.1 FM's Freefall Music Festival -- Saturday, September 4 starting at 3 p.m. at IX Art Park. Live performances by Zuzu's Hot Five, Susie and the Pistols, and Good Dog Nigel. There will be an attempt to form the world's largest human music note at 7:30 p.m. Plus, a hot dog and veggie dog cookout for our whole community. Find out more at wtju.net.

With only four months left in the year, the 2022 General Assembly session looms large and localities across the Commonwealth are putting together their legislative wish lists. Albemarle County will meet with area legislators in November with the hopes of enticing each to carry bills for changes in state law. (read list of 2021 legislative positions)

One request has the title “Enable Civil Penalties in Lieu of Criminal Punishment.”

“The purpose was to decriminalize a lot of the actions that are prohibited under the code,” said county attorney Greg Kamptner.

Many of these actions relate to zoning violations and would convert them to civil infractions rather than criminal ones. Some supervisors were concerned that frequent violators are still able to be held accountable. (sample legislation)

“I just want to make sure we’re not doing anything that makes it more difficult to deal with the so-called frequent fliers,” said Supervisor Diantha McKeel of the Jack Jouett District. “I recognize that there are not that many of them, but the ones that we have have just really consumed an enormous number of staff time.”

Zoning administrator Bart Svoboda said if the change was made, the county would be able to request higher fines for repeated violations.

“There may be some additional tools in the toolbox as we apply this to other sections of the county code,” Svoboda said.

Another legislative priority is to change law to require inspections and building standards for structures built for events and operations on agricultural properties.

“The buildings under current law do not have to meet the minimum requirements of the building code,” Kamptner said.

Kamptner said the agricultural community and the Farm Bureau would need to be involved in order for the legislation to have a chance of passing.

Supervisor Ann Mallek of the White Hall district said buildings where events are held should at the least be required to have features like panic bars in case of emergencies. She hoped to get support from her colleagues to move the legislation forward.

“If people want to put a tractor or livestock in some building, that’s different than having 300 people there,” Mallek said.

Another legislative idea is to expand an already approved law that allows photo-speed monitoring cameras to be used in school crossing zones and highway work zones. (HB1442 from 2020)

“The idea would be to expand the enabling authority to allow localities to decide whether they want to place these devices on rural roads,” Kamptner said.

LaPisto-Kirtley said police struggle to enforce speeding on two-lane roads in the rural area.

“I think long stretches of the rural roads where there it is virtually impossible for the police to ticket someone because if they do stop someone on a two-lane road it’s going to cause a mile-long back up,” LaPisto-Kirtley said.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel suggested the legislation be tailored for specific roads rather than a blanket provision. She also said Albemarle has yet to implement the authority it currently has.

“Our police department is still looking at that,” McKeel said. “They’re going to have to come back to us to let us know if they think they can even do that.”

Kamptner said the 2020 bill that gave enabling authority for cameras at work and school zones had originally included residential areas, but that was removed in order for it to pass.

“The concern that we have in our county are the crashes and the number of deaths which would indicate high speed so if we were to pursue these devices in locations at above 35 miles per hour that would take us out of the traditional residential areas,” Kamptner said.

Supervisors also discussed legislation to allow a portion of recordation tax to be set aside for affordable housing initiatives. They opted to not pursue legislation, but to instead find out whether they can take that step without additional enabling authority.

A final vote on the 2022 legislative agenda will be held in October.

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The name of the initiative is Cville Plans Together, but an attempt to update the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan to increase the number of affordable places to live at times seems like it could tear the community apart. Here’s one of over 50 community members who spoke this week during a five-hour work session on the topic.

“I wish this whole thing had been approached in a different way because it’s been so divisive and I’m sad to hear citizens of our community so upset with one another and I also wish we’d been able to talk in person,” said Mary Whittle.

On this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, a summary and recap of the review and preparation of an aspirational map intended to guide future development. I’m your host and guide, Sean Tubbs.

Most people in the community are unfamiliar with much of the jargon, but I’ve spent a good chunk of my career trying to explain the terms required to explain how the pieces fit together. Societies are complex organisms that have no instruction manual, but the goal of this newsletter and podcast, each and every time, is to help you better understand what’s happening. Thanks for listening.

In today’s first Substack-fueled shout-out, Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects with the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department, and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. Visit codeforcville.org to learn about those projects, and to sign up for a new volunteer orientation coming up this Saturday, September 4, at 4 p.m.

With four months to go until the end of 2021, the chair of the Charlottesville Planning Commission is hopeful Council will adopt a Comprehensive Plan before the clock strikes 2022. That will mark two years since the launch of the Cville Plans Together initiative. The firm Rhodeside & Harwell is leading the completion of the Comprehensive Plan, and subcontractor HR & Advisors has created an affordable housing plan that Council adopted in March. Preliminary work is underway on a rewrite of the zoning ordinance.

All of the work is done to fulfil a previous City Council’s request in the spring of 2019 to hire a firm to complete work on all three. Before we begin, let’s review the languages in the request for proposals. (read the RFP).

“Housing is at the root of historical structural inequity and oppression in the United States, and it came to be this way deliberately,” reads the request for proposals. “As we build a strategy to achieve a local housing landscape that is healthy, ample, high quality, and affordable, we must be equally deliberate in dismantling the dynamics and the structures that perpetuate continued inequity—structures that often go unnoticed by those of us who benefit from them or don’t directly experience their harm.”

In Late August, Rhodeside and Harwell released the third version of something called the Future Land Use Map which is intended to guide future development. In late March, the Planning Commission directed Rhodeside & Harwell to increase potential residential density allowed across the entire city but mostly in single-family neighborhoods. Some in those neighborhoods pushed back, and a third map balanced the two previous drafts.

At a work session on August 31, the Planning Commission met for over five and a half hours to weigh in on the map. While not a public hearing, nearly sixty people spoke during the virtual meeting.

At the outset, RHI Project Manager Jennifer Koch stressed they were not reviewing a final product.

“This is a draft and we expect there may be adjustments that may be made to it,” Koch said. “If we do make revisions to the map after tonight, the Future Land Use Map, we will make it clear how and why those changes were made.”

The Commission also reviewed the Land Use chapter of the Comprehensive Plan, which is connected to the Future Land Use Map.

“The land use map is connected to a variety of not only goals and strategies but also this overall chapter vision statement of what Charlottesville wants to be in the future related to land use, urban form, and historic and cultural preservation,” Koch said.

During her review of public engagement, Koch summarized two major camps that emerged during the input process earlier this spring.

“People who live in neighborhoods that are currently single family neighborhoods, there was a lot of expression of concern related to community character, development scale, and whatnot,” Koch said. “But I want to note there were a lot of comments and support for more housing, affordability and density in the city.”

Koch said the Future Land Use Map is intended to implement the major tenets of the affordable housing plan. The current map dates back to 2013 and most of the city’s land is designated for low intensity residential. Beginning with the second draft map released in late April, that base level that has been renamed to General Residential.

“What we were talking about at this point was to allow up to three units on those sites and a lot of those right now are currently zoned for single family use only,” Koch said. “So that represented a potential tripling of what was allowed in those areas.”

Another change to General Residential is the ability for a property owner to build a fourth unit on a lot if that unit were kept below the fair market rent.

Corridors and nodes

Before we get too much further, a little bit of history. You might want to take a look at the implementation chapter from the city’s 2001 Comprehensive Plan. The word “corridor” is used over four dozen times. Here are a few examples from a plan adopted by City Council 20 years ago.

“We will support initiatives to increase commercial, retail and residential growth opportunities in our commercial corridors,” reads a progressive economic center vision principle.

“We will increase the amount of market rate, higher density residential housing downtown and along the economic development corridors,” reads a residential opportunities principle.

“Adopt zoning changes and urban design criteria to implement the recommendations of the Corridor Study,” reads a section on land use and zoning changes.

That study refers to a December 2000 Commercial Corridor Study that heavily influenced the last major zoning citywide zoning change in 2003. If you’ve ever wondered why there are taller buildings on West Main Street or dense apartment complexes on Jefferson Park Extended, that rezoning is why. (read about the study on cvillepedia)

Koch and her team of planners built all three drafts of the Future Land Use Map on the 2013 land use map, which builds off of the one from 2007 Comprehensive Plan. The review process never really ends.

But, a new plan has to be adopted, and on August 31, 2021, Koch wanted to explain a bit more about corridors and nodes.

“I want to be clear that when we’re talking about corridors and nodes in the city, we do have those land use categories that are called mixed-use nodes, mixed-use corridors,” Koch said. “But when we talk about a development pattern that is sort of node and corridor centric, we are also looking at things like residential corridors, you know, nodes of residential intensity.”

For instance, maps designate a section of Cherry Avenue west of Roosevelt Brown as increasing to Medium Density Residential. That’s within walking distance to Buford Middle School, a facility proposed to be upgraded in the near future to accommodate 6th graders. That area is also near Forest Hills Park and Fifeville Park.

“We’ve looked at how can we put potential intensity near schools and near parks, and that’s been important from the beginning of this process,” Koch said.

In the second version of the map, most of the Lewis Mountain neighborhood was designated as Medium Intensity Residential as were portions of the Greenbrier and Barracks / Rugby neighboorhoods. However, feedback led the consultants to scale back some of those to General Residential.

“We heard concerns about some locations of the medium intensity residential and the mixed-use nodes, and we heard concerns about the city’s ability to plan for infrastructure in advance of development, and that includes traffic, transportation, utility, stormwater, and other types of infrastructure,” Koch said.

Koch said others are concerned that simply allowing more housing units will not lead to reduced prices.

“We heard a lot of people who said density does not equal affordability and we 100 percent agree with that,” Koch said. “The land use map alone will not get to the housing goals that we have for Charlottesville.”

There has been concern about people being displaced from neighborhoods that have historically been home to Black residents and people with lower-incomes. For many years, real estate investors and wealthier households have purchased single family homes in 10th and Page, Fifeville, and Rose Hill and invested in them. A feature of the third draft of the Future Land Use Map would seek to restrict intense development in these areas.

“In the Future Land use map, to reduce the allowable intensity in those areas, we are proposing this Sensitive Community overlay that could then potentially include less development intensity in the zoning,” Koch said. “But we have heard mixed opinions on whether allowing less development in those areas would be preferable for those who may be in those at-risk communities. We want to make sure we’re not impacting potential wealth-building in those communities.”

We’ll hear more details about the changes in this third iteration of the map as Commissioners ask questions. For now, Koch said the changes made to the map, including the conditional allowance of a fourth unit in General Residential, could help the city attain its housing goals.

Over fifty people speak at public comment

Koch spoke for nearly an hour before members of the public were allowed to give their inputs. At that point in the call, there were 238 people watching the Zoom call. Over the course of the five hours meeting, nearly sixty people would speak. There’s not enough time to go through it all, but before we hear what Commissioners and the City Council think, let’s hear some voices skeptical opposed to the map.

“We had no idea that the ultimate goal of Charlottesville was to have this high density area,” said Michelle Rowan. “We specifically looked for something close to the hospital, R-1, coming off of acreage. That’s what we were looking for.”

“Is it really an issue of affordable housing or is it really an issue of poverty?” said Fred Borch. “Is the issue of poverty whether or not housing is affordable?”

“Census data has shown that construction of new homes in the city has outpaced the city’s population growth,” said Kaki Pearson.

“If the city of Charlottesville is serious about redressing housing and racial injustices, they could create a program to target individuals and families much like the voucher program created in Evanston, Illinois, where aggrieved African-Americans only need to show that they were descendants of residents during a certain time period,” said someone who was on the zoom call as Mary Simpson. “Instead, our government is proposing to dismantle single-family neighborhoods like mine. Yes, I will be punished twice. Let me be clear. I don’t want 12-unit buildings or commercial establishments in my neighborhood. I don’t want the traffic, the trash, the noise, the crime, and all of that which naturally accompanies denser neighborhoods.”

“I really would like to just make a huge plea to slow down the process and expand it,” said Martha Smythe. “We are still living in a pandemic which has changed everything and we’re talking about a rezoning which projects to alter everything in the city and I see no reason to rush it.”

“This plan being presented by the consulting team is what I believe to be an ideological blueprint for pro-density interests,” said Philip Harway.

“I want to confess that I do not share your goal of increasing density in the city and I don’t recall ever that ever being on any ballot presented to the citizens,” said Andrew Grimshaw.

There were also many comments in favor of the plan.

“I’m a little puzzled at all the outrage behind what’s being proposed given that the unit that I live in currently is pretty emblematic of a lot of the proposed changes, which is a converted house that looks just like all of the other houses on the block,” said Brendan Novak. “The only difference is that I can afford to live there whereas I could not live in an entire single family home for example.”

“Something that we noticed when were looking at the side-by-side slide of the August map and the May map is that there is in general a lot less gray in the historically exclusionary neighborhoods, the white neighborhoods,” said attorney Caroline Klosko with the Legal Aid Justice Center, speaking on behalf of the Charlottesville Low-Income Housing Coalition. “North Downtown, Lewis Mountain Road. Locust Grove. Barracks / Rugby. There’s less allowance for medium density than under the May version of the map and we think this is a step backwards and we’re disappointed by this.

“I hope we can move back in the direction that the first Future Land Use Map was going,” said Chris Schopper. “I feel like we’ve taken a step back.”

“I think that cutting down the General Residential stories from 3.5 to two is going to create issues in the long run,” said Tim Giles. “We’re going to have houses that can’t even be built in existing R-1 neighborhoods.”

“It’s important that this process considers to take the needs of renters and center them as we are fifty percent renters and probably will grow as that demand grows with the University of Virginia’s growth,” said Oliver Platts-Mills, a developer with several holdings in the Fifesville and Rose Hill neighborhood.

“I think you need to support a version of this plan that increases density across the city and allows all sorts of people who want to live here to be able to move here,” said David Singerman.

“I’d just like to express my support for the May revision that had more substantial changes to density across the city and I’d like to express my support for greater density in historically exclusionary neighborhoods as well as neighborhoods across the city,” said Jamelle Bouie.

You’re reading a special edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement on the Charlottesville Planning Commission’s August 31 work session on the Future Land Use Map and the Comprehensive Plan.

In today’s second Substack-supported public service announcement: The Charlottesville Jazz Society at cvillejazz.org is dedicated to the promotion, preservation, and preservation of jazz, and there’s no time like now to find a time to get out and watch people love to play. The Charlottesville Jazz Society keeps a running list of what’s coming up at cvillejazz.org. This week, find out that the Charles Owen Trio plays at Miller’s Downtown on Friday at 9:30 p.m., Zuzu’s Hot 5 will play the WTJU Free Fall Concert on Saturday, and the Beleza Trio plays at Potter’s Craft Cider also on Saturday. For details, visit cvillejazz.org.

But what did the Commissioners think?

When it was their turn, Commissioners had five minutes to ask questions and make comments. Commissioner Jody Lahendro has served on the advisory body since August 2014 and is one of the most critical voices on the Commission.

“I have been doing a lot of reading and most of the literature that I’ve come across has concluded that simply adding density does little to nothing to adding affordability to a city, or affordable units to a city,” Lahendro said.

The current draft allows a fourth unit in General Residential if it is subsidized or sold below its market value. Lahendro expressed skepticism.

“Why wouldn’t developers simply turn single family parcels into three residential units and take the money and run?” Lahendro asked. “Is the fourth unit based on some kind of data?”

Koch repeated that the Future Land Use Map and the zoning would not be enough, and that tools in the affordable housing plan would be required. But, size of units could play a role in bringing down housing costs.

“There is an opportunity to provide units that are more sort of naturally affordable if they are at a size that is not available in a neighborhood right now,” Koch said.

The zoning rewrite will be overseen by subcontractor Code Studio. Lee Einsweiler is the founding principal.

“You’re right, Jody,” Einsweiler said. “There’s no specific evidence that that fourth unit is somehow magically more affordable. It is just a trade-off we felt was reasonable for adding to our original three that if you were going to add more we needed some guarantee that some portion might be affordable.”

Lahendro said he could not support the additional density without precautions. He said developers will purchase existing homes, tear them down, and build three units where they can.

“The land has become more valuable now than the buildings that are on it,” Lahendro said. “Given the opportunity to provide more housing units on the same parcel of land through upzoning, developers will build more units but at market rates that will not meet the affordability definition.”

Lahendro said he could support the density of or three additional units in single-family zoning in if the units were guaranteed to be rented or sold at affordable levels. As a general rule, households who pay more than 30 percent of their income for the roof of their head are considered distressed.

Commissioner Lyle Solla-Yates said areas near the University of Virginia such as the Lewis Mountain neighborhood should be places where children in low-income families can live and have opportunity. He studied the changes to the Future Land Use Map over the weekend.

“And I only saw really large reductions in potential affordable housing there,” Solla-Yates said. “I didn’t understand it. I understand there has been public comment calling for less, especially among the highest-income homeowners. That’s really the big group that’s been pushing this story.”

Commissioner Taneia Dowell went next. She also supported Lahendro’s idea of an overlay district for additional units only if all are affordable.

“I too have some heartburn about the density in this plan,” Dowell said.

The newest Commissioner is Karim Habbab, who joined the advisory body earlier this summer.

“I think we need more assertive language regarding affordable housing and the affordability of the affordable housing throughout all different intensities and zoning requirements, not just the General Residential one,” Habbab said. “I think it could apply to most of them.”

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg began his comments with a pointed question to the consultants.

“How do you decide whose opinions matter?” Stolzenberg said. “We’ve heard many hundreds of people’s feedback. Many people are arguing for one thing while many others are arguing for the direct opposite.”

Koch said the consultants have tried to strike a balance between multiple points of view.

“In terms of who we are listening to, we are trying to make that equity and affordability piece maintain strength and we think we have while also making compromise,” Koch said. “We are not swinging wildly one way or the other. I would say if we did that, if we really listened specifically to certain neighborhoods, a lot of these neighborhoods outside of those sensitive communities would not have any additional increase in potential density at all.”

Back to affordability. Stolzenberg said the city needs to provide incentives to developers if anyone is ever going to build the fourth unit. He said the nonprofit housing groups may not be interested unless they can build certain kinds of units in more places.

“My understanding in talking to our local housing nonprofits is that we have a couple of rental-oriented ones that don’t build buildings that size and you need at least 40 or 50 to get to a [Low-Income Housing Tax Credits] application,” Stolzenberg said. “And then we have homeownership ones like Habitat and the Community Land Trust. And for them, I think what they’re really seeking is for townhomes and in particular stacked townhomes. They keep saying stacked townhomes. That’s the fastest path to get affordability because land is so expensive and you can half the cost of land.”

Stolzenberg also said he did not favor a reduction in the number of stories allowed in General Residential from 3.5 in the second draft to 2.5 in the third. Commissioner Liz Russell picked up on this thread.

“It seems that the definition of missing middle housing is 2.5 to 3 stories, so if that’s what we say we want then that explains the reduction from 3.5 stories,” Russell said.

Russell said the process should result in a city that provides choices in housing.

“A range of housing opportunities in a way that is sensitive to the built form of our existing neigborhoods,” Russell said. “I think that’s what Cville Plans is working toward and I think it’s our role as Planning Commisioners to guide the density more specifically and not leave it to the market to decide what is built and what is affordable.”

This was Hosea Mitchell’s last meeting as chair. As such, he thought he would be candid in what said about the latest draft.

“The latest iteration disappoints,” Mitchell said. “The affordable housing plan that the consultants put together was designed to promote zoning and development that increased multifamily development in a way that buoyed equity and buoyed affordability in Charlottesville.”

Mitchell said the latest draft does not do enough to combat the long history of exclusionary zoning. Mitchell said he would support four stories in General Residential in places where it would make sense.

Three City Councilors weigh-in

The Commission’s role is advisory. Elected officials will make the final call. Let’s hear from three of them. First, Councilor Lloyd Snook.

“We have to remember that the Future Land Use Map is part of the Comprehensive Plan,” Snook said. “It is only about three pages of the Comprehensive Plan. The purpose of the Comprehensive Plan is to plan to deal with current and emerging problems. It is not particularly frankly to only preserve existing neighborhoods, though in some instances that could be a problem that we’re trying to address.”

Snook said the three values the Comprehensive Plan should address are racial equity, climate change, and affordable housing.

“Number three is dealing with all varieties of affordable housing,” Snook said. “We have to recognize that at the moment Charlottesville is becoming increasingly unaffordable for virtually everybody and that includes people who are making 100 percent of [area median income], not just 80 percent or 40 percent of 50 percent.”

Snook also said he wanted to see more information about the costs of building multiple units within one building.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker was on City Council in February 2019 when the decision was made to hire a firm to finish the Comprehensive Plan.

“I understand that a lot of people are challenged by Charlottesville, what has happened with past developments, the increase in pricing of housing and land, but there are certain members of our population who without us prioritizing them and especially the lower [area median income] they won’t be able to figure out in Charlottesville or existing areas,” Walker said.

Councilor Michael Payne said the Comprehensive Plan gives the change to change Charlottesville’s ecosystem for the better.

“Opening up the opportunity for more affordable homeownership and rental opportunity throughout the entire city and directly confronting the reasons that those opportunities aren’t available and allow more affordable duplexes, triplexes, townhomes to be built instead of having a system where you can only build a single family homes that’s selling for $600,000 or $700,000 in many cases,”

Payne said he was concerned that the latest version of the map was a step back in terms of meeting the city’s affordable housing goals. He said the longer the delay, the worse the housing ecosystem will get.

“Every day, week, month, and year the status quo continues and we know exactly what the status quo is, it’s gentrification, it’s displacement, it’s all the things that people continue to highlight as problems in our city,” Payne said.

Next steps?

Koch said she and her team will return to the Planning Commission at their regular meeting on September 14 for that review, and there is a work session slot reserved for September 21. The official public hearing will take place in October.

Between now and then, what are you going to do if you’re a Charlottesville resident? Have you taken a look at the map? Have you talked to your neighbors? As you’ve heard in this program, there are many opinions and thoughts. As you continue to read or listen to Charlottesville Community Engagement, I’ll continue to track this story, alongside the many other stories I write about land use, growth, economic development, and more of what makes this community function. Or not function. It’s a matter of perspective, but I’ll be here, documenting from as many views as I can.

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Today’s first Patreon fueled shout-out is a new one.

On today’s show:

A quick rundown on a couple of transit planning exercises and new routes in the area

Information on how area hotels have been doing this summer, and how the make-up of an area tourist board may change

The same firm that’s studying’s UVA’s housing initiative has been hired by the city’s public housing agency for a redevelopment study

Former Warren County EDA director indicted on federal fraud charges

Before we begin today, another COVID update. The Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,487 new cases today. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 75 new cases. The agency put out an alert late Monday evening that all localities under its jurisdiction are experiencing a high level of community transmission.

“As we experience this surge in cases, we urge all individuals, businesses, and other organizations to take prevention measures that include masks indoors and physical distancing,” reads the email. “The Delta variant is the dominant strain of the virus and the primary driver of recent high transmission rates of COVID-19 because it spreads more easily than earlier strains of the virus.”

This afternoon, the Virginia Department of Health announced the receipt of $4.3 million from the Centers for Disease Control to hire more community health workers to address the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The Virginia initiative will focus on geographic areas of Virginia with high rates of COVID-19 identified by project partners,” reads the release. “Those areas include parts of the Richmond metro region, Norfolk, Portsmouth, the Danville area, and the Southwest Virginia communities served by the Mount Rogers Health District.”

Governor Ralph Northam has declared a state of emergency related to the approach of Tropical Depression Ida. Heavy flooding is predicted across much of the state, particularly in southwest Virginia. The move allows the Commonwealth to mobilize forces to assist in a variety of different emergency situations.

“Given the storm’s current forecast, the Commonwealth will assist localities, especially those with vulnerable populations, to provide support in response to a large-scale weather event during the COVID-19 pandemic,” reads Executive Order 81..

A collision in Charlottesville Monday afternoon between a pickup truck and a cement truck killed the driver of the pickup truck. The crash occurred at a construction site on Druid Avenue. The 53-year-old driver was initially taken to the University of Virginia hospital but soon died from the injuries. According to a release from the city, the driver of the cement truck was not injured and is cooperating with an investigation.

The former director of the Economic Development Authority for both the Town of Front Royal and Warren County has been indicted on several federal fraud charges. Jennifer Rae McDonald, 44, is accused of wire fraud, bank fraud, aggravated identity theft, and money laundering.

“McDonald, through her position as executive director at the EDA, had access to funds belonging to the EDA and, as the indictment alleges, used EDA funds to pay on debt owed by her, other individuals, and LLCs she controlled, to purchase real property for which she often earned commissions as a real estate agent, and to purchase real property in the name of an LLC she controlled,” reads the release.

In all McDonald faces 34 counts for activities from June 2014 to December 2018. Several other people have been charged with crimes, including the entire Warren County Board of Supervisors. For more on the story take a look at coverage from Alex Bridges in the Northern Virginia Daily.

Now it’s time to pick back up from last week’s meeting of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau Board of Directors. The CACVB is an entity funded in part by transient lodging taxes that seeks to market the area for tourism. One key metric is the hotel occupancy rate. That figure was higher this summer than last year but still below pre-pandemic levels. Courtney Cacatian is the director of CACVB.

“My understanding is that’s largely due to employment challenges but some of our properties are doing better than others on that front,” Cacatian said.

After that update, Cacatian gave the Board updates on efforts to update marketing plans. That starts with data on what people who don’t live here know about the area.

“We received some research from SIR, a firm based in Richmond, and they had let us know that when our past visitors come to Charlottesville and Albemarle County, they are 83 percent more likely to make a return trip to this region,” Cacatian said. “With our prospective visitors, there was a major need here to let people know who we are and what we’re all about to attract them here in the future.”

What are your observations about how other people perceive the area? Leave a comment. I’m curious to know these things.

In any case, there are currently two City Councilors and two Albemarle Supervisors on the CACVB Board. Earlier this year, several members of the tourism sector asked the Board to consider changing its make-up to include industry members. That may happen according to this bit of information from Albemarle County Executive Jeffrey Richardson.

“I did go back and speak to the Board of Supervisors and the Board has indicated to me that they would be willing to move forward with the City of Charlottesville to look at the recommendations for modifying the existing [CACVB] Board.”

City Manager Chip Boyles said City Council will discuss amending the CACVB Board as well, but it’s not the elected officials’ positions that localities would give up.

“I was able to go back and converse with each of our City Council members and the consensus there is that likewise with Albemarle County we would be open to considering a change,” Boyles. “I think the discussion was that the City Manager and Chief Administrative Officer positions would possibly be replaced with industry representatives.”

Still remaining to work out are the specifics over those industry representatives.

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: Help support Black-owned business in the Charlottesville area. Check out the Charlottesville Black Business Directory at cvilleblackbiz.com and choose between a variety of goods and services, ranging from beauty supplies, professional services, and e-commerce. Visit cvilleblackbiz.com as soon as you can to get started!

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District is in the midst of conducting two studies related to transit, one of which is focused on increasing the amount of service in urban portions of Albemarle County. Lucinda Shannon is the planner working on the projects.

“We have two different grants that we are working on,” Shannon said. “The transit expansion study is a short-term project and it’s just within Albemarle County and it’s to expand transit services in the near term.”

Two public input sessions were held in late July and the goal is to have a feasibility study in place early next year. (See also Studying the Expansion of Transit in Albemarle, August 11, 2021)

“The transit vision plan is a little bit longer and it’s for the long-term project and it’s for the entire region so it’s going to go over about 18 months and should be completed on June 30, 2022,” Shannon said.

The plan is intended to present steps towards implementing a regional system.

“Right now we’re in the gathering information phase,” Shannon said. “We’ve kicked off the project and we’re made data requests from providers and gathered land use. We’re developing a website and a logo.”

You can also look forward to an interactive survey and map on the topic. To learn more about transit in this area, do go back and read or listen to the August 27, 2021 edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Outside of this newsletter’s immediate coverage is Bedford County, which launches its first public transportation service on Wednesday with a 21-passenger vehicle known as the Otter Bus. This service is a partnership between the Town of Bedford and the Bedford Community Health Foundation.

Also beginning Wednesday is the Afton Express, which will provide service between Staunton and Charlottesville. That service will be operated by BRITE.

Now let’s load up the time machine and go back eight days to the August 23, 2021 meeting of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. One item on the agenda was the hiring of a real estate firm to conduct a sustainability review of the CRHA’s properties and holdings. John Sales is the CRHA executive director.

“We are looking to undertake a sustainability plan to determine the future redevelopment and positioning of the housing authority’s assets to expand for and prepare for redevelopment,” Sales said.

The firm to be hired is Northern Real Estate Urban Ventures. That’s the same firm that’s been working with the University of Virginia on an initiative to plan and build up to 1,500 affordable housing units on land owned by UVA or its real estate foundation.

“We have already started redeveloping multiple sites and planning for the Sixth Street redevelopment and working to create a couple of resident planners for Westhaven,” Sales said. “So we’ve already started but we really do need to have a game plan about how we’d like to redevelop all of these sites.”

Sales said the study will try to determine what needs to be built and would include suggestions for new units that could be built to serve people with federal housing vouchers. New construction being built today is renting at too high levels for many to use that system.

“Developers aren’t building the housing units that are needed for the individuals that are getting the vouchers,” Sales said.

Northern Real Estate Urban Ventures will be paid up to $229,960 for the work. They were one of two finalists. (resolution)

A previous CRHA Board adopted a master plan in the summer of 2010, but the current renovation of Crescent Halls and the building of new units at South First Street did not directly follow that blueprint. For reference, you can read that old plan on cvillepedia.

The CRHA Board also narrowly approved a resolution to hire a firm to run video surveillance cameras on CRHA properties for security purposes.

“Residents have continued to ask for this ever since I’ve been with CRHA as a director, and that’s been been about a year ago in August,” Sales said. “There was a lot of violence and a lot of shootings going on at several of the sites and residents continued to ask about cameras and why CRHA didn’t have cameras.”

The CRHA Board adopted a policy on cameras at their meeting in July. Provisions are in the policy to make sure footage is not used for other reasons, but some residents want to know if that means footage can be used to see if residents are violating the terms of their lease.

“We have not expanded the cameras for that roll yet, but those are conversations that are starting to happen in the safety committee,” Sales said.

The vote was not unanimous. Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker voted against the contract out of a concern that the cameras will eventually be used to punish and harass residents.

“I think it’s just a really slippery slope and I think until people are impacted negatively they won’t even really realize,” Walker said.

The move was supported by the Public Housing Association of Residents. Shelby Marie Edwards is the executive director.

“I think everybody on this call probably knows that the Sixth Street residents have sustained quite a bit of violence over the past month or so, really all summer,” Edwards said. “The residents I was talking to there, I was talking to them and they said it would be really have something tangible to look forward to next. I do hear everything that the Mayor said about systemic oppression and how the use of cameras could go left, and we’ve been trying our due diligence to let people know about that but the fact of the matter is there’s something very real in front of them and they are hopeful the cameras will be able to help mitigate that violence.”

Walker was joined by CRHA Chair A’Lelia Henry in voting against it, but it passed on a 3-2 motion. Two Commissioners were absent from the meeting.

The contract with Turnkey will be for $186,040.

There may be more from this meeting of the CRHA in a future installment of the show.

Thanks for reading and listening. Just a reminder that for $25 a month in Patreon, you get to direct four shout-outs a month! That amount will go up soon, but this is a very good way to get info in front of people in a way that supports production. Visit the Patreon site to learn more.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout:

On today’s show:

An update on COVID numbers from over the weekend

A representative from King Family Vineyards on the area’s wine industry

A draft of the Crozet Master Plan is ready for review

The architect for Charlottesville City School reconfiguration wants feedback on the latest design schemes

The number of fully vaccinated Virginians continues to increase and is now at a total of 56.6 percent of the whole population and 67.7 percent of adults. The seven-day average for new cases each day is now 3,112 and the percent positivity has increased to 10.1 percent.

The percent positivity in the Blue Ridge Health District has increased to 6.3 percent with 54 new cases reported today. The agency sent out an email at publication stating there is now a high level of community transmission. Officials are urging people to wear masks and return to physical distancing.

To the south, Amherst County schools have reverted to virtual instruction due to a COVID outbreak. In-person instruction will begin again on September 2 and all students will have to show a negative test to enter classrooms. If they refuse, they will have to stay home until September 7.

The public school systems in both Albemarle County and Charlottesville have public dashboards with the number of cases. (Charlottesville Schools tracker) (Albemarle County Schools tracker)

Speaking of schools, the Charlottesville City Schools system is seeking feedback on various design schemes for the multi-million reconfiguration of elementary and middle schools. The architectural firm VMDO has produced a series of potential upgrades to both Walker Upper Elementary School and Buford Middle School. Walker would be converted to a pre-K facility and 6th grade would be added at Buford, with 5th graders distributed across the existing elementary schools.

The Charlottesville School Board will get a project update on Thursday, and the City Council will get an update on October 4. Council will be asked to provide direction on October 18. The current five year capital improvement program budget sets aside $50 million for the project, but that number is not expected to cover the full cost. (fill out the survey)

Later this week we’ll hear a lot about the Comprehensive Plan process in Charlottesville. Last week, the full draft of the Crozet Master Plan was released for public comment and it might be worth comparing the two.

The Crozet Master Plan is part of Albemarle County’s Comprehensive Plan and an update has been in development for the past two years. The draft has been produced internally by planners in the Albemarle Department of Community Development and is similar in design to the Rio Road / 29 Small Area Plan and the update of the Pantops Master Plan. There are five chapters in the 137-page plan. A questionnaire is open through September 14, which is also the day of the public hearing before the Albemarle Planning Commission. The Board of Supervisors will hold their public hearing on October 20. (read the draft here)

A researcher at Virginia Tech wants your help to find out if there are any pine snakes in the Commonwealth. The last sighting of this non-venomous snake was over 30 years ago, according to a release from the College of Natural Resources and Environment. If you think you’ve seen one and can provide documentation, Assistant Professor Kevin Hamed wants to hear from you. You can get his information here.

“Pinesnakes (aka bull snakes) provide ecosystem services to humans by preying on many creatures that cause homeowners problems, such as small mammals,” reads a press release from August 26. “A better understanding of their current distribution in Virginia is needed to manage and conserve these amazing reptiles.”

The typical pinesnake is around 50 inches long, and is not to be confused with either the eastern hog-nosed snake, or the juvenile eastern ratsnake.

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: The Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

Charlottesville is not the only college town in Virginia that may have been undercounted in the 2020 U.S. Census due to the closure of universities at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Demographer Hamilton Lombard of the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia told the Harrisonburg Citizen last week that that city’s population count may be as much as 2,000 below where it should be based on a comparison with housing data from building permits. The official count in the Census is 51,484, which is much lower than the Weldon Cooper Center’s 2020 estimate of 54,094. Charlottesville’s count of 46,553 is lower than the Weldon Cooper estimate of 49,447. To listen to more from Lombard, go back and review the August 21, 2021 installment of this newsletter.

Albemarle County leads the Commonwealth of Virginia in the amount of acreage of grapes planted for wine.

“Just over 700 acres right now,” said James King of King Family Vineyards. “Loudoun County in northern Virginia currently takes second place with 33 percent fewer acres planted, so Albemarle County leads the way by a large margin.

King made those comments last week to the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau, which featured him as a guest to talk about the role the wine industry plays in tourism.

“While a lot of other agricultural sectors like produce and other crops have seen consolidation, over the last few years, viticulture in Virginia continues to be very much a family-owned operation and enterprise,” King said.

King said there were seven wineries in Virginia in 1979 and that number has grown to over 300. King Family Vineyards opened in 1998 and is part of the Monticello Wine Trall, which has grown to 40.

“In agritourism, wineries tend to thrive in clusters,” King said. “Guests often multiple wineries in a day so when wineries opens down the road, it ends being good business for everybody.”

However, King said the industry faces many challenges, including unpredictable weather and threats to the grapes.

“We’re always battling Mother Nature, whether it is frost in the spring or invasive species in the summer,” King said. “Right now it’s the spotted lanternfly from China.”

King used his time to appeal to elected officials on the CACVB to not further restrict public events, which he said generates money that goes back into the winemaking operation. He said that can keep a farm within a family. King Family has 15 full-time employees and around 35 part-time employees.

There will be more from the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau meeting in an upcoming edition of the newsletter.

Thanks for reading and or listening. Special thanks to those who do both! And extra special thanks for the handful of people who are making a contribution through both Patreon and Substack! Patreon covers the cost of general research, and Substack covers the cost of producing this newsletter. This is all done under my company, Town Crier Productions, with a goal of bringing information about all of these various projects.

If you do subscribe through Substack, Ting will match your contribution as a way of supporting this local source of independent journalist. If you have any questions, please ask me in email!

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s show:

Charlottesville Area Transit makes some route adjustments and some examples of the “partnership” in the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership

An epidemiologist at the University of Virginiaexplains key differences between the current pandemic surge and the winter surge

The Free Enterprise Forum releases its annual report on local government spending trends

The number of new COVID cases in Virginia has exceeded 3,000 for each of the past four days, with 3,518 reported by the Virginia Department of Health. The percent positivity is 10, which means one out of every ten tests is coming back as a confirmed case. There have been 254 reported COVID deaths since July 27.

The VDH updated a dashboard today that tracks cases by vaccination status. Due to a variety of factors, this is a difficult one to update every day. Here are two conclusions listed on the site:

“Between January 17, 2021 and August 21, 2021, unvaccinated people developed COVID-19 at a rate 13.3 times higher than fully vaccinated people and 2.6 times higher than fully vaccinated people,” reads the section below “rates by vaccination status.”

“As of August 21, 2021, 4,767,990 Virginians have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19,” reads one under “vaccine breakthrough cases.” “ Of these people, 0.2 percent have developed COVID-19, 0.009 percent have been hospitalized, and 0.0017 percent have died.”

Dr. Costi Sifri is the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia. He told members of the press today that the term “breakthrough case” is a bit misleading in a time when the delta variant is so prevalent.

“Some of us are concerned by the word breakthrough suggesting that it is a vaccine failure and most of these infections that have occured are not failures,” Dr. Sifri said. “Most of these infections that occurred after vaccinations really are not failures. People have received the vaccine and the vaccine has done its job. It’s kept people out of the hospital. It’s kept them from serious consequences of COVID.”

The seven-day average for new cases now is where it was in early December as the winter surge hit. Let’s hear one interchange between UVA Health public information officer Eric Swensen and Dr. Sifri.

Eric Swensen:

“The number of new cases is now in the 3000’s which is roughly about where they were sort of shortly after Thanksgiving of last year. So the question is really, what’s different if anything between now and then and should we be concerned that case count has risen back to where it was?”

Dr. Costi Sifri:

“There is one huge difference and that is that we now have an effective vaccine and we did not have one in November that was being used and distributed. Our vaccination started December 15 and nationwide it started that week. So what we’re seeing right now is almost entirely preventable. That is the big difference and the frustration.”

Eric Swensen:

“Should people be avoiding crowds at this time until those third doses are more widely available for people. For some context, Liberty University is on a campus-wide quarantine through September 10. What are your thoughts on people being out and being out in crowds?” (LU page on their temporary mitigation period)

Dr. Costi Sifri:

“This gets into sort of the gray areas and challenges I think with COVID that are often individually based. Part of the calculation is whether you are vaccinated or not vaccinated. What is the nature of the event? Is the crowd 40 people out on a mountaintop or 500 people in an indoor arena? And what is your level of risk tolerance? The risk tolerance may not only be you but it may be the people that you live with. The kids that are home, loved ones, family members. I think that is a very specific answer. I think again if we’re vaccinated, that’s very effective. If you’re in a situation with crowds, wearing a mask is easy to do. You should be doing it if you’re indoors in the state right now where we have substantial or high levels of COVID transmission in nearly every county of the state.”

More on the pandemic as we move forward.

A regional pro-business group that takes a close look at local governments in the region has released its annual report on spending habits. The Free Enterprise Forum’s Choices and Decisions report is a Local Government Spending Index that compares municipal expenditures in Charlottesville as well the counties of Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson.

“The analysis seeks to develop and track over time an objective metric to capture the spending trend in each locality and determine if this trend can be correlated to other trends occurring within the locality,” reads the report.

One metric generated is per-capita operational spending, and Charlottesville ranks highest with a 2020 figure of $4,975.75 per resident. Albemarle is next at $3,398.44, followed by Nelson at $3,090.44, Louisa County at $3,026.44, Greene at $2,804.17, and Fluvanna at $2,559.43.

The index is modeled after the Consumer Price Index, a metric used by the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics to measure the cost of goods and services over time. The Free Enterprise Forum uses data from the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Auditor of Public Accounts. Review the whole report on their website. There’s also a spreadsheet with all of the data.

If you’re interested in becoming directly involved in Charlottesville government, the city is looking for applicants to many boards and commissions, ranging from the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail Authority to the Youth Council. If you’re interested in transportation, there are vacancies on bodies like the Jaunt Board of Directors and the Citizen’s Transportation Advisory Committee. For housing, there’s the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority or the Community Development Block Grant Task Force. Either way, if you’re interested in experience, even applying for these positions is a good way to get involved. Visit charlottesville.gov to learn more. (release)

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Before we get to a quick review of the Regional Transit Authority, two small pieces of Charlottesville Area Transit news. First, the free trolley-style bus that runs between downtown and the University of Virginia will return to traveling down McCormick Road through the heart of UVA Grounds. Second, additional service will be added to Route 9 during peak hours. That route currently travels between the University of Virginia Hospital, the Piedmont Family YMCA, Charlottesville High School, and downtown Charlottesville. CAT Director Garland Williams said the move is being made in the short-term to help with the start of the school year.

“Because we know there was going to be potentially some high schoolers that were going to use our service, we added additional service during the peak periods of time on Route 9,” Williams told the Regional Transit Partnership on Thursday.

According to the last seven years of ridership data, Route 9 is one of the least traveled of all of the current CAT routes whereas the trolley-style bus route has consistently had the highest ridership. The current Route 9 will change its configuration if Council agrees to the route alterations that have been under public review this year.

Under its new alignment, Route 9 will travel between downtown and Fashion Square Mall via the Piedmont Family YMCA in McIntire Park. Other routes will serve the UVA Hospital. Review all of the changes here.

One of the people who will take a final vote on the proposed transit changes is City Councilor Lloyd Snook. He became vice chair of the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership on Thursday and explained why he was interested in serving on that advisory body.

“My main interest in transit has been that I am convinced that Charlottesville is needing a transition from being a suburban-thinking town to being a city-thinking city and transit is an important part of that,” Snook said. “It’s also an important part of an affordable housing strategy and a city planning strategy.”

Another member of the Regional Transit Authority is the interim executive director of Jaunt, Karen Davis.

“I’m pleased to let you know that ridership is coming right back and this is trending up and our services are back to full service in all areas,” Davis said. “Despite the driver shortage that we’re seeing.”

Davis said that includes the Crozet Connect service, which had been running on a limited schedule due to the pandemic.

Another of the partners is the University of Virginia Transit Service, who joined as a voting member of the advisory body. Davis said the two transit providers recently got together for discussions.

“They got picked up in a Jaunt bus, brought to our home base, and we had three hours of meeting where we were brainstorming, where we made connections, and from here we have committed to meeting regularly and setting some priorities,” Davis said.

One example of a current conflict that might be resolved is that Jaunt vehicles cannot directly pick up or drop off passengers who are headed to the Emily Couric Cancer Center.

One place Jaunt buses can go is the Center at Belvedere, where Davis recently met with Director Peter Thompson. The Center is a non-voting member of the Regional Transit Partnership will also be served by Charlottesville Area Transit’s Route 11 when the service changes are made.

Now back to that driver shortage. There are several area transit agencies and each of them need more people to work behind the wheel.

“I was just taking steps to put a recruitment bonus in place only to realize that both CAT and UTS have totally offered much bigger bonuses so I have to address that program line,” Davis said.

Davis said she is retaining her existing drivers, and only one that she knows of has gone to work for CAT. CAT is paying a $2,400 bonus for new drivers who work for at least nine months as well as existing drivers. New and existing UTS drivers will get a $2,500 bonus.

“It’s going to be a $1,000 payout right away for our standing staff and $1,000 for new staff, and then after two full semesters of driving, the rest of the bonus,” said Becca White is the director of UVA’s Parking and Transportation.

White said she has been tracking closely the number of faculty and staff who have opted to pay for spaces as the pandemic continues.

“As we know, transit and parking are tied together very closely so we’ve been watching that uptake of parking permits because that’s oftentimes an indication of how many people are back in the office and what potential riders we have for CAT or Jaunt or Afton Express,” White said. “On August 1, about 55 percent to 60 percent of the academic employees had purchased their permits as compared to pre-COVID. Just in the last three weeks that number has now increased to 85 percent.”

White said ridership on health employee shuttle routes have increased as the semester approaches. The academic routes that serve Central Grounds have increased to 10,000 passengers a day. Before COVID, that number was around 15,000.

“And all of that service is in the last mile,” White said. “Every bit of it.”

U-Heights is an apartment complex on Ivy Road in Albemarle County that is no longer served by University Transit Service. However, there is a large immigrant and refugee population. White has worked with management at U-Heights to provide mobility for residents who are no longer served by fixed-route transit.

The theme of collaboration continued. The Regional Transit Partnership is staffed by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Garland Williams is the director of CAT.

“On the third of September, TDJPC staff will be over for a visit,” Williams said. “I want to kind of introduce them to my team and get them the lay of the land.”

That will include a look at capital projects that CAT will pursue.

A major purchase in recent years has been automatic passenger counters that will help provide more accurate ridership counts. Williams said these have been installed on all buses and the data is being validated.

But what about those route changes?

“We are in the final processes of getting the approvals,” Williams said. “The last piece that we have to do which we will hopefully be able to kick off next Friday is to get a consultant on board to finish up the required Title VI review from the changes based on the feedback we got from the community. Once that is done it has to go to Council and we’ll also share that information with Albemarle County Board of Supervisors.”

Title VI refers to the Civil Rights Act, which requires a public process before making changes on routes paid for with federal funds.

That means there is no set date for when the forthcoming changes will be made. That will require installation of new bus stops at places that currently do not have them, as well as removal of the stops that will be discontinued. A reason for the delay has been to address the driver shortage. CAT is down 22 drivers and pupil transportation for city school is down 20.

More from the Regional Transit Partnership in an upcoming newsletter.

Thank you for reading! Next up is the Week Ahead newsletter on Sunday, followed by another attempt to get one of these CCE newsletters done each weekday. Each week I get a little more efficient, which means I can bring you more information. And it’s all thanks to those of you who have contributed financially. I have taken my previous experience as a freelance journalist and created a one-person newsroom. Rather than give a set of links today, I just wish you a happy 239!

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out: With the summer heat in full swing, your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep cool. LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

On today’s show:

Highlights from the Resilient Recovery Conference being held by Resilient Virginia

That includes a broad overview of the link between transportation systems and climate change

University of Virginia Health moves to make COVID vaccination mandatory for employees

The COVID surge in Virginia continues with the seven-day average for positive tests increasing to 9.8 percent and another 3,453 new cases are reported today. The seven day average for new cases is at 2,731. At the same, the seven-day average for vaccination shots per day has risen to 15,011.

Officials at the University of Virginia Health System announced they would require all employees to become vaccinated, or to face disciplinary action. Wendy Horton is the Chief Executive Officer for the UVA Health System. (press release)

“Between now and November 1 we will be working with anybody that isn’t vaccinated to get vaccinated and that means for us fully vaccinated with the last dose of vaccination plus two weeks by November 1,” Horton said. “We feel that it’s really an important time to make this change with the delta variant and with the information that we know about the effectiveness of vaccines, we feel it’s an important step that we can take.”

As of today, 86 percent of the health system’s staff are vaccinated though that does not include contractors. The move comes two days after the Food and Drug Administration granted full authorization of the Pfizer vaccine.

The bulk of today’s show is coverage of a conference underway.

Resilient Virginia is a nonprofit formed in 1995 to help raise awareness of ways communities across the Commonwealth may need to adapt in response to any number of calamities that may come our way due to climate change. Heatwaves. Drought. Extreme rain. Invasive species.

Seven years ago, the organization changed its name from the Virginia Sustainable Building Network in order to put a sharper focus on the topic. This week they’re holding an online gathering they’re calling the Resilient Recovery Conference. Governor Ralph Northam kicked off the event this morning.

“Over the past sixteen months, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of comprehensive resiliency plans that address health, social, and economic concerns together with the increasing and significant impacts of climate change,” Northam said.

Northam said one of the top priorities in his one four-year term has been climate change. Individual initiatives include the Coastal Adaptation and Resilience Master Plan and the Community Flood Preparedness Fund. Virginia has joined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

“Last year, I signed the Virginia Clean Economy Act into law,” Northam said. “Virginia is now one of just a few states and the first in the south to adopt a 100 percent clean electricity standard,” Northam said.

Northam signed Executive Order 24 in November 2018 to direct the administration to prepare for sea-level rise and other natural hazards. (read the order)

“The number of federally declared disasters has steadily increased nationally and in Virginia,” reads the order. “The number has experienced a 250 percent increase in federally declared disasters over the past 20 years, including declarations for flooding, hurricanes, severe storms, and wildfire.”

That order cites an earlier report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, one that is now outdated because the IPCC entity released another one earlier this month that suggests change is inevitable to the weather system we have known throughout our lives. We’ll hear that report being referenced throughout this show. (IPCC report)

“As these types of events become more frequent and more intense, so do the threats to public health and safety, our environment, and our economic well-being, including our courts, military installations, infrastructure, tourism, assets, farms, and forests,” Northam said.

Just before the event began, Northam’s press office announced that Dominion Energy will lease space from the Port of Virginia at the Portsmouth Marine Terminal as a staging area for wind turbines that will be erected 27 miles off of the coast of Virginia Beach. (press release)

Krystal Laymon is the deputy director for climate resilience of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. She repeated the impacts of predicted climate change are being felt now.

“Over the past few years, the U.S. has seen the number of weather and climate disasters with losses exceeding $1 billion sky-rocket,” Laymon said. “From the years 2000 to 2009, there was an average of six disasters a year, each totaling a billion dollars. Last year alone, the United States faced 22 such events with a cumulative price tag in excess of $100 billion.”

Laymon said investment in mitigation before disaster strikes can save money, but acting now can also help to save lives. President Biden signed Executive Order 14,008 in February with the title “Tackling the Climate Crisis Home and Abroad.” (read the order)

“Every agency must be a climate change agency,” Laymon said. “A whole of government response ensures that the federal government presents a unified front on climate and considers climate resilience with every decision.”

The executive order established a national task force on climate change. That group’s fifth “readout” came just after the latest IPCC report. A particular concern is sea-level rise.

“It’s important to recognize that while coastal areas make up less than ten percent of the land area of the United States, they’re home to nearly 42 percent of the population,” Laymon said.

This week, volunteers across the country including Charlottesville are measuring the urban heat island effect. Laymon said extreme heat is another concern.

“The devastating heat waves are harming so many facets of people’s lives and the community,” Laymon said. “The urban heat island effect increases those vulnerabilities. In addition, extreme heat hits people’s wallets with increased energy costs which creates greater energy burden.”

Laymon also mentioned other initiatives such as Justice40, a program that seeks to ensure that 40 percent of federal investment in mitigation goes to disadvantaged communities. (read more)

In April, President Biden set an ambitious target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. (fact sheet)

“President Biden has set a new target of 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030,” Laymon said. “I’ll repeat that again. Fifty percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.”

Current targets for Albemarle and Charlottesville are to hit 45 percent of emissions by 2030 and to be carbon neutral by 2050. The University of Virginia seeks to be carbon neutral by 2030 and fossil free by 2050.

But that’s the future. Where are things now?

“The recent IPCC report on climate change showed that the sum amount of the climate change activities are already unavoidable,” Laymon said. “While we’re working to reduce carbon emissions, we need to prepare for the climate impacts that we are already seeing today.”

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community engagement, and an edition almost solely devoted to the first day of today’s Resilient Virginia conference. But, now, time for another subscriber supported public service announcement.

Do you ever look at a tree and wonder what kind it is? In September, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards will hold several identification walks in city parks for people who want to know more about the bark, leaves, and the flowers of our wooden neighbors. These walks are free, but you’ll have to register because groups are limited to 16.

September 5 at 11 a.m. at Pen Park (register)

September 11 at 11 a.m. at the Botanical Garden of the Piedmont (register)

September 24 at 11 a.m. at the University of Virginia (register)

Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

One of the first panels dealt with one of my favorite subject areas - transportation.

Angela Conroy is the senior air quality planner with the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.

“We’re having this conversation this morning because the scientists have measured a one degree Celsius increase in global temperature,” Conroy said. “The increase in global temperature is being due to human related carbon dioxide emissions that have drastically risen over the past several decades.”

Transportation makes up a good portion of those emissions, and reforming the way we move around is intended to reverse the trend.

“Reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector is essential to curbing national and statewide emissions,” Conroy said. “Currently the mainstream strategies to achieve transportation decarbonization include; the deployment of light, medium, and heavy-duty zero emissions vehicles; the deployment of electric vehicle charging stations; investing in research, development, demonstration, and deployment efforts of new generation renewable fuels, particularly in the aviation sector.”

Conroy said other investments include transit as well and other ways to reduce overall vehicle miles traveled. She also said other tools will be required such as carbon sequestration, taking out carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and reducing methane and other gases that contribute to the warming of the global atmosphere.

While attempts are made to reduce emissions, effects are also presenting themselves.

“Virginia climate change poses a significant threat to Virginia’s community infrastructure and the economy,” Conroy said. “The state has the highest rates of sea-level rise on the Atlantic seaboard with more than 34,000 buildings, 534 square miles of coastal land at risk of flooding by 2060.”

Some of the cost to prepare and adapt will be covered by Virginia’s participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Conroy said there have been two auctions so far in which various polluting agencies pay to exceed their allowed emissions allotment. (review all RGGI auction results)

“Two auctions in Virginia to date produced over $84 million of available revenue for flood mitigation and resiliency projects and for energy energy efficiency projects,” Conroy said. “Decarbonizing the electricity sector is absolutely necessary for decarbonizing transportation as well as buildings and the industrial sector.”

Virginia has also been tapping into its share of the Volkswagen Mitigation Trust Fund, a fund created when that automaker was caught lying about some of its vehicles emission standards. About sixty million of the $93.6 million the Commonwealth has received has been awarded, including an announcement last week of the purchase of electric school buses, including two for Albemarle County.

Looking to the future, legislation passed the General Assembly this year to require the State Air Pollution Control Board to set up a low-emission and zero emission vehicles program to regulate tailpipe emissions in new vehicles. Conroy said over 60,000 electric vehicles sold in Virginia in June, the highest amount to date. (read the bill)

Another bill passed to create a rebate program for electric vehicles, but it has not yet been funded. Conroy said rapid deployment on many fronts is required if warming is to be kept below the 1.5 degrees Celsius figure.

So, that’s the view from the state level. What about the view of the state level from a regional perspective? Jeremy Holmes is the executive director of the Roanoke Valley Alleghany Regional Commission. That’s a group akin to the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Before Holmes took on his current job, he ran a sustainable transportation program in that part of southwest Virginia.

“We actually worked with four other planning districts and covered a geography the size of the state of Massachusetts in Southwest Virginia so that included our urban centers of Roanoke, Lynchburg, and Blacksburg but as you can imagine most of what we dealt with was our rural communities, rural counties, cities and towns,” Holmes said.

Holmes said the economic shutdown that occurred at the beginning of the pandemic gives a glimpse into what could happen if people change behavior, but he was frank about the transportation problems facing rural Virginia.

“One of the fundamental things to remember is that these transportation systems are almost exclusively based on single occupant vehicle travel, so the infrastructure, the services, the locations of stuff almost entirely assume that you are getting to these places and accessing these services by yourself in your own motor vehicle,” Holmes said.

Holmes said this leaves many rural communities isolated. Many are already shrinking in population and in job opportunities.

“The impact here really is that people in order to access jobs and work now have to drive farther and farther than they did before,” Holmes said. “In Virginia, the Martinsville and Danville used to have the largest percentage of billionaires in the country driven by the furniture and textile industry. Now it’s one of the highest areas of poverty in the state and Martinsville and Danville commuters are commuting to Lynchburg, Roanoke, farther away, an hour each way. Which means they’re driving more, they’re driving by themselves and taking more time. They’re emitting more on these long trips and they’re more vulnerable.”

Vulnerable in particular to the volatility in fuel prices. Specialized health care is also located in urban areas. And, state transportation funding formulas and processes mean more funding goes to urban areas. That includes maintenance funds, which may lead to more damage as rainfall increases.

“These communities often have fragile infrastructure,” Holmes said. “They have relatively few roads, bridges that are way beyond when they should have been maintained, and surprises like sinkholes and things just waiting to happen as they address issues of flooding and storm surges and mudslides and that sort of thing.”

On the plus side, Holmes said telework and telehealth may be ways to reverse those trends if they can become more commonplace as the pandemic continues. He also said efforts to increase rural broadband may help with some kinds of trips. Holmes said many rural communities that have been on hard times might have more positive futures as the 21st century continues if there is investment.

“Our small communities have great bones,” Holmes said. “These are places that were built and lived in at a human scale for a long time. They still have that scale. There’s been huge disinvestment. Buildings are empty or abandoned or need a lot of work, but mostly the community scale is there so that if folks don’t have to drive long distances to get to things, the infrastructure is in place to revitalize these communities to places that people want to live and can have access services that they are now going out further to get to.”

We’ll have more from the Resilient Virginia conference over the next few weeks or so. There are two more days if you’re interested in purchasing a ticket. They are not a sponsor, hence this text is not italicized.

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On today’s show:

A preview of two Piedmont Housing Alliance projects that go before Charlottesville’s Planning Commission today

Updates on UVA housing initiative and the Charlottesville affordable housing plan at recent Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee meeting

The Virginia Department of Health’s COVID tracker is functional again and today the agency reports another 3,027 cases and the seven-day percent positivity of test results is 9.7 percent. Nationwide, over 150,000 COVID cases have been reported. There are 43 new cases in the Blue Ridge Health District where the percent positivity is 5.1 percent.

The rest of today’s stories are all about housing.

Tonight, the Charlottesville Planning Commission will hold a preliminary discussion on two rezoning proposals from Piedmont Housing Alliance to build a variety of affordable housing types. (meeting info)

In one, 50 age-restricted units would be built on undeveloped land at the Park Street Christian Church, and in the other, 95 units would be built on the campus of the Monticello Area Community Action Agency. Both projects have been designed by BRW Architects and engineered by the Timmons Group. There was a community meeting for the two rezonings on August 10. Let’s hear about the Park Street Christian Church first from architect Bruce Wardell.

“The property itself is at the edge of a fairly well-organized neighborhood,” Wardell said. “The church for those of you who are familiar with the site, the church sort of sits at the top of the site and the land slopes down pretty steeply to Park Street.”

They’ll also need a rezoning to Planned Unit Development as well as a sidewalk waiver to avoid having to build a pathway on the eastern side of Park Street.

“In order to build a sidewalk along that edge of the property, you would need to disturb a fairly significant part of that, the woods and the wooded areas coming down to that side of the street,” Wardell said.

The 50 housing units themselves would be built on an area in between the church and Park Street.

“These buildings will be essentially invisible from the neighborhood,” Wardell said. “They avoid the critical slopes.” Wardell said. “This will be 100 percent affordable housing for seniors. It will be targeted at 60 percent of the area median income or below, which in this area is an annual salary of about $45,000 for a total of two. And the structure of this is that the rent would be about 30 percent of their monthly income.”

The second Piedmont Housing Alliance project that will be before the Planning Commission also involves BRW and Timmons, but also includes Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville. Wardell said providing affordable housing units is one goal.

“And some mixed-use, and some market rate homes, and some Habitat homes in the project,” Wardell said.

In order to secure Low-Income Housing Tax Credits to finance the project, rezoning approval needs to be in place by next march in order to meet a deadline from the entity formerly known as the Virginia Housing Development Authority.

“We have current zoning that’s there but as everyone knows we are also in the middle of a very enthusiastic discussion about future land use and future zoning in the city,” Wardell said. “Currently the site is zoned R-1.”

The draft Future Land Use Map depicts the land as neighborhood mixed-use node. The application is for Planned Unit Development, a district that would be customized for the site.

“There will be 85 affordable units, eight market rates, two existing market rate homes that are the existing homes, and then there’s affordable homeownership which is part of it which is 20 townhomes and duplexes which will be focused on 30 to 60 percent of the area median income,” Wardell said.

Tonight’s discussion before the Charlottesville Planning Commission is a preliminary one.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time now for another reader-supported announcement.

The nonprofit group Resilient Virginia works to inform decision makers and officials about how to prepare for a changing world. They’re holding their annual event virtually this year and I’ll have a few stories from it. But, you have the chance to attend! The Resilient Recovery Conference will take place the mornings of August 25, August 26, and August 27. Take a look at the details of the event as well as pricing at resilientvirginia.org.

Moving ahead now to a week later, when the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee met for what chair Phil d’Oronzio said would be a light agenda. The meeting was filled with information, however. Looking ahead to a week from today, outgoing Neighborhood Development Services Director Alex Ikefuna gave an update on the development of the Future Land Use Map and the Comprehensive Plan.

“There is a work session scheduled with the Planning Commission on the 31st of this month,” Ikefuna said. “Subsequent after that work session there will be a meeting with the Steering Committee, and there may be some more changes based on the feedback from the Planning Commission on the 31st of this month.”

The material for that meeting is not yet available. You can register in advance, though.

The City Council and Planning Comprehensive Plan will hold a joint meeting in October at which they are expected to make a recommendation to the elected officials.

“We’re looking at completing all this before Christmas, and hopefully Council will get to take a shot on the adoption of the Comprehensive Plan at some time between November ending and Christmas,” Ikefuna said.

After that, the Cville Plans Together initiative will turn to a rewrite of the zoning ordinance. In March, the Council adopted an affordable housing plan that influenced the development of the Future Land Use Map and will do the same with the zoning code.

The HAC also got a brief update on the University of Vir ginia’s pledge to build up to 1,500 affordable homes on land that either it or its real estate foundation owns. The campaign kicked off a public input session in April, as I reported back then. UVa has hired Northern Real Estate Urban Ventures to conduct the work with principal Gina Merritt leading the initiative. Alice Raucher is the Architect at the University of Virginia.

“We have kicked off a listening tour with Gina with two goals,” Raucher said. “To perform the development principles that will guide the developer’s work and to understand where UVA’s initiative can fit in and be complementary to existing efforts in the city and the county.”

Raucher said they’ve listened to dozens of groups and individuals, and several themes are emerging.

“There may be funding gaps even with Low Income Housing Tax Credits and we need to figure out what the University will do about that,” Raucher said. “We don’t have an answer just yet.”

Raucher said the consultant team has been doing due diligence on land owned by the University or its Foundation.

“Our findings will be discussed internally and with the advisory group and more information will be shared publicly this fall,” Raucher said.

UVA will contribute the land and a third party developer will actually build the units. More information can be seen on the project’s website.

As mentioned, the City Council adopted an affordable housing plan in March. Some next questions are how it will be implemented and how that implementation will be measured. A draft spreadsheet was discussed. (draft spreadsheet)

“The idea here is that this is a useful base of operations and as we build out and fill this out it’s going to produce the need for specific work product as we move forward,” said HAC Chair Phil d’Oronzio.

The current draft is not an official tool but one governance recommendation is for the city to hire a housing coordinator to oversee all of the various initiatives underway. The spreadsheet assigns that goal to Sam Sanders, the new deputy city manager.

Under funding recommendations, is this specific goal:

“Dedicate $10m per year to fund affordable housing to:

1) increase the # of subsidized affordable homes by 1,100 homes (on top of an existing stock of 1,630 actively subsidized homes)

2) preserve 600 existing subsidized affordable homes

3) stabilize 1,800 to 2,200 owner and renter households facing housing instability

But, who should be tracking the information? As mentioned, the city has not had a housing coordinator for a year. The last person who had that role now runs the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. The person before that now is Albemarle County’s housing coordinator. Sam Sanders just started work, and Ikefuna’s replacement doesn’t start work until September. City Council has spent about $165,000 to create an inclusionary zoning program and to track funding spent through the existing Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund. Who’s doing the tracking of implementation now?

HAC member Dan Rosenweig is also president and CEO of Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville.

“In a really general sense boiled down I don’t know that we have many other options other than to jump in and support staff as our senior leadership team in the city rebuilds the infrastructure in City Hall, adds people at staff on the housing side,” Rosensweig said.

Sanders welcomed assistance from members of the HAC, especially in terms of potential recommendations for next year’s budget.

“Being perfectly honest with you and trying to remain a straight shooter that I promised to always be, if I had to timeline this, and have staff handle it, we probably would not have it done by the end of the year,” Sanders said.

For the full story, watch the entire meeting, which is under an hour. Take advantage of these meetings being virtual while it lasts, because otherwise you’ll have to attend in person. (watch the video)

Thanks again for reading! Please forward on to someone you think might be interested.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

On today’s show:

Albemarle Supervisors to spend more on rural broadband initiatives

Supervisors also agree to further review of the homestay ordinance

An update from the UVA Health System on the latest in the pandemic

A database error has prevented a specific number of new COVID cases from being reported by the Virginia Department of Health. Assume they’ve gone up since Friday.

This morning, the Food and Drug Administration fully approved the use of Pfizer vaccine, removing the emergency use tag that has been in place. Dr. Costi Sifri welcomed the move. He’s the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System.

“We’ve all been waiting for this day and are very excited to see that full approval has been granted,” Dr. Sifri said. “We know that there are some people in our community who were waiting for that, that felt that full approval was needed before they felt entirely comfortable with the vaccine despite the fact that I think it’s been clear that the vaccine has been safe and effective for months and months now.”

Dr. Sifri said this may mean that more institutions will feel more comfortable requiring vaccinations. One such entity is the U.S. Department of Defense, which will not make vaccinations mandatory.

There are still no approved vaccines for children under 12, but work is underway toward that effort.

“Those clinical trials are going on right now by Pfizer and Moderna and we’ve heard we may start to hear some results of those studies as soon as September,” Dr. Sifri said.

Another new vaccine development that Dr. Sifri said might come in September is guidance on whether those who took the Johnson and Johnson would benefit from a second shot.

The UVA Health System is also placing more restrictions on visitors to its medical facilities beginning on Thursday.

“For in-patients, two designated visitors can be identified by the patient,” said Bush Bell, the administrator of hospitality and support services. “They must remain the same for the duration of the patient’s stay.”

Only one visitor will be allowed for out-patient procedures as well as emergency room visits.

“And as always, patients who are being evaluated for COVID or are positive will not be permitted visitors unless they are pediatric patients or adults with special needs,” Bell said.

The rest of our stories today come from the Albemarle County Board of Supervisor’s meeting from August 16, 2021.

The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled earlier this month that the Federal Communications Commission must provide more information about why it has not updated its policies on the potential health effects of mobile phones and the towers that allow them to communicate.

The court ruled on August 13 that the F.C.C. must give further justification for a claim that its current regulations are sufficient to "protect against harmful effects of exposure to radiofrequency radiation unrelated to cancer." (read the ruling)

The Environmental Health Trust and others had sued the F.C.C. for failing to adequately explain why a process to update rules last adopted in 1996 was abandoned.

The ruling directs the FCC to provide a "reasoned explanation" for why it continues to base testing procedures for cell phones on 25-year-old guidelines from 1996, to address the health effects of radiofrequency radiation on children in a world where cell phones are ubiquitous, and to address the impacts of radiofrequency radiation on the environment.

Supervisor Ann Mallek raised the issue during consideration of a cell tower on county-owned land at Walnut Creek Park.

"Should we be stopping accepting more and more of this possibly non-compliant [towers] when the rules get straightened out?" Mallek asked. "Wouldn't it be sensible to have the rules straightened out first before we have more things that are put up in the county that we then have to deal with after the fact?"

County Attorney Greg Kamptner explained that the F.C.C. halted their review of those guidelines in 2019.

"And that process could have ultimately resulted in updated regulations pertaining to the radiofrequency standards," Kamptner said. "The court also made it clear that it was not making any decision on the viability of the 1996 standard."

As a result, Kamptner said the ruling does not affect current applications. In this case, the matter before the Board was whether County Executive Jeffrey Richardson should sign the application from Verizon.

"It also doesn't affect the federal law preemption of state and local governments from considering radiofrequency emissions in their wireless related decisions and their regulations," Kamptner said.

Mallek was the lone vote against the resolution to authorize Richardson to sign off on the application.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Interested in the history of the public library system in the area? This subscriber-supported public service announcement urges you to consider tuning Wednesday in to the next edition of the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society’s next video presentation, which is the second part of a look at the The Local Library Centennial: When does "Public" become Public?

Filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson and Jefferson Madison Regional Library director David Plunkett return to talk about how many of the anniversary projects they talked about in January have now been realized! Exhibits created by the ACHS commemorating the 100-year anniversary of the Public Library system have been installed on the 3rd floor of JMRL’s Central Branch. Learn more by watching this live event or by visiting albemarlehistory.org. (register on Zoom) (Facebook Live)

Watch part one here!

Supervisors also got an update on how Albemarle’s staff proposes to use the remaining balance of the American Rescue Plan Act funding the county will get in the current and next calendar years.

In all, Albemarle will receive $21.2 million in ARPA funds from the federal government. In June, the Board of Supervisors approved a framework for how to spend it. That includes $4 million for support for human services and economic development, an initial $3 million for broadband initiatives, and the balance for capital budget and fiscal planning for upcoming budget years.

Nelsie Birch is Albemarle’s chief financial officer.

“We will be making a recommendation to increase the funding from ARPA to support our broadband efforts,” Birch said.

Specifically, staff recommended using an additional $1.5 million in the ARPA balance to cover the local match for potential projects funded through the Virginia Telecommunications Initiative (VATI). Supervisors approved the idea and awards from the state program will be made in January. Mike Culp is the head of the newly created Broadband Accessibility and Affordability Office.

“This VATI session we’re going to have at least it seems like 60 to maybe 100 applications so it just goes to show the Commonwealth is really taking a good look at this and they’re going to be funding a lot more programs this year so let’s be in that bucket,” Culp said.

Last week, Albemarle released $800,000 of that human services funding for the emergency financial assistance program.

There have been many requests for Albemarle to follow Charlottesville in using local ARPA funding to hire attorneys to represent people who are going to be evicted. Albemarle has so far not committed that funding. Emily Kilroy, the county’s director of communications and public engagement, said Albemarle is covered under the extension of the national moratorium on evictions. She also said the county’s approach has been direct payments to those with demonstrated needs.

“The Emergency Financial Assistance program that ran from June 2020 through June 2021 provided direct funding to support rent and mortgage payments,” Kilroy sent in an email. “This program was able to serve 2,653 residents, and approximately $2 million of federal CARES Coronavirus Relief Funds were distributed, primarily for rent/mortgage payments.”

As mentioned, another $800,000 in funding has been made available.

Later that afternoon, Albemarle had a work session on the future of the homestay ordinance, which regulates transient lodging such as AirBnB in the county. The current rules were adopted in 2019 and were intended in part to make sure those who are renting out their homes are complying with regulations.

“The number of non-compliant new listings is declining so our message is getting out,” said zoning administrator Bart Svoboda.

Svoboda said county staff wanted to know if certain changes should be made to the ordinance. One current regulation is that houses and structures being used for transient lodging are setback at least 125 feet away from a property, unless the Board grants a special exception.

“The 125 foot setback reduction is by far our most sought after special exception,” Svoboda said. “Forty-two have been submitted, 29 have been approved, and we still have ten pending.”

The Board agreed to allow staff to make changes to the ordinance to allow for administrative approval of those special exceptions. Svoboda said that would depend on whether sufficient screening was present as well as other factors.

Other changes might be to change the rule that requires rural area property owners to live in the structure they rent out. Svoboda said he will return to the Board with details about those possible changes after the beginning of calendar year 2022.

Supervisors also agreed to continue hiring a third-party to assist with inspection. For more details on this issue, read Allison Wrabel’s story in the Daily Progress.

Interested in the shout-outs you hear? Consider a $25 a month Patreon subscription to get a message to the audience! Contact me if you have any questions, as there are a few guidelines. But your support will help the program continue to be produced as often as I can get it out the door!

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In today’s Substack-fueled shout-out, Code for Charlottesville is seeking volunteers with tech, data, design, and research skills to work on community service projects. Founded in September 2019, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects with the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department, and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. Visit the Code for Charlottesville website to learn more, including details on projects that are underway.

On today’s show:

A demographer at the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia is concerned about the accuracy of the 2020 Census

Updates from the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee

Dr. Danny Avula gives a press briefing on planning for booster shots this fall

Charlottesville Police Chief blasts police group’s concerns about her leadership

In July, the Virginia Department of Health stopped releasing COVID data on the weekends, so today we’ll begin with the seven-day average yesterday of 2,322 and the percent positivity increased to 9.1 percent. There have been 156 deaths from COVID in Virginia since July 21. As of yesterday, two-thirds of adult Virginians are fully vaccinated and the seven-day average of shots per day is 14,581. That’s around the same number as last week.

The VDH usually updates its dashboard measuring the percentage of new COVID cases by vaccination status on Fridays, but that did not occur yesterday. On August 19, there were over 141,000 new cases nationwide, around the same rate as in mid November. The winter surge peaked at around 250,000 cases a day the week of early January.

There is growing concern about the ability of the delta variant to infect the vaccinated, but also concern that vaccinated individuals who got either the Pfizer or the Moderna mRNA shot may need a booster. Dr. Danny Avula is overseeing the Virginia Department of Health’s vaccine programs. (read transcript of 8/19 briefing) (listen to full briefing)

“Overtime, vaccine efficacy starts to decrease, [but] vaccine efficacy is still very strong against hospitalizations and deaths, and we are starting to see decreased effectiveness against the Delta variant,” Dr. Avula said.

This week, the first third shots have been given to immunocompromised individuals. September 20 is the target date set by federal officials for the roll-out of booster shots for the general population. That depends on approval from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and the overall Centers for Disease Control. But, the general parameters of how it would work are becoming known.

“You will be eligible for a booster shot eight months after your second dose of your mRNA vaccine,” Dr. Avula said.

The details for those who got the Johnson and Johnson are not yet known because research is still inconclusive, but Dr. Avula said the CDC hopes a solution will be worked out by September 20. Dr. Avula also said he’s been told by federal officials that there will be enough supply.

“There is enough vaccine for a third dose for every American and we just need to remember that this means this will be a very different scenario from what we working with from December to March,” Dr. Avula said.

Meanwhile, Ting Pavilion has joined a growing list of venues that will now require proof of vaccination for admittance. Many restaurants and businesses have begun to require them as well.

The summer pandemic surge has put a pause on the preparations for the possibility of in-person public meetings in Albemarle. Emily Kilroy is the county’s director of communications and public engagement.

“We’ve done all in-person for many years,” Kilroy said. “We pivoted very quickly to all virtual, but what does it look as we return to normal? There has been a lot of work leading up to that next phase of public meetings, and that work has put on hold just given the CDC’s substantial transmission rate that they have labeled Albemarle County as having.”

Kilroy said there are many in the community who would not feel safe sitting in a closed room with other people. She made her comments at the virtual meeting of the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee, which we’ll hear more about in the future.

A dispute in Charlottesville’s Police Department became more public Friday afternoon when the city of Charlottesville released a statement responding to a letter from the Central Virginia chapter of the Virginia Police Benevolent Association.

The August 10 letter from chapter president Michael Wells stated that Charlottesville police officers have lost confidence in Police Chief RaShall Brackney due to recent rule changes and policy changes regarding internal investigations and states that have not been fully explained. The letter states a PBA survey of officers captures this spirit and asks for a meeting with Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker and others to remedy the situation.

The city’s response is in an unsigned 14-paragraph statement, the first paragraph of which announces that members of the city's SWAT team have been terminated for alleged behaviors that are described in detail in the 9th and 10th paragraphs. The statement describes steps Brackney has taken since becoming chief in June 2018.

“Chief Brackney was tasked with updating and reforming how police services are provided within the City of Charlottesville, as well as working to bridge a divide between the city’s citizens, especially African American residents, and law enforcement,” the statement continues.

The statement describes how Brackney is seeking to change a “warrior mentality” in the police department. The statement cites a video sent to Brackney by a member of the public which allegedly shows a police corporal making comments captured by a city-owned phone.

"The video contained profanity and language indicative of the very subculture of aggression that Chief Brackney is committed to eradicating from Charlottesville policing," the statement continued.

The statement goes on to give Chief Brackney's account of the disciplinary action that followed, and concludes with accusations against the PBA for interfering in the process. For more on the story:

Read the story in the Daily Progress from reporters Katherine Knott and Allison Wrabel

Read the statement

Watch the August 12 Police Civilian Review Board meeting

The county’s seven community advisory committees are intended to be monthly forums to help Albemarle staff and elected officials implement the seven areas designated for growth. They’re also places where one can learn information about developments that are underway. County planner Michaela Accardi provided an update at this past week’s meeting. (download the presentation)

“The first project I’ll talk about is the Hydraulic and Georgetown office building,” Accardi said.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors granted a rezoning for the project back in 2008 to clear the way for offices. The project was dormant for many years, but a site plan was approved last October and construction on the one-acre site is underway.

“The applicant is in the process of undergoing utility improvements on the site so you might see some work over there,” Accardi said.

A new 60,000 square foot Boys and Girls Club on school property at the Lambs Lane campus is in the planning phases and requires a special use permit to allow for a Community Center. Accardi said a vote on that permit is currently in deferral, even though the final site plan is under review.

“This is a little bit of an untraditional, nontraditional approach where the site plan is under review because this building can exist on this site as a school use,” Accardi said.

Groundbreaking is slated for August 28, according to Jack Jouett District Supervisor Diantha McKeel.

Another project that has been deferred is a residential one called Arbor Oaks Townes in which an applicant is seeking a rezoning for one acre of land on Hydraulic Road from R-4 to R-15. A community meeting was held in October, but the 14-unit project is on hold indefinitely.

One project that is moving forward is the Premier Circle project which will see up to 140 units dedicated to households and individuals with very low and extremely low incomes. Piedmont Housing Alliance, Virginia Supportive Housing, and the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless are the entities behind the project.

“The rezoning was approved by the Board of Supervisors and we haven’t had any further plans submitted at this time,” Accardi said.

There was also an update from Samantha Strong, the manager of Stonefield. The former Pier One Space is being subdivided into three spaces, one of which will be the first Virginia location of the Torchy’s Tacos chains.

“The middle space is under negotiations and I’m actually expecting that before the month is out we’ll have that lease signed,” Strong said. “The third space is also in the early stages of negotiation.”

Elsewhere in Stonefield, there’s a lease signed for another chain eatery called Organic Krush.

“We’re really excited because it’s going to bring cold-pressed juices, whole fruit smoothies, it’s very all-natural, very healthy, bold, different things like that,” Strong said.

Strong said the pandemic has not affected vacancy rates on the retail side of Stonefield.

“We are very close to being at 100 percent occupancy which has not happened at Stonefield before,” Strong said.

Strong said the space formerly occupied by an Italian restaurant may become an event space, citing a need for such places in the community.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time now for another reader-supported announcement.

The nonprofit group Resilient Virginia works to inform decision makers and officials about how to prepare for a changing world. They’re holding their annual event virtually this year, and registration prices go up at the end of this week. The Resilient Recovery Conference will take place the mornings of August 25, August 26, and August 27. Take a look at the details of the event as well as pricing at resilientvirginia.org.

Earlier this month, t he U.S. Census Data released more of the results of the 2020 count, with numbers on population, housing units, and demographics. The official Charlottesville population is 46,553, or a 7.1 percent increase over the 2010 count. Albemarle’s official population increased 13.6 percent to 112,395. The count began on April 1, 2020, after most higher education facilities shut down at the beginning of the pandemic.

Each year, the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia produces population estimates for use by the state government to help allocate funds for various programs and government services. Their 2020 estimate for Charlottesville was 49,447, nearly three thousand more than the official count. (2020 Weldon Cooper estimates)

Hamilton Lombard is a research specialist who combs through building permits and other sources to come up with the estimates. I spoke with him this week to ask about the discrepancy between the official count and the higher numbers from Weldon Cooper.

“When you look at the Charlottesville region as a whole, we’ve had remarkably steady growth decade after decade,” Lombard said. “This decade wasn’t really very different. Where the growth happened shifted a little bit. First half of the decade we had fairly strong growth in the city. It seemed to slow down maybe even slightly reverse in the second half of the decade just because there was a lot of less development going on in the city.”

Lombard said he thinks the county in Charlottesville is inaccurate based on a review of individual tracts.

“I think most college students on campuses were counted correctly, but ones off campus were not typically,” Lombard said. “If you look at the Census block over near the Corner that has the GrandMarc apartment complex, in 2010 the Census count is 796 residents. In 2020, the count is 348. There are probably multiple cases like that.”

In 2006, Charlottesville successfully challenged the Census Bureau’s 2005 estimates, which slowed a decline of around 4,000. I’ve got questions out to the city to see if they plan a dispute this time around. (Listen to a 2006 radio story I produced on this topic)

For the rest of this interview, you’ll have to listen to the podcast for the details.

Thanks for reading! Did you know that if you sign up for a paid subscription, Ting will match the amount! So, for $5 a month, $50 a year, or $200 a year, Ting will make a contribution to support this independent production and keep me in the business of tracking as many pieces of the puzzle as I can. And, please share with people you think would like to know more about what’s happening in the community.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council approves a rezoning and pursues a collective bargaining ordinance

Albemarle County is getting half a million to pay for two electric school buses

Frank Friedman is stepping down as president of Piedmont Virginia Community College

Also in Albemarle, the reopening of an emergency financial assistance pool of funding

This morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 2,764 new cases and the percent positivity rises to 8.8. The percentage of adult Virginians is 66.4 percent. The seven-day average for vaccines administered is 14,676.

Albemarle County has announced the relaunch of an emergency financial assistance for community members. These funds can be applied to mortgage, rent, or utility payments. If you or someone you know are eligible, you can call one of two hotlines to leave a message. A press release mentions it may take up to three weeks to get a response. Applicants will have to demonstrate a loss of income. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors allocated $800,000 in American Rescue Plan Act funds for this purpose. The numbers are 434-326-0950 for English speakers and 434-373-0930 for Spanish speakers.

Frank Friedman will retire as president of Piedmont Virginia Community College when the upcoming academic year ends next May. Friedman has been the president of PVCC since 1999 and is the fifth person to lead the institution since it was established in 1972.

“It has been an honor and a privilege to serve as president of PVCC,” Friedman said in a statement. “I have worked with the finest, most dedicated faculty and staff you will find anywhere. I am so proud that in the 23 years I have been president, over 150,000 students have received an accessible, affordable, high-quality education at PVCC.”

Since 1999, PVCC has acquired the former Monticello Visitor’s Center and converted into the Stultz Center for Business and Career Development for workforce services, launched satellites space in Stanardsville, the IX Building and the Jefferson School City Center, and 150,000 students have been enrolled. PVCC will launch a national search to find Friedman’s successor.

Albemarle County will receive $530,000 from the state government to purchase two electric school buses. The funding comes from an environmental mitigation trust set up when the firm Volkswagen was caught lying about the ability of some of its engines to provide low emissions. Albemarle’s amount is part of a $10.5 million pay-out from the trust fund to replace 83 diesel school buses across Virginia. In all, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality administers over $93 million in the trust.

“The Trust is the result of settlements resolving allegations that Volkswagen violated the Clean Air Act through the use of emission testing defeat devices designed to cheat on federal emissions tests,” reads a statement on the DEQ site. “Volkswagen sold more than 500,000 excessively polluting vehicles in the U.S. More than 16,000 were sold in Virginia, and produced over 2,000 tons of excess nitrogen oxides (NOx) in violation of federal pollution standards.”

Elsewhere in our area, Augusta County will receive $523,198 for two buses, and Culpeper County will receive $530,000.

The city of Charlottesville and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission are seeking comment on a year-end report documenting how one pot of federal funds has been spent. The Consolidated Annual Performance and Evaluation Report (CAPER) tracks where HOME funds and certain Community Development Block Grants are allocated, who gets the funding, and what housing units are either created or rehabilitated.

“For PY20, completed HOME projects included two first-time homebuyer assistance projects, development of two new rental units, and twelve homeowner rehabilitation projects, for a total of 16 units,” reads the CAPER. “For CDBG projects, the City worked with sub recipients to implement public service and economic development projects.”

For all of the details, take a look at the document. The TJPDC will have a public hearing on September 2 at 7 p.m. and Charlottesville City Council holds a public hearing on September 20. You can also submit written comments. Details in the public advertisement in the Daily Progress.

Time now for another subscribed-supported public service announcement.

September 5 at 11 a.m. at Pen Park (register)

September 11 at 11 a.m. at the Botanical Garden of the Piedmont (register)

September 24 at 11 a.m. at the University of Virginia (register)

Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

Time now to catch up with the City Council meeting from Monday, August 16.

One item on the consent agenda was Council’s approval of a tax refund plus interest of $63,009.25 to a nonprofit entity who had been charged after demonstrating they were exempt. Charlottesville Commissioner of Revenue Todd Divers said the identity of the group is protected from being revealed.

“This was not our fault,” Divers said. “This taxpayer had been paying this license tax for years since before I was elected. The question of their exemption? It was a tough call. We consulted with the tax commissioner in Richmond. We consulted with the Attorney General’s office.”

Divers said in both cases the state agencies advised him to make the exemption.

Rezoning approved

Council took a final action on a rezoning and special use permit for an eight-unit apartment building at 1206 Carlton Avenue in Belmont. Here’s City Planner Matt Alfele.

“The applicant at 1206 Carlton Avenue is requesting a rezoning from R-2 multifamily residential to R-3 medium density residential with no proffers,” Alfele said.

No changes had been made to the application since Council’s discussion on August 2.

Nearby resident Charles Neer pleaded with Council to deny the special use permit for additional density because eight units is too dense and the eight parking spaces to be provided are not enough.

“If people have one car, then that means that somebody is going to be driving around every night looking for a parking place,” Neer said. “And guess what? There’s going to be more than one car. There’s going to be a bunch of cars driving around.”

Neer suggested Council approve the rezoning which would have allowed five units.

Council voted 4-1 for the rezoning and 3-2 on the special use permit with Mayor Nikuyah Walker voting against both and Councilor Heather Hill voting against the increased density.

City to study collective bargaining options

At the end of the meeting, Council took a vote to direct the city manager to pursue an ordinance to allow city employees to pursue entities to allow them to engage in collective bargaining. That’s not been possible until action by the General Assembly last year. (read the bill)

At the public comment period earlier, bus driver Mary Pettis urged Council to proceed.

“I’ve driven the bus for 35 years in the City of Charlottesville and I’m here to ask you all to allow us to have a union because I feel it will help us,” Pettis said. “Help us get more things that we need. I personally had to move from Charlottesville to Waynesboro because I couldn’t afford to live in Charlottesville. I have three jobs because I don’t make enough money just driving the bus.”

Earlier this summer, Council approved a $2,400 bonus for new and existing school bus and transit bus drivers using funding from the American Rescue Plan Act.

City Manager Chip Boyles said the city of Alexandria and Loudoun County have begun to implement collective-bargaining.

“Both governing bodies studied the topic over a course of several months, put together financial proposals, and used outside consultants in developing an implementation plan,” Boyles said.

For some perspective, Loudoun County has a fiscal year 2022 budget of $3.3 billion based on a tax rate of $0.98 cents per $100 of assessed property. The city of Alexandria has a budget of $770.7 million based on a tax rate of $1.11 per $100 of assessed property. According to the U.S. Census, Loudoun has a 2020 population of 420,959 and Alexandria has a population of 159,467.

So far, Charlottesville has not done the work on implementation but at least one group of city employees have requested the ability to enter into collective bargaining.

“On March 6, 2021, Charlottesville Fire Department notified the City Council that a majority of its members within the department desired that the City Council should adopt such an ordinance to provide rules for the city employees to engage in collective bargaining with the city,” Boyles said.

Boyles recommended Council deny an ordinance that’s been offered by employees of the fire department, but to move forward with study of how one might be crafted, as well as a review of possible budget implications. In the case of Loudoun County, their current budget includes $300,000 for eight positions to oversee the collective bargaining process.

“This is an issue not studied or addressed within the current FY22 City Budget,” Boyles said. “I would research administration and support cost estimates for consideration for your FY23 budget development process,” Boyles said.

Council voted unanimously to approve Boyles’ recommendation to proceed with study of a collective-bargaining ordinance.

Charlottesville is currently without a human resources director.

“The [Human Resources] position closed on Friday so we’ll begin that process this week of starting to narrow that down and hopefully we will have a director in shortly,” Boyles said.

This week marks the six month anniversary of Boyles as city manager. In that time, two deputy city manager positions have been filled, as has the positions of city attorney and neighborhood development services director.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s show:

An update on the Urban Rivanna River Corridor plan

Advice and information from the Blue Ridge Health District

Two Albemarle beaches remain open this weekend, and but another is done for the summer

Charlottesville is cracking down on boat storage at the Ragged Mountain natural area

This morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports another 2,244 new COVID cases and the seven-day percentage of tests that come back positive is now at 8.5 percent. Six months ago on February 17 that figure was 8.9 percent when the winter surge was beginning to recede. Now the figure has been climbing as the Delta variant of COVID continues to spread.

Ryan McKay is the director of policy and planning at the Blue Ridge Health District.

“We have been seeing an increasing number of cases on a daily basis really for about the last month or so so this current surge that we’re experiencing has happened somewhat quickly,” McKay said.

McKay said the end of mandated social distancing and mask wearing means there are more close contacts than before, which adds to the tracing efforts.

“Those who are testing positive are largely those who are unvaccinated, whether they are those who aren’t currently eligible to receive a vaccine, so children under the age of 12,” McKay said. “Or adults who for whatever reason medically can’t get vaccinated. And then obviously individuals who have not yet received their vaccine. So this Delta variant is much more contagious than we’ve experienced so far.”

McKay said many of the new cases are tracing back to indoor settings, which is why health officials are recommending masks indoors especially for unvaccinated individuals. In the past week, Governor Ralph Northam has mandated facial coverings in Virginia schools, though some systems across the Commonwealth still plan to defy that order. McKay hopes people will do voluntarily in other indoor settings.

“So anytime we’re indoors, individuals regardless of vaccination status, we want to make sure those individuals are wearing masks in indoor settings particularly if it’s a setting where there are a large number of individuals in an enclosed area to really try and minimize or reduce the spread,” McKay said.

McKay said the Blue Ridge Health District expects cases to continue rising. With that, that means COVID testing is increasing. But, if you get a test at one of their events or facilities, you will not get notified if the result is negative. Here’s Kathryn Goodman, communications and public relations manager for the BRHD.

“Instead we’re encouraging everybody to sign up for [the University of Virginia’s] MyChart and that’s where they can receive their test results within 12 to 24 hours,” Goodman said.

People who have positive results will be contacted.

Last Friday, the Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency authorization for a third dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine for certain people who are immunocompromised. Here’s Dr. Denise Bonds, the director of the Blue Ridge Health District.

“We are now offering third doses to anyone who is moderately or severely immunocompromised,” Dr. Bonds said. “This third dose of vaccine should be 28 days from their second dose of either Pfizer or Moderna and moderately to severely immunocompromised individuals who meet that category might be individuals who had an organ or a stem cell transplant, or who have advanced or untreated HIV infection, individuals who are currently undergoing treatment for cancer, or certain medications that an individual might take that might weaken the immune system.”

Dr. Bonds said the recommendation is to get the same kind of vaccine as the first two doses, but that’s not a requirement. Anyone who got the Johnson and Johnson vaccine should not get one of these doses, and health officials are reviewing a strategy to provide boosters to those individuals.

To get the third dose, you will need an appointment. Dr. Bonds recommends talking to your doctor. Visit the Blue Ridge Health District site to learn more. Officials do not anticipate supply concerns at this time.

Later in the evening, Dr. Bonds and other district officials presented to both the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee and City Council. Dr. Bonds said she knew that some members of Council are concerned about the ailment known as Long COVID where symptoms seem to remain. She cited a recent paper in Nature. (read the paper)

“They looked at lots and lots of papers and tried to combine all the data to summarize it in a cohesive fashion and what they found was that 80 percent of individuals who have had a confirmed COVID infection continue to have at least one symptom two weeks following their acute infection,” Dr. Bonds said.

Dr. Bonds said the most reported of those symptoms is fatigue, followed by headache, attention issues, hair loss, and shortness of breath.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she is concerned that many students returning to classes do not have masks designed to prevent airborne transmission of viruses. She also expressed concern that many who have not received a vaccine so far may not do so if they are treated negatively.

‘We in this community are doing the same thing that people around the country are doing, and I’m sure the world, where we’re treating the vaccine hesitant as the vaccine hostile and pushing those people from even considering it or changing behaviors,” Walker said.

Teletha Howard is leading up the Blue Ridge Health District’s community outreach to people who are vaccine hesitant, including Black community members.

“I’m very honest when I talk to people,” Howard said. “I tell them my story and my story is that I did not get vaccinated as soon as everybody did because I was hesitant. So it took me a while and the reason why I was hesitant was because I wanted to have conversations with more people and with the medical professionals before I was confident in getting the vaccine.”

Walker thanked Howard for the way she is approaching her work. Dr. Bonds said the district is there to provide vaccines when people are ready.

“Everyone needs a different amount of information,” Dr. Bonds said. “Everyone needs different questions answered. And, really, the way to help people who are vaccine hesitant is to help feel them reassured and answer their questions, not to be antagonistic towards them.”

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: The Rivanna Conservation Alliance is looking for a few good volunteers to help out on Clean Stream Tuesdays, a mile and a half paddle and clean-up to remove trash and debris from popular stretches of the Rivanna River. Trash bags, trash pickers, gloves, and hand sanitizer/wipes will be provided, though volunteers will need to transport themselves to and from the end points. Kayaks for the purpose can be rented from the Rivanna River Company. Visit the Rivanna Conservation Alliance's volunteer page to learn more about upcoming dates.

The rest of today’s show logs information related to water.

If you have a boat stored at the Ragged Mountain Natural Area, you’ll need to remove it by September 17. That’s when the city of Charlottesville will begin to enforce a ban on doing so that’s codified in the city’s ordinance. Non-motorized boats are allowed on the city-owned reservoir. They just can’t be stored there.

The swimming beaches at Chris Greene Lake and Mint Springs Valley in Albemarle County will be open this weekend for one last hurrah, but the season is over at Walnut Creek. These places are open Thursday through Sunday.

The Rivanna River serves as the boundary between eastern Charlottesville and the Pantops area of Albemarle County. To the north is the Pen Park within Charlottesville, and the river meanders south to the Sentara Martha Jefferson complex.

The area has been studied for many years, and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has been working on a study intended to unify future planning and implementation efforts. Nick Morrison is a planner with the TJPDC who updated the Charlottesville Planning Commission at their meeting on August 10. (TJPDC page on the plan)

“The goal of this phase of this planning project was to develop a vision and an action plan for that urban section of the corridor,” Morrison said.

Morrison said a vision statement makes the argument that the Rivanna River is one of the community’s “greatest assets.”

On the Charlottesville side, there’s a new apartment building nearing completion on River Road. Planning is moving forward with at least one pedestrian/bicycle bridge over the Rivanna. On the Albemarle side, apartments are planned along State Farm Boulevard and the fate of the State Farm headquarters building remains unknown. Their employees no longer have to report to work to do their duties.

The idea of the plan is to coordinate infrastructure, and to make sure attention is being paid to the impact on the environment.

“In terms of environmental protection, high-level, looking for approaches to protect any sort of sensitive biological or ecological areas, any sort of improved ongoing coordination between the city and the county, particularly in water quality and conservation,” Morrison said.

Commissioner Jody Lahendro noted that the report contains dozens of action items.

“Where do you go from here?” Lahendro asked. “I’m worried about creating yet another report that is just overwhelming with so many action items that are so disconnected that it goes back on a shelf. What’s the implementation for this?”

Sandy Shackelford, the director of planning and transportation for the TJPDC, said that before the plan is finalized, her staff will identify short-term goals as priorities.

“My thought was that we focus on sort of the foundational action items that are going to be needed to build off of these other ones, so focusing on things like inventorying existing infrastructure or conditions, or systems, or things like that,” Shackelford said.

Lahendro said he felt the cultural inventory conducted to date does not go far enough to protect certain areas that may have been Monacan sites.

“You just assume that everybody wants to be able to visit all these cultural sites,” Lahendro said. “I expect there’s some prehistoric sites along this river that we don’t want to have people going with metal detectors ravaging and destroying.”

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg suggested the plan should take note of desire from many to limit additional parking spaces. He also said the plan should address transit.

“The only thing that actually about transit is about signage from transit stops, which I think is good, but I think it would make sense to have stuff about connections to the river area both transit and pedestrian and bicyclist,” Stolzenberg said. “I’m also a bit confused by this idea that adding pedestrian facilities means we must add more parking as well.”

The TJPDC is also helping Albemarle County with a study of how to expand transit, with the Pantops area being one of the study areas. (check the August 11 CCE for that story)

Commissioner Liz Russell said language should be more clear about helping community members and visitors learn more about the history of the river, if it’s going to include a section on that topic. She noted the plan already includes examples from how other communities have utilized their riverfronts, such as Greenville, South Carolina and Richmond.

“You know the Richmond case study really I think says very beautifully that ‘helping visitors develop a fuller understanding of different aspects of people’s lives throughout the history of the region will help them understand strong connections and understanding.’ I really think we’re not quite making that point in like why are we talking about the history, and what could that mean in anyone experiencing any of these opportunities within the corridor.”

This is the second phase of the planning process. So far, there’s not a concrete plan for a third, but Shackelford said it would be more to design future infrastructure.

“If you look at the Richmond plan, they ended up with a master plan where they put things on paper,” Shackleford said.

Shackelford and the draft Rivanna plan refer to the Richmond Riverfront Plan, adopted by that city council in November 2012 and amended nearly five years later.

Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell cautioned the plan should not be to create an urban environment such as in Richmond or Greenville.

“We don’t want to be that developed I don’t think based on the emphasis on protecting the environment, protecting the river, being the prime directive,” Mitchell said.

Commissioner Stolzenberg said he felt developing along the river in a way that put more eyes on it could be beneficial.

“If you had apartments or restaurants that kind of fronted the river and had access to it, that would create a positive feedback loop where we would care more about the quality of the river, and more people would be able to use the river,” Stolzenberg said. “That might detract somewhat from the sense of being out in the wilderness but you can get that on the James, right?”

The plan was originally to have been adopted by December 2020 but the pandemic affected the timeline. The Albemarle County Planning Commission has not yet had a presentation on the latest draft.

What do you think about the Rivanna River plan? Let us know in the comments. I’ve spent a lot of time writing about plans, and this newsletter was created in part to keep the plans from being put on shelves and forgotten. I’m not here to say what should happen, but I want to shed light on previous studies, plans, decisions, and all sorts of things about what I’ve seen in my time as a reporter.

Please consider becoming a subscriber through Substack or a Patreon contributor to help ensure I can keep doing this. And definitely share with someone you think might be interested!

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On today’s show:

Details on the Belmont Bridge construction

Jack Jouett Middle School gets a new name

The COVID surge continues

A conversation with Matt Lawless, the town administrator of Scottsville

The summer COVID surge continues with a seven-day average of new cases at 2,058 and a percent positivity of 8.2. A month ago those numbers were 336 and 2.7 respectively. There were 2,302 cases reported Saturday, 1,887 on Sunday, and 1,712 this morning. The percentage of fully vaccinated Virginians is now at 55.2 percent and the percentage of adult Virginians is at 66.3 percent.

On Friday, a Centers for Disease Control panel recommended third doses of either the Pfizer or the Moderna vaccine for people who are immunocompromised. Later that day, the federal Food and Drug Administration amended the emergency authorization to allow that to eventually occur.

Dr. Denise Bonds, the head of the Blue Ridge Health District, will be a featured guest at tonight’s meeting of the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee to answer questions on the pandemic.

On Saturday, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville dedicated two homes in Charlottesville’s Venable neighborhood. The two new homeowners are graduates of Habitat’s Homeownership Program and the Pathways to Housing Program. Habitat purchased two lots on 12th Street Northwest from Dogwood Properties of Cville LLC in December 2019.

Earlier this month, Habitat submitted a site plan for more blocks of the first phase of the redevelopment of the Southwood mobile home park. Specifically, Timmon Groups has filed a site development plan for the Village 2 on the land that’s already been zoned by the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. This section will contain eight market-rate single family homes and 21 market-rate townhomes with no income restrictions.

Among the Habitat units in this section are three Habitat single family homes to be reserved for households below 80 percent of the area median income for an affordability period of 40 years. There are also ten Habitat townhomes, and three Habitat units in duplexes. The Albemarle Planning Commission got an update on the rest of the first phase of rezoning in July, and you can read a summary here.

In 319 days, Jack Jouett Middle School in Albemarle County will be known as Journey Middle School. The Albemarle School Board voted to rename the school, which has been named for the historical figure since opening as a junior high school in 1966. For more on this story, I recommend Katherine Knott’s story in the Daily Progress. (presentation to Albemarle School Board)

After several years of planning and study, there is an active construction site for the Belmont Bridge now that the project is fully approved and fully funded. The city held an information session on August 11 and Brian McPeters is with Kimley Horn, the firm that designed and engineered the bridge. The event was referred to as a Pardon Our Dust Meeting. (presentation) (watch the video)

“The project is primarily replacing the existing Belmont Bridge,” McPeters said. “That’s the bridge that carries traffic northbound and southbound over the railroad, over Old Avon, and over Water Street. It does include a secondary pedestrian-style bridge.”That bridge connects to a new mezzanine to be built in the area leading to the Ting Pavilion, and will make the walkway from the bridge compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

“But it will also build a concrete and steel structure that will be a great gathering place and create a sense of place for folks interacting with the bridge and accessing the Belmont Bridge,” McPeters said.

Construction of the bridge will take about 31 months from now to complete, according to McPeters, the manager of the city’s urban construction initiative. The informational meeting focused on how the traffic of all types on the roadway will be affected.

“There will be inconvenience and we do ask for your patience and it will be our job to inform you of what that inconvenience will be so you can plan accordingly and possible take an alternate route or be prepared for slight delays,” McPeters said.

Right now, construction activities have been limited to utility relocation and parking lot construction. When things really get underway, traffic will be moved around to different sections.

“Generally speaking, during daytime hours, traffic will always have one lane northbound and one lane southbound, and then you’ll have turn lanes at the intersections similar to what you have today,” McPeters said.

For the full details, take a look at the presentation.

Some highlights from the project:

Five-way intersection at Old Avon/9th/Garret/Levy will be simplified with removal of Old Avon movement, with a section of Old Avon become a pedestrian plaza space

Expansion of the pedestrian passageway from the bridge to the Pavilion area

A pedestrian passageway will be built at the Graves Street intersection to replace existing at-grade crosswalk

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and time now for another audience -supported public service announcement.

The nonprofit group Resilient Virginia works to inform decision makers and officials about how to prepare for a changing world. They’re holding their annual event virtually this year, at a time when we’re all digesting the latest reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The Resilient Recovery Conference will take place the mornings of August 25, August 26, and August 27. Take a look at the details of the event as well as pricing at resilientvirginia.org.

Albemarle County and Fluvanna County both have one town, and it’s Scottsville. The 1.54 square mile community has its own separate municipal government, with a police force, an administration building, a town Council, and a town administrator. That person is currently Matt Lawless, who has served in the position since March 2018. Before that, he served in the same position in the town of Boones Mill in Franklin County. Lawless lives in Scottsville, but recently traveled up to Charlottesville to sit with me one morning on the Downtown Mall.

To have the full experience, take a listen to the fifteen minute interview. Here are some of the highlights for readers.

“Scottsville is the oldest and only incorporated town in Albemarle County,” Lawless said. “We’re on the James River at the southern end of Albemarle and we can see Buckingham and Fluvanna from a high point in town.”

As town administrator, Lawless oversees planning, economic development, zoning, flood control, tourism marketing, and anything else that is required of him. At one point, Scottsville was the Albemarle county seat.

“Before Charlottesville was settled and before the Three Notch’d Road was built, the trade up and down the James River was fastest and most efficient, so having a town on the river right upstream from Richmond was of primary importance,” Lawless said.

Lawless said there are architectural styles from colonial to early modern in the buildings that have survived floods. A levy project in the 1980’s now protects the community from cyclical devastation.

“The last big flood in town was in 1972,” Lawless said. “Hurricane Agnes. Water above the first floor and into the second floor of many of the downtown buildings. In the 1980’s, the town organized and got support for a levy and pump system which protects the town to a wonderful high level now. It still needs maintenance and staffing, and that’s very important. We rely on a volunteer corps to maintain that but it protects the town and supports future investment.”

Is Scottsville in Albemarle’s growth area? What role might Scottsville play in providing homes for people to live? What are the constraints on its growth? What about the future of the tire plant? What about passenger rail? Why didn’t Columbia in Fluvanna County survive like Scottsville?

For those questions, you’ll have to take a listen to the whole interview. After all, this is a podcast and newsletter.

Thanks to all of my Substack and Patreon supporters for their investment. The interview was made with equipment purchased earlier this year. I’m grateful for the ability to dedicate my time and energy to this line of work. Special thanks as well to my friend Jeffry Cudlin for most of the music in the show. His involvement is made possible by a generous contribution this past January from the Valley Research Center, which may or may not actually exist.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out:

What’s your perfect holiday weekend in Charlottesville? Hanging with friends outside... Great live music... Maybe breaking a Guinness world record? Then mark your calendar for WTJU 91.1 FM's Freefall Music Festival -- Saturday, September 4 starting at 3 p.m. at IX Art Park. Live performances by Zuzu's Hot Five, Susie and the Pistols, and Good Dog Nigel. We'll attempt to form the world's largest human music note at 7:30 p.m. Plus, a hot dog and veggie dog cookout for our whole community. Find out more at wtju.net.

On today’s show:

Albemarle County is looking for a consultant for to help update their zoning code

U.S. Census Bureau releases population figures for 2020

Charlottesville Planning Commission gets an update on the Cville Plans Together initiative

The University of Virginia plans to increase the number of opportunities for people to get vaccinated

The Virginia Department of Health reports 2,270 new cases of COVID-19 today, the third straight day with one-day totals in excess of two thousand. The percent positivity has increased to 7.7 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are 37 new cases today and the percent positivity is at 4.6 percent.

There have been 244,944 cases of COVID since mid-January, and of that amount, 98.34 percent of cases were in people not fully vaccinated. Of 2,838 deaths, that figure is 98.17 percent.

(The above paragraph was corrected to fix a typographical error)

In Albemarle County, 73.2 percent of adults are fully vaccinated, or 63.6 percent of the total population. In Charlottesville, 61.8 percent of adults are fully vaccinated, or 54.7 percent of population.

The numbers in outlying counties are lower. For instance, in Louisa the figures are 54.4 percent of adults and 45.5 percent of the total population. In Fluvanna those numbers are 64 percent and 54.5 percent. In Greene, those numbers are 63.3 percent and 56.8 percent, and in Nelson 65.3 percent of adults are vaccinated and 55.6 percent of the total is fully vaccinated.

The University of Virginia Health System has announced they will make vaccines available in their outpatient pharmacies by appointment, weekdays between 11 a.m. and six p.m. Justin Vesser has helped lead the health system’s vaccination efforts.

“So we’re at this time when we sincerely hope everyone makes the decision to become vaccinated and there’s a lot changing on the vaccine front and a lot changing on the COVID front with the Delta variant and the current surge that we’re in,” Vesser said.

These are in addition to the vaccinations at the COVID clinic.

“We have community pharmacies that are UVA pharmacies in Zion Crossroads, we have them in Fishersville, we have them at UVA Cancer Center at Pantops, one in the UVA Bookstore, and one at student health clinic on the UVA campus,” Vesser said.

Masks are now required indoors at all public schools in Virginia, per a public health emergency order issued yesterday by Governor Ralph Northam. Even though the state of emergency has elapsed, the public health emergency is still in place. One whereas clause in the order point out that children under the age of 12 are not eligible for a vaccine yet. (read the resolution)Among the others:

Only 40.3% of 12-15 year-olds and 51.7 % of 16-17 year olds in Virginia are fully vaccinated as of August 10, 2021

Universal and correct mask use is an important COVID-19 prevention strategy in schools as part of a multicomponent approach and has been shown to be associated with lower incidence of COVID-19 in schools

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) advises universal indoor masking for all teachers, staff, students, and visitors in K-12 schools, regardless of vaccination status

Exceptions are made for anyone eating or drinking, exercising, for participation in religious rituals, and for those with health conditions that prevent wearing a mask.

The U.S. Census Bureau has released population and demographic data from the tally in 2020. According to the count, Charlottesville officially has 46,553 people, a 7.08 percent increase from 2010. Albemarle’s population is 112,395, a 13.56 percent increase since 2010. Louisa County’s population increased by 13.4 percent to 37,596, Greene increased 11.68 percent to 20,552, and Fluvanna grew 6.06 percent to 27,249. Nelson County’s population shrank by 1.63 percent to 14,775. Overall, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission increased by 10.4 percent to 259,120.

Virginia as a whole has an official population of 8,631,393, a 7.9 percent increase since 2010. There are 218.6 people per square mile. Charlottesville has a density of 4,544 people per square mile, and that figure is 156 people per square mile in Albemarle County. (population and housing data viewer)

A major purpose of the Census is to allocate seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. Virginia will continue to have 11 members.

Albemarle County is looking for a consultant to help update its zoning order. On Tuesday, Planning Director Charles Rapp hosted a briefing for representatives of firms interested in doing the work.

“The zoning ordinance exceeds probably 30, 40 years of life and its in need of an update,” Rapp said.

The chosen firm will enter into a multi-year contract to do the work in phases.

“We have an initial phase outlined in this [request for proposals] that focuses on zoning district land use clarifications and setbacks as kind of the first two sections,” Rapp said.

Subsequent phases will be undertaken as Albemarle begins to update its Comprehensive Plan.

“As we finish sections of the Comprehensive Plan, we will identify sections of the zoning ordinance that correspond with that topic,” Rapp said. “So an easy one to talk about is natural resource planning. So a zoning ordinance that might relate to natural resources would be landscaping, lighting, stream buffers, all of that kind of stuff.”

Back to that first phase. Rapp said this would be an update to transition toward a more modern zoning code that is easier to use and better organized.

“We would like to get a consultant on board by October,” Rapp said.

A second request for proposals will be released soon for a consultant to work on the Comprehensive Plan.

After this brief break, catching up with the Charlottesville Planning Commission.

You’re reading to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In this subscriber supported public service announcement, over the course of the pandemic, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society has provided hours and hours of interviews, presentations, and discussions about interpretations and recollections of the past. All of this is available for you to watch, for free, on the Historical Society’s YouTube Channel.

Some examples:

June 7, 2021 event on a report on how to improve cvillepedia

January 28, 2021 event on the Jefferson Madison Regional Library’s history

December 17, 2021 Speaker Series with Jordy Yager of Mapping Cville

Later on Tuesday, the Charlottesville Planning Commission met for their regular meeting in August. They’ll have two work sessions coming up, and the agenda for this one was relatively light.

As always, the meeting began with updates from Commissioners, including the nonvoting representative from the University of Virginia, Bill Palmer.

“I don’t have a whole lot to report other than just the reminder that fall semester starts on August 24 and we’ll be in pretty full swing around Grounds with first years coming back for orientation and all that,” Palmer said.

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg noted the finalization earlier this month of a key global update of how the entire world’s climate is changing.

“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has released the first part of its sixth assessment report and most of the stuff in there is bad news and some of it is tentatively good news if we act on it and I would encourage all of you to read it,” Stolzenberg said.

Stolzenberg said the report shows the global temperature will likely continue to rise above the 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming considered to be an important threshold. Efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are intended to keep that number lower.

“And we’re most likely looking at three degrees or more unless we can get very significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions,” Stolzenberg said.

Stolzenberg said the good news is that if the world can get to net zero, temperatures could eventually begin to go down. (view the various reports on the IPCC website)

James Groves, an associate professor in the Department of Engineering and Society at the University of Virginia, spoke about the report during matters from the public. He said it is the first update from the IPCC since 2013.

“Without surprise, the report states that our lifestyles are dangerously eroding the natural world around us, setting the stage for increasingly difficult living conditions for everyone and everything,” Groves said.

Groves said he hopes the Comprehensive Plan needs to have specific recommendations related to climate change such as recommending specific financing mechanisms to replace heating and cooling systems.

“Investments in sustainability solutions like [Commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy] financing, a green bank, and micromobility could put critical dollars in the pockets of our most needy neighbors, year after year, while stabilizing the climate for all of us,” Groves said.

Speaking of the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan, the firm Rhodeside & Harwell updated the city Planning Commission on the next steps for the Cville Plans Together Initiative. In February 2019, a previous Council opted to spend nearly a million dollars on a firm to complete the Comprehensive Plan, rewrite the zoning code, and adopt an affordable housing plan. That last step was completed in March.

Jennifer Koch is with Rhodeside and Harwell.

“What we’ve heard from you all is that you’d like to see us have a Comprehensive Plan to Council this year,” Koch said.

The consultant team continues to review the feedback submitted this spring in six-week public input window on the Future Land Use Map and some of the draft chapters of the Comprehensive Plan. There’s an upcoming work session on August 31.

“We’ll come to you with what we’re proposing as some adjustments to the Future Land Use Map and the Land Use, Urban Form, and Historical, Cultural Preservation chapter to respond to what we heard,” Koch said.

Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell said he thinks it is crucial to get a Plan for the current City Council to vote on before the end of the year.

“Slippage is not an option,” Mitchell said. “We do not want to have to educate a new Council. If it slips, we could be looking at another couple of years.”

More to come in the near future.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out: With the summer heat in full swing, your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep cool. LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

On today’s show:

A new nonprofit launches to promote regional entrepreneurial activities

A quick review of a recent stakeholder meeting on increasing transit in urban Albemarle

Several area destinations receive state funding for tourism marketing

Albemarle County seeking a consultant to help lead upcoming rewrite of the zoning ordinance

The Virginia Department of Health today reports 2,117 new COVID cases, the highest one-day count in four months. The percent positivity is now at 7.5 percent. The seven day average for new cases is now at 1,733. The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 52 cases today. The percentage of Virginians fully vaccinated is now at 54.8 percent, a number that includes children. The number of adult Virginians fully vaccinated is now 65.8 percent. The seven-day average of shots per day is now 14,124.

Next week, the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles will open a window in the Scottsville Town offices. The DMV Select will open on August 16 in the second floor of Victory Hall at 401 Valley Street. DMV Select offices allow for limited transactions such as picking up registration decals, but do not issue driver’s licenses. For a full list of services, visit the DMV website. You’ll need to schedule an appointment and masks are required. (schedule an appointment)

Speaking of Scottsville, repairs have been made to the library following heavy storm damage in late July. The library reopened yesterday at 1 p.m.

A new nonprofit is launching in the Charlottesville area to support regional entrepreneurship. Venture Central is to be a partnership between the city of Charlottesville, Albemarle County, the University of Virginia, and the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce. The group has announced the first members of the Board of Directors and will begin a search for an executive director. According to a release, Sarah Rumbaugh of the firm Relish will serve as the chair. Other board members include the economic development directors of both Albemarle and Charlottesville.

Governor Ralph Northam has announced the award of $861,080 in matching grants through the Virginia Tourism Corporation’s Recovery Marketing Leverage Program. The initiative exists to help expand the Virginia is for Lovers brand and to encourage new tourism marketing partnerships. (see a full list of recipients)

The Charlottesville Convention and Visitors Bureau will get $10,000 for Birthplace of Virginia Wine program

Dairy Market will get $20,000 for Charlottesville’s Bite-Sized Adventures: A Foodie Bucket List

Front Porch Cville will receive $19,980 for Rivanna Roots: A Riverfront Concert Series 2022

Blackburn Inn and Conference Center in Staunton will receive $20,000 for Sip, Stay, and Explore: Hiking Trails and Virginia Wines

The Heifetz International Music Institute at Mary Baldwin University will get $2,182.50 for a marketing program

Waynesboro Economic Development and Tourism will receive $10,000 for EXPERIENCE Waynesboro

Wayne Theater Alliance will get $10,000 for an outdoor production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat

Picking back up from the August 4, 2021 meeting of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors, that body agreed to apply for $314,000 in Community Development Block Grant funding for a food security program. Stacy Pethia is the county’s housing policy manager.

“The proposed project would serve a total of 470 individuals and households through three distinct programs,” Pethia said.

These are $110,000 for a grocery card gift program to serve up to 220 households, and $144,000 for the Local Food Hub’s Fresh Farmacy program to provide fresh produce for 18 months to 100 households. The funding would come specifically from a COVID relief program.

Supervisors also agreed to amend a special use permit that allows the Monticello United Soccer Club to operate on land off of Polo Ground Road. Scott Clark is a planner with Albemarle County.

“The proposal would increase the number of total number of fields to seven although only four would be used for play at any one time,” Clark said. “This is to enable them to move feels around, rest fields, prepare fields.”

The land is within Albemarle’s rural area, and there are no permanent facilities on the property. There is no increase in the number of parking spaces.

“This property could easily return to agricultural use in the future with a very low impact on the site,” Clark said.

The Mon-U soccer field is on Polo Grounds Road, which is just to the north of where the furthest Charlottesville Area Transit route currently stops. That won’t change when the city-owned and operated agency alters its routes later this year, but CAT is conducting a review of how to expand service to the north. So is Albemarle County and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. The Charlottesville Jazz Society at cvillejazz.org is dedicated to the promotion, preservation, and preservation of jazz, and there’s no time like now to find a time to get out and watch people love to play. The Charlottesville Jazz Society keeps a running list of what’s coming up at cvillejazz.org. This week, find out that the Michael Elswick Gathering plays at the Pub at Lake Monticello on Friday and the Eric Franzen Trio plays at Early Mountain Vineyards on Saturday. Take a look at cvillejazz.org.

At the same time, Albemarle County and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission are doing the exact same work as part of a study partially funded by the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

Boris Palchik is a transit planning project manager with Foursquare Integrated Transportation Planning, a firm hired to help conduct the work. The other consultant is Michael Baker International. Palchik ran a meeting on July 26 that sought to get initial feedback for the study.

“It’s really a feasibility study and implementation plan for expanding transit service in both population and employment centers in Albemarle County,” Palchik said.

The July 26 meeting was for northern Albemarle County along U.S. 29, and one on July 28 was held for Pantops. We’ll focus on July 26 first. (watch the video)

Palchik said the study may not result in several new fixed routes, but may include a combination of on-demand routes and other new transit options. The work consists of a market analysis, a service analysis, and stakeholder outreach.

“The market analysis is looking at the underlying environment in which transit operates or needs to operate in the study area,” Palchik said. “The service analysis is looking at what’s happening today on the ground in terms of ridership and productivity.”

Stakeholder outreach includes the July meetings and other ways to get a sense of what people might want and need in expanded transit. In addition, to Charlottesville Area Transit, Jaunt provides service in the area through on-demand, one fixed-route service, and through its partnership with Greene County Transit.

“There’s really many different ways to provide transit service and each of those ways has its own ideal operating environment,” Palchick said. “When we’re looking at the market analysis, we’re trying to understand the environment that exists so we can make recommendations that are appropriate.”

That means taking a look at population density, the built environment, employment opportunities, and other factors to measure the potential for public transit to work.

“Transit service is most effective and most efficient in areas that have higher density,” Palchick said. “The kind of tipping point for where fixed route transit service really begins to make sense is once you have more than five people or jobs per acre.”

Research conducted so far indicates moderate-to-high transit potential south of the South Fork of the Rivanna River. The highest population density in the area is along Commonwealth Drive, which is currently served by CAT’s Route 5. Service gaps are north of Rio Road and in the Hollymead / Forest Lakes area.

This work also comes at a time when Albemarle continues to become more dense, with more properties coming online such as North Pointe, Brookhill, and numerous other developments that will be more dense than single family homes.

Palchick said the stakeholder analysis specifically sought out information that may not have come through their initial review.

During the service analysis, stakeholders were shown older information on CAT routes, several of which are changing in the coming months. There will be alterations to Route 5, Route 7, Route 8, and Route 11, all of which serve Albemarle’s northern urban area. Learn more about the CAT changes here.

Scott Elliff is a member of the Forest Lakes Community Association’s Board of Directors. The FLCA has used a portion of its homeowner association fees to fight development of a mixed-use development on Ashwood Boulevard known as RST Residences. Elliff took the opportunity to speak at a discussion on expanding transit to point out that the existing character of his neighborhood is suburban.

“The challenge that’s happening up here is that we’re starting to get developments that are going to be by necessity pretty dense,” Elliff said. “There’s one that’s being planned which we’re opposing and hasn’t come before the Supervisors yet. It would be a huge high story development on the corner of Ashwood and 29.”

Currently there is fixed-route transit service in the Forest Lakes area provide by Jaunt through their Route 29 Express.

According to Valerie Long of the law firm Williams Mullen, 75 percent of the apartments in the RST development will be rented to people who can demonstrate household incomes between 30 percent and 80 percent of the Area Median Income. Elliff is concerned that if all of those people drive, it will exacerbate traffic congestion out of a neighborhood that only has two direct connections onto U.S. 29.

“The only solution from a transportation standpoint that I can think of is to have a dedicated service that picks people up at those affordable housing apartment buildings and takes them non-stop down to Barracks Road, downtown mall, and UVA where the jobs are,” Elliff said.

Elliff claimed there were no jobs in his area. In fact, let’s hear more of what he had to say.

“We’re up here in a beautiful area,” Elliff said. “There are no jobs. There are retail jobs… in the shopping centers north and south. If it’s going to be heavily affordable housing, these are people who are going to be working retail and they’re going to be working as administrative assistants or something in small companies but not around here. This is completely residential.”

Elliff’s claim made me look up the latest information from the Virginia Employment Commission on the top employers in Albemarle County. Several of them are within close proximity to the Forest Lakes neighborhood and all rough measurements below are taken from the pool at Forest Lakes South using main roads and Google Earth. (VEC profile)

4 is the Department of Defense and the various military installations at Rivanna Station (4.77 miles away)

6 is the Crutchfield Corporation which operates by the Charlottesville Regional Airport (3.5 miles away)

7 is the Northrup Grumman Corporation located in between both sides of Stonefield on U.S. 29 (4.4 miles away)

9 is Wal-Mart located just south of the South Fork of the Rivanna River on US. 29 (2.2 miles away)

18 is Emerson (listed as G.E. Fanuc) on U.S. 29 north of North Pointe (5.2 miles)

29 is Costco in Stonefield on U.S. 29 (4.5 miles away)

32 is Target in Hollymead Town Center (2 miles away)

36 is MicroAire Surgical Instruments in the former U.S. Postal Service building off of Airport Road (2.75 miles away)

38 is Rosewood Village Associates with facilities in Hollymead Town Center (2.4 miles away)

The RST rezoning goes to the Board of Supervisors on September 15.

Now, on to the July 28 meeting, which covered the Pantops area. Fewer people attended that virtual call. Pantops is currently served by Charlottesville Area Transit Route 10, which will also be changing as a result of the upcoming route changes.

Here’s Boris Palchik with Foursquare once again reviewing a market analysis.

“In the Pantops area north of U.S. 250, there are a number of key kind of activity generators like multifamily housing, the Social Security administration building, but it’s still showing fairly low density,” Palchik said.

Dick Hiss, the chair of the Pantops Community Advisory Committee, asked if the various analyses conducted take a look at future land use changes.

“Have you considered the changes that we see coming in the Pantops area such as the motor vehicle department going somewhere?” Hiss said. “That building has had a sign on it for years saying it is moving.”

Hiss said he is also wondering if State Farm employees will return to that building. State Farm is the fifth largest employer in Albemarle according to the VEC. Sentara Martha Jefferson is the third.

Gina Morss-Fischer, a public affairs specialist with State Farm, confirmed in an email to me today that employees assigned to the Charlottesville-Albemarle office will continue to work from home.

Palchick said the stakeholder meetings are intended to take note of comments such as this.

For a time, Albemarle County had been updating development dashboards which depicted what projects were coming up in the near future. These have not been updated since February 2020 in part because of the pandemic and in part because a staff member moved on. Charles Rapp is the planning director in Albemarle County.

“The staff member that was previously managing the dashboards is no longer with the county so we have used this as an opportunity to collaborate with our GDS department and create an updated version of the development dashboard,” Rapp said in an email to me this morning. “This new approach will have automated updates regularly and should provide a more streamlined approach toward conveying information. We are working through the final details now and hope to have it ready for the public soon.”

(review the current Development Dashboards on the Albemarle website)

But back to transit. Palchick said on-demand microtransit could be an option for parts of Albemarle in the future.

“The main difference between microtransit and Uber and Lyft is that Uber and Lyft operate with a fleet of vehicles that are not infinite, but you never quite know what kind of vehicle you are going to get when you request a service,” Palchick said. “Whereas with microtransit you have a set fleet of vehicles and a set group of drivers that are operating the service so it is more predictable and can be more closely branded with the local public transportation service and be more closely affiliated with it.”

Currently, Pantops is also served by Jaunt’s Buckingham Connect East service.

“So this service operates between Buckingham County and destinations in Charlottesville and Albemarle County,” Palchick said. “Those destinations include downtown Charlottesville, the University hospital, Martha Jefferson Hospital and the Westminster Canterbury retirement community.”

Westminster Canterbury is the 14th largest employer in Albemarle County.

In addition to the meetings on July 26 and July 28, the consultants are holding individual meetings. The goal is to complete the study by next January in order to apply for funding from the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation to pay for a pilot project.

Will any of this result in a better transit system? That means to be seen.

Another thing I encourage people to see is the staff report of a February 11, 2008 joint meeting of the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and Charlottesville City Council to discuss a study for a Regional Transit Authority that would be one unified system. That never happened, but eight years later, a Regional Transit Partnership was formed to encourage collaboration between area systems. That body next meets on August 26. (RTA staff report)

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Welcome to the 221st day of the year, at least, that’s the spot on the annual timeline upon which this script was written and the chronic coordinates when this recording was made. We can also just go ahead and say it’s August 9, but where would the fun be in that? In any case, this is the 229th edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement, which is also perhaps an unnecessary numerical signifier. Either way, I’m Sean Tubbs, your two syllable host.

On today’s show:

The General Assembly signs off on Governor Northam’s $4.3 billion ARPA spending plan, but makes a few adjustments

One Albemarle Supervisor warns about dry conditions

And a federal partnership is seeking volunteers to help map urban heat island conditions in Charlottesville

In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out: The Rivanna Conservation Alliance is looking for a few good volunteers to help out on Clean Stream Tuesdays, a mile and a half paddle and clean-up to remove trash and debris from popular stretches of the Rivanna River. Trash bags, trash pickers, gloves, and hand sanitizer/wipes will be provided, though volunteers will need to transport themselves to and from the end points. Kayaks for the purpose can be rented from the Rivanna River Company. Visit the Rivanna Conservation Alliance's volunteer page to learn more about upcoming dates.

The seven-day average for COVID cases in Virginia continues to rise with the Virginia Department of Health reporting that number as 1,626 today. On Saturday, there were 1,784 new cases reported, 1,573 cases reported Sunday and 1,298 today. The seven-day percent positivity rose to 7.3 percent. As of Friday, 98.55 percent of cases since February have been in people who have not been fully vaccinated.

There are 51 cases reported in the Blue Ridge Health District today and the percent positivity rose to 4.5 percent.

On Friday, leaders at the University of Virginia announced they would begin requiring masks indoors in order to prevent the spread of the Delta variant of COVID-19. UVA is still preparing to begin the fall semester later this month. According to UVA Today, the policy applies to indoor spaces owned or leased by the University, but are not required when eating or drinking. The policy also does not apply outdoors.

The General Assembly has passed a marked up version of a plan to spend $4.3 billion of state funding that comes from the federal American Rescue Plan. The legislature’s changes include $2.5 million for grants for community-based gun violence prevention reduction and $3,000 bonuses for officers who work in Sheriff’s offices and regional jails. The General Assembly also wants the Department of Motor Vehicles to submit a plan within 30 days to serve walk-in customers at service centers. Currently all visits are made by appointment only.

Around $761 million in funds will not be programmed at this time depending on the direction of the ongoing pandemic, according to a release from Governor Northam’s office.

Areas with high amounts of asphalt and pavement are less healthy places to live, and a hotter climate will exacerbate the problem. The city of Charlottesville is participating in a federal program to map urban heat islands and is looking for volunteers to provide data on temperature and humidity levels. The National Integrated Heat Health Information System is a partnership between the Centers for Disease Control, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and other partners across the world. According to the website, the idea is to “understand this problem, develop a robust and science-informed response, and build capacity and communication networks to improve resilience.”

The effort is seeking people who are willing to take samples on three different occasions in the last two weeks of August. If you’re interested, there’s a volunteer interest form to fill out. If you need more information, that’s available on the city website.

On Friday, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change finalized the first section of their Sixth Assessment Report titled Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis. A 39-page Summary for Policymakers describes in detail how human activity since the beginning of the industrial age has contributed to the gradual warming of the planet. The Arctic sea ice is melting, sea level is rising, and the report indicates that warming will continue throughout the mid-century even if greenhouse gas emissions can be cut severely. (view the various reports on the IPCC website)

Earlier this month, Governor Ralph Northam announced five new historical markers will be placed across the Commonwealth to commemorate contributions Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have played. One of them will celebrate the life of W.W. Yen, a Chinese man who graduated from the University of Virginia in 1900.

“Virginia has about 2,500 historical markers across the state but not enough are dedicated to sharing [Asian American and Pacific Islander] history,” Northam said in a ceremony announcing the new markers, each of which was submitted by students across Virginia. “This is a problem because AAPI history is Virginia history.”

Take a look at the release to find out who else has been recognized.

The rest of the newsletter is a review of last week’s Albemarle Board of Supervisors meeting. That was August 4 for anyone who needs a time stamp.

At the top of the meeting, Supervisor Ann Mallek wanted people who don’t live in the rural area to know there’s a problem.

“Urban people who have not been out in the countryside may not be aware of how severe this dryness is,” Mallek said. “We have streams drying up all over the place in the countryside and pastures are gone, hayfields are gone, cornfields are gone.”

According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, Albemarle County is either in the Abnormally Dry or Moderate Drought. All of Nelson County is marked as Moderate Drought, while Fluvanna and Greene counties are Abnormally Dry.

Mallek warned that the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority be clear in reporting conditions to the city of Charlottesville and the Albemarle County Service Authority.

“If we don’t start getting rain there is going to be a precipitous drop in supply,” Malelk said. “It happens very fast, like two, three, four feet a day at South Fork [reservoir] when things get to that saturation point.”

According to today’s water report from the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority, South Rivanna is full, as is the Totier Creek reservoir that serves Scottsville. Sugar Hollow is down over ten feet and Ragged Mountain is 2.31 feet below the usual level.

Albemarle County has hired a new director of the Human Services Department. Ti-Kimena-Mia Coltrane will take over the position on September 20, 2021, succeeding Lorna Gerome who will retire that month. Coltrane’s most recent position was as the Organizational Learning and Development Administrator for the city of Roanoke. She has worked in human resources for 17 years and has a Bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of North Texas, a Bachelor of Science in Human Services and religious studies from Indiana Wesleyan University, and a Master of Public Administration from the University of Maryland.

“I look forward to applying my experience in developing current and future catalyst leaders to services,” Coltrane said in a press release.

Supervisors also agreed to schedule a public hearing on September 1 on whether to adopt an ordinance to levy a cigarette tax, a power that counties in Virginia only just received from the General Assembly this year. The work is being coordinated by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, who will be administering a regional board to collect the tax. Lori Allshouse is the Assistant Chief Financial Officer for Policy and Partnerships for Albemarle County.

“The ordinance would establish a regional board which would efficiently administer the collection, accounting, disbursement, compliance monitoring, and the enforcement of cigarette taxes assessed by localities that desire to join the board,” Allshouse said.

Fluvanna, Nelson and Greene counties have expressed interest in joining the board. Madison, Orange, and Augusta counties are also considering the board, even though they are not part of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. The city of Charlottesville is also interested.

I’ll have more from the Board of Supervisors meeting and from other recent meetings in future installments of the newsletter.

Thank you for reading. Did you know this is a podcast, too? Every installment of CCE (but not the Week Ahead) is a podcast as well, building off my years in audio production. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify!

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Hello and welcome to Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs, and before we get started, I wanted to remind some of you and tell some of your for the first time that this program is an offshoot of a podcast I created in March 2020 to get information out about COVID-19.

Doing the Charlottesville Quarantine Report made me want to get back to journalism, and here I am a year and a half later with the 228th installment of this show and what is the 57th installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. Let’s get right to it.

On today’s program:

Amid rising COVID cases, Governor Northam requires vaccines or weekly COVID tests for state employees

An infectious disease expert at the University of Virginia is concerned about this flu season

The Blue Ridge Health District takes questions on where we are at the moment in the pandemic

You know there’s something serious going on with the public health response to the surge in COVID cases when there are press conferences at the local, University of Virginia, and state level all held on the same day. We’ll get through all of those in this episode of the program dedicated solely to COVID. Let’s start with the numbers today.

There are another 1,760 new cases of COVID-19 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health and the seven-day rate for positive test results is 6.8 percent. That’s up from 4.8 percent a week ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 30 cases today and the percent positivity is at 4.7 percent. Dr. Denise Bonds is the director of the Blue Ridge Health District.

“We had a lovely couple of months where as vaccinations increased, our case counts went down, and unfortunately in this country we have had now had an increase of what’s called the Delta variant,” Dr. Bonds said.

Dr. Bonds said the Delta variant is changing guidance from national health officials on wearing masks indoors. Locally, restrictions are beginning to go back in place. For instance, Albemarle County will require all visitors to administration buildings to wear a mask, regardless of vaccination status, beginning on Monday.

Part of the reason is that even people who are fully vaccinated could potentially still carry the Delta variant as the virus load is believed to be higher. So official guidance has changed.

“If you are vaccinated and know you have an exposure to someone who had a diagnosed case of COVID, the recommendations are that you get tested three to five days after that exposure and that you wear a mask when you are out in public for 14 days or until you have that negative test,” Dr. Bonds said. “That’s because we know with the Delta variant that you can become infected, have very mild or no symptoms if you’re vaccinated, but still be capable of shedding that virus to other individuals.”

Dr. Bonds said she has resumed wearing a mask when she goes to the grocery store and when she goes to a weekly exercise class.

The total for fully-vaccinated Virginians, including children, is 54.3 percent, up from 53.8 percent a week ago. The seven-day daily rate for vaccinations has increased to 13,031 a day, up from 11,840 a week ago.

Dr. Bonds comments came at a town hall this afternoon by the Blue Ridge Health District to provide information about how to get a vaccine, how to get tested, and the latest status on vaccinations. Jason Elliott is a communications officer with the Blue Ridge Health District. (watch the Town Hall)

“The math on this works out to about 61.8 percent of the Blue Ridge Health District having at least one dose and we’re sitting now at 56.5 percent of our Blue Ridge Health District being fully vaccinated,” Elliott said.

The Blue Ridge Health District is offering vaccinations four days a week at a smaller location at Fashion Square Mall in daytime and evening hours. They’re also offering shots at their headquarters one day a week. Their mobile vaccination clinic is also in use from time to time for something they’re calling Shot on the Spot.

“Coming up you’ll see us at Westhaven Health Day this weekend,” Elliott said. “We’ll also be at Lake Anna this weekend.”

The “Mobi” van will be on the Downtown Mall this Monday. There is still an active homebound campaign underway between the health district, UVA Health, and the Charlottesville Fire Department to provide vaccinations to people who cannot leave their home.

“The added bonus to this is that we take care of everything for your first and second dose, and you get that smoke detector set up or that battery replaced if you need that as well,” Elliott said.

We’ll hear more from the Blue Ridge Health District later in the program. Just before the town hall, the University of Virginia Health System held their weekly press briefing.

In the near future, booster shots for COVID may be on the horizon but are not currently recommended. Will that become an annual event? Dr. Patrick Jackson, an infectious disease expert, said it is too early to tell.

“With a lot of humility, we’re only known about this virus for about 19 months,” Dr. Jackson said. “There’s a lot of things still to know. HIV was discovered the year before I was born and my day job is to work on HIV virology so there’s just a ton we don’t know yet.”

Dr. Jackson said it is likely that COVID will likely remain present as a respiratory pathogen that continues to circulate similar to influenza.

“I think vaccination will continue to be a major emphasis for COVID-19,” Dr. Jackson said. “In terms of how often that vaccination will need to be updated, I think that’s unknown right now. There are reasons to believe that COVID-19 will mutate more slowly than influenza does so it might not be a yearly vaccine but there might be periodic updates that are recommended.”

Dr. Jackson said last year there was virtually no transmission of influenza because of social distancing and this may present a problem.

“Every year when the flu season comes around, you kind of rely on people having been exposed the previous year and recovered to kind of tamp down on the amount of transmission that flu can run through in a population,” Dr. Jackson said. “So I do think that in this upcoming flu season that vaccination is going to be incredibly important and we’re going to have to ramp up our efforts to vaccinate people because I think having kind of missed the last flu season is that we are kind of set up for a worst season this time around.”

Dr. Jackson was asked at the press conference what he wanted Governor Northam to do to take steps for public health.

“We already have a lottery in Virginia,” Jackson said. “We might as well have a vaccination lottery. I think that there’s at least some data that that helps get some people off the fence. Things the Governor can do to encourage vaccination particularly among state and local governments would be very helpful, up to and including expanding some vaccination mandates for people who are in a public facing role I think would be positive.”

Dr. Jackson said it is also important that people who are sick get time off from work.

“Paid time off for staff who are not feeling well to go home, recover, get tested, is super important, and supporting students who are not feeling well to continue their education, whether that is remotely,” Jackson said. “In an ideal world, and this is outside of the hands school system probably is allowing parents to take time off from work to care for their kids when they are sick rather than sending them in.”

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time now for another reader-supported announcement.

The nonprofit group Resilient Virginia works to inform decision makers and officials about how to prepare for a changing world. They’re holding their annual event virtually this year, and registration prices go up at the end of this week. The Resilient Recovery Conference will take place the mornings of August 25, August 26, and August 27. Take a look at the details of the event as well as pricing at resilientvirginia.org.

It has been a few months since Governor Northam held a press briefing specifically to address COVID-19. The pediatrician took to the dais today, wearing a mask, in order to give updates.

“When we last spoke in early May, things were looking very good,” Northam said. “And they still are overall. This summer our case counts have dropped to the lowest we have seen since October of 2020. And we have been seeing drops in hospitalizations, deaths, and in our percent positivity.”

However, the number of cases and the percent positivity have begun to increase as the number of vaccinations began to stall. That’s given the Delta variant room to spread.

“The arrival of the Delta variant combined with the number of people who are not vaccinated is driving our case counts back up,” Northam said. “A large majority of the people getting infected now are unvaccinated. They haven’t gotten their shot.”

Northam stressed that Virginia is still reporting lower numbers each day than at the height of the winter surge.

“And I am confident we will not go back to that point,” Northam said.

Northam said since January, 99 percent of COVID cases have been in people not fully vaccinated.“Even though Delta is more contagious, vaccinated people are still strongly protected against getting so sick that they have to go into the hospital,” Northam said. “Nearly every single person who has died from COVID has been unvaccinated.”

Northam announced mandatory vaccinations for the 120,000 people who work for the Commonwealth of Virginia by September 1.

“Anyone who chooses not to be vaccinated will have to get a COVID test every week and show proof of a negative result,” Northam said. “And I really encourage local governments and private companies to do the same thing.”

Northam urged those who are hesitant to get the shot now.

“The time for waiting is over,” Northam said. “Millions of people around the world have been vaccinated and we are fine. Three hundred and fifty million doses have been distributed in the United States including nearly ten million right here in Virginia.”

Children under the age of 12 are still not eligible to get a vaccine, though Northam said he is hopeful approval from the Food and Drug Administration will come within the next month. Under Virginia law adopted by the General Assembly this past winter, schools are required to offer in-person instruction five days a week and they are to follow guidance from the federal Centers for Disease Control. (read the bill)

“The CDC guidance is that people in schools need to be wearing masks,” Northam said.

Several districts have already taken votes stating mask-wearing will be optional. Northam urged these localities to consult with their legal counsel and to reconsider.

“It’s the law of the land and we expect our school districts throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia to follow the law,” Northam said.

Northam stopped well short of issuing a mandate for indoor masks. The state of emergency declared on March 12, 2020 has now expired. On August 5, 2021, Northam invoked some of the messaging used back in the early days of the pandemic.

“One of the things I said when all this started is that we as Americans are fighting a biological war and our enemy is the COVID-19 virus and when I served in the United States Army, one of the things that was so reassuring to me as an American was that Americans were on board with our mission. They were behind everything that we were trying to do to win this war. I would just hope that Virginians and Americans would look at this as a war and want to win that war.”

So for now, just like I was doing in March 2020, I’m remaining vigilant, watching the numbers, and changing my behavior again.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In this edition of the program:

Charlottesville City Council discusses a rezoning in Belmont zoning, bringing up issues of affordability and ensuring safe connectivity

Charlottesville hires a new planning director

An international developer has submitted rezoning plans for 525 units on Old Ivy Road

The summer surge in COVID-19 continues with another 1,717 cases reported this morning by the Virginia Department of Health. The percent positivity rate has increased to 6.5 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 37 cases reported, and the percent positivity is at 4.2 percent. The Central Shenandoah Health District reports 39 today, and Central Virginia Health District reports 34. There are some interesting geographic variances. The Alexandria district reports 19 while the Leonwisco district in far southwest Virginia reports 53 today and the neighboring Mount Rogers district reports 49.

Six months ago today, the VDH reported 3,059 new cases. The agency will update a dashboard that breaks down cases by vaccination status on Friday.

If you have questions about what’s happening, you’ll have the chance to ask health officials questions at a town hall that the Blue Ridge Health District will hold on Thursday, August 5, at 1 p.m. Panelists will include Dr. Denise Bonds of the health district and pediatricians Dr. Paige Perriello and Dr. Jeffrey Vergales. Register on Zoom.

On Tuesday, the Roanoke County School Board voted 3-2 to not require masks for kindergarten through 5th grade, according to the Roanoke Times.

Charlottesville has a new director of the department that oversees land use and zoning within the city. James Freas will be the next Director of Neighborhood Development Services, a position that’s been held by Alexander Ikefuna for the past six years. Freas is currently the director of Community and Economic Development in the town of Natick in Massachusetts, a position he has held since November 2019. Before that, he worked in land use positions in Newton, Massachusetts. He also served four years as a city planner in Hampton from 2005 to 2009.

This will be a return to Charlottesville for Freas, who graduated from the University of Virginia with an undergraduate degree in psychology. He also earned a Master of Community Planning from the University of Rhode Island and a Master of Studies in Environmental Law from the Vermont Law School.

"I am excited to be returning to Virginia and eager to get started with the City,” Freas said in a release. “There are a number of important conversations happening right now around development and zoning and I look forward to engaging with the community.”

Freas will report to Deputy City Manager Sam Sanders and begins work on September 13.

A developer that builds rental housing throughout the world has filed an application with Albemarle County to rezone 36 acres of undeveloped land on Old Ivy Road for 525 units. Greystar wants to build on property to the west of the University Village retirement community and Huntington Village.

“The residences planned for the Property are proposed to be entirely for rent, at least initially, in response to a strong interest in rental properties in the area,” reads the narrative for the proposal.

In all there are five properties involved in what’s being called Old Ivy Residences, all but two of which are zoned already at the R-15 zoning category required for density. One 5.52 acre property is zoned R-1. However, there is also an application to change the status of steep slopes on the property from preserved to managed. The lands are currently owned by the Filthy Beast LLC, Father Goose LLC, and the Beyer Family Investment Partnership.

According to the narrative, there would be 77 single-family homes, 43 townhouses, 58 duplexes and 312 apartments. Again, all rental.

“Market research demonstrates a demand for single- family residences for young families, young professionals, graduate students and retirees who desire more space but are not interested in, or able to purchase a home at this stage of their lives,” the narrative continues.

An existing pond on the property would be retained and serve as open space and for stormwater management. Some of the land had been purchased by the Virginia Department of Transportation for the Western Bypass, a project that was canceled in 2014.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In this subscriber supported public service announcement, over the course of the pandemic, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society has provided hours and hours of interviews, presentations, and discussions about interpretations and recollections of the past. All of this is available for you to watch, for free, on the Historical Society’s YouTube Channel. There’s even an appearance by me, talking about my work on this newsletter. Take a look!

There’s an age-old question in land use. Which comes first? The development, or the infrastructure? Should developments be limited in size if all of the pieces aren’t yet in place to support additional residents?

The topic came up during Council’s consideration on August 2 on the rezoning of 1206 Carlton Avenue which will allow development of an eight-unit apartment complex on a currently empty lot in Belmont. The project also requires a special use permit. City planner Matt Alfele represented city staff.

“The applicant is also requesting side setbacks be modified from 13 feet to 8 feet,” Alfele said. “The application materials indicate the height of the building would be approximately 40 feet but no greater than the R-3 allotted 45 feet.”

Charles Neer of Chestnut Avenue appealed to Council to deny the rezoning, as a previous Council had done for that property in October 2018.

“The petitioner has come back again asking to rezone the property, increasing the density from six to eight and not increasing the parking,” Neer said.

The project is being developed by Management Services Inc., a firm represented by civil engineer Justin Shimp who we’ll hear from later.

This rezoning comes at a time when there is heightened attention on the cost of housing. The Alfele said the Planning Commission had asked Shimp about how much it would cost to live in the apartments.

“The applicant stated it would be the $1,100 to $1,500 range for a mix of one and two bedroom units within the development,” Alfele said. “The Planning Commission also stated that this type of housing, missing middle, would support more housing opportunities in the neighborhood.”

In his presentation, Shimp laid out the dimensions for the proposed building.

“So the premise is here that we have a small building that is 26’ by 94’ so its essentially about the size of two single family houses stacked back to back, with a stairwell in the center, is the scale of the house, being about three stories,” Shimp said.

Four of the units are one bedroom, and the other four are two bedroom units.

Shimp also said this proposal contains one more parking space than the one denied in 2019.

“It is not intended to be luxury type of housing,” Shimp said. “The developer of this is not in that. They’re trying to build a simple structure with moderate price housing.”

Shimp stated the rents would effectively be within the range of affordability for people and households making 80 percent of the area median income. He said the property had been zoned R-3 until a city-wide rezoning in 2003.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker had concerns there was not enough parking, and that the developer would not be required to add sidewalks elsewhere in the neighborhood as part of the development. She said the city should not have to be the sole party responsible for building infrastructure to support growth.

“The developers are talking about feasibility and we never ask them questions about what that means in terms of profit for them and I know I’ve been told quite a few times that that’s apparently not our business,” Walker said. “How can they ask us for more but we think something that’s necessary for the neighborhood and especially for the new community members, that if we’re talking about walkability that we want them to walk somewhere and be safe. I just don’t understand how we think that that is not something that is acceptable to tie into a request when they are asking us to build more than they can build by-right.”

Councilor Lloyd Snook said if the city is going to intentionally increase density, there need to be plans for how the infrastructure will follow.

“Whether the infrastructure is provided by the developer or whether it is provided by the city at our expense, and as I look at that area the first that concerns me is that the streets are all pretty narrow, the lots are pretty close together and that’s fine,” Snook said. “But if we’re going to have close together lots and an emphasis on walkability, then we also ought to be having an emphasis on sidewalks and sight lines on the roads that we’ve got. A lot of the roads not only are narrow but they twist and turn a little bit. I would like to think about whether there are things the city would recognize that there are things that we would like to go in that area.”

There is no small area plan for Belmont. The 2007 Comprehensive Plan has an appendix that compile neighborhood input that had been collected by the defunct Charlottesville Community Design Center.

There’s also the 2015 Bike and Pedestrian Master Plan as well as the also the 2016 Streets That Work plan, which is intended to make streets serve pedestrians and cyclists. Those are handy documents to have, but city engineer Jack Dawson said they are not always useful in cases like such as this.

“There is sort of a missing link I would say very generally between developing a single property and looking at the overall multimodal network,” Dawson said.

But in the case of 1206 Carlton, Shimp pointed out that there is a sidewalk on one side of Carlton Avenue. He said the issue is a request to build a sidewalk on to Chestnut Street.

“We have sidewalks on our side that will get you all the way into Belmont,” Shimp said. “It’s not an issue. There was a question of could we connect to across the street, and that road comes down at a pretty rough slope and I don’t think it’s possible to build a sidewalk without substantial work and probably right of way condemnation. Those are all outside the limits of this project.”

Councilor Michael Payne has joined Council since the October 2019 vote. He said he supported the project as a good example of infill development that would provide workforce housing.

“You know, I was just comparing it some recent apartments that have come on line,” Payne said. “These are half the rent of some of the new apartments that have come online.”

Walker wanted to know what would prevent those units from increasing in rent anyway. Shimp said the design of the project would limit its worth on the open market.

“The square footages are not substantial,” Shimp said. “It’s a smaller unit. There’s not swimming pools or other sort luxury amenities. It’s just designed as a workforce housing structure. That’s for the neighborhood that it is in.”

Walker said that at one point, her house in Belmont was considered workforce housing with small homes on small lots.

“Mill workers at the IX building and now you have houses that are selling for $300,000 and up,” Walker said.

One home on Walker’s street that is blocks away sold in June for $452,500, or nearly 48 percent of the 2021 assessment.

Shimp said a lack of non-luxury units in the community on the market helps contribute to the rising market price for housing. He again said this project would provide the “missing middle” prompting a question.

“So when you are saying missing middle, what does that mean for you?” Walker asked.

“That means something that is basically more than a duplex but less than a garden apartment building,” Shimp said.

Shimp said that “missing middle” was about the structure, and not about the income of those in it. However, he also said he would be submitting a triplex to city officials and hoped the rent in those would be in the $800 range.

Walker expressed concern the rents would not remain low without a guarantee. Shimp said he would like to see a city policy that would make it easier to build houses with rents at lower price points. That is not currently in place.

Councilor Lloyd Snook said there was not much the city could do to put an affordability guarantee in place.

“In a market economy, I don’t know how you guarantee that kind of thing more than a years down the road anyway,” Snook said.

There was no official vote on the rezoning because a second reading is needed. A majority of Councilors did indicate support. It will come back up for approval at a future Council meeting.

Before you go! To keep this program going, two things need to happen. I need to increase the number of people who sign up for this email. I also need more of you to sign up for paid subscription through Substack here. Ting Charlottesville will match your contribution as a sign of their support for local independent journalism. So, do consider signing up and drop me a line if you have questions.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out:

If you're curious and want to dig deeper, there's another podcast you might want to try. Especially if you ask why, and not just what. And if you belive that politics should be about making communities better.

If so, check out Bold Dominion, a biweekly podcast from WTJU 91.1 FM. Bold Dominion is a state politics explainer for a changing Virginia. Their latest episode asks: Where does Virginia’s trash come from and who does it get dumped on? Check it out at BoldDominion.org.

In today’s program:

Charlottesville wants offers from groups that want the Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea statue

A brief update on recycling efforts from the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority

Friends of Esmont secure an important resource for the revitalization of the village

Charlottesville-Albemarle MPO advances next round of transportation projects

Charlottesville has opened the process for organizations and other interested parties who are willing to purchase the relocated statue of Lewis, Clark, and Sacagawea that stood for over a hundred years on West Main Street. The bronze sculpture by Charles Keck carries the official name “Their First View of the Pacific” and is currently located at the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center in Darden-Towe Park.

“Offers are due August 27 with a plan to have recommendations to Council to begin considering which of the offers you may be interested in during the month of September,” said City Manager Chip Boyles.

There is a four-page solicitation of offers for the statue that requires applicants to demonstrate recontextualization.

“The Recontextualization Plan must include an accurate historical narrative of the positive role Sacajawea provided in the exploration efforts of the Lewis & Clark Expedition and include the concerns that the statue may be interpreted to depict a lesser more subservient role provided by Sacajawea,” reads section 2.5 of the solicitation.

The executive director of the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center said she would be responding. The Daily Progress caught up with her recently, and I spoke with her two days after the statue was brought to the center on July 10.

Boyles made his comments at last night’s City Council meeting. He also encouraged people to spread the word that the city is looking for bus drivers.

“Starting pay begins now at $16.97 an hour and up according to qualifications, and includes a city full-time employee health care benefits and most importantly with your approval at the last meeting provides a $2,400 sign-on bonus for both transit drivers and school bus drivers,” Boyles said.

I’ll have more from the City Council meeting in an upcoming version of the newsletter.

“Their First View of the Pacific” is currently being stored at the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center. This photo is from December 2014 as the hotel at the intersection was still under construction.

A nonprofit group that seeks to revisit and restore the history of a small village in southern Albemarle County has purchased a commercial building for a future grocery store, museum, and visitor center. Friends of Esmont bought the Purvis Country Store property and have plans to convert it into the Purvis Store Market. An adjacent shed will become a shelter to serve as a trailhead for a future Esmont Trail. Friends of Esmont was founded in 2018 to revitalize Esmont through several projects including the trail, restoration of historic structures, and memorializing the Esmont Depot.

According to a history provided by Friends of Esmont, the store dates back to 1900 and was owned by the Purvis family from 1937 to 1989. The structure is a contributing resource in the Southern Albemarle Rural Historic District.

Work is set to begin today on replacement of a waterline on Keith Valley Road in the Greenbrier neighborhood. The project will replace a two inch pipe that is over 40 years old. The work will be conducted by Linco, will take about ten weeks, and may result in road closures at times. According to city Communications Director Brian Wheeler, the work will move the line from private property to public right of way at a cost of $74,430.

You’re reading and listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement and time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. THe Charlottesville Jazz Society at cvillejazz.org is dedicated to the promotion, preservation, and preservation of jazz, and there’s no time like now to find a time to get out and watch people love to play. The Charlottesville Jazz Society keeps a running list of what’s coming up at cvillejazz.org. This week, find out that the Charles Owen Trio plays at Potter’s Craft Cider on Thursday, Angelica X and friends play at the Front Porch on Friday, and so much more. Take a look at cvillejazz.org.

Reviewing more meetings from late July, both Rivanna authorities met on July 27 for regular meetings. We learned that the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority is receiving more materials at the Ivy Materials Utilization Center (MUC) than in previous years. In June, there were 154.96 tons of construction and domestic waste received at the facility, compared to 101.17 tons in June 2020 and 94.12 tons in June 2019. Executive Director Bill Mawyer said county investment in the MUC and longer hours of operation has made operations more efficient. (RSWA agenda packet)

“The net operating cost from the transfer station has declined from in 2018 for about $33 per ton to currently just under $9 per ton,” Mawyer said.

The RSWA is seeking permission from the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to increase the amount of waste it can process in a day from 300 tons to 450 tons a day.

“That would deal with a few of the spike days where we have an extra heavy load,” Mawyer said.

The RSWA Board got an annual update on the state of recycling from the solid waste director, Phil McKalips.

“There haven’t been a lot of changes with our material pricing,” McKalips said. “It’s been pretty stable surprisingly. Cardboard went up with COVID probably related to a lot of shipping.”

Many of the recyclable materials collected either at the McIntire Road drop-off point or the Ivy Convenience Center are sent to a paper sort facility on Meade Avenue.

“The cardboard, mixed-paper, and at least currently newsprint is all going to a Sonoco Mill south of Richmond,” McKalips said. “Our plastic films are going to Trex, plastic containers go to Sonoco, office paper goes to Sonoco. Glass is being picked up by Strategic Materials down in Wilson, North Carolina, and our metals go to Gerdau.”

McKalips said revenues from glass recycling have dropped from $25 a ton to zero, a situation he continues to monitor.

“We continuously get requests to look into doing additional types of recycling, recycling new materials,” McKalips said. “One that’s come in recently is styrofoam and I’m kind of exploring that. We try and generate and flesh out whether that seems plausible we’ll bring that to the board.”

The RSWA is currently working to build a third place to bring recycling at the Keene Convenience Center.

Another regional body that met last week was the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Policy Organization’s Policy Board, which consists of two city Councilors, two Albemarle Supervisors, and the administrator of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Culpeper District. One of the items on their agenda was update of their public participation plan, a document required by federal law. Lucinda Shannon is a planner with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. (read the plan)

“We changed the name to the Charlottesville Albemarle MPO Engagement Plan,” Shannon said. “I think with the last plan from the public comments that we received there was some confusion about what this plan was for and the engagement plan outlines the process and activities that the MPO uses to create opportunities for effective participation, communication, and consultation with all parties interested in the development, adoption, and amendment of its transportation plans and projects.”

No one spoke at the public hearing and the plan was adopted.

The main event at the MPO meeting on July 28 was approval of several projects that the MPO will continue to take through the next round of the Smart Scale funding process. Applications are not due until next year but concern over a project in the last cycle led to a reform of the public engagement process. (view the presentation)

District Avenue Roundabout

Hillsdale Avenue Extension

Rivanna River Bike & Pedestrian Crossing

Avon Street Corridor

5th Street Corridor

The MPO can submit four applications, as can the City of Charlottesville, Albemarle County, and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission itself. To review this presentation and learn more about the projects, click this link and you’ll go right to that point in the YouTube video. (read the staff report)

A member of the Citizens Transportation Advisory Committee had been lobbying for a flyover road to be constructed to relieve traffic congestion in the area around Hydraulic Road, U.S. 29 and the U.S. 250 bypass. The idea will not proceed at this time out of concerns the Smart Scale process would not fund such a project.

Chuck Proctor, an engineer in VDOT’s Culpeper District, said people interested in the overall transportation system will have the chance in the near future to influence its future as the MPO begins review of the Long Range Transportation Plan next spring.

“The long range planning process is what we’re going to be basically be kicking off in the spring at the MPO and in that process we’re going to be identifying and looking at the needs in the region and identifying solutions to those needs and that’s going to be the place where we need to look at this as possibly an option to address a concern of traffic flowing through the area,” Proctor said.

The current long range transportation plan was adopted in May 2019. (plan’s website)

At the end of the MPO meeting, the public got an update on the Afton Express, a commuter bus route that will begin service between Staunton and Charlottesville in September. Sara Pennington is the program manager for RideShare, a service of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

“The service is going to be administered by the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission, our counterparts across the mountain,” Pennington said. “They are on a demonstration grant from the [Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation] to offer this service starting September 1.”

On the eastern side of the Blue Ridge, the service will stop twice at the University of Virginia, the Amtrak station, the Downtown Transit Station, and twice at Fifth Street Station. Fares are $3 each way, though the first month will be free. Visit britebus.org for the schedule.

“This program is really designed for the commuter,” Pennington said. “They specifically scheduled most of this to revolve around working hours.”

Albemarle County recently received funding through Smart Scale for a park and ride lot at Exit 107 on Interstate-64. The idea is for Afton Express to stop there once it’s been built.

What about you? If you live in the Shenandoah Valley and work in Charlottesville, would you ride it? What about transit in general? I’m interested in the topic, which is why I cover the topic so much. I’ll have more about efforts in Albemarle County to expand service in a future edition of the newsletter.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s program:

An update on COVID numbers in Virginia and masking policies in area schools

Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors takes a look at the housing market

City Council considers next year’s budget, approves additional funding for additional study on affordable housing

Over the weekend, Virginia added another 3,555 cases and the seven-day daily average is now 1,108 cases a day and the percent positivity is six percent. The average number of vaccinations a day has increased to an average of 12,414 a day from 11,438 a week ago. The percentage of Virginians totally vaccinated has increased to 54.1 percent.

If you have questions about what’s happening, you’ll have the chance to ask health officials questions at a town hall that the Blue Ridge Health District will hold on Thursday, August 5, at 1 p.m. You can ask in advance by sending them a message by Wednesday morning at 8 a.m. Panelists will include Dr. Denise Bonds of the health district and pediatricians Dr. Paige Perriello and Dr. Jeffrey Vergales. Register on Zoom.

When Nelson County opens its public schools later this summer, masks will be required for all students, staff, and visitors. That message was included in a letter the school system sent to parents that included a survey about preferences going forward. That also includes students on school buses. (letter)

Albemarle County will also require masks indoors when school begins on August 23.

“Our mitigation strategies throughout this pandemic have served the health interests of our students, families and staff very well,” said Rosalyn Schmitt, the division’s Chief Operating Officer. “Since March 2020, we have had nearly 200 confirmed cases of COVID-19 among students, staff, and on-site contractors. Yet, there are very few instances in which it is suspected that transmission of the virus occurred on school property,” she said.

Families in Albemarle can still continue to request a virtual option, and the school division even now has a principal devoted to that option. Some changes have been made. Temperature checks will not be required to enter buildings and school buses will operate at full capacity due to the installation of air purifying HEPA filters.

Meanwhile, the Amherst County School Board voted Thursday to make mask-wearing optional.

The town administrator of Scottsville declared a state of emergency on Friday retroactive to late Wednesday night, when a powerful thunderstorm raged through the town.

“There was significant heavy rain which flooded several buildings,” reads the declaration from Matt Lawless. “Large hail damaged vehicles, buildings, and crops. High winds damaged buildings and were especially damaging to trees and utility poles.”

The declaration was made after the fact because Scottsville was without power for most of the day Thursday and parts of Friday. (Virginia code on local emergencies)

“In accordance with this Declaration, the Town will participate in the Regional Emergency Operations Plan,” the document continues. “The Town will furnish aid and assistance under the regional plan.”

Lawless said the damage to town government is about $5,000, and details on other damages are still coming in. The Scottsville library remains closed today due to damage, though curbside service is available.

Scottsville Town Council will need to ratify the Declaration at their meeting on August 16. (Declaration)

An Albemarle County company is among eight Virginia firms that have recently graduated from a statewide economic development program intended to boost their international exports. Greenberry’s Franchising Corporation is a growing suite of coffee retailers that went through the Virginia Leaders in Export Trade (VALET) program put on by the Virginia Economic Development partnership.

“The success of Virginia businesses both at home and abroad is key to maintaining strong, resilient state and local economies,” said Governor Northam in a release. “The VALET program equips growth-minded companies with the resources they need to stay competitive in today’s global marketplace and expand trade opportunities in a post-pandemic world. I congratulate these eight graduates on their impressive export sales and remain confident that they will continue to contribute to the economic vitality of our Commonwealth in the years to come.”

Two other companies that completed the program are AccuTec Blades of Augusta County and Paul’s Fan Company of Buchanan County.

The Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors has reviewed sales from the second quarter this year and found that home prices are up, as is volume of transactions. According to the report, there were 1,533 homes sold in their coverage area April through June, a thirty percent increase over the same period in 2020. Median sales prices were 13 percent over last year to $376,000, up from $295,500 in the same period four years ago.

CAAR also reports the number of listings were down by 48 percent. In addition to Charlottesville, CAAR covers Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson counties. Sales in Nelson County were up 85 percent over 2020. You can get the report from the CAAR website at caar.com.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time now for another reader-supported announcement.

The nonprofit group Resilient Virginia works to inform decision makers and officials about how to prepare for a changing world. They’re holding their annual event virtually this year, and registration prices go up at the end of this week. The Resilient Recovery Conference will take place the mornings of August 25, August 26, and August 27. Take a look at the details of the event as well as pricing at resilientvirginia.org.

Tonight, Charlottesville City Council meets at 6:30 p.m. and the rest of today’s show looks back at recent conversation from a work session last week.

Council held the second reading of an appropriation of $165,000 to conduct a review of the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund and to further define how the upcoming rewrite of the city’s zoning ordinance will be “inclusionary” in order to carry out the goals of the affordable housing plan adobe by Council in March. The additional funding will go to broaden the scope of the overall Cville Plans Together initiative. (read the Affordable Housing Plan)

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he supported the effort, but sought clarity about what the deliverable product would be for the additional review.

“I would hope that before things get too far along, somebody in the city government whether its someone in the city government whether it’s the City Manager’s office, whether it’s in [the Department of Neighborhood Development Services], I’m not sure who, would sit down with Rhodeside & Harwell and figure out what specifically we’re going to get in the way of an evaluation of these incentives,” Snook said.

To continue the story, let’s go back to the July 21st meeting of the city’s Housing Advisory Committee, an appointed group that consists of representatives from a wide spectrum of stakeholders. A new member who joined the group at that meeting is also running for City Council. (watch the HAC video)

“Thank you, Juandiego Wade with the city of Charlottesville School Board,” Wade said.

Two other people new to the HAC and new to Charlottesville city government are two new top deputies to City Manager Chip Boyles. Ashley Marshall has been Deputy City Manager for Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion since May, and Sam Sanders has been Deputy City Manager for Operations for a little over two weeks.

Sanders will oversee the Department of Neighborhood Development Services, and will play a lead role in overseeing the rest of the Cville Plans Together initiative. More specifically, Sanders will help implement the affordable housing plan adopted by Council. One of the three main points of the plan is to “adopt progressive and inclusionary zoning reforms.”

The HAC’s discussion at their July 21 meeting covered how to implement that affordable housing plan. Phil d’Oronzio is the body’s chair.

“Now that we have an agreed-upon in principle affordable housing plan, now what do we do?” d’Oronzio said.

Deputy City Manager Sanders had the opportunity to go first.

“The number one priority that I was given the day I walked in and honestly I’ll tell you 45 days before I arrived, number one priority is filling the [Director of Neighborhood Development Services] position,” Sanders said.

Sanders said a candidate had been selected, so we could hear soon who that might be. The theme this new person will be charged with implementing is Reimagining NDS. Another key vacancy is the housing coordinator position, who will be charged with tracking the metrics by which the affordable housing plan will be measured.

“But I guess the key thing we have to point out as it related to the affordable housing plan is that we don’t have the money yet,” Sanders said. “There’s a $10 million allocation that we’re all excited about being able to say that we’re going to receive it every year, but it has not yet been realized yet but it’s going to take that happening before the real implementation can begin.”

The housing coordinator position has been vacant for a year, since John Sales left to become executive director of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

Sanders said the city needs staff in the housing office to do the work. The plan itself calls for a culture change.

“There is a culture in which City staff can be at odds with the development community and the advocacy community, which limits the effectiveness of housing and development policies,” reads page 70 of the plan.

Sanders said the reason for the $165,000 is to pay consultant HR&A Advisors to go back to work on Charlottesville affordable housing policy. The scope for the adopted plan did not include a review of how the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund has worked to date. That review has not been done in recent years.

“It needed to be done because it was one of my questions.” Sanders said. “I said, hey, give me a summary of what we’ve done. And the response was: we can’t.”

So now, back to City Council’s meeting from July 28 and a reminder they were talking about whether to approve the $165,000. Here’s Councilor Lloyd Snook again.

“I just want to make sure that it gets guided before we get a final product,” Snook said.

Sanders explained to Council the two areas of work that the additional scope will cover. Here’s the bit about the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund and the review of the past ten years.

“Basically looking at who we gave money to, how much did we give to them, when did we give it to them, and what were the expectations,” Sanders said. “And then there will be the analysis of what were the deliverables that we were able to track through whatever reporting whether they did or not. In addition to looking through what our internal records are, they will be doing site visits.”

The second task is to flesh out the inclusionary zoning aspects of the upcoming rewrite of the zoning ordinance. The topic is currently covered on pages 94 through 96 in the housing plan adopted by Council in March. Now the consultants will turn the ideas into specific code.

“The goal of it was to have the consultants help us design what an inclusionary zoning program could look like,” Sanders said.

Sanders said the program would be customized for Charlottesville to fit the city’s needs and that Council would have the final say. Council approved the resolution to move forward with that work and then moved on to a conversation about the strategic plan as well as introductory work into the Fiscal Year 2023 budget development process.

As of today, there are 333 days until July 1, 2022, when that budget will begin.

It may seem a long way off, but there are some big ticket items that the city is planning on financing in upcoming years. Here’s City Manager Chip Boyles.

“The financial items are so large and with that we’ll be talking about the reconfiguration of the school and a couple of capital improvement plan projects that decisions do have to be made on in the very near future,” Boyles said.

Council put their strategic planning process on hold at the end of last year shortly before Boyles was hired as City Manager. Boyles said he needs some input about how to prepare the budget for next year, but there is not time this year for a full update of the plan so he asked for an extension of the existing plan in the short-term, while allowing for some amendments such as elevating the role equity will play in the fiscal year 23 budget.

There’s strategic planning, and then there’s logistical planning. In the current five-year capital improvement program budget, Council included a placeholder of $50 million to cover the cost of the first step of a reconfiguration of Charlottesville schools. Krissy Hammil is a senior budget management analyst for the city of Charlottesville. Earlier this year, she told Council repeatedly that doing so would be based on an assumption of increases in the city’s property tax rate. (read my November 2020 story)

“One of the things that is kind of a continuing conversation that we started last year is the school reconfiguration project and the need for the tax increase for the debt service that will be associated with that,” Hammil said.

Hammil said that level of funding anticipates an eventual ten cent increase in the tax rate to cover the additional debt service. The capital improvement program is at its limit, and the school system now wants $60 million for the first phase of reconfiguration.

Hammil said the current capital program also assumes the city will proceed with the West Main Streetscape, a multi-phased project that requires city funds to match state and federal money that’s already been awarded.

“West Main is still a decision point that will need to be discussed,” Hammil said. “Currently there is $18 and a quarter million dollars that are programmed in for bonds that have been authorized for that project. If we are now moving the school reconfiguration to $60 million then $10 million of that will need to be reprogrammed from the West Main project and moved to the school project.”

Hammil also said that if the school reconfiguration project is moved up to FY2024, the ten cent tax increase will have to happen all at once rather than be phased in over multiple years.

Another source of funding for the future is a potential sales tax increase with proceeds dedicated to school improvements. Such a rise would require a referendum, something that not yet been scheduled. There’s a second phase planned in the future to upgrade Walker.

In the meantime, Councilor Payne said he would support reducing funds for the West Main Streetscape.

“I just don’t see any realistic way to be able to afford school reconfiguration and our other priorities unless we’re cutting that,” Payne said. “The only way I could maybe see it being possible as if there is some sort of an infrastructure bill passed by Congress and there’s some way we’re able to take advantage of that.”

Boyles said staff will be meeting with VDOT to determine the last possible time when the city can indicate whether the first phase of West Main will be conducted. To recap, study for the streetscape got underway in September 2013 with work overseen by the firm Rhodeside & Harwell. The project is divided into four geographical phases, three of which have received different levels of funding from VDOT. In June, the Commonwealth Transportation Board approved $10.8 million for the third phase of the project and no local match is required.

“The time is clicking on the very first funding that we received from Smart Scale and while they initially have agreed to us being able to delay that so we could combine the three phases all together into one contract, they are still limited in to how far they could push that out,” Boyles said.

That meeting with VDOT is scheduled for this Friday.

Council ended up making no firm decision on West Main, similar to their conversation in February. Read my story from then to learn more. By the end of this meeting, Council asked for more information about how the sales tax referendum might be implemented. Here’s City Councillor Heather Hill.

“Part of the beauty of this sales tax is that it is actually is very deliberate and its for capital improvements for schools up to a certain number of years,” Hill said.

Stay tuned.

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On today’s show:

An update from the University of Virginia Health System on concerns about the Delta variant

A quick preview of the General Assembly special session on Monday

Piedmont Housing Alliance has submitted two rezoning proposals in Charlottesville

For the past three days, the Virginia Department of Health has reported over a thousand new cases of COVID-19 each day, with 1,178 new cases listed today. The seven-day percent positivity has increased to 5.1 percent and the seven day average for new cases has increased to 869. On June 30, those numbers were 1.6 percent and 172 respectively.

Since June 1, there have been 18,462 cases reported. Of that amount, there have been 757 hospitalizations and 79 deaths. Of those cases, 97.1 percent are in people who are not fully vaccinated. Of those deaths, all but 5 were of people unvaccinated.

The increase is likely due to the prevalence of the Delta variant. The Washington Post reported yesterday that the Centers for Disease Control had an internal analysis that the variant is perhaps as contagious as the virus that causes chickenpox. Dr. Patrick Johnson is an infectious disease specialist at the University of Virginia.

“The Delta variant seems to create larger amounts of virus in the upper airways in patients that it infects and that makes it more possible for people who have the Delta variant to infect other people,” Dr. Jackson said. “And unfortunately, vaccination, while it is protective, is less protective against ongoing transmission than we were hoping.”

Dr. Jackson said vaccination still offers protection against COVID symptoms getting worse.

“So one place that we see this quite clearly is from the United Kingdom,” Jackson said. “They had quite a significant number of surges from the Delta variant but really a very modest increase in the number of deaths from COVID-19 even with those increased cases.”

Is it time to consider booster shots for COVID-19? Dr. Jackson said the global supply of vaccines needs to be factored in as those public health decisions are made.

“I think one consideration about giving third doses to everyone in an age category is that even if you are purely U.S. centric, at some point we need to acknowledge that low rates of vaccination around the world are a problem for us,” Dr. Jackson said. “The more SARS-COV-2 replicates in other parts of the world, the more variants we are likely to see.”

Eric Swensen is a public information officer for the UVA Health System who said tis morning that about 80 percent of their staff are vaccinated.

“Beginning on Monday for people on our staff who are not vaccinated, they will be subject to mandatory weekly testing so that’s how we’re handling that moving forward,” Swensen said.

On Monday, the General Assembly will convene to fill judicial vacancies and to approve the spending of $4.3 billion in federal funds from the American Rescue Plan Act.

Governor Ralph Northam has spent this week outlining his proposals for the money and here’s that list courtesy of a legislative report from the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

$250 million for the Rebuild VA program

$50 million for the tourism industry, which may or may not include funding for agencies such as the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau

$53 million for the Industrial Revitalization Fund, including the Virginia Main Street program

$250 million for upgrading ventilation systems in public schools

$411.5 million for clean water initiatives

$935.6 million for the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund and to increase capacity at the Virginia Employment Commission

$485 million in investments for the behavioral health system

$114 million for public safety initiatives

$111 million for financial aid for college

Delegates and Senators will not be allowed to suggest amendments to the proposals. Both Houses convene at noon on Monday. (schedule)

(story updated - see comments)

The Piedmont Housing Alliance will soon file two applications to rezone two properties on Park Street in the city of Charlottesville for below-market housing projects. The nonprofit entity is working with Park Street Christian Church on a proposal to build 50 units for seniors behind existing church buildings.

They’re also working with the Monticello Area Community Action Alliance (MACAA) to rezone that agency’s property at 1025 Park Street for 65 below market units, 20 market rate townhomes, and 4,700 square feet of commercial space to allow MACAA to continue to operate on the site. There are community meetings for both rezoning proposals on August 10 at 5:30 p.m. either virtually on Zoom or in-person at the Charlottesville High School library. In both, the request is for Planned Unit Development. The concept plans for both were created by BRW Architects.

Charlottesville City Council denied a previous rezoning for the MACAA property in November 2017 that would have seen construction of a 141-unit assisted living facility on the site. (Read a Charlottesville Tomorrow story from then)

A Charlottesville dermatologist has been sentenced to 12 months probation and home confinement on three counts of using her Drug Enforcement Agency registration number to acquire Demerol. According to a release from the United States Attorney’s office for the Western District of Virginia, Dr. Amalie Shaffner Derdeyn pled guilty to the charges in March, which included using the registration numbers of other physicians.

A German company that owns the manufacturer of the pesticide Roundup has agreed to stop selling the product to residential customers in the United States beginning in 2023 in order to limit its legal liabilities. Bayer purchased the company Monsanto in June 2018 and two months later a jury in San Francisco awarded $80 million in damages to a man who had claimed the active ingredient of glyphosate was the cause of his cancer and that the risks of using the product were not sufficiently labeled. That award was eventually reduced to $21 million on appeal but that was just one of thousands of lawsuits about Roundup. Bayer plans to appeal the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Even if Justices do not select the case or uphold the verdict, the replacement of glyphosate will happen in 2023 according to a July 29 post on Bayer’s website.

“The company and its partners will replace its glyphosate-based products in the U.S. residential Lawn & Garden market with new formulations that rely on alternative active ingredients beginning in 2023, subject to a timely review by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and state counterparts,” reads the press release. “This move is being made exclusively to manage litigation risk and not because of any safety concerns.

The company will continue to sell Roundup to professional companies and the agricultural sector.

Before you go! If you’d like to ensure continued production of the newsletter and continued research into the community, please consider making a monthly contribution through Patreon. There are a few tiers that you can take a look at, and for one more month you can get in on the shout-out action for $25 a month before that price increases for new patrons. If you have questions, please drop me a line.

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On today’s show:

Another update on the redevelopment of Southwood Mobile Home Park by Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville

Spotted Lanternfly spotted in Albemarle

Two Virginia community colleges have new names

Governor Ralph Northam announces federal ARPA funding fo water and wastewater projects

Governor Ralph Northam has announced plans to use $411.5 million of the state’s share of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to invest in water and sewer infrastructure throughout Virginia. There is no list of projects provided in the release, but the announcement does state that $186.5 million will go to wastewater treatment plants, $125 million will go to assist Richmond, Alexandria, and Lynchburg replace their combined sewer overflow systems, and $100 million will go to water systems in small and disadvantaged communities. The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority was set to discuss how it may seek out ARPA funds at its meeting today, and I’ll have that information in a future newsletter.

Yesterday, Governor Northam announced $250 million in ARPA funds to improve ventilation in public schools, and those projects will all require local matches. (release)

Earlier this month. Northam announced the use of more than $200,000 to bolster grants from the Virginia Main Street program run by the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. Several communities in the general area received funding:

The Town of Farmville will receive $25,000 on a wayfinding system identified in a 2020 study

The Town of Orange will receive $25,000 for the Orange Downtown Association and the Orange County African American Historical Society for placemaking in a town park

The Town of Altavista will receive $20,000 to add to an existing grant for the town’s Downtown Business Investment program to fill empty storefronts

Nelson County will receive $7,000 to create a market analysis and retail gap analysis for the village of Lovingston

An invasive insect that threatens a wide range of crops has been spotted in Albemarle County. The Virginia Cooperative Extension has confirmed the presence of Spotted Lanternfly this month. The extension is a service of Virginia Tech and Virginia State University, whose communication staff prepared an informational video.

“The Spotted Lanternfly, an invasive bug from China, has been wreaking havoc on agricultural crops and causing a nuisance in the Northeast since 2014,” the narrator narrates. “Now the pest has found its way to Virginia. The insect can attack everything from peach and apple trees to hops and grapes.

Extension agents have been training volunteers to monitor for the Spotted Lanternfly. Visit the Extension’s website to learn more and to find out how to report the species if you see a specimen.

Two new community colleges in Virginia have new names, and another has added one character to its title. The State Board of Community Colleges approved the changes last Thursday. John Tyler Community College in Chesterfield County will become Brightpoint Community College, and Lord Fairfax Community College in Fauquier and Fairfax counties will become Laurel Ridge Community College. Patrick Henry Community College will add an ampersand to become Patrick & Henry Community College due to it serving two southside counties in that area. (VCCS release)

All 23 colleges in the system are re-examining their names and the names of their buildings. John Tyler was the 10th president of the United States and a slaveholder who eventually served in the Confederate House of Representatives. (learn more on Brightpoint site)

In the case of Lord Fairfax, the school’s website states that before the institution opened, minutes from 1969 reveal there was a struggle to come up with a name.

“The workgroup unanimously agreed, based on his history and lack of any notable legacy, that if the college were being named today, the group would not recommend it be named for Thomas, the 6th Lord Fairfax,” reads the Laurel Ridge Community College website.

At least two other community colleges are expected to change their names. These are Dabney S. Lancaster Community College in Clifton Forge and Buena Vista and Thomas Nelson Community College in Hampton Roads.

In today’s second subscriber-supported public service announcement:

On Thursday, July 29, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will turn the spotlight on four interns who have been helping the organization on topics this summer. Tune in on YouTube or Facebook at noon to learn about work to identify people buried in the early 19th century in unmarked graves at Pen Park, how cvillepedia is being updated to have a more broad perspective on local history, and to learn more about the ACHS’s Race and Sports project. It’s part of the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society’s Unregulated Meanderings series. Register on Zoom!

In 2007, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville purchased the Southwood Mobile Home Park in Albemarle County’s southern growth area for $7 million. Since then, the nonprofit agency has served as landlord of the site which currently has about 1,500 residents in 341 mobile homes. Since then, Habitat has been planning to redevelop it on a bigger scale that at the 16-unit Sunrise Trailer Court on Carlton Road. Megan Nedostup is a planner with Albemarle County.

“In 2016, the county partnered with Habitat through a Board resolution and then for fiscal year 2017 through fiscal year 2019, the Board of Supervisors included in their strategic plan initiative revitalizing urban neighborhoods,” Nedostup said.

In 2018, the Board agreed to contribute $675,000 to assist Habitat prepare its rezoning application for the first phase. In 2019, Habitat, the Board of Supervisors, and Albemarle Economic Development Authority entered into a performance agreement through which Albemarle would provide up to $1.8 million to help fund construction of affordable housing as well as $1.4 million in property tax rebates. Supervisors approved the first rezoning from R-2 to Neighborhood Model Development that year as well. (performance agreement)

“Four hundred and fifty maximum units were approved in this phase one,” Nedostup said. “The units included a mixture of residential townhomes, multifamily, single family, duplexes and a maximum of 50,000 square feet of non-residential was permitted under the code of development.”

Construction of several blocks is underway and at various stages of the review process. Some of the first units to go through the site plan are the ones being constructed by Piedmont Housing Alliance using Low Income Housing Tax Credits in Blocks 11 and 12. In all, Piedmont Housing is seeking to build 121 rental units in Southwood Apartments.

Blocks nine, 10, and the rest of 11 are mostly market-rate townhomes on the future New Horizon Drive to be built by Atlantic Builders

“There are 16 affordable townhomes,” Nedostup said.

Village One consists of Blocks 5, 6, and 8, with parts of Blocks 3 and 4. There are a wide range of unit types in this area. An illustrative plan depicts what developer is building what units and where. In all, 287 units are planned so far, with planning to get underway on Village 2 in the future.

Dan Rosensweig is the chief executive officer at Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville.

“We all know that you took a bit of a leap of faith with us when you recommended approval about two years ago,” Rosensweig said. “This is something a little bit different in that it was organized as a block plan which created a framework, a regulatory framework, which created flexibility for cohorts of residents to design the various moments within the new development.”

Rosensweig took the Planning Commission on a video fly-through of these sections, which you can watch as part of the YouTube video. That’s also the best way to get a full sense of where the project is at the moment. (watch)

One small detail, the first floors of each of the buildings that make up Southwood Apartments will be 12 feet high, which Rosensweig said will allow them to serve as commercial at some point in the life cycle of those buildings. Here’s another detail about the architecture of some of the residential units in Village One.

“One of the things that’s very important to us at Habitat and I know that it was important to you all in the rezoning process is that you can’t tell Habitat units from market-rate units so on every block there is a mixture of Habitat homes and market rate homes and we’ve coordinated with the market-rate builders to make sure our architecture matches up,” Rosensweig said.

Rosensweig said that during the rezoning, Habitat agreed to make 15 percent of the housing in the first phase below-market through various interventions to bring down the cost to future residents.

“So that would have been 50 of the 335 total units,” Rosensweig said. “We ended up 207 affordable units out of the 335 or 62 percent. That breakdown is about 80 Habitat units for purchase, six Habitat units for rent, and that will toggle a little bit. Some of the families may rent originally and then purchase the ones that they are renting.”

Piedmont Housing Alliance is building the rest of the subsidized units.

The original plan had been to not move any of the mobile homes during the first phase, but 25 units have had to be moved.

“In the initial phase, we had hoped not to move anybody at all,” Rosensweigh said. “That’s why we developed greenfields at first. We thought we might have to move a few. We’ve had to move a few more than we thought but none of them off-site. Out of an abundance of caution, we’re working with 25 families that are adjacent to the first construction zone that were a little too close for comfort.”

So far, eleven of the 25 trailers have been moved to other sections of the park and others should be moved by September. Rosensweig said Habitat has accumulated many trailers in its 14 years operating the site and was able to provide those in situations where the original structure could not be moved.

As for construction of new units, Habitat’s Chief Construction Officer said the first lots will be turned over to developers sometime this fall. Here’s Andrew Vinisky.

“We anticipate our first five Habitat homes and likely the first four market rate homes to be delivered some time next summer,” Vinisky said.

Work is underway now on the phasing for the rest of the Sunrise development. Attorney Lori Schweller of the firm Williams Mullen said staff has made a recommendation on how to proceed.

“We have been working closely with staff to plan for submittal of phase two and have been advised that an amendment to the existing zoning makes the most sense so we are preparing our concept plan and new code of development and hope to submit that in the fall,” Schweller said.

Commissioner Karen Firehock had several questions related to affordability.

“What percent or total number of the original units that you showed us a couple of years ago were supposed to be occupied by South residents?” Firehock asked. “How many are currently committed to existing residents? I’m trying to understand your success rate.”

“It’s actually going pretty well,” Rosensweig said. “We essentially canvassed the neighborhood and if you recall we’ve had numerous families who have been working toward this for a while so our first application process took place in the spring and we had 25 families step forward. Remember there are 49 homes in the first village, but they’re not all going to get built next year. There’s about 20 to 25 that are going to be get built every year so that was about the right number of families we needed to fill up the first buildings that we’re building.”

Rosensweig said the second application process will begin in August, and he expects all 86 Habitat units in the first phase to be occupied by current Southwood families.

“We can’t force anybody to stay in the neighborhood and so there will be some families who leave and we’re working one on one on a strategy with all of them,” Rosenweig said.

Rosensweig did not have a break down on the annual income for the first cohort of families, Southwood, but said the average AMI for a Habitat family is 32 percent of the area median.

Commissioner Tim Keller went back to the 1,500 people who are believed to be living at Southwood currently. He said with just over 200 affordable units in the first phase so far, that might not be be enough to accommodate all current residents who might want to live there.

“I’m concerned at least that what we’ve seen so far, that there could actually be a net loss [of affordable housing],” Keller said.

Rosensweig said that there is more of Southwood to be developed.

“This is phase one so this is 30 acres out of 123 so there are 207 affordable homes on roughly a fifth of the site,” Rosensweig said. “There is an area four to five times the size of what Phase One is that will accommodate more affordable housing so when we come back for the second phase of rezoning, that’s where the additional density of affordable housing and market rate housing wll be.”

Keller said the numbers of affordable units often appear to be in flux.

“It seems like each time we have these discussions we’re told there are going to be answers in the future and I just can’t believe you be doing this without having those kind of projections,” Keller said.

Commission Chair Julian Bivins noticed that all of the affordable rental units appeared to be clustered, with the 120+ rentals built by Piedmont Housing Alliance in Block 12 and many of the Habitat clustered in the middle of village one.

“And I’m sort of seeing all of the affordable housing units grouped together which means that people will sort of co-locate,” Bivins said. “When you bring this back for the second time, that will be one of the things I’m going to key off of.”

For another version of the story, please do check out Allison Wrabel’s July 16 story in the Daily Progress.

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On today’s show:

An uptick in COVID cases continues throughout Virginia

Council approves Fontaine Avenue streetscape design and extra funding for Meadow Creek Valley trail

Charlottesville Area Transit continues route change public input session while Albemarle gets ready for theirs

Today the seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases in Virginia is 671 and the seven-day percent positivity has increased to 4.3 percent. As of today, 53.6 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated, and do keep in mind that this number includes people under the age of 12 who cannot yet receive a shot. From June 19 to July 18 this year, there have been 8,012 new cases of COVID in Virginia and 97.09 percent cases are in people not fully vaccinated. There have been 25 deaths, and all but two were in people not fully vaccinated.

Dr. Costi Sifri is the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia.

“I think we’re fortunate in Charlottesville and Albemarle and our surrounding communities because we have a relatively high vaccination rate and we are also in a state that is one of those minority of states that vaccine rates that are above 50 percent and that’s provided some barriers to widespread transmission of Delta,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri acknowledged the uptick in cases, but said other parts of the country are experiencing much steeper climbs.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has been granted $2 million to spend on affordable housing projects. The funding comes from a statewide initiative from Virginia Housing called Resources Enabling Affordable Community Housing in Virginia, or REACH. Earlier this month, the agency announced it would spread $40 million around the state. Nonprofit groups, developers and others will be able to apply for the funding to help finance new construction.

“This funding puts the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership (CVRHP) and the TJPDC in a strong position to be able to contribute to affordable housing solutions through the development of new rental, homeowner, and/or mixed-use housing opportunities,” said Christine Jacobs, the interim director of the TJPDC.

The TJPDC has received funding for planning projects related to housing, but this is the first time the regional agency will play a role in the financing. Details to follow, and we’ll learn more at the TJPDC’s meeting on August 5.

Work on the replacement of the Belmont Bridge is picking up. Beginning today, flagging crews will periodically halt the flow of traffic while work is conducted to relocate utility lines.

“The contractor is undergrounding electrical as well as telecommunication lines to accommodate the future pedestrian underpass under 9th/Avon Street between South Street and Monticello Road,” reads a release sent out Friday afternoon.

More information about how construction will be conducted will be given out at an information meeting on August 11.

Today’s main segment consists on a lot of catch-up items from last week.

Charlottesville will seek additional funding to implement a plan to build a trail along Meadow Creek through the City of Charlottesville. Trails planner Chris Gensic told Council the details last week on a Transportation Alternatives grant opportunity offered by the Virginia Department of Transportation.

“The grant the parks department is pursuing is to construct a long awaited portion of an [Americans with Disabilities Act] accessible the Meadow Creek valley from the Michie Drive area up to the Virginia Institute of Autism at Greenbrier Drive and also around the corner to Greenbrier Park,” Gensic said.

The city will use $135,000 from an already-funded capital account for trails to match federal dollars that come through VDOT for a total of $675,000.

“That’s on top of about $375,000 we already have for this particular project,” Gensic said. “Costs have gone up over the years so we’ve determined we’re going to need this extra money for this particular project in Meadow Creek.”

Council approves Fontaine Avenue streetscape design

Council also approved the design for the $11.7 million Fontaine Avenue Streetscape, a project funded by VDOT’s Smart Scale in 2017 that is working through the long process from idea to construction. Kyle Kling is a transportation planning manager for the City of Charlottesville.

“In January of 2020, Council accepted the Planning Commission’s recommendation that this project’s conceptual design was found to be in accordance with the city’s Comprehensive Plan,” Kling said.

But what is the project, and what will it do for the half-mile stretch of Fontaine Avenue from city limits to where the roadway becomes Jefferson Park Avenue? Owen Peery is an engineer with design firm RK&K.

“In line with the City of Charlottesville’s overall transportation goals, the project seeks to make Fontaine Avenue a complete street which should produce accommodations for all users,” Peery said. “Ensuring safe passage for pedestrians and bicyclists, understanding that this serves as a gateway corridor into the city and ensuring the impression is attractive and improving access to local facilities and ensuring these facilities are easily accessed by pedestrians, bicyclist, and transit users.”

Final design will continue while property is acquired for public right of way, and construction would begin sometime in 2023.

Councilor Michael Payne had a question about something not in the plan.

“I’ve been reading through some of the community feedback and there are a couple of people who have raised the question of why these aren’t protected bike lanes with bollards or some kind of physical separation between the bike lane and the road where cars are,” Payne said.

Kling said the main reason is the need to keep the travel lanes accessible to emergency vehicles given the presence of the Fontaine fire station.

“We felt that if we were to put 11-foot travel lanes out there with some type of separated facility restricting access, it would make it more challenging for those vehicles to travel the corridor when needed,” Kling said.

The other reason is the presence of lots of driveways along the roadway, which would need to be closed.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker asked City Manager Chip Boyles to ask the University of Virginia to contribute financially if there are any cost overruns. Specifically, she suggested the city could ask to transfer some of UVA’s $5 million commitment for the fourth phase of West Main Street.

“There’s a lot of traffic in that area due to their work too that maybe that could be transferred,” Walker said. “I think its a conversation that is worth having,” Walker said.

Limited options to assist Greyhound

At the very end of the meeting, City Councilor Heather Hill asked if the city would be playing any role in the plight of Greyhound, which has closed its station on West Main Street but still picks up passengers on the street.

“I just want to acknowledge to the public that we’re hearing the frustrations,” Hill said. “The most recent comment that came today was around the role our own bus station could play as a housing location for those stops.”

City Manager Chip Boyles said he is concerned about the situation.

“A lot of our citizens utilize Greyhound to travel,” Boyles said. “We are very limited in what we can do because it is a private carrier and a private service.”

Boyles said the city has been asked to provide a shelter, but they can’t do so on private property without a landowners’ permission. Still, he is trying to work out a solution.

“We would love to talk with Greyhound,” Boyles said. “I know that they have inquired. The last that we heard was that they were just looking for someone to take over the service.”

For many years, the city helped subsidize Greyhound but stopped the practice beginning with the FY2014 budget.

Two other intercity bus services travel through Charlottesville, though both go north to rather than southeast to Richmond. These are the Piedmont Express run by the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation, and Megabus. Both of those services utilize a stop at Arlington Boulevard and Barracks Road.

Charlottesville completes transit public input sessions

Keeping on the transit theme, last week Charlottesville Area Transit held the second of two public input sessions on upcoming route changes. The presentation on July 21 was the same as five days earlier. This time the first question came from Jane Colony Mills, the executive of the food pantry Loaves and Fishes.

“We are located down Lambs Road at the intersection of Hydraulic and Lambs,” said Mills. “We serve probably 25 to 30 percent of Charlottesville’s population but if you don’t have a vehicle they can’t get to us.”

The nearest bus line is Route 5, and it’s about three quarters of a mile away from the nearest stop on Commonwealth Drive.

“I was out doing registration today and there are just numerous people who have to catch rides or figure out other ways of accessing our services because they can’t get here on public transport,” Colony Mills said.

Another person on the call wanted to know if service could be restored to Albemarle Square, which has a new tenant in a new grocery store. CAT Deputy Director Juwhan Lee explained why there are no bus routes there anymore.

“The property owner actually asked us to leave the property and so until they invite us back in, we will not able to serve the property directly,” Lee said.

The route changes will have to be approved by Council before going into effect.

At the same time, Albemarle County and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission begin the public input component of the a study about ways to expand transit in urban Albemarle, with the goal of increasing service to Route 29 north of the Rivanna River, to Pantops, and to Monticello. Tonight’s meeting deals with service in the north and begins at 6 p.m. (meeting info)

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In today’s newsletter:

The Charlottesville Planning Commission learns more about a proposal from nonprofit housing groups on an affordable housing overlay in the Future Land Use Map

The seven-member appointed body also recommended a request from Charlottesville’s public housing authority to drop a condition of a critical slopes waiver

And there are now two fatalities from a house fire in Fifeville early Wednesday morning

A second person has died after a fire in a home in Fifeville early Wednesday morning. Crews were called to the 1000 block of Cherry Avenue to a structure fire. According to a release, firefighters rescued one person who was trapped. That person and two others who escaped were taken to the University of Virginia Medical Center, and one died soon after arrival. This afternoon the Fire Department reports a second person has since died and the third occupant is still hospitalized. The Fire Marshal’s office is investigating.

Time to catch up with activities this month from the Charlottesville Planning Commission, who met on July 13. I previously reported two other items from the meeting in the July 16 installment of this newsletter. Now it’s time for the rest. (download the agenda packet for details)

Commissioners got details on an alternative version of the Future Land Use Map that is part of the Cville Plans Together initiative. If you’re unfamiliar, check out previous coverage:

Charlottesville Planning Commission gets first look at draft Future Land Use Map (April 13)

May: A busy month for Charlottesville to plan together (May 9)

Oversight group discusses Cville Plans Together initiative; Democratic Council candidates offer their views (May 25)

Charlottesville Planning Commission briefed on public comment for Cville Plans Together initiative (July 12)

The idea for an overlay district for affordable housing stems from members of the Housing Advisory Committee, one of whom is the executive director of the Piedmont Housing Alliance.

“The proposal we are going to discuss tonight reflects our effort to distill the common ground from the spectrum of insights, concerns and hopes that we have heard,” said Sunshine Mathon. “Consistently across all of the discussions we’ve heard the following. We’ve heard common praise for protecting and preserving historically Black and low-income neighborhoods. We’ve heard common support for addressing affordability broadly across the city and that mostly everyone is okay with future affordable housing in their neighborhoods. And lastly we’ve heard concern that density for density’s sake alone doesn’t serve anyone well.”

The proposal suggests creation of a new low-intensity residential category that would limit density in historically Black and low-income neighborhoods like Fifeville, 10th and Page, and Rose Hill.

“This land use would be the base land use for historically Black and low-income neighborhoods to reduce development pressures by essentially keeping in place the existing density allowances in these neighborhoods,” Mathon said.

A second concept is that the rest of the city would have the General Residential land use category which as described by the consultant would allow three units per lot.

“Recognizing that growth has been historically accommodated on the backs of low-income neighborhoods, this would shift growth patterns to higher income areas,” Mathon said. “To some extent.”

The third concept would be to only allow higher-intensity residential to developments that kept a portion of the units below-market.

“This proposal recommends that medium-intensity residential be a by-right use in all parts of the city if and only if affordable housing is part of a proposed development,” Mathon said. “This recommendation privileges affordable housing and guides density with purpose in all neighborhoods.”

Mathon said acceptable practical constraints include topography, lot sizes, and infrastructure. He said the revised maps that have been developed are not final and also need to be refined.

“Our proposal is intended to establish common principles that set the stage for the next level of detailing,” Mathon said.

Mathon also said the proposal does not currently define affordability but he set out what needs to be known.

The minimum percentage of affordable units in a particular development

The depth of affordability of units

The length of time those units must stay affordable

Dan Rosensweig, the executive director of Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville, said there are areas of the city where it should be easier for developers to build a lot of units.

“There may be areas of the city for example that don’t want to be general residential, but they are really the areas of the city, and I’m not going to name specific places but we know, a lot of people know where they are,you really don’t want to put the extra restrictions on them, where you just want density, intensity, and volume to happen,” Rosensweig said.

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg said he supported the suggested framework because it builds upon language from other documents such as the recently adopted affordable housing plan.

“In the affordable housing plan it says explicitly under the multifamily by-right zoning ‘establish a mandatory inclusionary zoning as part of any revision to the multifamily zoning,’” Stolzenberg said. “To me I think it does make a lot of sense to add that directly into our descriptions in the map.”

Stolzenberg also supported the idea of more density throughout the city if below-market housing is required. A reminder that medium-scale would allow between eight to 12 units per lot.

“I also think it makes a lot of sense to allow that possibility of medium-scale apartments everywhere with that requirement for affordability,” Stolzenberg said. “And that saves us a lot of kind of fine-grained picking out of things in the map versus letting that go to the site plan level requirements in making sure that for lots where that is proposed the infrastructure is actually in place and the physical constraints and that is doable.”

Stolzenberg said this way decisions about infrastructure would be made at site plan level. He did suggest a name change from “low-intensity” to “sensitive neighborhood.”

Rosensweig said the goal was to create more affordable housing.

“You can’t do a mapping exercise without thinking about the history of the map and the intentionality of the zoning map to calcify what had been put in place with restrictive covenants,” Rosensweig said. “To me, what is really important as somebody who is a champion of affordable housing and who has also tried to develop affordable housing is that it should be available, opportunities for affordable housing should be available throughout the city. A family’s zipcode shouldn’t be their destiny. I think one of the primary purposes of this map is to create the conditions by which affordable housing can happen in every neighborhood.”

Commissioner Jody Lahendro said he liked the idea, but still has concerns about the map provided by Rhodeside & Harwell. He posed several questions as the concept continues to be shaped.

“Who establishes whether a development is compatible within the context?” Lahendro asked. “What are the benchmarks? What are the requirements? Is it done on a project by project based on the context directly around that project? Or is it done by a zoning district, or a district of some kind?”

Commissioner Chair Hosea Mitchell offered these comments to the consultant.

“Density for the sake of density is dumb,” Mitchell said. “Density with a purpose, density that is smart, density to borrow from Sunshine, density that privileges affordability is good and the overlay as it has been presented does just that, it provides density with a purpose, the purpose being affordability.”

City Councilors were also on the call. Commissioner Michael Payne said he supported the framework.

“It’s a good framework for addressing some of the concerns a lot of people have over ensuring that density is actually promoting affordability to the maximum possible extent,” Payne said.

However, Councilor Payne had concerns the regulations aren’t too restrictive that developments can’t work out financially.

“I just want to make sure we don’t end up in a situation where projects don’t pencil out and we have a de facto downzoning for some neighborhoods that have racial covenants and redlining,” Payne said. “And then likewise, how do we ensure that we’re actually monitoring and keeping units affordable as part of the requirements of any overlay.”

Commissioner Stolzenberg said many of the details about affordability can be answered while the next phase gets underway. But he said the proposed overlay will help guide that conversation.

“Clearly the real details of levels and all that needs to be pushed to the zoning ordinance rewrite where we’ll have the map done,” Stolzenberg said. “But it is also important now to basically for your small projects that are just getting into this overlay, in determining what your base level is, you’re going to be setting those levels implicitly, right? So if general residential allows triplexes, if you’re building a fourplex, you’re saying that it has to be 25 percent affordable, which might preclude fourplexes all together. So I think that while the bulk of the details should be pushed out later, there is some amount that you should need to be thinking about now.”

The consultants with Rhodeside & Harwell continue to go through the feedback from the official community input process, which ended on June 13. The next official meeting with the Planning Commission is tentatively scheduled for August 31. Jennifer Koch is the project manager for the Cville Plans Together initiative and she said they will take the proposal into consideration as it fits in with the overall strategy.

“We have met with at least Dan and Sunshine a couple of times just to make sure we understood what was being proposed,” Koch said. “Like Sunshine said, some of these thoughts about an overlay we have in the chapter of Comprehensive Plan as part of the next step was zoning.”

Mitchell said he wanted to complete the Planning Commission’s role in the Future Land Use Map this by October so the currently elected Council could take a vote. Two Council seats are up this November.

But we’re not done with the Cville Plans Together initiative just yet today! This past Monday, Council held the first of two readings on approval of additional $165,000 to expand the scope of the project. Specifically, they’re to be directed to study how the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund is used, as well as a further study of inclusionary zoning. Some of the funding would come from the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund, which was created in 2007 as a dedicated account for housing projects. Alex Ikefuna is the director of the Department Neighborhood Development Services.

“This request is essentially a fund transfer to enable staff to complete a couple of related projects designed to implement the affordable housing plan that was endorsed by the City Council a couple of months ago,” Ikefuna said.

The work will include a review of the performance of the past ten years of the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund.

“The program is designed to evaluate whether the city’s investment is actually producing the desired outcome,” Ikefuna said.

Ikefuna said the additional funding for the inclusionary zoning study is not related to the affordable housing overlay presented by Habitat for Humanity and the Piedmont Housing Alliance. He did offer this caveat to Council about expectations for this process.

“Everything that comes out of the Future Land Use Map and perhaps the zoning ordinance and maybe portions of the overlay that would be integrated into the Future Land Use Map has to be what the market can respond to,” Ikefuna said. “We have to be cognizant of that.”

Councilor Heather Hill has been a member of the Housing Advisory Committee and is glad to see the review of the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund will be conducted.

“I just think this is really long overdue,” Hill said. “I know the Mayor and I have discussed throughout our time on Council and just making sure we have a process in place that does have that accountability but also just looking back historically and understand what has and hasn’t been working so that we can have the most effective use of city dollars moving forward.”

I’m in the midst of conducting my own review of the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund, and if you’re a paying Substack subscriber, you’ll get that report as soon as I’m done with it. After that it will be posted to the Information Charlottesville website. About a quarter of you are paying, and I’m grateful for your support to help me keep an eye on things for all of us.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: Help support Black-owned business in the Charlottesville area. Check out the Charlottesville Black Business Directory at cvilleblackbiz.com and choose between a variety of goods and services, ranging from beauty supplies, professional services, and e-commerce. Visit cvilleblackbiz.com as soon as you can to get started.

Earlier in the Charlottesville Planning Commission meeting, Commissioners voted unanimously on a proposal from the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority to alter one of the conditions in a critical slopes waiver they were granted in early 2019 for the first phase of the redevelopment of South First Street. Carrie Rainey is a planner with the city of Charlottesville.

“The previously granted critical slopes waiver allows for construction and land disturbing activities within critical slopes for a development that would include 62 multifamily residential units in three buildings and a community resources center,” Rainey said.

City code defines a critical slope as one that has a grade of 25 percent or higher, and also contains either a horizontal run greater than 20 feet or is within two hundred feet of a waterway. The idea is to prevent erosion and prevent sediment from entering waterways, which kills macroinvertebrate life. The waterway Pollocks Branch is within the latter.

After construction at South First Street began, CRHA notified the city it would not be able to comply with a condition of the slopes waiver that required a phased construction so that two buildings on First Street would be built first “in order to create a better stabilized site during construction and to facilitate more effective erosion and sediment control measures.”

“The purpose of that is building three is placed on the trap that serves to treat the sediment from the areas where [buildings] two and three are being built,” said city engineer Jack Dawson.

CRHA officials maintain that because of supply issues, they need to construct all three buildings at once in order to lock in costs. On the day of the Commission’s discussion, CRHA’s engineers suggested that a combination of enhanced silt fences and placement of mulch to slow the flow of stormwater runoff that would go to Pollocks Branch, which flows into Moores Creek, which flows into the Rivanna River.

“That’s mostly not acceptable for this type of application and there are sort of some further concerns I have with that as well,” Dawson said.

After spending a few minutes detailing what he felt was problematic about the plan, Dawson reached a conclusion, though he said he understood the importance of this project.

“It’s going to be difficult to ensure that what’s done here is actually enforceable and carried out,” Dawson said. “There’s been significant problems on the site so far with conforming with the erosion and sediment control scheme.”

City Attorney Lisa Robertson said the critical slopes waiver process happens at the legislative level, sometimes long before a site plan will be submitted.

“So the situation you wind up with is that you vote on these things and you adopt conditions such as let’s sequence the buildings to make sure we provide extra protections for the critical slopes areas and minimize disturbance and then you find out when you get closer to construction through the process of doing the erosion and sediment control plan that certain things can or can’t be done with that,” Robertson said.

Robertson said if the Commission granted the waiver, CRHA and city staff would still have to work to ensure the plan complies with Virginia’s erosion and sediment control regulations.

“What you really need to decide tonight is whether or not you’re going to get rid of the construction sequencing condition and whether or not you need to get rid of any other conditions,” Robertson said.

Robertson suggested this is one area to review as the zoning code is updated.

Ashley Davies of Riverbend Development led the CRHA’s presentation. The request is centered on a need to build all three buildings are materials are found due to supply chain issues related to the availability of lumber during the pandemic.

“We certainly don’t have any ill intent and we are just as committed to protecting Pollocks Branch as anyone else,” Davies said.

Davies said the disturbance of slopes has all occurred and stabilization methods are in place, but the condition on phasing does not work in order to meet the project schedule.

“We’ve also think I spent a lot of time working with staff to try and make adaptations on site as we’ve discovered issues but basically what we found is that staff is like, ‘well, we can’t make any of these recent adaptations because this was a Planning Commission and City Council condition’ so it doesn’t really allow the [erosion and sediment process] to adapt or be amended with staff,” Davies said.

Davies said she did not feel Pollocks Branch would be in any danger of environmental harm. Scott Collins, a civil engineer working on the project, said the sediment trap would still be in place during construction.

“We are still achieving 100 percent stabilization on the site from the parking lot up,” Collins said. “For everything that would go to that sediment trap, before we remove that sediment trap we are stabilizing that per Virginia stormwater and erosion and sediment control standards.”

Dawson said in a recent site visit, he saw sediment being discharged into Pollocks Branch and that construction was outside of the limits of disturbance outlined in the plan. Dawson also said he chose not to take immediate action.

“We certainly could have issued a stop work order immediately,” Dawson said. “That’s not what we did.

The Commission voted unanimously to recommend dropping the waiver. It will next move on to City Council.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

On today’s show:

A quick update on what Albemarle Community Development Department is up to

The number of new COVID-19 cases in Virginia hits a months-long high

The Commonwealth of Virginia wants your input on future train service

The first half of Charlottesville City Council’s July 19 meeting

The pandemic is not over, and one set of facts to support that statement is reported daily by the Virginia Department of Health. Today, the agency reports another 721 new cases, the highest one-day total in the past few months. The seven-day average for new daily cases is 429 and the percent positivity is three percent.

Once a week, the VDH updates a dashboard that breaks down cases by vaccination status. From June 1 through July 9, 96.98 percent of the 7,486 new cases reported were in people who were not fully vaccinated. The rest are what are known as breakthrough cases.

Last Friday, University of Virginia Health System director of hospital epidemiology Dr. Cost Sifri, said there’s an uptick nationwide of rising COVID-19 cases.

“We’re seeing a steady climb,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s being driven in parts of the country that have two things. It’s a low vaccination rate and the Delta variant. And that’s as we had predicted a month or a month and a half ago, unfortunately.”

As of today, 53.2 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated, with higher rates generally reported in metropolitan areas and lower ones in rural areas. For instance, Lee County at the southwestern tip of Virginia reports 29 percent fully vaccinated whereas that number is 62.3 percent in Albemarle County. However, the number drops to 53.7 percent in Charlottesville.

Reports are out today that Louisiana Representative Steve Scalise finally got vaccinated this past Sunday, citing concerns over the Delta variant of COVID-19.

“The Delta variant is far and away the most fit virus and the most dangerous virus that we’ve seen to date but it doesn’t mean it’s the end of line,” Dr. Sifri said. “New mutations could crop up and the Delta variant or new types of variants could develop elsewhere around the world and that gives us a lot of concern.”

Don’t throw your mask away just yet.

After years of planning and several studies, construction has begun on the Belmont Bridge. The city won’t hold an official information session on the project until August 11, but crews have begun grading land to the west of the bridge for a temporary parking lot. In June, the city issued a notice to proceed to the Caton Construction Group to implement a $23.7 million contract to replace the bridge with a completion date of January 2024.

The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation has opened an online survey to seek feedback on the forthcoming Statewide Rail Plan. The introduction to the feedback form states that the purpose is to study “the feasibility of instituting cross-state intercity passenger rail service linking Hampton Roads, Richmond, and the New River Valley, also known as the Commonwealth Corridor.” Participants are to asked to rank their priorities, what they’d consider as trade-offs, and what locations should be connected. For more information on the development of the Statewide Rail Plan, visit this link. (take the survey)

For another survey, Albemarle County is asking residents to report their broadband needs, particularly in areas that are not currently served. Firefly VA is a subsidiary of the Central Virginia Electric Cooperative formed to expand Internet through public-private partnerships. They’re looking to create a map for their Regional Internet Service Expansion (RISE) Project and want to plot out areas that only have satellite or cell phone internet as well as areas served by internet at less than 25 megabits per second. The finding will help prioritize the use of state and federal funding. (survey)

Former Charlottesville Mayor Maurice Cox has been the Commissioner of Chicago’s Department of Planning and Development since October 2019. Earlier this month, the Chicago Sun-Times reports that Chicago has just created a Design Committee that will advise on approvals of major developments there. Cox served as Mayor from 2002 to 2004, and was in that position when the City Council approved major zoning update. He served in a similar position in Detroit before moving to Chicago. The Design Committee will examine projects in excess of 10 acres, over 2,500 residential units, and high rises over 80 feet tall.

Meanwhile, life and land use changes have moved on in Charlottesville and Albemarle County.

The Albemarle Planning Commission got an update from their Community Development Director at their meeting on July 6. Jodie Filardo became the director of that entity in September 2019. (review the presentation)

“Our primary focus day in and day out is on land use and the building of homes and commercial properties, which directly impact lifestyles,” Filardo said. “Where you live, work and play, and how you get there, are all areas we think about and plan for every day.”

That work is governed by a plan that is occasionally presented to the Board of Supervisors, who then give direction on what priorities should be undertaken. The last time that happened was this past May.

Filardo said her department’s staff shrunk by nearly 11 percent due to retirements and the freezing of several positions due to the county’s cautionary approach to budgeting. Several of those have since been filled, such as an additional zoning compliance officer.

Filardo reminded the Planning Commission that work on policy issues comes as staff has capacity. Current projects underway continued work to develop the Housing Albemarle Plan, a form-based code for the area around the intersection of Rio Road and U.S. 29, assistance with the Urban Rivanna River Corridor Plan, and the Crozet Master Plan. The Board of Supervisors will get a look at the second phase of the county’s Stream Health Initiative tomorrow.

One project not yet underway but in the queue is an update on the county’s wireless policy. Albemarle will hire a consultant to do the work to update a policy that’s been in place since December 2000.

Filardo said one need is to continue to boost capacity by hiring more staff and increasing efficiencies.

“As the county is now increasingly urban, [the Planning Commission] and the community are asking for faster and more efficient services from Community Development,” Filardo said.

Last September, the Board of Supervisors directed the department to move more swiftly on a plan to update the zoning code while concurrently reviewing parts of the Comprehensive Plan.

“The comp plan work is a high priority and will occur incrementally in phases,” said Amelia McCulley, the deputy director of the Community Development Department. “We identified zoning ordinance work that corresponds with the policy work in the comp plan so those intersecting efforts will align and be scheduled accordingly with work products in each phase.”

This may seem obscure, but an update of the bureaucracy is intended to help increase the county’s ability to help provide affordable housing. McCulley provides one example of what isn’t currently working.

“Our density bonus requirements are outdated and inconsistent between zoning districts,” McCulley said. “They are intended to provide a bonus for measures and improvements above and beyond ordinance requirements.”

For instance, a developer of a housing project between Berkmar Drive and Woodburn called Berkmar Overlook filed a site plan in 2019 that anticipated getting additional units through two types of bonus density. However, staff later wrote to explain that no bonuses were allowed in the existing R-6 zoning.

The original application had been for 71 single family units with eight townhouse units through a bonus density and other units granted through a tree preservation bonus. What’s actually getting built is 52 units to be sold on the open market with no affordability provisions.

Another item worth noting for people interested in Albemarle Land Use is something called Business Process Optimization that is underway to update all of the forms through which community members and businesses interact with the county government.

“We are an urbanized county now,” Filardo said. “Yes, we have 95 percent of our county is as rural, but the demand for services from our county community really is at a level that is similar to fully urbanized county and in order to accommodate that need for information and the data we need to make good decisions, we must have much better systems.”

You can watch the whole discussion at the July 6, 2021 meeting of the Albemarle Planning Commission.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. It’s time now for the second Patreon-fueled shout-out:With the summer heat in full swing, your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep cool. LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $74,950, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

Finally today, a look at some of what happened last night at the Charlottesville City Council. The consent agenda passed without any changes, meaning the city will move forward on spending $830,000 in American Rescue Plan Act funding to cover the cost of providing $2,400 bonuses to school bus and transit drivers. Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker wants Council to consider more bonuses for other city employees.

“I just want to make sure that we are prioritizing figuring out bonus or incentives for other city employees also,” Walker said.

This was the first meeting of Council since three statues erected around a hundred years ago were removed on July 10. City Manager Chip Boyles gave this report.

“Things went much quicker and very quieter than we had anticipated but it always better to over prepare and not need it,” Boyles said. “Staff has continued and we will update you as we progress on getting the final resting places for those three statues. We’ll be prioritizing the Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea Statue first.”

That statue is currently being stored at the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center in Darden Towe Park.

Boyles also introduced new deputy city manager Sam Sanders, who started work on July 12 after working in Baton Rouge, Louisiana as the head of a neighborhood development corporation.

“I’m trying to figure out how he started on the Monday after we had such a busy weekend but we’ll figure that out later,” Boyles said.

However, Sanders did not comment. He and fellow Deputy City Manager Ashley Marshall will address the city’s Housing Advisory Committee at their meeting at noon tomorrow. Council’s work session on July 27 will be held on the budget development schedule for fiscal year 2023 as well as the resumption of the creation of a strategic plan. That effort was put on hold at the end of calendar year 2020.

At the next regular meeting of the Council, Boyles said the city will have a better idea of how much American Rescue Plan Act funding will be left after a shortfall in the fiscal year 2021 budget is plugged.

“Of course we finished the fiscal year on June 30 and we’re starting to get a better understanding of what these funds can or can’t be used for and we’ll present that to you,” Boyles said.

I’ll have more from the City Council in the next installment of the program. Other events to catch up with include a recent presentation to the Albemarle County Planning Commission on the redevelopment of the Southwood Mobile Home park. Stay tuned!

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In today’s show:

Virginians for High Speed Rail hold a “town hall” on the future of passenger service in the Commonwealth

Charlottesville Area Transit holds the first of two input sessions on upcoming route changes

Students at Jack Jouett Middle School may soon take a Journey

A committee reviewing the name of Jack Jouett Middle School has recommended that the facility be renamed Journey Middle School. The group was chaired by teacher Hannah Peters.

“Inclusiveness was the value repeated most often by our students, community members, and staff,” Peters said in a news release on the school site. “Journey is a concept that applies to all. Middle school is a place that prepares students for the academic rigors of high school and beyond.”

Other choices included “Hope, Peace, and Justice,” “Monacan”, and keeping the existing name. The latter was the preference of a community survey.

Superintendent Matt Haas will make his recommendation to the School Board at their meeting on August 12. The Board would take a vote as soon as August 26, but the name change would not take effect until July 1, 2022.

According to the release, Jouett is reported to have held over two dozen people in enslaved servitude. Prior to this effort, the county has renamed three other schools and retained the name of Virginia Murray Elementary School. Cale Elementary has been Mountain View since July 1, 2020 and Sutherland Middle School is now Lakeside as of the most recent July 1. The Murray High School is now the Community Lab School.

Virginia’s Planning District Commissions will be granted $40 million to use to create new housing across the Commonwealth. Funding will pass through the regional organization, such as the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Opportunities include renovating blighted properties, creation of regional housing trust funds, and building housing in business districts. The funding comes through the Virginia Housing Development Authority, which is now known as simply Virginia Housing. Specifically, the funding is part of their REACH program. We can expect more details perhaps at the August 5 meeting of the TJPDC.

Virginia will be able to participate in a regional program designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions after a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit from a business group last week. The Circuit Court of Richmond ruled that Virginia Department of Environmental Quality did not violate state rules when it revised regulations to enter a cap and trade system known as the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). The Virginia Manufacturers Association had argued the move created an “illegal carbon tax on ratepayers”

“The Court recognized that DEQ scrupulously followed the General Assembly’s directives and did not violate Virginia’s Clean Energy and Community Flood Preparedness Act when it amended its carbon trading program regulations to allow for the direct auction of carbon dioxide allowances,” said DEQ Air and Renewable Energy Director Mike Dowd in a release today.

For more on the ruling and the RGGI system, read this article in the Virginia Mercury.

A project to relocate a gas line from one side of Emmet Street to the other met with damage this weekend, resulting in a detour of southbound traffic heading toward the University of Virginia. Rain damaged a utility trench and in order to make repairs, all southbound traffic on Emmet Street will be detoured through Massie Road and Copeley Road. The gas line is being relocated as part of UVA’s Emmet / Ivy Corridor project. UVA Architect Alice Raucher will discuss that larger project at the Albemarle County Planning Commission on July 20 beginning at 6 p.m. (learn more about the detour ) (Albemarle PC meeting info)

In the past year and a half, the state of Virginia has invested heavily in the future of rail, spending billions to buy hundreds of miles of right of way for that purpose from CSX. The investment has been made as a way of relieving congestion on Interstate 95 and other roads without widening. Shannon Valentine is the Virginia Secretary of Transportation and she created an Office of Innovation at the Virginia Department of Transportation to study major corridors.

“The congestion along I-95 particularly from Fredericksburg to D.C. is some of the worst in the country,” Valentine said. “We were going through a number of options and the natural solution was let’s look at building more roads and we learned through the study that just building one lane, 52 miles from Fredericksburg to 495 in each direction would cost $12.5 billion.”

Valentine said the study also forecast the expansion would be obsolete within ten years of completion. She said the investment in rail will be a third of the cost and focus on moving freight and passengers through the corridor. Part of the improvements will be to build a new bridge across the Potomac dedicated to passenger and commuter service.

Valentine made her comments at a July 15 “Town Hall” held by the group Virginians for High Speed Rail. The other speaker was Stephen Gardner, the president of Amtrak. That federal agency is investing in new trains for additional service in the northeast corridor.

“First and foremost, we view our mandate as trying to create as many alternative trips to driving and as we can across America to create that alternative to connect communities with reliable, efficient, and time-competitive service,” Gardner said.

Amtrak was created as a federal agency in 1971 to consolidate 20 passenger rail services across the United States into one. In Virginia, the seventies coincided with a period of disinvestment in passenger rail. Today’s efforts didn’t come out of nowhere.

“This program, this effort to expand has been a many, many decades long effort,” Gardner said. “It’s just been a long and continuous effort to try to develop an expanded service that could really support the tremendous growth and opportunity in the Commonwealth and it’s taken a while to turn vision into fruition.”

Gardner credited Virginia for having a plan when the time came for expansion. There has been daily service from Lynchburg to D.C. since October 2009 and a second daily train will be along in the near future.

“We are adding a second train in the FY22 from Roanoke and Lynchburg north, and we’ll be expanding and extending that train, both trains actually, over to the New River Valley into Christianburg, Blacksburg, Virginia Tech,” Gardner said.

Watch the entire Town Hall on the Virginians for High Speed Rail’s YouTube channel. The group was formed in the 1990’s to build support for restored and renewed passenger service in Virginia.

If you're curious and want to dig deeper, there's another podcast you might want to try. Especially you ask why, and not just what. And if you belive that politics should be about making communities better.

Charlottesville Area Transit has held the first of two public input sessions about changes to bus routes intended to boost ridership. The agency has experienced a sharp ridership decline over the past several years, and relatively new director Garland Williams has overseen some potential changes.

“It is our intention to make sure that we get feedback and make adjustments to the CAT system that [are] fruitful to everyone and make sure the system is as productive as it possibly can be,” Williams said.

During the pandemic, CAT hired Kimley-Horn and the Connetics Transportation Group to study the system to recommend changes.

“We’ve had declining ridership for the last seven years,” Williams said. “We needed to figure out how to mitigate that, turn it around, put a stop on it, and put our best foot forward to make sure that the adjustments that we’re going to put in place will allow us to be productive.”

The adjustments are the first in a series of proposed changes, as Albemarle County and the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission are working on a study to expand transit regionally. The first opportunities for public input in that study are next week.

It is a fact that ridership is declining. Jim Baker of the Connetics Transportation Group knows another fact.

“Generally about 62,500 people in the Charlottesville area are within a quarter mile of a stop, a transit service,” Baker said.

Specific directives were to add service to South First Street in Charlottesville and the Center at Belvedere in Albemarle County. Capital funding from the city of Charlottesville for the Center was contingent on the new site being accessible to transit.

“But also just to get 30 minute or better service to more people in the Charlottesville area and also to make sure that no route operating worse than a 60 minute service frequency,” Baker said.

Service will be extended to Mill Creek. Route 7 will travel all the way to Wal-Mart. And there will be more options for people to move around without having to go to the Downtown Transit Station.

“We’re proposing a new crosstown service from the south Charlottesville up to the U.S. 29 corridor, so from Willoughby going through the UVA hospital complex and then up to the shops at Stonefield,” Baker said.

Five people made a public comment at the first session, which was held at noon on Friday. You can watch the whole thing on the city’s streaming meeting website.

One person said he was glad service will be extended to the Center, but also had a concern that the bus only stops there once on the route.

“Apparently there’s no return so if I get the 11 bus and ride to the Center and get off and spend my afternoon there, how do I get home?” asked Todd Cone.

Williams said the intersection of Rio Road and Belvedere Boulevard is currently unsignalized, which means making a left-hand turn very difficult.

“You do get home,” Williams said. “It’s just that there’s no, you have to ride around unfortunately because it is unsafe for us to go across an unsignalized intersection. A CAT vehicle is not a car so it’s a 35 foot bus trying to make it across six lanes of traffic. It’s not a safe way for us to go southbound towards downtown. You are able. You just have to get on the Center and ride around.”

Carmelita Wood, president of the Fifeville Neighborhood Association, said many of the bus stops in the area offer no protection from the elements.

“Some of the Routes, 4 and 6 on Cherry, and I think it’s Bailey Road and Fifth Street, there’s no coverage from the weather and the heat,” Wood said. “They recently put in seating in some areas, but in most of the areas there’s no coverage from the rain and the snow and the heat.”

Juwhan Lee, assistant director at CAT, said a full review of city bus stops is underway.

“What we’re trying to do is go out there and see where are stops are and what conditions they are in and what amenities they have,” Lee said. “We want to look at everything, look at the condition of the infrastructure of the location, and see what we can do improve it. Does the stop need to be here? If so, how can we make it better?”

Lee said such a study has not been conducted for over ten years.

Anthony Woodard is the manager of the McIntire Plaza off of McIntire Road just south of the interchange of the John Warner Parkway and the U.S. 250 Bypass. He noted no bus service serves the area, which will soon house more people.

“There’s a lot of employment opportunities there,” Woodard said. “A lot of nonprofits in the area. Habitat Store, Blue Ridge Area Food Bank. And soon to be over 200 residents living back there as well as other neighborhoods nearby. The closest next stop is over half a mile away.”

Williams said the area is on his radar for future coverage as those housing units come online, and as CAT looks ahead to the next set of upgrades.

“It’s not off of the table but in the existing model, if we have additional funding it would be looked at it and when the additional residents get there, then we probably would look at as a recommendation to add additional service there,” Williams said.

For details of the specific changes, visit the Charlottesville Area Transit website to review the presentation. And participate at the next event at 6 p.m. (meeting info)

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On today’s show:

Work to begin on roundabout at intersection of Stony Point and Proffit roads in northern Albemarle

The latest campaign finance is in for candidates in Albemarle and Charlottesville

The Charlottesville Planning Commission recommends approval of a rezoning in Belmont that was previously denied in November 2018

And discussion of a street closure in the Little High neighborhood could pave the way for a new trail connection

We’re in the middle of summer, and it’s been quiet on the local elections front. Not only has there been a lull in campaign events, there was not much campaign finance activity in Albemarle or Charlottesville. Reports for activity between May 28 and June 30 were due yesterday to the Virginia Department of Elections. They have been made available through the Virginia Public Access Project.

Democrat Juandiego Wade began the period with a balance of $32,626 and raised an additional $1,015 in cash over that time. He spent $28,381 during the reporting period with $18,000 spent on Liveview Marketing and $2,350 in advertising with the Daily Progress. Wade finished the money with a balance of $5,259.

Democrat Brian Pinkston began the month with a balance of $14,152 on hand, and raised an additional $850 in additional funds including $500 in a loan from himself. He spent $12,701 during the period, including the repayment of $9,922 in loans to himself. Pinkston concluded the period with a balance of $2,301.

The two independents in the race did not report any fundraising. Incumbent Nikuyah Walker filed a report that stated a campaign balance of $90 with no expenditures or receipts. There is no report yet in the Virginia Department of Elections database from challenger .

None of the races for Albemarle County Supervisor are contested this year, but new reports are available all the same from the three candidate. Incumbent Jack Jouett District Supervisor Diantha McKeel raised an additional $500 and reported no spending, bringing her balance to $32,556.

Incumbent Rio District Supervisor Ned Gallaway reported no fundraising or spending, and has a balance of $15,809. In the open Samuel Miller seat, Newcomer Jim Andrews raised $2,001 in cash and spent $3,190 in the period, leaving a balance of $29,317. No write-in candidates filed a report.

There are four General Assembly races of note in the area.

The 25th House District includes part of western Albemarle County. Incumbent Republican Chris Runion began the period with $44,960, raised $13,235, and spent $2,566, leaving a balance of $55,628. Democratic challenger Jennifer Kitchen began the period with $78,249. She raised $29,834, with cash contributions from nearly 600 individuals or entities. Kitchen spent $24,524 and had a end-of-period balance of $83,558.

The 57th House District case is contested. Incumbent Democrat Sally Hudson began the period with a balance of $52,254, raised $1,348, and spent $10,742. Her opponent is Republican Philip Hamilton, who began the period with a balance of $1,179 on May 28. Hamilton raised $150 in cash, spent $990, and had a balance of $338 on June 30.

In the 58th House District, Incumbent Republican Rob Bell began the period with $264,965 and raised an additional $20,565, spent $3,935, and had a balance of $281,594 on June 30. Challenger Sara Ratcliffe began the period with $2,804, raised $5,532 including $3,002 in loans, and and spent $1,108.

The 59th House District includes a portion of southwestern Albemarle and the Republican incumbent is Matt Fariss. Fariss began this reporting period with $12,846 on May 28 and raised $24,120 from 60 individuals or entities. He spent $5,628 in the period and had a balance of $31,338. His Democratic challenger, Ben Moses, began the period with a balance of $130,216 and raised $56,985 in the period with cash coming from 141 individuals or entities. He spent $29,627 and ended the period with a balance of $157,248. Independent Louis Scicli reported no money during the period.

Races in the Virginia Senate are not until 2023.

Another roundabout is coming to another corner of Albemarle County. Construction will get underway next week at the intersection of Stony Point Road and Proffit Road for the project, which was funded in the second round of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process in 2017. In order to save money and attract efficiencies, VDOT opted to bundle that project with several others into a single $28.5 million design-build contract that was eventually awarded to Curtis Contracting. Completed projects include a traffic light on U.S. 29 at Interstate 64’s Exit 118 and the Rio Mills Connector Road that opened in June. A conversion of the junction of I-64 and U.S. 250 at Exit 124 is underway, and a roundabout at Route 151 and U.S. 250 southwest of Crozet will begin construction later this summer. (more information)

Today, two segments that make up half of a recap of the Charlottesville Planning Commission meeting from earlier this week. There was a lot of activity and it is all worth documenting. First, the meeting began with announcements. First up was Bill Palmer, the non-voting representative from the University of Virginia’s Office of the Architect. Another office building from the 20th century is coming down.

“The demolition of the Dynamics building over at the Emmet/Ivy corridor is underway and a lot of the utility enabling seems to have started over there so that project to enable the Data Science institute as well as the conference center and hotel that we’re building over there so that’s finally getting underway after lots and lots of planning,” Palmer said.

Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell serves on the city’s Parks and Recreation Advisory Board. He told his colleagues and the public that the Onesty Family Aquatic Center will not open this summer.

“The reason is we just can’t get enough lifeguards to support all of the parks we’ve got,” Mitchell said. “This is not unique to Charlottesville. This seems to be a nationwide problem that we just can’t get the lifeguards.”

In the first item of business, the Commission considered a rezoning and special use permit for a vacant lot currently zoned R-2, which would allow two units on the property.

“The requested rezoning would be to R-3, residential multifamily medium density,” Mitchell said. “And then the following special use permit would then allow the applicant to build eight units.”

A similar application went before Commission and the Council in 2018 and was denied by Council in October that year. As part of this application, eight parking spaces would be provided on site. Here’s Matt Alfele, a city planner.

“Residents are concerned that the code-required eight parking spaces will not be enough for this development and the overflow parking will impact the surrounding neighborhoods, especially the homes on Chestnut Street,” Alfele said.

One change since 2018 involves how vehicles will get in and out of the site. Justin Shimp is the engineer on behalf of MSC.

“We have worked with the traffic engineer and we have a one-way entrance off of Carlton because that is a narrow street and the one-way entrance is a safe entrance and we exit out the alley, so there’s no traffic concerns,” Shimp said.

Shimp said the rezoning was consistent with the city’s desire to build more housing units.

“The reality is that if you look at the goals that are stated for the city in terms of providing housing to folks who take alternate means of transportation, and how to deal with climate change and other issues we face, these sort of in-fill projects are an excellent way to achieve those goals,” Shimp said.

Though not a representative of the rental company that would manage the units, Shimp said the one bedroom units would be rented between $1,100 and $1,200, and the two-bedroom unit would be around $1,500. None of the units are being subsidized and will not be proffered to keep them below market.

The situation may be different in the future when the Comprehensive Plan is adopted and the zoning ordinance is rewritten. Lisa Robertson is the city attorney.

“What we’re all waiting for so anxiously is a zoning ordinance that can have regulations that say if we’re going to require a certain amount of affordable housing for every development of a specific size, we want to be right upfront about what that means and what the paperwork that’s going to be required over the course of the affordability period will be,” Robertson said.

Several residents of the immediate neighborhood asked for the rezoning to be denied or for more parking to be required. Another Belmont resident said there should not be more parking.

“I have to say I’m a little dismayed by the number of my neighbors who want more car storage here,” Gold said. “This is a really solid location for car-free living.”

This time around, the Planning Commission unanimously recommended approval of both the special use permit for more density and the rezoning. It goes next to City Council at a future meeting.

In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

Next, the Commission was asked to weigh in on whether Charlottesville should give up public right-of-way between East High Street and Meriwether Street in the Little High Street area. This is what is known as a “paper street” because most of the land dedicated to the city for a road was built upon. Tony Edwards is the Development Services Manager in the city’s Department of Public works.

“This subject street was created in 1940 with a subdivision plat that established the Little High neighborhood,” Edwards said. “The 1940 subdivision created a new Lewis Street.”

An adjacent landowner has asked for the city to give up the right of way in order to avoid a cut-through street from ever being built to the Little High neighborhood. Another nearby landowner asked that an existing gravel path be turned into a formal city trail for bikes and pedestrians.

“It was determined that the existing gravel path actually veers outside of the platted right of way of 13th Northeast over the yard of a private residence and a busy parking lot,” Edwards said. “Staff at that time was also of the opinion that establishing a bike and pedestrian connection within the platted right of way would be difficult and expensive.”

Nonetheless, city staff recommended not vacating and closing the right of way in part to preserve the possibility of meeting future transportation needs.

The applicant for the street closure said one reason for the request is because the amount of developable property on the parcel he manages is less than it should be because of differing building setback rules when there’s an adjacent street - real or paper. In this case, twenty feet versus fifteen.

“If you take 20 feet away from the property line, basically, it removes all of that property from utility,” said Roy Van Doorn, the manager of the LLC that owns 1140 East High Street.

Van Doorn said a connector road would overwhelm the Little High neighborhood. Under his proposal, there would be more parking for uses on East High Street and he would fix drainage issues. He made this offer on behalf of himself and neighboring properties.

“I made a proposal and its on the table that we as property owners around this section would put in a 12-foot wide gravel connector so that bikes and pedestrians could walk in that area,” Van Doorn said.

If the city were to work out an arrangement for that land to be dedicated to public use, that connector would need to be built to standards according to traffic engineer Brennen Duncan.

“It wouldn’t necessarily have to be built to the full roadway standards but it would have to be built to [Americans with Disabilities Act] or bicycle-trail standards,” Duncan said.

The specific question before the Commission was whether vacating the street conformed with the Comprehensive Plan. Commissioner Jody Lahendro said no.

“I don’t like the idea of forfeiting the city from the future possibility of doing something,” Lahendro said.

Commission Lyle Solla-Yates said he support thinking about the issue more while an arrangement is worked out to use the right of way for non-motorized modes of travel. Van Doorn had sent over his compromise proposal on Monday, which was not enough time for the Planning Commission to get a staff report on the idea.

Van Doorn requested a deferral to work through the details of how to make the connector trail work.

“Owning the land for us is not that important,” Van Doorn said. “What is important is that the Little High Street neighborhood has a way to utilize connectivity but not automobile,” Van Doorn said.

Will this come to pass? Stay tuned in future installments of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

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In today’s first Patreon-fueled shout-out:

On today’s show:

The executive director of the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center talks about the sudden acquisition of a statue

A look at upcoming county fairs in the area

And a look at upcoming meetings to talk about transit in Albemarle and Charlottesville

Virginia posts a record surplus for FY2021

When the pandemic forced the shutdown of many sectors of the economy in the spring of 2020, many predicted tough times for government budgets. However, the Commonwealth of Virginia closed fiscal year 2021 with a $2.6 billion surplus, the highest in history. Even with the slowdown, budget officials expected revenues to be about 2.7 percent over fiscal year 2020, but total revenue collections were 14.5 percent over that year. The details will be released on August 18 at a meeting of the General Assembly’s Joint Money Committee, but preliminary information is available in this release.

Though slightly outside of our area, the Fauquier County Fair began yesterday in Warrenton. The event is being held for the first time since 2018, having been canceled by the pandemic last year and by construction in 2019. The fair takes place through Sunday on grounds off of Old Auburn Road in Warrenton. There’s a rodeo on Friday night! Learn more in an article on Fauquier Now or take a look at the Fauquier County Fair website.

The Madison County Fair also kicked off yesterday through Sunday. We’ve missed the donkey races but the LumberJack show of Champions is on Friday night. The Louisa County Agricultural Fair begins on July 29. The Augusta County Fair begins on July 27. The Albemarle County Fair is a stripped-down event this year that begins on July 30 at James Monroe’s Highland.

“This year the 2021 Albemarle County Fair will focus solely on the exhibition and sale of livestock,” reads a notice on the fair’s website.

A group of medical professionals at the University of Virginia’s hospital for youth is opening a food pantry this month at the Battle Building on West Main Street. According to a release from what’s now known as UVA Children’s, the pantry builds on a partnership last November with the Local Food Hub’s Fresh Farmacy program that provided produce to pediatric patients and their families. An internal team put together a program to start the pantry and secured a three-year grant from Molina Healthcare as well as donations from Kroger. Here’s a link to the fundraising site if you want to contribute.

This Friday, riders of Charlottesville Area Transit will get the first of two chances to weigh in on proposed route changes that are intended to help boost ridership. A community meeting begins at noon to hear from representatives of CAT and the consultants Kimley-Horn and the Connectics Group to give public feedback on the new routes, which will extend bus service to Mill Creek. A second meeting will be held next Wednesday (Friday meeting info)

But what about people in parts of Albemarle that don’t have bus service? The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has hired consultants to study ways to expand routes into urban sections of Albemarle, particularly on U.S. 29 north of Charlottesville, Pantops, and to Monticello. Two virtual meetings are scheduled later this month to get feedback from people with a focus on U.S. 29 north on July 26 and a focus on Pantops on July 28. These are being held through Microsoft Teams. (July 26 meeting) (July 28 meeting) (Read a StoryMap on the concept)

On Saturday, July 10, 2021, crews hired by the city of Charlottesville swiftly removed two statues honoring two Confederate generals from two City Parks. A few days before, Council had authorized spending up to $1 million for their removal, but a provision in the resolution cleared the way for some of that money to be used for the removal of the Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea statue that stood at the intersection of West Main Street and Ridge Street since 1919. The expedition west began in 1803 shortly after the Louisiana Purchase by President Thomas Jefferson.

Just after 11:30 a.m. on Saturday, the city’s communications office put out a notice that Council would meet in an emergency session at noon. Here’s Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker.

“Thank you all for coming on short notice,” Walker said. “We are trying to just maximize the opportunity that we have with the crew being in town and taking care of just the legal issue of being able to move the statue on Main Street.”

To do so, Council had to adopt a motion waiving a requirement that at least five hours notice has to be given before an emergency meeting. (read the applicable City Code provision)

City Manager Chip Boyles said there had been no plan to remove the Lewis and Clark and Sacagawea statue, but there was “an unforeseen opportunity” to proceed because the Confederate sculptures were removed quicker than anticipated.

“The tremendous work by the city staff, the construction crews, and by our community support, has given the city an opportunity to finalize the interest that was provided by Council on November 15 of 2019 and then funded on Council on July 7, 2021,” Boyles said. “Council has been clear in their interest to relocate the Sacagawea, Lewis, and Clark statue to another location that’s either owned or co-owned by the city.”

Such a location is at Darden-Towe Park, which is co-owned by Albemarle and Charlottesville. Along the banks of the Rivanna River is the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center, which is run by executive director Alexandria Searls, who was contacted shortly before the emergency meeting. The item on the agenda was simply to relocate the statue, and not to transfer ownership. That will have to happen at a later date. Searls said the center would not take the statue without provisions.

“It would be my hope that to eventually if you decided to give us ownership of the statue to actually have provisions agreed to first about the type of interpretation because under my leadership, interpretation agreed with the Native Americans of Virginia and the Shoshone is highly important and I would want to ensure that for the future regardless of whether I’m there or not,” Searls said.

Searls said she would want to work with the Native American Student Union at the University of Virginia on interpretation efforts, as well as interpretations from others, particularly from Sacagawea’s own tribe.

“The Shoshone, the way that they would like the statue to be interpreted is of paramount importance,” Searls said. “Indigenous women are going missing to an alarming extent. Faces and people are disappearing. So one of the things that the statue in a way interprets is moving beyond sort of the white person fixation on Sacagawea and the way they contextualize her to a larger view of people who are living today and how they are represented.”

Rose Abrahamson is the great, great, great-niece of Sacagawea and she offered to Council her support to the statue’s transition to the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center. She had the chance to speak before the vote.

“Mayor, Councilors, city, I would like to say that we have come a long way,” Abrahamson said. “We have come a long way to become the human tribe that we should be and come together in unity and come together to educate our young and our future generations.”

Abrahamson said the statue’s new location at the Lewis and Clark Center would not be offensive, and a depiction of her ancestor that she personally finds offensive can be used to address a contemporary crisis.

“It can educate the public to the missing, murdered Indigenous Women, the plight of women in our society, the Native women,” Abrahamson said.

Within two hours of the vote, the city shut down the intersection of West Main, Ridge and McIntire by driving public works trucks into strategic positions. That allowed the same crew to come in to remove the bronze sculpture from its granite plinth.

At 2:31 p.m. a crane lifted the sculpture into the air eliciting cheers from the assembled crowd. The sculpture was placed on a flatbed trucks and taken straight to Darden Towe Park where Alexandria Searls was waiting to let them the crew in to drop off the sculpture. It has been placed temporarily on a square of wooden beams behind a orange mesh fence.

In February, the city had sent out a request for information for groups interested in receiving the statue, and the Lewis and Clark was just one of groups that fulfilled that request. I spoke to Searls inside the Lewis and Clark Center on Monday about the process that got the statue there, and what comes next.

Searls:

We were founded right before the Bicentennial and we teach the skills of exploration as well as the local and national history of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Tubbs:

Can you just describe where we’re sitting?

Searls:

We are sitting along the banks of the Rivanna River and we are right underneath the Southwest Mountains as well as near the birthplace of George Rogers Clark. The land that we’re on was once very important to the Monacan nation as part of a whole interconnected group of villages along the Rivanna, or what we call the Rivanna. We don’t know their name for the river.

Later this was owned by Jonathan Clark who was the grandfather of William Clark.

Tubbs:

Now it’s been almost a year and a half since the City Council decided to vote to remove the statue. At that time, was there any interest of it coming over here?

Searls:

There was interest in it coming over but we didn’t want to lobby for a certain outcome because we felt that it was owned by the community and we wanted to value what the community decision was. So we made it clear that we were open to receiving it if that ended up being the decision. I sent a letter to Council at that point saying that if you move it, we are open to receiving it.

Tubbs:

Well, let’s go back to that because it seems a bit intractable. I think it was last year when the Council said yet again ‘we’d like to see proposals.’ Can you just talk a little about… obviously it’s here now but before it was here, can you give a sense of what are some of the planning things you need to just to anticipate the possibility of it coming here?

Searls:

That’s an interesting question because it wouldn’t be here right now if I had not done more work than the [Request for Information] asked for. The county of Albemarle has been a wonderful partner to us. And the park people here are amazing. This park is run so well. And when we answered the call for the RFI, I was taking it very seriously. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t promising something that the county wasn’t going to like and I wanted to research and do everything from how we were going to afford somebody to move it to what the site plan requirements are and I got started on this and I was writing a proposal. I talked to the engineer who prepared At the Ready to be moved. I had the figures. Turned out they didn’t even want to know the figures.

So when I said I’m getting the permission of the Board of Supervisors to do this, I was told ‘this RFI is not supposed to be detailed. You’re supposed to write a one page proposal and if we like it we’ll ask you to make a long one. I’m really glad I didn’t listen to that because I basically said ‘Albemarle County is my partner and I’m not going to put in an idea for a proposal without them.’

I had before the day of the emergency meeting approached City Hall, not the Councilors, but the City Hall, to be an option for that because with so little money that we have, I knew that this might be the only opportunity to have it here at least for a while. And we used it today in an educational program for the first time so that was exciting.

On the other hand, I also started researching the statue and through a genealogist I located the grandchildren of the sculptor.

Tubbs:

Who was the sculptor?

Searls:

The sculptor was Charles Keck. He also did the Jackson that was removed. He did both of those. And I was preparing if we were to receive the statue to do a complete evaluation of what the interpretation would be. So I also consulted art historians, I talked to Indigenous historians, I have begun to read books written about Lewis and Clark in the early 1900’s to get an idea of the mindsets of the time when it was created.

Tubbs:

And when was it created? Was it created for a specific purpose?

Searls:

That’s an interesting story because it was created as a commission but they only commissioned Lewis and Clark. They did not commission Sacagawea so basically the sculptor decided to add her and that is significant from what I found out from the family because he was a sculptor that took any commission that went his way because he had lost an amazing amount of money in one of the crashes. He owed his best friend who bailed him out about $100,000 and that’s a lot now but it was even more then. So he wasn’t in a position to be discriminate and could no longer do the sculptures that he wanted to do. So basically she was the only sculpture that he did that he wanted to do. And I haven’t sorted that through completely but it was just one aspect of what I wanted to know about the situation.

Tubbs:

So one of the critiques of the statue for many years has been that Sacagawea is cowering. Others say that she’s searching. I don’t know the statue that well, but isn’t that part of the interpretation process?

Searls:

Yes, and I’ve got to say here that I’m not finished coming up with my own reactions to this statue. But let me back up by saying that there’s an interesting phenomenon going on and that’s the phenomenon that when something is up, that means its endorsed. And that is not part of my belief at all. I think a statue whose original intent — and I’m not really talking about specifically about Lewis and Clark, I’m talking all statues — was one thing, like to glorify a hero that might not be deserving of glory or to reveal the power of the ruler, ruling class. Just because you leave it up doesn’t mean you agree with it.

For example, when I look at that Lewis and Clark statue, even though its meant to glorify them as heroes, I do not think that they were flawless heroes. In fact, a lot of what we do here is examine their failings actually. What do you think?

Tubbs:

Well, I’m still just trying to figure it out because its interesting. If you look at the three statues that were taken down on Saturday, two of them are in an undisclosed location and may never ever see the light of day. We don’t know yet. But at least with this one, it will have a new life, potentially here, especially if you can get some funding to do the proper interpretation and to install it in some way that maybe you haven’t figured out yet. But at least there’s a sense of ‘well, at we’re going to melt it down as one of the descendants said on Saturday.

Searls:

One phrase that I think of a lot, not just on these issues but in general is that: In war, treat your victories like a funeral. And to me that means if you’re in a war, someone is dying and even if you win you shouldn’t rejoice because it’s better not to demonize your opponent. It’s better to look at them with some empathy of their dead or of their situation. It’s better not to immediately assume that someone who wants to melt down a statue resembles the Taliban. Maybe they don’t. Or it’s better not to think that someone who wants the statues to stay in place is a racist because maybe they aren’t.

I get reasons and viewpoints. I receive emails, calls. I’ve listened. And I think that it’s dangerous on so many levels to rejoice in the face of the people who are crying, because any victory anybody somebody is crying. So my effort here is to find a way of compromising even if that might not be possible but at least a way to respect different viewpoints and to let people come to new viewpoints.

It’s important to realize that when you have your dead that other people have theirs. For example, if somebody looks at that statue and only sees a heroic Lewis and Clark and doesn’t see the Trail of Tears that followed soon afterwards, that’s celebrating something without crying for the other side.

You’re reading to Charlottesville Community Engagement and an interview with Alexandria Searls of the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center. We’ll be back to that in just a moment.

The Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea statue is now on the grounds of the Center inside of Darden Towe Park, which is jointly owned by Albemarle and Charlottesville. Searls said the statue is very different close-up than from where it stood for 102 years and there’s a bit of a mystery.

Searls:

You know, I still haven’t decided if it’s three people or four people in the statue. I can see the fourth person perhaps now that I can get close to it.

When the Shoshone were here, we talked about the terrible plight of missing Indigenous women and since Sacagawea is somewhat missing in terms of when you look at that composition, she’s like down there, and there’s taking up space with their guns. The ultimate sort of disappearing is actually disappearing and never being seen again. And that’s what’s happening to young women today.

In terms of white Americans revering Sacagawea at different points because she helped them or she was seen as friendly to white explorers, but really what I would like to see in terms of Indigenous people is really seeing the people of today. And one of the women who came, Dustina Abrahamson, had suggested the statue could be used as some sort of a starting point for people making new art and making people see the people who are disappearing. And I’ve been following her Facebook page since they visited in 2019 and I’ve seen a relative of hers go missing and I’ve seen other challenges that happen in Indigenous communities so I think we need to move beyond these handful of icons that we’ve put up and move into the thousands of native people who are actually here.

Tubbs:

What can this Center do? Obviously, the whole point is to draw awareness of this past but yet not to say ‘it was this way’ or ‘it was that way.’ People who visit here, what do you want them to takeaway? Do you need the statue to do this?

Searls:

My staff and I were talking about this today. I don’t think we need anything except the woods, the river, and a place to rest in between. Our programs are very oral. We get all this knowledge and we study and we interpret it and we talk to people basically. You don’t see any signs here telling you what to think about anything.

I arrived in Charlottesville on the Greyhound bus or Trailways or whatever it was back then with my duffel bag to be a first year at UVA. I came out of that door with my duffel and there were taxis and there was that statue. I went to high school in New York City and I wasn’t impressed with the statue. All I saw were a bunch of guns and it’s hard for me to imagine that it would become part of my life. And I didn’t even see her. I just saw two men. I didn’t know what it was whatsoever.

Let’s go back to what I said about are there three people or four in that sculpture? At first I only thought there were only two when I first arrived in Charlottesville so one of the preeminent art historians, Malcolm Bell from UVA, said that there four people in that sculpture and that she was holding a baby and there’s a cradle-board and the baby’s in there. I didn’t see it. And even though he’s famous with books, I was willing to think he wasn’t right. Then when I encountered the sculpture over there, I saw that he’s very possibly right. And it puts a new spin on it because when you get close you can see that William Clark’s hand and hers are touching along a piece of wood. And they’re both holding it up. You can see a sack in there and you can see more of an extension of something in there in the back.

She’s sitting on some rocks and he’s helping her carry that as she’s leaning forward and they’re meant to be on the cliffs looking at the Pacific and so she’s looking down at the ocean and William Clark is looking just ahead and then Meriwether Lewis on top is looking at the far distance and that’s definitely a hierarchy. I mean, it’s Lewis preeminent, William Clark, and then the woman in the way that she is.

But it does matter to me whether she’s holding a baby or not and he’s helping her hold whatever it is. So, I haven’t asked Professor Bell what the documentation of this is because I know the sculptor did not take notes of any extent. Now, he did have a collection of books so I think the answer is in what he would have read about Lewis and Clark back then and I read a book written in 1905 about Sacagawea and she never let her baby out of her sight. She was always carrying that baby. So I’m of the opinion now that there are four people in that statue. I’m not 100 percent sure, but I say this to say I’m not exactly sure what’s going on with that statue. I know he wanted to honor her. I know he wasn’t trying to degrade her.And that is important to me. If I felt like he had tried, I would not have wanted that here. And there are people I’m sure who do think that was his goal.

Tubbs:

So it’s only been here for two days as we’re talking. Now it’s here. You still have the interpretive work. You’re not finished with the work that you thought you were going to have to do to get it here. Suddenly it’s here. How do you feel?

Searls:

I feel excited. I mean, it is pretty amazing to see these huge faces being pulled up the hill. I was waiting at the gate. I let them in at the gate. It took hours. They told me it would be 20 minutes but I was there for hours. So I opened up the gate and then the cortege comes through. A flatbed. A trailer. A crane. And about 30 cars with lights. To see them all go up the hill and to see those faces going towards the Center was pretty amazing. I wasn’t at the removal of the Confederate statues but they seemed to be moving backwards with their rears so it was sort of more like they were riding out of town whereas this felt like they were arriving and it was pretty amazing.

Tubbs:

You said you were excited about this. What are some of the possibilities now?

Searls:

I think that some of the possibilities [are] that if you’re showing something that is painful to some other people, it requires some work together. And I do think that out of this will come more partnerships with Native Americans about Indigenous representation and I think that we’ll all be more aware. And the park guy said that a woman this morning came and put up a sign up by the statue briefly that this is Native land and she took a picture of the statue with it and then left.

But we teach that this is Native land. We teach about the Monacans. We regularly every two years are invited by to different tribes out west as part of being in a Lewis and Clark group. I think that the focus will be even more on that and I am certainly learning much more. I’m reading Jeff Hantmann’s book Monacan Millennium right now, and I’m reading more about Sacagawea and the attitudes that have been about her throughout the decades. So I think it will make those realities more of the story. Not less.

Tubbs:

You said that you used it today in the camp. How so?

Searls:

So, when the kids came, they’re 8 to 11, we all walked over there. And actually I invited their parents too because it is a camp that’s about history and it is about exploration and it is actually historic when a 100-year-old monument moves so I wanted them to be part of that history and the first group.

And I basically said: Is there a baby there?

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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A year ago today I took a leap of faith to begin bringing you information about what’s happening in the area in and around Charlottesville, with a focus on local meetings. I’m Sean Tubbs, and I’m glad to say that I’m grateful that you and many others have become listeners and readers. The world doesn’t have to be a scary place if people are armed with information and the power of critical thinking.

In this episode of the program:

The Albemarle County Economic Development Authority endorses ownership change at a section of Southwood

Community members ask questions at Barracks/Emmet public hearing

Several area companies receive funding from Virginia for early-stage research

In a sign that the pandemic continues to be dormant, Albemarle County reopened its office buildings to the public yesterday. Though regular business hours of 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. have resumed, community members who need to transact business are asked to call 434-243-7929 to ensure that the service is available. The last day the buildings were open to the public was March 27, 2020. Public meetings will remain virtual now as the county continues to operate under a local emergency.

At the same time, the Virginia Department of Health today reports another 346 new cases of COVID-19 and the seven-day percent positivity is at 2.3 percent. Today’s count is the highest since May 28 when 404 new cases were reported.

Governor Ralph Northam has announced that his first budget proposal for the Virginia government’s share of federal American Rescue Plan Act funding will be to use $353 million for small businesses and industries that were hit hard by the pandemic. Part of that will be $50 million to assist the Virginia Tourism Corporation with a Virginia Tourism Recovery Program. Another $250 million will be added to the existing Rebuild VA program. The balance of the funding will to the Industrial Revitalization Fund and the Virginia Main Street program. (release)

Two local recovery programs currently have open windows for grant applications. Albemarle County is receiving applications for its Agribusiness Resiliency grant program through July 26 for awards of up to $10,000 through July 26. (apply)

Charlottesville’s Office of Economic Development is accepting applications for the second round of their BRACE Grant for small businesses. BRACE stands for Building Resiliency Among Charlottesville Entrepreneurs and offers up to $2,500 for businesses to “gain resiliency and adapt in response to a threat such as the COVID-19 pandemic.” (more information)

Several area researchers and entrepreneurs will receive an infusion of funding from the state government to advance development of new technologies. Governor Ralph Northam has announced the inaugural recipients of the Commonwealth Commercialization Fund, which seeks to boost research in a variety of fields including autonomous systems, clean energy, cybersecurity, and data analytics. Grants of up to $100,000 will go to firms engaged in stage technology. (click for full release)

“Facilitating research breakthroughs and getting new technologies out of the lab and into the hands of consumers is key to driving economic growth and creating jobs in the Commonwealth,” said Governor Northam.

Recipients in the area include:

Advary of Charlottesville will receive $100,000 for Progress Toward Commercialization of a Novel Hydrogen-Based Product for Pelvic Brachytherapy

AgroSpheres, Inc of Charlottesville will receive $100,000 for Commercialization of Reliable, Sustainable Crop Protection Products

Bonumose, Inc of Charlottesville will receive $100,000 for Making Healthy Sugar Affordable for the Mass Market

Caza Health LLC of Earlysville will receive $99,898 for Improving Women's Health Outcomes – A New Diagnostic Research Tool

Cerillo, Inc of Charlottesville will receive $100,000 for Development of a Low-Cost, Miniaturized, Field-Deployable ELISA Reader

Contraline, Inc of Charlottesville will receive $100,000 for Development of Market Access Strategy for a Novel Male Contraceptive

Icarus Medical LLC of Charlottesville will receive $99,989 for Determination of Clinical Outcomes for a Novel Multi-Compartment Unloader Brace

Laser Thermal Analysis LLC of Charlottesville will receive $50,000 for Steady State Thermoreflectance in Fiber Optics: SSTR-F

Leading Edge Advanced Fibers, Inc. of Charlottesville will receive $100,000 for Development of Ultra-Lightweight Materials for Use in Satellites

Metaform of Charlottesville will receive $97,547 for System for Effectively Integrating Disparate Information Sources

One of several major transportation projects intended to make Charlottesville an easier place to bike or walk passed a milestone last week. In 2017, the city was awarded $8.6 million in Virginia Department of Transportation Smart Scale funds for a project at the intersection of Barracks Road and Emmet Street. The design public hearing was held on July 7, 2021.

“The purpose of the project is to improve the operational performance of the Barracks Road and Emmet Street intersection while also enhancing bicycle, pedestrian and transit facilities serving the adjacent neighborhoods,” said the narrator of a presentation shown at the virtual meeting. (watch the full presentation)

The work will include a new northbound right-turn lane on Emmet Street, an additional west-bound left-hand turn lane on Barracks Road, upgraded traffic signals, increased medians, and a shared-use path up Barracks Road. Part of the work will involve something called a “pedestrian refuge” to allow slower walkers to cross Emmet Street and take a break.

“The scope of bicycle and pedestrian improvements on Barracks Road were less somewhat less defined which provided an opportunity to involve local citizens in the early planning and decision-making process,” the presentation continued.

One man expressed concern that this plan seemed to have come from nowhere and that it may not actually work.

“This has been a long time question for me about Charlottesville and planning and development,” said Joel Bass. “How do we actually develop in this town without working with [the University of Virginia] and getting feedback from them on their plans?”

Bass said what was needed from westbound Barracks Road was a right-hand lane.

Before we hear from city staff, some background. In 1986, Albemarle, Charlottesville and UVA signed a Three Party Agreement and until 2019 there was a public body known as the Planning and Coordination Council (PACC) where projects and planning were discussed in the open. Since late 2019, a private body called the Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee meets and those events are closed to the public. This LUEPC group last met on June 25, 2021 and there is one page of minutes. (read those minutes)

Back to the Barracks/Emmet project. There is a steering committee that includes a member of the UVA Office of the Architect and those meetings are open to the public. Kyle Kling in Charlottesville’s public works department.

“In our department, we meet quarterly with the University to discuss projects the city is administering as well as projects that the University has throughout their Grounds and during those conversations we always discuss how things will trend during the future and how projects may supplement each other so that coordination is ongoing,” Kling said.

Two other Smart Scale projects are in the planning states to the south on Emmet Street. The Emmet Street Streetscape had its design public hearing in December 2019. The Commonwealth Transportation Board just approved $20.6 million in funding for a second phase of that project that would span between Arlington Boulevard and Barracks Road.

There was some concern at the public hearing about the shared-use path that will travel about a third of a mile up the hill on Barracks Road to Buckingham and Hill Top roads. Gregory Kastner was appreciative to get a dedicated facility, but had a question about how that fits into a larger network.

“As you’re on the bike lane coming up the road, how does that transition to the current sidewalk?” Kastner asked. “With it ending at Hill Top, there’s still a fair bit of up to go where the rider is going to be going pretty slow and it really wouldn’t be a great place to get dumped out on the road.”

Kastner said he hoped the scope of the project extended up to Rugby Road where the hill flattens.

Kling said in the short-term, a sharrow would be painted on the road in the short-term as VDOT has strict rules about extending Smart Scale projects past the boundaries outlined in their initial application.

“I do know that there are some plans in the works on the city’s end to kind of continue bike and pedestrian upgrades further into town along this stretch,” Kling said.

About another two-thirds of a mile up Barracks Road is another Smart Scale project to address the intersection of Preston Avenue and Grady Avenue. That project has also not yet begun.

Next steps for the project include final approval by City Council this summer and completion of the design in the winter of 2022. If all goes according to schedule, construction would begin in the spring of 2023.

Now time for another reader-supported public service announcement. The future of passenger rail in Virginia got a lot more brighter this year as the Commonwealth of Virginia signed agreements with CSX to purchase hundreds of miles of railway corridors for three billion dollars. Virginians for High-Speed Rail are holding a transportation town hall on July 15 at 1 p.m. on the “True Story of the Virginia-CSX Deal: Lessons Learned and the Future of Passenger Rail.” Virginia Transportation Secretary Shannon Valentine and Amtrak President Stephen Gardner are the speakers. (register)

Later on tonight, the Albemarle County Planning Commission will get an update from Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville on the redevelopment of Southwood. The 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee got an update in late June, as reported in this newsletter.

The first phase of construction is underway based on a rezoning granted by the Board of Supervisors in August 2019. Part of the project involves construction of apartments that will be required to be rented to families below sixty percent of the area’s annual median income.

Those units will be constructed by Piedmont Housing Alliance, who are contracting with Habitat to purchase 4.74 acres of land within the first rezoning phase. Habitat had entered into a performance agreement with Albemarle County and the Albemarle Economic Development Authority to provide the below-market units in exchange for up to $1.8 million in funding from the county tied to specific milestones. Under the terms of the agreement, Habitat would also receive tax rebates for either a period of ten years or until Habitat got $1.4 million in rebates. (original performance agreement)

That agreement has to be amended to reflect the new arrangement. The Albemarle Economic Development Authority met on June 30, 2021 to discuss the matter. Richard DeLoria is the assistant county attorney.

“The redevelopment plan is going to work towards 700 to 800 new dwelling units,” DeLoria said. “Four hundred of those units will be affordable dwelling units… The plan is to develop phase one first because that will not displace the residents who are now in the mobile homes.”

DeLoria said the EDA is serving as a conduit for the funds that Albemarle is putting forward, both up-front and through the rebate process. He also said it was always anticipated as a possibility that Habitat would involve another partner.

“From my recollection and discussions before the Planning Commission and before this board is that in order for this project to be viable, Habitat would sell a portion of it to a third-party,” DeLoria said.

In late June, the Virginia Housing Development Authority awarded Piedmont Housing Alliance over a million in Low Income Housing Tax Credits for 70 units in what will be known as Southwood Apartments. The cost to build the remaining 51 apartments in the project that are shown in a conceptual drawing of the Southwood project will be supplemented by another affordability mechanism. (2021 LIHTC rankings)

In order to close the deal, the EDA had to adopt a resolution approving a certificate that determined Piedmont Housing is an entity that will implement some of the terms of the affordability agreed to in the original performance agreement. The resolution was crafted to acknowledge that the EDA was solely serving as a conduit and had no independent verification of the contents of a letter the EDA chair will sign acknowledging the EDA’s endorsement.

“The reason for that is that you never know where these letters will end up or when it’s going to become a problem,” said Jim Bowling, the attorney for the EDA. “My role is to ensure that the board members don’t become entangled in any future disputes.”

DeLoria said that Housing Coordinator Stacy Pethia indicated no issue with a draft endorsement letter, but deputy county attorney Andy Herrick had raised a flag.

“I will say that the attorney for the Planning Commission has had some comments on it, and the significant comment is on page 2, clause number 2 that indicates that the 30-year minimum period of affordability may be shortened in the event of the sale of property,” DeLoria said,

The agreement doesn’t anticipate that as a possibility. That language is required by federal regulations related to Low Income Housing Tax Credits. (approved resolution)

Attorney Tara Boyd represented the Piedmont Housing Alliance at the EDA meeting and explained the apartment complex will be built on Hickory Street in the northeast corner of the property.

Boyd said her job is to do due diligence for PHA, which is a newcomer to the performance agreement.

“We reviewed this and we saw some things that we wanted to get comfort on to make sure that we weren’t stepping into liabilities that either we weren’t intended to have or didn’t make sense for us,” Boyd said. “And one of the things that jumped out was this description of the LIHTC [affordable dwelling units], the 80 LIHTC ADUs, and this 30-year requirement. In order to get the Low Income Housing Tax Credits for these 80 units, the federal [regulations] governing those credits, they provide a 15-year point during the affordability period when the ownership can turnover.”

Boyd said the plan is for Piedmont Housing Alliance to retain ownership for the 30 years but the technicalities of the Low Income Housing Tax Credit require an amendment to reflect that possibility. Piedmont Housing Alliance took advantage of such a point a few years ago to become the majority partner in a consortium that owns Friendship Court.

The Board of Supervisors will consider this matter at an upcoming meeting.

Finally today, I mentioned at the top of the show that today, July 13, is the anniversary of the first edition of the program. I created this show and newsletter because the pandemic woke up a calling to describe what was happening. I’m fortunate that when I was about 19 I lucked out and found a pathway forward that allowed me to apply my curiosity about the mundane into a career.

If you’re interested, check out the first newsletter. The podcast version is less than five minutes long. (July 13, 2020 Community Engagement Newscast)

I hope to do this for a very long time. Thank you for your support, and for reading. There was a brief time I strayed off the pathway and I’m glad to be back now. I can definitely do so if I can continue to grow the audience and get more people to help cover the cost of me working tirelessly to get this work done:

Support my research by making a donation through Patreon

Sign for a subscription to Charlottesville Community Engagement, free or paid

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I’d like to thank my very good friend Jeffry Cudlin for his contribution of music that you hear throughout most of the shows. He makes me sound good, and I’m grateful for his work. I owe him vocals to finally get the musical act we’ve been practicing on for over 35 years.

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The biggest story in land use in Charlottesville this year continues to be generated by the Cville Plans Together Initiative, an effort by a consultant hired by City Council to update the Comprehensive Plan and produce a new zoning ordinance to encourage and implement the creation of additional housing units. Council adopted a new affordable housing plan in March. That was the first item the firm Rhodeside & Harwell was tasked to complete. In this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, the sole item is a rundown of the Charlottesville Planning Commission’s June 29, 2021 work session on the plan. (download the presentation to follow along)

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The Cville Plans Together era of the update of Charlottesville’s Comprehensive Plan has been underway now since January 2020. Community engagement plans suffered when the pandemic struck America two months later, forcing public input sessions to be virtual. Despite that, the City Council adopted an affordable housing plan in March, and the initiative held a six-week public input process which concluded on June 13.

On June 29, Cville Plans Together held another virtual work session with the Charlottesville Planning Commission to go through what they learned. But that work session began with an introduction from the newest member of the seven-member advisory group. Let’s hear from him.

“Hi everyone! My name is Karim Habbab and I’m honored to be part of the Planning Commission. I moved to Charlottesville in 2011 as a UVA student and graduated from the architecture school there in 2015 and started working with BRW Architects in town. It’s been six years with them and I’m excited to join this Commission at an exciting time.”

Habbab is the latest Planning Commissioner to join the process while it is underway. Liz Russell joined the Commission last September to replace a vacancy around the time the initiative was in its second round of community engagement. There are only two Commissioners remaining from when the review began in January 2017.

Jennifer Koch of the firm Rhodeside & Harwell is the project manager for Cville Plans Together.

“This was our third engagement period for Cville Plans Together, but we’re building on earlier work completed by the Planning Commission from 2017 and 2018 with this Comprehensive Plan update process,” Koch said.

There were multiple ways to communicate, including an online survey, direct correspondence with the engagement team, and the ability to leave comments on an interactive version of the Future Land Use Map. More on that in a moment.

For the first time in the Cville Plans Together era, the receding of the pandemic meant there could be some in-person events in this third period.

“We held six pop-up events over two weekends, mostly between May 14 and May 16 and we had a lot of face-to-face conversation at these events,” Koch said.

There were also two webinars during the public engagement session. A meeting with interested neighborhoods was held on May 18 and the project’s steering committee met on May 19. (read an article about the latter)

More than 400 people responded in an online survey but the majority of comments were made via direct correspondence

“We received about 1,130 emails,” Koch said. “This is a lot of email comments and that’s great. It’s a lot more than we received in previous phases.”

Koch said the Charlottesville Low Income Housing Coalition led a campaign that generated about 500 of that number through June 13. A new group skeptical of the plan called Citizens for Responsible Planning sent in a petition with about 400 signatures, but that number is not reflected in the count.

There were over 700 comments from about 225 individuals on the interactive map, and around 430 responses to the survey. A full engagement summary is coming at a later date, so for now I’ll refer you to the slides for the preliminary breakdown.

There were also specific comments on the draft housing chapter of the Comprehensive Plan.

“A lot of the revisions we made in the housing chapter were focused on pulling in those recommendations from the affordable housing plan,” Koch said. “Sort of the main theme we heard about this chapter was a general support for increasing housing density or intensity, but then similar to the land use piece we heard some concerns about what that potential increase in density or intensity might mean, particularly related to community character.”

Ron Sessoms of Rhodeside & Harwell went through some of the feedback. He noted some of the feedback from the campaign by the Charlottesville Low Income Housing Coalition.

“There were concerns about displacement particularly among Black and low income residents throughout the city,” Sessoms said. “There was a desire for more density in historically exclusionary white communities. We received some comments that this Future Land Use Map wasn’t going far enough.”

Sessoms said there was also a push from this campaign to increase the number of units allowed per lot from three as depicted in the current draft to four or five.

Critiques of the plan were also received.

“There were concerns around transportation and infrastructure, particularly considering the increase in density,” Sessoms said. “There were quite a bit of concerns about developer intentions in implementation. Citizens are very skeptical of developers so there were concerns about whether or not with the increase in density and whether or not developers would take advantage of that and have negative impact to the community.”

Sessoms said there are also concerns about height in many of the newly created land use designations. He also said the feedback gives geographic data on areas that are not as sold on the plan.

“Neighborhoods that are proposed to be experiencing the most change had the most negative feedback so communities like Barracks/Rugby, Greenbriar, Lewis Mountain, north of downtown, Rugby Hills, those communities did have more negative sentiment around the future land use map,” Sessoms said.

Another theme in the survey demonstrates that how one feels about the Future Land Use Map depends on one’s financial relationship to where they live.

“Looking at homeowner versus renters, there was a higher degree of support for the Future Land Use Map from renters,” Sessoms said. “And less support from homeowners, again with homeowners citing concerns around property values, community character, and other concerns that directly impact the places that they live and they own. And renters see this as an opportunity to diversify where they can live in the city. Perhaps there are more opportunities to rent in communities and neighborhoods that were traditionally out of reach.”

Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell opened it up to public comment before the seven Commissioners were allowed to give their thoughts. Let’s just hear two at the moment before hearing

Maddy Green, a new appointee of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners, wanted the Commission to know where comments critical of the draft map came from.

“Just noting that they came from a lot of communities that were exclusionarily zoned and had racial covenants in the houses and I think that we can see that residents are still advocating for those same policies and quite frankly they are racist policies in Charlottesville,” Green said. “Saying you don’t want affordable housing in your back yard or any kind of density is effectively saying you don’t want people who make less money in your backyard.”

As part of the engagement process, eleven neighborhood associations submitted a petition with over 400 signatures asking for the planning process to be slowed down. One of those associations was Johnson Village, where Kevin Hildebrand lives.

“It has gotten very expensive in the last few years as house prices have gone up but most of the single-family houses are still there and they are a vehicle for wealth development for families who have invested there and I think the idea of transitioning most of the city to apartments in multifamily dwellings where people don’t have the ability to improve themselves through home ownership is short-sightedness on the part of the city,” Hildebrand said.

Comments went back and forth on this line for a while before it went back to the Commission for questions and comments . They will be asked to recommend or not recommend the plan at a future public hearing. They first had the chance to ask questions. Later on we’ll hear their direct input.

Liz Russell went first and she had a question based on what one of the speakers had asked about the relationship between density and affordability.

“One thing I heard was questioning, one resident was questioning of upzoning that has occurred in places like Minneapolis and I think Chicago,” Russell said. “My understanding was that it’s sort of too soon to say but it sounds like there’s sine other reports out there and I’m wondering if the consultants could provide any insight.”

Jennifer Koch said the results are not yet in.

“In several of those locations I think some of those changes were done quite recently which does make it difficult to say as you mention,” Koch said.

Lee Einsweiler of the firm Code Studio will be taking the lead on rewriting the zoning code. He agreed with Koch’s assessment.

“I’m afraid that I have to agree with you,” Einsweiler said. “We don’t have a lot of information right now that points to any one given solution being the answer to this question but all of the ideas that are being presented begin to tackle the same problem. If you don’t have to have a car you can save $8,000 a year on average. If you can live in a smaller home, you’re paying less for your total square footage.”

On the same, Commissioner Taneia Dowell wanted a direct response to a related question.

“It was mentioned tonight during public comment and also as I’ve spoken to all different residents throughout the city is that I’m finding that our residents are feeling that the increased density and intensity that has been proposed is not actually going to solve our affordable housing crisis,” Dowell said. “What is your response for our constituents?”

Koch said that land use policy alone will not be the solution.

“I think it is great people are recognizing that and flagging that, but we’re trying to use lan d use potentially allowing for increased intensities or some mix of uses that will need to be paired with financial support and initiatives and other support in other ways from the city,” Koch said.

The director of the city’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services agreed with that sentiment.

“Land use is just a piece of the pie,” said Alex Ikefuna. “I’m encouraging the public to go out and read the draft affordable housing plan which is on the website. It spells out several recommendations, one of which is land use. Land use is just one of the few recommendations.” (read the Affordable Housing Plan)

The executive summary of the 158-page states that other recommendations are the designation of $10 million in city tax-payer funds to affordable housing projects each year and making the process more inclusive. The third major recommendation is devoted to land use under the name “Adopt Progressive and Inclusionary Zoning Reforms.”

Representation in responses?

One of the reasons a previous Council voted in February 2019 to spend nearly a million on the Cville Plans Together initiative was a lack of involvement with Black residents of Charlottesville.

As part of the presentation for the June 29 work session, the consultants broke down previous efforts for the entire Comprehensive Plan review so far since the first public input session in May 2017. At several events that month, 156 people signed in and 65.71 percent identified as white and 34.29 percent identified as Black.

In a survey conducted in September and October 2018, there were 1,182 responses. Nearly three quarters identified as white and 15.84 percent identified as Black.

The first community engagement phase of the Cville Plans Together initiative continued a trend toward less participation among Black residents. A survey conducted online in May and June 2020 yielded 1,172 responses. Sixty-three percent identified as white, 11 percent identified as Black, six percent preferred not to answer and another 12 percent left the question blank.

An online survey conducted in November and December last year had much fewer participants with 274 responses and over a third left the box for race and ethnicity blank. 108 of the respondents said they were white and 44 said they were Black.

In the current survey, sixty-six of 430 survey respondents identified themselves as white and 24 percent left the item blank. Only 2.3 percent identified as Black.

This raised a question from one Planning Commissioner.

“A big concern from 2017 was diverse representations especially for Black and low-income representation,” Solla-Yates said. “What do we do?”

LaToya Thomas of sub-contractor Brick and Story said there was a lot of skepticism in the community built up over decades.

“I think particularly among the Black residents that we have spoken with, there’s a lot of skepticism around the public process over all,” Thomas said. “There’s a lot of skepticism around the city and obviously a very long time frustration for what many folks feel is a system that’s set up to not serve them adequately.”

Thomas said the pandemic made it difficult to do many of the community engagement activities that had been planned.

When it was his turn, Commissioner Jody Lahendro noted that the Future Land Use Map depicted some areas currently designated as “low intensity residential” to the “medium intensity residential” category which would allow up to eight to 12 units per lot with building heights of up to four stories. In his question, he quoted the provision in Virginia code that requires Planning Commissions to prepare and adopt Comprehensive Plans. (read the code)

“For me as a design professional, this seems like a drastic change that’s a conflict,” Lahendro said. “Please help me understand as professional planners how this represents as the code of Virginia says ‘a Comprehensive Plan that’s ‘a coordinated, adjusted, and harmonious development’ based on good land use practices.”

Koch said the goal is to increase housing stock based on public input.

“We have heard an urge to have additional housing types allowed or available to people in some neighborhoods where they have not been available,” Koch said. “The way we have decided to show it is along corridors because we feel that can help to facilitate transit-oriented growth where we are potentially allowing additional density that could also help to facilitate other infrastructure improvements that may be needed to go with that.”

The corridor approach expands on the last major rezoning in 2003 which created specific zoning districts such as West Main Street, Cherry Avenue, High Street, and more. This followed the 2001 Comprehensive Plan, which frequently refers to a 2000 study called the Commercial Corridor Study. (read about this study on cvillepedia)

Sessoms said the details will come as detailed work on the zoning takes place.

“In the future land use map, it’s very general and we have ranges in heights of up to four stories, up to 12 units per lot, and that allows this greater flexibility to define more specific zoning districts in the zoning phase,” Sessoms said. “It certainly would not appropriate to have four stories in every location that we show in medium-intensity residential because it would be out of character, out of scale and just not befitting.”

Lahendro also asked what tools were in place to prevent displacement and further development in Black and low-income communities. Koch said there are tools identified in the affordable housing plan.

“You know, providing tax abatement, or support for owner-occupied rehabilitation, support for people who may want to add an [affordable dwelling unit],” Koch said.

Koch said that allowing density in other sections of the city could assist with the issue as well.

Meanwhile, it is instructive to note that many properties in those neighborhoods continue to sell to owners with the ability to pay large amounts of money for the existing single family homes that are currently there. Here are some recent examples.

A home in the 300 block of 5th Street SW in Fifeville sold on May 28 for $520,000, which is 32.35 percent over this year’s assessment.

A home in the 800 block of Anderson Street in the 10th and Page neighborhood sold for $575,000, which is 75.73 percent over the 2021 assessment of $327,200.

In the Rose Hill neighborhood, a home in the 900 block of Henry Avenue sold for $255,000, or 82.8 percent over the 2021 assessment.

Commissioners weigh in

Commissioner Liz Russell wanted more information on the possibility of an affordable housing overlay district, something that will be discussed at the July 13 meeting of the Planning Commission.

“I have concern that density for density’s sake will not result in what we are trying to achieve but that something like an affordable housing overlay could tip the scales in favor of affordable housing,” Russell said.

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg pushed back on comments from the Lewis Mountain neighborhood about additional residential density that would be allowed under the middle intensity residential category.

“To me I think that a 12-unit apartment building or a six-plex or an eight-plex is small enough that it doesn’t really have any super appreciable adverse impacts on the neighborhood and an apartment building, a small apartment, is not going to hurt you,” Stolzenberg said. “And as well there are some concerns about physical constraints on lots. We have site plan review processes that will ensure there’s adequate infrastructure, sewer, and water.”

Commissioner Dowell returned to the theme of protecting Black neighborhoods from further investment from outsiders.

“We do not want them to be gentrified out of the neighborhood and we also know to make sure that we reiterate time and time again that homeownership does create generational wealth,” Dowell said.

Commissioner Lyle Solla-Yates brought up a transportation matter.

“A major concern that I’m seeing from very high income people is traffic,” said Solla-Yates. “They live in their cars. They think most people live in their cars and for many they’re right. They are skeptical that we are going to make a transition and based on our past, they’ve got a good argument.”

A lot of the conversation was influenced by an alternate Future Land Use Map that has been put forward by members of the Housing Advisory Committee outside of the formal public comment period that closed on June 13. The idea was discussed at the June 16 HAC meeting. (watch the meeting)

Here’s a brief overview:

Much of Fifeville, 10th and Page, and Rose Hill neighborhoods would be designated as a “low intensity residential” category with “a range of housing types scaled in context with the existing single-family character.” The idea would be to preserve homes in the center of the city in neighborhoods historically populated by low-income housing.

The proposed medium-intensity residential designation would apply to every single residential district across the city if a certain amount of below-market units are provided by the developer.

High-intensity residential would be allowed in more site-specific areas, if a yet-to-be-determined number of below-market units are provided.

Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell had positive thoughts about the idea, which will be discussed by the Planning Commission at the end of their meeting on Tuesday, July 13.

“The ability to protect the low-income communities but be a little more thoughtful in the way we increase density in places like Greenbrier and Lewis Mountain,” Mitchell said.

Mitchell also said he supports efforts to work with other communities in the Planning District. The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership has a draft plan called Planning for Affordability that is going through the approval process. (read the plan)

The meeting concluded with over an hour of additional public comment. To finally get this newsletter out, I’m going to skim through this for now. There will also be more opportunities for public comment as the plan continues to move through the various public hearing processes. If you want to watch the public comment from the June 29 work session, here’s the link to do so.

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In today’s program:

Albemarle Supervisors adopts a new housing plan but leaves a few loose ends related to incentivizing developers to build below-market housing units

Governor Northam announces loans to local nonprofit groups to help cover costs of affordable projects

Blacksburg gets a grant for electric vehicles and Amtrak invests in new trains

Albemarle retains AAA ratings and Charlottesville opens up a new round of small business grants

Three top bond ratings agencies have reaffirmed Albemarle County’s AAA bond rating, a financial status that gives the county lower interest rates. Albemarle is only one of ten jurisdictions in Virginia with the top rating from Moody’s Investor Services, S&P Global and Fitch Ratings. According to a press release, Albemarle issued $57.7 million in debt on June 24 to cover the upfront costs of projects such as the additions at Crozet, Red Hill, and Scottsville elementary schools. On the same day, Albemarle refinanced another $20.4 million in existing debt saving $2.5 million in interest payments on projects.

“The savings will remain in the Capital Projects Fund,” said Albemarle Finance Director Nelsie Birch in an email this afternoon. “As the County embarks on its upcoming FY 23 – 27 long range financial planning process, this savings will allow greater flexibility and capacity as we plan for the future.”

Amtrak has announced $7.3 billion in investment in 83 new trains to replace an aging fleet with an option to purchase over a hundred more. The new trains will be built by Siemens Mobility, a California-based company. Among the routes for which the new rolling stock will roll will be the Northeast Regional service, which travels between Roanoke and D.C.’s Union Station and points north.

“The Commonwealth is committed to promoting, sustaining, and expanding state-sponsored passenger rail service across Virginia,” said Jennifer Mitchell, Director of the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation in a release. “Replacing a 40-year-old fleet, the new Amtrak trains will help us meet those goals with modern, dual-powered engines, improved operations, increased fuel efficiency, and lower carbon emissions – in both electric and diesel mode.”

A second daily Northeast Regional train is expected to begin sometime in 2022.

The Town of Blacksburg and Blacksburg Transit have received a $5.15 million grant from the Federal Transit Administration to help attain its goal of having an all-electric fleet by 2032. The funding comes from the FTA’s Low- or No-Emission (Low-No) Grant Program and is part of a $182 million funding package split up between 49 projects across the country.

“FTA's Low-No Program supports transit agencies in purchasing or leasing low- or no-emission buses and other transit vehicles that use technologies such as battery electric and fuel-cell power to provide cleaner, more efficient transit service in communities across the country,” reads a release from the FTA. “This year's funding opportunity prioritized applications with an environmental justice component as well as those that support workforce development to help America’s transit workers succeed even as their jobs change along with technology.”

Last month, the director of Charlottesville Area Transit said his agency needs to study the issue further before proceeding with purchase of electric buses. One difference between Blacksburg and Charlottesville is topography, and Garland Williams said he has to be able to guarantee vehicles are able to reliably climb the city’s many hills and retain a charge. (review the other 48 projects) (Read the July 4 Charlottesville Community Engagement)

Charlottesville’s Office of Economic Development has announced the next round of a grant program intended to help small businesses in the city. The second round of the Building Resilience Among Charlottesville Entrepreneurs (BRACE) grant program will open on Monday. The first round distributed funding to 69 businesses to help survive the pandemic. The second is intended to help business get through the recovery period. Businesses can apply for up to $2,500 and must make a 30 percent contribution as part of the request. For more details, visit the city’s website.

Governor Ralph Northam has announced another $21 million in housing loans for below-market housing that includes additional funding for four area projects. The Affordable and Special Needs Housing loans come through the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.

Piedmont Housing Alliance will receive $1.9 million for the first phase of Friendship Court, which will see construction of 106 new units on land that is currently green space.

“Friendship Court was previously awarded funds through a competitive ASNH application, and this additional application supports the implementation of Zero Energy Ready Homes and Passive House certification standards, as well as permanent supportive housing units, which will provide select tenants with additional wraparound services on site,” reads a press release from the Northam administration.

Virginia Supportive Housing will receive $1.46 million for the Premier Circle Permanent Supportive Housing project on U.S. 29.

“Premier Circle Permanent Supportive Housing is the construction of 80 units for formerly homeless and low-income adults from the Charlottesville region. Each studio unit will be approximately 350 square feet and contain a kitchen and full bathroom, and resident amenities include phone and computer rooms, laundry facilities, a fitness area, and free Wi-Fi,” reads the release.

Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville will receive $1.4 million for home ownership opportunities at Southwood.

“Southwood Affordable Homeownership is the construction of 16 single-family condo units, five single-family attached townhome units, four single-family duplex units, and one single-family detached unit,” reads the release.” The 26 new homes will be constructed in the existing Southwood mobile home park and serve families relocating from substandard mobile homes in the park. The homes will serve residents at or below 60 percent of the Area Median Income (AMI).”

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority will receive $934,000 for the first phase of the South First Street public housing project.

“South First Street Phase One is the new construction of 62 one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartment units across three garden-style apartment buildings,” reads the release. “The development includes substantial indoor community resource space programmed and designed by residents. Outdoor amenity spaces and access to trails and recreational space along Pollack’s Branch will be available for residents and the surrounding community.”

CRHA will also receive $835,000 in funding for the renovation of Crescent Halls.

“Crescent Halls is the substantial rehabilitation of an eight-story building comprised of 105 apartment units for lower-income seniors in Charlottesville,” reads the release. “This renovation includes new unit layouts, finishes, plumbing fixtures and appliances, building-wide mechanical systems and windows, elevator modernization, and roofing that will support a photovoltaic array. The renovated units will continue to serve seniors and disabled residents, providing better access through the retrofitting of 11 units that will include roll-in showers, grab bars, roll under sinks, and front controls on ranges.”

Read more in the Governor Northam’s press release.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors has adopted an updated version of its housing policy after amendments were made to make clear that some sections of the plan would not be implemented until after an incentives package for developers is also approved. That had been a sticking point at the public hearing for Housing Albemarle that was held on June 16. The 99-page document contains many new requirements for “affordable” units. These include:

Currently developers seeking a rezoning must provide 15 percent of units as affordable. The plan would raise that to 20 percent.

Mechanisms would be developed such as deed restrictions to guarantee affordable rentals would be required to be below-market for a period of 30 years and that affordable for-sale units would be required to be below-market for a period of 40 years.

A maximum rent for affordable units would be set at one-fourth of 65 percent of the area median income. Maximum sales price would be 65 percent of a federal guideline known as the HOME Program’s 1-Unit Purchase price.

A maximum rent for “workforce housing” would be capped at 110 percent of the fair market rent as determined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The plan had been amended to state that all of the above “will follow approval of a package of developer incentives for affordable housing.”

Supervisor Donna Price said she was concerned that such incentives may not be possible.

“As I’ve continued to communicate with developers there are some concerns about whether we are realistically going to be able to meet those objectives,” Price said. “With regard to the for-sale affordable housing, whether the target metrics that have been set are going to be financially able to then be met.”

Price said the plan was incomplete without the incentives package. Supervisor Liz Palmer asked when that would come back to the Supervisors for approval. Jodie Filardo is the Community Development Director for Albemarle County. She said it will take some time.

“In our last estimate, we created a very broad estimate that had us coming back within the year on those development incentives,” Filardo said. “Since the last meeting we have had one meeting with a gathering of developers really for a listening session to hear what the issues are from their perspective.”

Filardo said ideas from that meeting are being reviewed by staff and staff will return to the focus group with some potential ideas for incentives.

“And we expect to have those meetings wrapped up by the end of this month,” Filardo said. “That said, some of the suggestions from staff are actually going to require zoning ordinance amendments which are never quick. And so, while we’re working very hard to not have this take a year to get back to you all, it is going to take some time because we have a lot of stakeholders we need to vet this through.”

Stacy Pethia, Albemarle’s Housing Coordinator, said work could begin to implement other parts of the plan while the incentives package is worked out.

“Out of the 12 objectives and I think 49 strategies, 43 or 42 of those strategies could move forward,” Pethia said. “If the policy were approved today, we could begin working on everything else that’s in there.”

Pethis said details of the affordability provisions could change as discussions with developers continue.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said the plan would be a living document that would change as implementation gets underway.

“If things need to be adjusted, adapted, this isn’t as strong as this, I mean, there’s a ton of details that have to be worked out that this policy has set up,” Gallaway said.

For example, Objective 6 is to create a Housing Trust Fund.

“Funds can be distributed as either grants or loans to a variety of local partners including for-profit and nonprofit developers, affordable housing services providers, public housing authorities, or local government departments, as well as individual homeowners or landlords,” reads the plan. “Priorities for the use of housing trust fund dollars can be set to meet local priorities as housing needs change.”

“There are so many details about this trust fund that remain unanswered and we don’t know where the Board is going to fall on that in terms of governance of a trust fund, where is the money going, is it going to be one fund?” Gallaway asked. “Two funds? Ton of details.”

Gallaway said even without an official package of approvals, the Board could continue to vote on proposals that are in excess of the current policy.

“If we approve this policy today and someone wants to bring us an application before the refinements of incentives are there, and they have an incentive idea, we can consider it,” Gallaway said. “Nothing holds us back from taking action.”

Price was satisfied with the answers and the motion to approve the plan was approved unanimously. I’ll have more from this meeting of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors in a future newsletter. (read the plan)

Finally today, one property rights advocacy group in the area published a report today that makes the argument Albemarle’s rezoning process is preventing creation of more housing stock. The Free Enterprise Forum’s white paper is entitled Density Deferred, Density Denied and examines how three different projects were reduced in size from their original application to the final approved project due to neighborhood opposition. (download the paper)

I’ll be appearing with Neil Williamson of the Free Enterprise Forum on the July 9 installment of the Real Talk program with Keith Smith and Jerry Miller. It begins at 10:15 a.m. and I’m not entirely sure what link to send to you. Do go take a look at our last appearance from June 11, which has all of eight views as of this recording. (YouTube link)

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Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to grow native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

In this installment:

Charlottesville City Council funds future action on Confederate statues

News on several key property transactions in the region

Federal help is on the way for Virginia’s towns

Governor Ralph Northam has announced an additional $304.5 million in American Rescue Funds for the 190 towns in Virginia. Under Virginia’s constitutions, towns are municipal jurisdictions within counties that have their own form of local government. In this region, that includes Stanardsville in Greene County, the towns of Louisa and Mineral in Louisa County, and Scottsville, which is in both Albemarle and Fluvanna counties. I’ll speak with the town manager of Scottsville in a later installment of the show to find out how they’ll use their funding. (press release)

Emmet Street near Ivy Road will be closed overnight tonight and the next two nights to relocate a natural gas pipeline from the west side to the east side of the road. According to a release, the work is being done as preparation work for the University of Virginia’s Emmet/Ivy Corridor project. The nighttime closure is also scheduled to take place on July 20. The roadway is already under a partial closure for the work which is expected to be completed by July 31. Learn more about the project on cvillepedia.

Tonight, the Design Public Hearing for a nearby transportation project will take place at 6 p.m. This is for a Smart Scale project known as the Barracks / Emmet Intersection and it involves new turn lanes and others upgrades to the roadway as well as a shared-use path heading up Barracks Road. Details can be seen at barracksroadimprovements.com (meeting info)

If you’re hoping to speak at the general public comment at the Albemarle School Board meeting on Thursday, you may want to sign up now to get in the queue. According to a news release on the school system’s communication page, the School Board is limiting the number of speakers to 40 and will choose who gets to speak through a random lottery. That lottery will be conducted by Jon Zug, the clerk of the Albemarle County Circuit Court.

“Historically, school board agendas have set aside 30 minutes to hear public comments during business meetings, with each speaker provided up to three minutes,” reads the release. “In recent meetings, however, the number of requests from people wishing to address the board during a meeting has exceeded two and three times that number, extending well into the time set aside to review or vote on business agenda items.”

A development firm has filed a request with Albemarle County to subdivide a 69-acre property south of the Fontaine Research Park to make way for a neighborhood of 73 single-family homes. Riverbend Development submitted the request for the Granger property, a piece of land that has long been the subject of speculation.

Access to the site would be to Sunset Avenue Extended with an emergency access point onto Stribling Avenue, which is restricted by a one-way railway underpass. The lots will each have a minimum of 20,000 square feet and 80 feet of road frontage, except in the case of lots along cul-de-sacs. This project would be consistent with the existing R-1 zoning and the Comprehensive Plan of Neighborhood Residential Density. No action is required by the Board of Supervisors as this is what is known as a ministerial review.

Woodard Properties has purchased another couple of properties on Cherry Avenue in an area currently zoned for mixed-use. The company paid $1.55 million for two properties at 801 Cherry Avenue, currently a vacant lot. That’s 41.24 percent over the 2021 assessment. In April, Woodard Properties paid $3.1 million for the Cherry Avenue Shopping Center and five vacant properties behind it. These two lots make up about 0.85 acres.

Now it’s time for a reader-supported public service announcement. The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are having a Warehouse Sale at Albemarle Square Shopping Center (300 Albemarle Square) Friday, July 9 through Sunday, July 11 from 10-6 each day. There will be Fiction, Mysteries, SciFi and Fantasy, Cookbooks, Military, Biographies and YA and Children’s Books There will be a capacity limit of 80 shoppers. Proceeds benefit our regional public library system, *JMRL, serving Charlottesville, Albemarle, Greene, Louisa and Nelson.

Whenever a plan becomes known for what will happen to the Confederate Statues in two Charlottesville parks, funding will be in place to cover at least some of the costs. Charlottesville City Council took action this morning at a special meeting on a resolution to allocate $1 million to the effort, which would be a legal action given a ruling this spring by the Virginia Supreme Court that the two statues are not protected war memorials. Council voted on June 7 on a resolution to ask groups if they had interest in taking ownership. (read the resolution)

“The 30 day window for considering statue relocation is coming to a close very shortly so we wanted to be able to have funding in place to take care of that," Boyles said.

So far, there have been eight inquiries from entities interested in taking on the statues.

The resolution voted on by Council today also covered the Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea statue on West Main Street.

"This is just putting funding in place so that we can either remove, store, or cover any or all of the three statues,” Boyles said.

Boyles said Council will have to vote to approve any transfer of ownership. The funding allocated today could cover the costs of relocating or covering, actions which by themselves would not require a vote by Council.

Councilors did not make any comments before taking the vote. In the public comment period, art historian Malcolm Bell said Council should not treat the Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea statue the same as the Confederate statues.

“The Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea monument is an important work of art by a well-known artist,” Bell said. “It is also completely innocent of the accusations that have been made against it.”

Council directed staff to come up with a plan to remove the statue in November 2019. Charlottesville Mayor Walker said the request came from Sacagawea’s descendants.

“If people go back and look at that 2019 meeting, we didn’t just make this decision and tried to be really thoughtful about making the decision, I guess that’s my comment, by bringing Sacagawea’s descendants here.”

Council also held first readings on three resolutions for which there were not fully detailed staff reports. Boyles said the items were urgent matters. The first was an appropriation of $1.986 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds.

“The city will be the recipient of just approximately $19 million that is divided over a two year period,” Boyles said. “Right now what we’re recommending is that for community support that we go ahead and approve on July 19 funding for the Peace in the Streets program, which is a neighborhood support program and likewise the mentoring at Lugo-McGinness Academy. These are both [Conscious] Capitalist programs.”

Other funding in this appropriation includes $300,000 for the Legal Aid Justice Center for a eviction prevention program as well as $811,000 for emergency assistance for families through the Pathways program, $250,000 in support for small businesses, and $200,000 in safety improvements at the City Hall lobby.

“We will do community engagement,” Boyles said. “There will be a public hearing at your July 19th meeting on this matter and we’ll be able to provide a written presentation on this ahead of time.”

Council also took first reading on a resolution to use funds to provide bonuses to encourage more people to apply as bus drivers for both the school system and Charlottesville Area Transit. Boyles said the school system needs about 30 drivers to operate, but is well below that figure at the moment.

“We do have the ability through additional routes to get by without about 14 drivers and we currently have nine drivers with the school year right upon us,” Boyles said. “This is not unique to Charlottesville or Albemarle or Virginia. This is a national epidemic that’s occurring all over.”

The resolution proposes a $2,400 bonus for new drivers as well as enhanced health benefits for school bus drivers. Participants would get that bonus over a nine-month period, and existing drivers would also get the amount to encourage them to stay on the job.

A similar bonus will go for CAT drivers to prevent people from quitting that job to drive a school bus. If approved on July 19, the program would last two years.

More details will be available in time for the July 19 meeting.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out: As we head into summer and the weather heats up, your local energy nonprofit, LEAP, wants you and yours to keep cool. LEAP offers FREE home weatherization to income- and age-qualifying residents. If you’re age 60 or older, or have an annual household income of less than $75,100, you may qualify for a free energy assessment and home energy improvements such as insulation and air sealing. Sign up today to lower your energy bills, increase comfort, and reduce energy waste at home!

On today’s show:

Updates on capital projects and cybersecurity from the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority

A look at how the pandemic affected transportation behaviour

And the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership discusses ways to get a better system by connecting various moving parts

Over three quarters of a million Virginians on Medicaid now have access to mental health and dental benefits. Governor Ralph Northam marked the occasion on July 1 while launching a new medical and dental center in Richmond. The change came in the form of an increased line item in the budget, which went into effect on yesterday. Medicaid members are now eligible for three cleanings a year as well as preventive care. The benefits are administered by DentaQuest, who can be reached at 1-888-912-3456 or visiting dentaquest.com. (press release)

The Board of Directors of the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA) met virtually on June 22. The RWSA builds and maintains the infrastructure that treats drinking water and processes wastewater in the various urban locations. That takes a lot of money, and there are a total of 54 projects in the agency’s capital improvement program over the next five years, at a cost of $170.1 million. But planning is also underway for projects that will be built after that time. (CIP highlights)

“The theme in our infrastructure and master planning you may note is pipelines,” said Bill Mawyer, the executive director of the RWSA. “We’re working on a central waterline that is going to largely go through the center area of the City of Charlottesville.”

A route has been identified for this project, and a cost-share allocation between Albemarle and Charlottesville has been discussed. The current capital program does include about $43 million for a new waterline between the Ragged Mountain Reservoir and the Observatory Hill Water Treatment Plant. That amount includes an upgrade of the water treatment plant that will increase its capacity to 10 million gallons a day.

The RWSA is still working to secure easements for a nine-mile pipeline to connect the Ragged Mountain and South Fork reservoirs. The project has a cost estimate of $80 million and has a current estimated completion date of 2033.

Another project that needs an agreement between Albemarle and Charlottesville is the replacement of the Schenk’s Branch interceptor. That’s an aging sewer line for which the first phase has been completed. The hold-up is the project’s alignment, which can either go on city property underneath McIntire Road south of Preston Avenue, or it can go on land owned by Albemarle County at its main office building. The RWSA’s monthly update on project has more information about the nearly $4 million project.

“Following pipe alignment determinations, the design plans will be updated, and the construction approach will be coordinated with a City project planned for the same general area,” reads the update.

The Board also got an update on security issues from the RWSA’s information systems administrator.

“Cyber-attack is the number one threat right now to our water infrastructure,” said Steven Miller.

It’s been nearly two months since a ransomware attack led to the shut-down of the Colonial Pipeline, leading to temporary fuel shortages in Virginia and other southern states. In February, a water treatment plan in Oldsmar, Florida was attacked by a hacker who sought to increase the levels of sodium hydroxide in order to poison people. That attack was stopped by monitoring by an employee. (Industrial Defender article)

Miller described the vulnerability that was exploited.

“Somebody left a remote access program on a machine and just left it sitting there and the operator’s password was acquired somehow and they were able to break in,” Miller said.

Mitigating tips include requiring multifactor authentication and backing up critical systems so they can be replaced if access is shut down through a ransomware attack. Miller said there are several layers of protection.

“So our first layer basically is physical,” Miller said. “We lock our water plants. We don’t just let people walk up to computers and use them.”

Other layers include camouflaging the RWSA networks through the next generation of firewalls.

“That software will also allow us to do something called geo-fencing which allows us to block all traffic from a specific area,” Miller said. “There’s really no reason we should have any traffic going to or from China.”

Next, the RWSA got an update on the federal and state permits required to draw water from the natural environment for urban water supply. The permits issued by the Virginia Department of Environment Quality and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers expire in 2023 and will need to be reviewed. Jennifer Whitaker is the RWSA’s chief engineer.

“We luckily submitted our permit for the urban system in May of 2021 and are working our way through the process,” Whitaker said.

Since the last permits were issued, there’s a new dam at Ragged Mountain and the upgrade of two water treatments are underway. Future elements in the water supply plan include the construction of the South Fork to Rivanna waterline, the eventual raising of the water level at Ragged Mountain, and the decommissioning of the North Rivanna water treatment plant.

There are separate urban water systems for Crozet and Scottsville, as well as Glenmore.

The RWSA Board will next meet virtually on July 27 shortly after the meeting of the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority.

The pandemic affected how Americans traveled, with fewer vehicle miles traveled at a time when people were asked to stay at home as much as possible. The Commonwealth Transportation Board had a briefing on the numbers at their meeting on June 22 from Laura Schewel, the chief executive officer of StreetLight Data. (view the presentation slides)

“Everything that moves these days has some sort of technology on board to help measure it,” Schewel said. “It can be the geolocations in your phone, connected car data, data from car fleet management systems.”

StreetLight takes that data and analyzes it to describe how people are using roads across the whole country. Nationwide, vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in urban communities was at 60 percent of normal levels in April 2020 at the height of the lockdowns. The decrease was not as high in rural counties.

“Urban areas saw far more VMT decline and still haven’t recovered to the same level as the more rural and suburban counties,” Schewel said.

Schewel said while VMT is back up, there is evidence congestion is down in part to more people driving outside the traditional peak hours.

“We’re using our existing assets more evenly and that means we’re using our existing assets better,” Schewel said. “And that may mean that in some areas, we have reduced the need for road expansion or new roads because we’re doing a better job of using the roads we have.”

Schewel said better data may help transportation planners make better decisions about what might be needed in the future and that more time and data collection is needed.

“I think for the future, or really right now what we need to is to measure, we need to predict, but I don’t think we should make a prediction,” Schewel said. “We need to predict in ranges because we know there is uncertainty and we know things can change. We need to predict a range of outcomes.”

The Virginia Department of Transportation’s traffic division uses 512 counting stations to measure traffic volumes mostly on major highways. Engineer Mena Lockwood said Virginia saw a sharp decline in VMT in the early days of the pandemic but there has been a rebound.

“Since then we’ve been relatively steady and over the last couple of months we’ve actually had our traffic at above typical conditions and the all vehicle traffic has just been below typical conditions.”

Lockwood showed data that indicate that congestion in Virginia’s metropolitan areas is beginning to return to pre-pandemic levels. Several members of the CTB noted that this is the time for employers to consider incentive programs for teleworking and other programs to reduce vehicle miles traveled.

Another factor in the fall could be the full return to in-person school. Mary Hynes represents the Northern Virginia District on the CTB and she said localities need to be prepared.

“I’m a little worried about that, particularly in the really urban places, that we’re just going to have traffic jams beyond believe in September all about taking kids to school,” Hynes said.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time for another reader-supported public service announcement.

The future of passenger rail in Virginia got a lot more brighter this year as the Commonwealth of Virginia signed agreements with CSX to purchase hundreds of miles of railway corridors for three billion dollars. Virginians for High-Speed Rail are holding a transportation town hall on July 15 at 1 p.m. on the “True Story of the Virginia-CSX Deal: Lessons Learned and the Future of Passenger Rail.” Virginia Transportation Secretary Shannon Valentine and Amtrak President Stephen Gardner are the speakers. (register here)

If you’re interested in driving less, and you want to know what’s happening to improve transit, a good place to start is the Jefferson Area Regional Transit Partnership. The group consists of representatives from Charlottesville Area Transit, Jaunt, and the University of Virginia Transit Service, as well as elected and appointed officials. It’s also a place where people can comment on transit issues. One speaker at the June 24 meeting was Ethan Heil, who decided last year to get more involved.

“Last September I was excited to hear my appointment to the CAT Advisory Board,” Heil said. “Unfortunately since then I haven’t received any follow-up communication.”

Heil said he understood the body might not have been a priority during the pandemic, but that the advisory board should play a role going forward.

“I’m hopeful and respectfully request that we could find an opportunity to reengage the CAT advisory board,” Heil said.

Council discussed whether to keep the CAT Advisory Board as an entity last October when they reviewed the status of various appointed bodies. The Board has not met since the pandemic began.

At the end of the meeting, City Councilor Lloyd Snook said Council considered the fate of the CAT Advisory Board last October.

“We basically decided at that point that there really wasn’t a lot of reason why the CAT Advisory Board should be sort of a Council-level appointment,” Snook said. “It ought to be something that worked directly with Garland [Williams] and the transportation piece more directly rather than have us involved.”

Garland is Garland Williams, the manager of CAT. He said the advisory board is important, its its function needs to be studied.

“I think it needed to be looked at and I asked for your authorization to hire a consultant to look at what the CAT advisory board does and then bring back a recommendation to Council sometime this year or early next and you authorized me to do so,” Williams said.

One item on the partnership’s agenda was new guidance on getting assistance from VDOT staff for Smart Scale projects that seek to move more people onto to transit and other multimodal solutions. Chuck Proctor is an engineer in the Culpeper District.

“We can help you develop sketches for infrastructure improvements, if you wanted to put out a bus pull out or if you’re going to be doing bus stops,” Proctor said. “Even bike-pedestrian facilities to and from a transit stop.”

This year, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission succeeded in securing $3.38 million in Smart Scale funding for a park and ride lot in Exit 107.

That would be on the route of the Afton Express service between Staunton and Charlottesville that is slated to start in September. The next deadline for the next Smart Scale cycle is not until the summer of 2022. Transit agencies can make their own applications.

Proctor said there are efforts to find a location for a park and ride lot on Pantops. There had been one at the Pantops Shopping Center.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel said she wanted to know more information about how people use park and ride lots, given the rising cost of land in the community.

“We don’t want to go out and take good valuable land or space and end up with, I mean we just need to know what we’re doing before we go ahead,” McKeel said.

Becca White, the director of parking and transportation at the University of Virginia, said park-and-ride has to be part of a coordinate strategy in order for it to work.

“It’s not park and ride for park and ride’s sake,” White said. “It has to be the right amenities. It has to be lighted properly. It has to have waiting areas. It has to be linked to either transit or car pool trips. It can be very successful but it’s not a park and ride for park and ride’s sake.”

CAT is studying possible locations for a park and ride lot on U.S. 29 in Albemarle County’s northern growth area. CAT Director Garland Williams said such a facility would be ideal for people driving to the University of Virginia.

“It would also add a hub for transit where you would have dedicated restrooms for our facilities moving forward,” Williams said.

The TJPDC is also studying expanded service in Albemarle’s northern growth area. The first round of public engagement efforts should begin in July.

One change that will happen in the short-term is that CAT buses will no longer travel through the Rio Hill Shopping Center. Williams told the partnership that the property owners asked for the stop to be removed.

“Their reasoning was the shopping center will be undergoing a renovation of the storefronts and the current bus route will not work with the vision of the shopping center,” Williams said.

The shopping center would still be served, but the buses will not travel on the Rio Hill Shopping Center property. (learn more about the renovation in the February 6 CCE)

Toward the end of the meeting, Jaunt’s planning manager Steven Johnson posed an interesting question. Could bus stops used by multiple transit agencies be given names that could be shared?

“So that in our literature everybody is referring to the same stop by the same name,” Johnson said. “I think that would be a good thing for users of our systems.”

In June, City Council approved an appropriation of federal funding for Charlottesville Area Transit to purchase eleven buses, all of which will be powered by fossil fuels. CAT is conducting a study on how to proceed. (read more in June 24 CCE)

But some area transit fleets have bought a few electric vehicles. Jim Foley, the director of pupil transportation for Albemarle County Public Schools, said his system applied to Dominion’s electric school bus program.

“I’m not sure we’ll get them, but we gave it a try,” Foley said. “We did go visit Louisa County who did get two of the electric buses and they love them, plus Dominion came out with a program to reimburse schools for fast-chargers which would save hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

Foley said he drove one of the vehicles and found it to be smooth and powerful.

Christine Jacobs, the interim director of the TJPDC, said she would convene a workshop of various stakeholders outside of a partnership meeting in order to discuss the issue.

“Just sit everybody at the table so we can all share all of the information that we have,” Jacobs said. “Results from studies that are being done, data on the different types of buses. I think it’s something that there’s a real momentum and a craving for us all to share information and make sure that we’re all on the same page.

Williams expressed caution about having community members decide what kind of buses to purchase.

“The community doesn’t get involved when you’re talking about the selection of fire trucks, or police vehicles, or any of the other vehicles associated so it’s a little interesting there’s a lot of concern about selection with individuals who have not run a transit system and do not have any information about running it and what it takes to make sure that I am going to be reliable.”

Williams said a study will soon get underway to determine the best pathway forward and to develop a plan to transition the fleet. In the meantime, he does not want his hands tied.

“I’m not going to be subject to a command telling me to buy an electric bus when I have no confidence that it’s going to work,” Williams said.

Finally today, as reported here before, route changes are pending for Charlottesville Area Transit. The information has been presented to the Regional Transit Partnership and the City Council, but this summer the public will get the chance to ask questions in two virtual meetings. (Council Briefed on Proposed Transit Changes, June 2, 2021)

Both the Connetics Transportation Group and the firm Kimley-Horn have as been working with Williams on the changes. Here’s Williams at a June 29 press briefing.

“When we went into the pandemic, there was concern like most transit agencies about how when we get out of the pandemic, what do we do the make the system better for all who use it?” Williams asked.

Williams said the route changes are intended to reverse a period of ridership declines that was happening before the pandemic. In 2013, CAT carried over 2.4 million riders a year, but that dropped to just over $2 million in 2018. Williams also acknowledged there are a lot of moving parts in transit at the moment.

“This is not the end-all to-be-all,” Williams said. “The region is doing a visioning study so this was designed as a temporary measure over the next couple of years while that study is done to prevent us from having continued rapid decline in ridership.”

In the current system, all but one of the CAT’s 13 routes goes to the Downtown Transit Station. In the changes, at least one route will be oriented north-south to travel between Stonefield and the Willoughby Shopping Center. Jim Baker is with the Connectics Transportation Group.

“We’ve proposed introducing some new crosstown service from south Charlottesville to U.S. 29 so no longer will you need to travel to downtown, transfer to a bus to continue up to U.S 29,” Baker said. “You can do all of that on the same bus.”

Another change is that CAT service would be extended to Mill Creek in Albemarle County. Service would also go through the South First Street public housing complex. Other routes would have Sunday service for the first time.

The two public meetings will be on Friday, July 16 at noon and Wednesday, July 21 at 6 p.m.

Before you go:

Thanks so much to everyone for their financial support. No pitch today. I just want to thank you for reading. As I said in the podcast, the fact that you’re reading this shows that you care about the future of our community. I do as well, and have dedicated my life to reestablishing my pathway as a journalist. As you celebrate with friends and family, please tell others about the work. I’m about to begin Year Two and would like to expand the audience! This work is free and the work is paid for by the quarter of the audience that’s decided to contribute. I’m grateful to everyone who thinks this work is worthwhile enough to keep going.

Thanks again,

Sean Tubbs, Town Crier Productions

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On today’s show:

The Pantops CAC hears about development projects and an extension of the Old Mills Trail

The Metropolitan Planning Organization endorses planning projects

Virginia’s Constitution turns 50 tomorrow

Albemarle and Charlottesville launch a Buy Local campaign

We begin today with some transportation news. U.S. 250 in Nelson County between Route 6 and I-64. has reopened to traffic two months after being closed after a rock slide. According to a release, that’s two weeks ahead of schedule. Lou Hatter is a spokesman for the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Culpeper District.

“We had two contractors who were really focused on getting this work done as quickly as possible,” Hatter said. “The fact that U.S. 250 was not open created real issues particularly for people lived on Route 6, Afton Mountain Road.”

The contractors worked six days a week and removed over 700 dump trucks of material removed from the failed slope.

“It was a steep slope so the work had to be done in stages because they had to go in with equipment and level out an area called a bench that the equipment could work from and then they would reach up above that to remove the loose material.”

Hatter said a series of something called a “soil nail” have been drilled into the rock.

“They’re secured in place with a cement grout and then over top of that is overlaid a chain link material like chain link fencing, a mesh material and that’s secured to the rods,” Hatter said.

Over top of the soil nails is a layer of straw and grass seed intended to grow vegetation quickly. Hatter said the contractors also identified another area where a slope might have failed, and this same process has been applied at that location.

In addition to being the first day of Fiscal Year 2021, July 1 is also the 50th anniversary of Virginia’s current constitution. The 1971 Constitution replaced a version from 1902 which historic records show was created to make it harder for Black Virginians to vote and to enshrine segregation as the law of the land. That constitution imposed a poll tax and literacy requirements to vote. The 1971 Constitution was an attempt to remove those restrictions following federal bans as well as passage of the Civil Rights Act. Copies of all four of Virginia’s Constitutions are on view at the Library of Virginia through Thursday. Learn more about the 1971 Constitution in a press release sent out by the office of Virginia Governor Ralph Northam.

Albemarle County and Charlottesville have launched a joint Buy Local campaign to promote small businesses in the area. The economic development offices in both jurisdictions will run the campaign and are looking for businesses that might want to participate in what’s being described “as a multi-channel, multimedia promotional and educational campaign.”

From the release:

“Locally-owned, independent businesses with a brick-and-mortar facility in the City of Charlottesville or Albemarle County interested in being featured in the campaign should contact Jennifer Schmack at jschmack@albemarle.org (for Albemarle-based businesses) and Jason Ness at nessj@charlottesville.gov (for Charlottesville based-businesses).”

Today is the official last day for Rebecca Carter as administrator of Buckingham County, according to the Farmville Herald. Carter moved to the county south of Albemarle in 1986 when her husband was transferred to a job with CSX. Soon after she went to work for Buckingham County as an administrative assistant. In 1994, she became administrator. Carter announced her resignation last December due to her husband’s failing health. Wayne Carter died in April, and Rebecca Carter told the Farmville Herald she plans to spend her retirement helping with the family farm.

There’s an effort underway in Albemarle County to extend the Old Mills Trail along the Rivanna south of Pantops. That was one piece of information told to the Pantops Community Advisory Committee during their briefing on the Urban Rivanna River Corridor Plan, a joint planning effort intended to encourage greater collaboration between Albemarle and Charlottesville along a common border. Tim Padalino is a planner in Albemarle’s parks and recreation department.

“There is an existing section of the Old Mills Trail as I think most viewers and attendees know,” Padalino said. “It’s approximately two and a half miles in length between Darden Towe Park on the upstream section and the I-64 bridges downstream, the current ending of the trail.”

Padalino said the proposed extension would go further downstream to Milton through an area that is currently overgrown and wild. If turned into a trail, people might be able to walk to a spot that is also being planned for a better place to end a journey on the river itself.

“So for example the vision for the Rivanna Greenway and Blueway includes future development of an expanded improved public landing and river access sport at Milton as well as some type of a new trailhead facility at Milton,” Padalino said.

The extension will pass over land owned by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation. Padalino said a primitive pathway does exist, but it’s not sanctioned. The idea would be to use crushed stone as a trail bed rather than paving the four mile long, six foot wide trail. There’s also no funding yet for the extension.

“It’s not officially maintained and it’s not permanently authorized for public use,” Padalino said. “Some easement acquisitions are still necessary before beginning final project design and funding request and grant applications and everything else that will come in the weeks and months ahead.”

The extension to Milton will pass in some section close to the railroad, which will be owned soon by the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority. It will also pass by the Luckstone quarry.

“And part of the arrangement and agreement between Luckstone and Albemarle County is to make sure that trail users can remain safe while passing through an active quarry,” Padalino said.

Padalino made his comments at the Pantops Community Advisory Committee. That group also got updates on development projects under construction or under review. Senior planner Cameron Langille said contractors hired by the Virginia Department of Transportation continue to work on converting the junction of U.S. 250 and Interstate 64 into a “diverging diamond.”

“As it stands that project is still on track to be completed at the original date of March 2023,” Langille said.

Planners are reviewing a new 1,000 square foot building at the Pantops Shopping Center.

“There’s a flat green grassed area there that they’re going to install some new parking into and then the new building is going to be a drive through car wash,” Langille said.

Across U.S. 250, the façade of the former Battlefield/Malloy Ford has been demolished. Malloy moved to U.S. 29.

“What they’re doing is to try to build the façade back because they’re looking to get some new auto dealerships to go back to that site,” Langille said.

A site plan is nearing approval for The Hampton Inn to be built on State Farm Boulevard. A second hotel The Overlook is still in the review process for a rezoning application.

“The applicant has told us that they want to continue going through reviews with staff until our comments have gotten to a point where the applicant feels comfortable moving forward to a public hearing with the Planning Commission,” Langille said.

Langille said a proposal to build 130 apartment units on South Pantops Drive next to the Overlook Condominiums has been withdrawn. In its place is a new development for 40 townhomes.

Two former fast food franchise buildings in the Pantops Shopping Center have closed in the past year. A Burger King remains vacant while the Hardees has a new tenant.

“Tobey’s Pawn Shop has gone on in and occupied that space,” Langille said. “They just did some work inside of the building but really didn’t change anything else on site.”

The Pantops Community Advisory Committee will next meet in August and will take off the month of July.

Time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement!

The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are having a Warehouse Sale at Albemarle Square Shopping Center (300 Albemarle Square) Friday, July 9 through Sunday, July 11 from 10-6 each day. There will be Fiction, Mysteries, SciFi and Fantasy, Cookbooks, Military, Biographies and YA and Children’s Books There will be a capacity limit of 80 shoppers. Proceeds benefit our regional public library system, JMRL, serving Charlottesville, Albemarle, Greene, Louisa and Nelson.

Finally today, time to go through some of the June 23 meeting of the Metropolitan Planning Organization Policy Board. To recap, that’s the federally-mandated body that approves transportation funding. It’s made up of two Charlottesville City Councilors, two Albemarle Supervisors, and the head of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Culpeper District.

The MPO adopted a resolution supporting an effort by the city of Charlottesville to seek additional funding to support the Meadow Creek Trail. Chris Gensic with the city’s Parks and Recreation Department said the city received a Transportation Alternatives grant of $300,000 two years ago for the project, which according to the staff report was for “the design and construction of a bike and pedestrian bridge across Meadow Creek as part of the U.S. 250 Commuter Trail from Hydraulic Road to Brandywine Drive.” That amount included $75,000 in local funding.

However, that amount will not be enough to cover the project.

“After doing some discussions with VDOT and thinking it through, we came up with a plan where A, you can’t just build a bridge that isn’t connected by a full multi-use path,” Genesis said. “There’s paths in that area but they are recreational dirt surface paths. In order to construct the entire project, to get all the funding in at once and hire one contractor and just get it all done, we’ve decided to apply for a second round of funding.”

The request this year is for $500,000 and will require $135,000 in local funding as a match.

A second city department is also making a Transportations Alternative Project grant request to fund the existing Safe Routes to School program for the next two fiscal years. More specifically, the funding would cover the cost of a full-time coordinator.

“That coordinator helps to implement programs in the city schools, things like Bike and Walk to School day events, helmut giveaways, neighborhood bike repair,” said Amanda Poncy, the city’s bicycle and pedestrian coordinator. “Working with the city school division to better understand how kids are getting to school, and also building a website and social media presence.”

The MPO approved resolutions of support for both, and a third for a planning grant for future of the Amtrak station on West Main Street. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a transportation planner with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

“This is a small station but it serves a lot of riders,” Hersh-Ballering said. “The size of the station doesn’t currently meet the needs of our numbers of boardings and alightings and with continued investment by the state into rail and passenger rail, it will continue to not meet those needs.”

If funded, the TJPDC would create a master plan for the site. More on all three of those projects as 2021 continues. We’ll also hear more the rest of the year about the candidates for projects for consideration in the next round of VDOT’s Smart Scale process. The deadline isn’t until next year, but pre-selection work is underway. Potential projects for the MPO to consider are:

A roundabout at the intersection of District Avenue and Hydraulic Road

An extension of Hillsdale Avenue to the U.S. 250 bypass

A bike and pedestrian crossing of the Rivanna River

Multi-modal improvements for Avon Street between Mill Creek and Belmont Bridge

Multi-modal improvements for 5th Street between Southwood and Harris Road

A grade-separated interchange, or “flyover” at U.S 250 and U.S. 29

Interested in more information in any of these stories? Take a look at the video. If you have any questions, let me know and I’ll try to help. That’s what I am here to do!

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On today’s show:

Information from the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership

Charlottesville schedules an information session on construction of the Belmont Bridge replacement

Rockingham County gets a grant to study better ways to dispose of animal waste

Want to know what’s going on with the construction of the Belmont Bridge replacement? The city of Charlottesville has scheduled an information session for August 11 for the project, which is officially underway now that the city has issued a Notice to Proceed to Caton Construction Group to begin the work. The city’s contract with Caton Construction Group is for $23.7 million.

According to a release sent out this morning by the city, one of the first steps will be construction of a temporary public parking lot on East South Street. The medians on Avon Street and 9th Street will be removed beginning in early August along with utility relocation. The terms of the contract require traffic on the bridge to be open during construction, though there will be temporary closures that will be publicized in advance.

Speaking of road projects in Charlottesville, one lane on Emmet Street near Ivy Road will remain closed from 7 a.m. through 5 p.m. each weekday through July 31, 2021. The closure will allow a contractor to relocate a natural gas pipeline from the west side of the street to the east. This work is part of the University of Virginia’s plans for the Emmet/Ivy corridor, which includes construction of a new hotel and conference center and new buildings for the School of Data Science and the Karsh Institute of Democracy.

An organization that seeks to ensure an Independence Day Celebration in Charlottesville each year has raised enough funding to proceed this July 4. Celebrate US Charlottesville has raised enough feeds to proceed with an event that will begin atop Carter’s Mountain shortly after 9 p.m. on Sunday. The event will also be shown on MeTV and slightly later on Fox27. Sponsors who helped bring the amount over the top include Wendell Wood and Alan Powell/S&N Communications. Any additional proceeds will be donated to the Ronald McDonald House.

Governor Ralph Northam has announced the latest recipients of planning grants from the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. One of these Agriculture and Forestry Industries Development (AFID) grants has gone to Rockingham County for their research into equipment that can convert organic waste into soil and a methane bio-gas that could be sold as a commodity.

“The $20,000 AFID Planning Grant will be matched with local funds and will explore the financial feasibility of such a facility, available waste streams, potential locations, and ownership structures,” reads the press release.

If you’ve been to Potter’s Craft Cider in Albemarle County, their operations at Neve Hall on U.S. 29 were funded in part by a $50,000 AFID grant as part of a $1.56 million investment. The terms of the performance agreement between Albemarle County, the Albemarle Economic Development Authority and Potter’s Craft require the creation and maintenance of at least five new jobs and the purchase of nearly $520,000 in locally grown apples.

The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership is nearly finished with a plan intended to coordinate efforts to increase the number of below-market housing units across the six localities of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. The title of the document is Planning For Affordability: A Regional Approach. (download the draft plan)

“We felt that it was important to somehow identify what was particular to the region instead of just rehashing individual action steps that might be in the individual chapters for each locality,” said Anthony Haro, the executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless. “And this led to some good conversations about how to track regionally these goals.”

The plan is intended to foster collaboration that pools resources and improves communication about housing issues in order to reduce pressure on individual localities to shoulder the burden alone. But Haro said that won’t happen without coordinated implementation.

“This naturally led to the question of who is going to track these regional goals and who is responsible for overseeing the region,” Haro said.

There’s also an additional chapter for each locality in the region. Each of these will be presented to the governing body in each before being approved by the entire Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Christine Jacobs, interim director of the TJPDC, outlined what would happen the June 23 meeting and that consideration for approval.

“Between this meeting and when it would go before the Planning District Commission, we will be working with individual jurisdictions to get their feedback to present as they direct us to,” Jacobs said.

Jacobs noted it was no coincidence that the recommendations for Charlottesville match those in the Affordable Housing Plan adopted by Council such as a commitment to invest $10 million a year in affordable housing.

“That is completely intentional to not have a document that is conflicting with or competing with the city’s affordable housing plan as approved,” Jacobs said.

The partnership voted to move the plan on to the next step. Then they discussed their budget, which at the moment appears to be short for the next fiscal year. There’s enough money to begin, but they’ll need to find more money. Keith Smith of Fluvanna County is the chair.

“Anybody wants to write a $75,000 check, we’ll be more than happy to take it,” Smith said.

The partnership did not vote on a budget, but members agreed to return to their organizations and governments to discuss additional funding. Albemarle Supervisor Ned Gallaway is on the partnership’s executive committee and he said he understood the ask might be tricky.

“I think everybody agrees though that the partnership is worth it and we want to see it continue, but it can’t be done without the resources,” Gallaway said.

Before adjourning, members had the opportunity to let the others know what’s happening in their jurisdiction or at their non-profit. Sunshine Mathon, the executive director of the Piedmont Housing Alliance, said housing nonprofits are still trying to determine how much funding will come out of the American Recovery Plan. That information may not be fully known until later this year.

“Everyone remains optimistic that we’re going to see a really powerful surge in funding which is hopefully going to catalyze significant impact, but it’s hard to plan that far out as well,” Mathon said.

In a future newsletter we’ll have more from the Cville Plans Together initiative and feedback on the Future Land Use Map. City Councilor Michael Payne said the real work will come when the zoning ordinance is updated.

“I think there’s a question of whether as a city government and as a community we’re actually going to put out money where our mouth is and actually make some of those zoning changes that haven’t happened for a while for a variety of reasons,” Payne said.

The last rezoning was in 2003, which saw the creation of several mixed-use zones throughout the city, as well as residential districts intended to increase the number of University of Virginia students who could live closer to Grounds.

The Future Land Use Map has caused concern from many in Charlottesville, as reported by City Councilor Lloyd Snook.

“We are finding that an awful lot of our very good liberal friends are a little bit horrified to learn that we may be proposing to build an apartment building in their back yards,” Snook said. “There are some interesting tensions that are manifesting themselves at the moment.”

Snook said the Planning Commission has only looked at a draft report and it has not been approved by either the Commission or the Council.

“And there’s lot of arguments to be had so stay tuned,” Snook said.

Brandon Collins, an organizer with the Public Housing Association of Residents, acknowledged there is tension with some of the city’s neighborhoods.

“Part of this is the leadership in the city hasn’t really gone to those communities and sold the idea of rolling back segregation and really presenting that as a positive to the community,” Collins said. “Honestly, myself and some other advocates aren’t necessarily the people to sell that to those neighborhoods. It needs to be other voices.”

Earlier this year, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority broke ground on the renovation of Crescent Halls, a nine-story building that recently suffered a watermain break on the 7th floor. Brandon Collins is an organizer with the Public Housing Association of Residents.

“We’ve got renovation of Crescent Halls which challenge wise may wind up costing a whole lot more than anybody had even imagined even a few days ago and some of that is related to the supply issues,” Collins said. “Not just the costs but getting supplies in when you need them on your schedule.”

Collins also said there have been obstacles in dealing with the city’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services.

“We are still having a challenged relationship with the planning department at the city and we’re trying to work on that but it remains a work in progress,” Collins said.

Finally from this meeting, and for this installment of the show, Anthony Haro said several agencies have received emergency vouchers to help with homelessness, but many continue to struggle to find places for them to be used. But he did relate this news.

“We have an all-time low number of homeless veterans or veterans experiencing homelessness in our area which is really exciting and we’re on the precipice of being able to declare a functional end of homelessness which I really struggling say because it’s a technical term about the number,” Haro said. “But it’s hovering at five to six veterans experiencing homelessness where previously we’ve always hovered around 15 to 20. So that is a pretty significant shift in our system of care.”

Haro said the goal is to bring that number to three or lower by September.

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On today’s show:

An update on Habitat for Humanity’s redevelopment of Southwood

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority gets a briefing on economic gardening

Charlottesville Police Department releases its annual report for 2020

Before the segments with soundbites, a few bits of timely information:

Governor Ralph Northam has announced that the General Assembly will convene in a special session on August 2 to fill judicial vacancies and to allocate over $4.3 billion in federal relief funding related to the pandemic. In May, Northam and legislative leaders put forth a statement that seeks to prioritize the funds as an investment on Virginia’s future.

“We reject calls to refuse these federal dollars, and we support the law’s prohibition on cutting state taxes to substitute federal dollars,” reads the statement. “We embrace this rare opportunity, and we choose to invest.”

The five broad categories for investment include to help public health, small businesses, workers, public schools, and to deploy broadband across the Commonwealth.

The Charlottesville Police Department has released their annual report for 2020. The total number of reported crimes continued a downward trend from 3,168 total Group A offenses in 2018 to 2,492 in 2020. Group A ranges from homicide to weapon law violations. Four people were murdered in 2020 compared to only one in 2018 and two in 2019. The number of calls for shots fired increased in 2020 to 292, up from 185 in 2018 and 169 in 2019. Overall, there were 35,744 calls for service last year. (read the report)

For the second year in a row, Monticello will hold a private ceremony on Independence Day for naturalization of new American citizens. It is an annual tradition for such an event to be held each July 4 with a prominent speaker. Last year the event was not held for the public due to the COVID pandemic, and this year will once again be a virtual celebration featuring highlights from previous years. To get a sense of what these are like, take a listen to the 2006 event recorded for the Charlottesville Podcasting Network. Or the one from 2008. Or the one from 2017. (calendar)

After years of planning, construction is well underway for the Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville’s redevelopment of the Southwood Mobile Home Park in Albemarle’s southern growth area. Land has been cleared along Old Lynchburg Road to make way for the first phase of the project. Andrew Baxter is the director of operations for Habitat and he briefed the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee at their meeting on June 17, 2021.

“Last September as you probably are aware we had the ribbon-cutting, have owned the park for a number of years, invested a great deal in basic infrastructure and safety over the years,” Baxter said.

In August 2019, The Board of Supervisors approved a rezoning of nearly 34 acres of land from R-2 to the Neighborhood Model District, and the concept plan in the application is for up to 450 homes.

“We’re operating now under a 2019 approved non-displacement plan,” Baxter said. “That’s our primary commitment in this redevelopment, that we will not displace current residents of the park, unless they choose to go somewhere else.”

Baxter said the idea had been not to move any existing residents in the first phase, but issues with aging septic systems on the site forced a change.

“If you can imagine, a trailer park that was initially put in place in the 1950’s and 1960’s, about half the park is not on public sewer so that’s created some challenges,” Baxter said.

In all, 26 mobile homes are in the process of being relocated and that work is expected to be complete in August. Baxter said Habitat is complying with the federal Uniform Relocation Act as part of those efforts. (watch a video on the URA)

“The options vary from physically moving a trailer to an empty pad in the park and the family goes with it, to moving a family to a vacant trailer that we own, to moving the trailer off property to a location that’s identified and desirable by the family, by the homeowner,” Baxter said.

The first lots to be used for new homes will be ready this fall.

“That will allow for the construction of what we call Village 1, so Phase 1 Village 1, which will be a combination of duplexes, there’s one single-family dwelling in Village 1, and then four condo buildings that constitute twenty units total,” Baxter said.

Baxter said the process is also underway for existing residents to apply for Habitat’s homeownership program.

“And that is an incredibly detailed, individualized process for each family that involves financial coaching, to get those folks ready if they want to be homeowners,” Baxter said.

At the same time, the Piedmont Housing Alliance has been successful in their application for Low Income Housing Tax Credits for 70 units in what’s to be called Southwood Apartments. (2021 LIHTC rankings)

“So there’s very low rent units will be available for certain folks if they qualify as well,” Baxter said.

A second rezoning application is also being prepared for the rest of the park’s redevelopment.

Partners in the project so far are Faulconer Construction, Atlantic Builders, and Southern Development. Atlantic is building the condominiums and Southern Development is building the market-rate units.

There is other construction happening nearby on Old Lynchburg Road. After Baxter was County Planner Tori Kanellopoulos gave details on site plans that are under review, such as part of the Albemarle Business Campus development for which ground has already been broken.

“Block 5 includes a 103,500 square foot self storage building with additional retail space and restaurant that would be 3,800 square feet,” Kanellopoulos said.

Later in the meeting, Supervisor Donna Price updated the CAC on items the Board has been up to lately. I’ve not yet had a chance to review the recent public hearing on the Housing Albemarle update, so let’s hear from Supervisor Price about why only parts of the plan were adopted at the meeting on June 16.

“The Board clearly, had a very clear consensus for support for the overall theme and structure,” Price said. “There were four areas we did not vote to approve and that was an incentives package for developers [and] what percent of affordable housing needs to be provided in a rezoning. Currently its 15 percent and there’s a proposal to raise it to 20 percent. What the length of the term for the affordable housing would be. Currently it is ten years and the proposal is to raise it to 30 years for rental units and 40 years for sale units.”

Price said the final item where Supervisors had concerns was over how affordability is measured. At the public hearing, many representatives from the development community expressed concern about their increased costs.

Ideas for incentives include tax breaks, reduced utility connection fees, and expedited application review.

“We want to have a policy that not only makes us feel good but will achieve good,” Price said. “While we would like to to 15 to 20 percent affordable housing, is that going to be an economically viable plan?”

Stay tuned.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. In this subscriber supported public service announcement, over the course of the pandemic, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society has provided hours and hours of interviews, presentations, and discussions about interpretations and recollections of the past. All of this is available for you to watch, for free, on the Historical Society’s YouTube Channel. There’s even an appearance by me, talking about my work on cvillepedia.

At their meeting on June 15, the Board of Directors of the Albemarle Economic Development Authority (EDA) got presentations on projects that seek to improve businesses in Virginia and the region. The work of the Albemarle Economic Development Office is directed by a strategic plan known as Project Enable. Roger Johnson is the director of Economic Development.

“One component of Project Enable was to launch a business retention and expansion strategy,” Johnson said.

To get ideas, economic development staff have been in talks with their counterparts at the Virginia Economic Development Partnership. Jason Smith is the manager for a program called Economic Gardening which seeks to nurture existing companies started in the Commonwealth.

“It’s geared towards facilitating growth for Virginia companies,” Smith said. “This is not about finding that next big base hit or home run. This is about working with folks in our backyards. It’s about working with companies that are looking to grow. They might now have that million dollar budget like the Googles and the Amazons have. This program will create an even playing field for those companies.”

The program is aimed at manufacturing companies and other trades who are considered at their “second-stage” and offers training tools and advice on how to boost sales and overcome growth challenges. Two Albemarle companies that are participating in the program are Gropen and Biomic Sciences.

“They get access to data, research, and intelligence they wouldn’t otherwise have and are able to determine where they should expand, when they should expand, and what their competitors are doing that puts them in a better position to be successful long-term,” Johnson said.

Later in the meeting, the Central Virginia Small Business Development Center made a pitch for additional funding from the EDA to help fill a financial shortfall projected for the next fiscal year.

Rebecca Haydock is the organization’s director.

“Albemarle County makes up a significant portion of the work that we do,” Haydock said. “It is the largest recipient of our resources with clients being about 44 percent of them for the ten municipalities that we serve.”

Specifically Haydock asked for $25,000 to help unlock another $66,000 from the state. The EDA agreed to make the contribution.

The EDA next meets on June 30 for a special meeting to discuss whether it would be acceptable for a piece of property at Southwood to be transferred to ownership by the Piedmont Housing Alliance.

Before you go today:

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On today’s show:

Land use updates from the Charlottesville Planning Commission

Council appoints an architect to fill a vacancy on the Planning Commission

Updates on transit and Stonefield

We begin today’s show with a piece of news from this afternoon before we begin into a time machine for some sonic travel throughout the month.

Charlottesville City Council has made an appointment to fill a vacancy on the Charlottesville Planning Commission. The seven-member body is the lead advisory panel on items of land use and planning in the city. Here’s City Councilor Heather Hill making the motion.

“I move that City Council appoint Karim Habbab to the Planning Commission,” Hill said.

Habbab is an associate architect with BRW Architects, according to a bio on the firm’s website. He is a native of Jordan and the son of two architects. He moved to Charlottesville in 2011 to attend the University of Virginia.

Now, let’s go back to the most recent meeting of the Charlottesville Planning Commission from June 9. At the beginning of each meeting, Commissioners give updates from the various committees they are on.

William Palmer is a planner with the Office of the Architect at the University of Virginia. He sits on the Planning Commission in a non-voting capacity under the terms of a 1986 agreement. He noted that earlier this month, the Board of Visitors were told of a $50 million gift from Martha and Bruce Karsh to create the Karsh Institute of Democracy. (read the UVA Today story)

“That’ll lead probably to another building at the Emmet Ivy corridor to kind of complement what’s already under planning there, the Data Science institute and the hotel and conference center,” Palmer said.

According to UVA Today, the building for the Karsh Institute of Democracy will be ready in 2026. The University will match the $50 million gift.

Next, Commissioner Jody Lahendro reported from the Tree Commission, which earlier this month signed off on the United States Department of Agriculture’s plan to introduce wasps at the Ragged Mountain Natural Area to fight off infestations of the Emerald Ash Borer.

“It’s going to be a five-year study and will be completely funded by the USDA,” Lahendro said. “This is a study that’s actually been ongoing since 2007 and has now been started in over 29 states.”

The Planning Commission is next scheduled to meet again on June 29 for a work session on the next steps for the Cville Plans Together initiative. Habbab joins the Planning Commission as one phase of the Comprehensive Plan ends and another moves forward. The comment period on the Future Land Use Map ended June 13.

The consultants report that there were at least 1,137 emails, 37 voicemails from 26 individuals, and several signatures to various petition campaigns. Over 220 people left over 700 comments on an interactive version of the Future Land Use Map. Those are now all visible.

The June 29 work session will see a timeline for how the rest of the process will play out. Here’s Alexander Ikefuna, the director of Neighborhood Development Services (NDS)

“We have enabled staff and the consultant to prepare an informed timeline on how the final draft document makes its way to the Planning Commission and the City Council for joint public hearing and subsequently for the Council for final consideration,” Ikefuna said.

A rewrite of the zoning code would begin in full earnest after the Comprehensive Plan is adopted. Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell was clear that the process will take time.

“This is a vision document, the Future Land Use Map is a vision document,” Mitchell said. “We are a ways away from rezoning. We are ways away from things like R-1 going away. Based on this vision document, R-1 is not going away.”

This review of the Comprehensive Plan began in January 2017 and since then, there has been much turnover and only Commissioners Lahendro and Taneia Dowell are still on the body.

Missy Creasy, the deputy director of NDS, offered some perspective on how the process has been intended to be proactive.

“The commission really came at this from, ‘something is going to happen to our community, we know that we’re seeing growth and we want to consciously make decisions about how that happens and now allow something to happen to us,’” Creasy said.

Stay tuned for June 29. (June 29 meeting info)

There’s another meeting happening on June 29 about a topic that is perhaps just as important as a discussion of the Future Land Use Map. It’s definitely related. Charlottesville Area Transit has been working with the Connetics Transportation Group and Kimley-Horn on an update of the system. I’ve reported on the potential changes, as has Allison Wrabel in the Daily Progress in a story from March 1. This event is being held as a general overview of the changes, and two public engagement sessions will be held before Council makes a decision to approve the changes. (meeting info)

One of the changes would see Route 8 transferred into a line that would run between the Willoughby Shopping Center on 5th Street extended in Charlottesville to Stonefield.

More on transit later on in in this installment. For now, we have to keep moving.

In the June 23 installment of this program, we heard a little from the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee. I did not include an update from Stonefield mostly because I ran out of time. But before we move on with today’s show, and with the idea of a more direct transit route connecting Stonefield with Charlottesville, let’s hear from Stonefield’s manager Samantha Strong on some recent updates.

“We were very excited just in the past few weeks,” Strong said. “We had Sunglass Hut open up their location with us. Splendora from the Downtown Mall has now opened up her location. So get excited. Come get some gelato.”

The building that had been occupied by Pier 1 imports will be split into spaces for more than one business.

“The first one that will be coming in is Torchy’s Tacos, so get excited for some tacos and margaritas out of Austin, Texas,” Strong said. “And just upcoming we have Ronnie Megginson with Kulture Vibez. We have Team Hair Studios that’s going to be opening up within the next month. And we also have Akira Ramen and Sushi. Those are all going to be opening on the north side.”

Strong said the Regal movie theater is open again. She said merchants and business owners are seeing new vibrancy.

“May of 2021 for some of them was actually the best month of sales they have had ever since they opened,” Strong said.

The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are having a Warehouse Sale at Albemarle Square Shopping Center (300 Albemarle Square) Friday, July 9 through Sunday, July 11 from 10 to 6 each day. There will be Fiction, Mysteries, SciFi and Fantasy, Cookbooks, Military, Biographies and YA and Children’s Books There will be a capacity limit of 80 shoppers. Proceeds benefit our regional public library system, JMRL, serving Charlottesville, Albemarle, Greene, Louisa and Nelson.

Now on to more from the Charlottesville City Council meeting from Monday, June 21, 2021. City Manager Chip Boyles said notices has been given to nearby battlefields and museums notifying them of the city’s interest in getting rid of two Confederate statues that are currently in city parks. Three responses of interest had been received by Monday.

“Two are in state, and one from out of state,” Boyles said.

Boyles said City Hall is expecting to return to normal operations in September.

“At which time, all public meetings, boards and commissions will begin to meet in person,” Boyles said.

In the past fifteen months, government meetings have moved online. Vice Mayor Sena Magill wondered if staff could be allowed to appear at meetings remotely rather than be present in Council Chambers.

“I want to take whatever positives we can from this pandemic and provide as much flexibility as technology allows,” Magill said.

Boyles said that he thought that would be possible.

“Our understanding right now is that in the case of City Council the elected officials will have to be physically present but staff could do either,” Boyles said.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she wanted to limit the number of people in Chambers out of continued health concerns.

“We’re talking about that time of year,” Walker said. “It’s going to be flu season picking up, regular colds in that fall and winter season so hopefully by then there will be some changes to how they are looking at this from a federal and state level.”

Interviews for the Director of Neighborhood Development Services position began today.

Later in the meeting, there was a public hearing on appropriations of $5.3 million in supplemental funds for Charlottesville Area Transit. Garland Williams is the director of CAT.

“What we have is a combination of capital and operating dollars,” Williams said. “The capital is $4.32 million which will allow us to buy rolling stock which means buses, support vehicles.”

About $630,000 transfers through to Jaunt for their services.

Councilor Michael Payne asked if the eleven buses planned for purchase were to build capacity or replace an aging fleet. Four of them are new vehicles and the rest are replacements. They will all be diesel engines, but Williams said future purchases could use alternative fuels.

“We are actually undertaking a study that will allow us to see whether we should be looking at doing whether it is [Compressed Natural Gas] or electric vehicles of a combination of the two,” Williams said. “The electric vehicle component for transit is coming and its coming quickly but its relatively new.”

Williams estimated there would be enough testing and experience with electric transit fleets for the technology to become more widespread. One issue in this community is the topography and the need for a drivetrain that power up hills. No one spoke at the public hearing.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council gets an update on city finances and economic recovery

Albemarle’s Places-29 Hydraulic panel gets an update on crime, climate, and Stonefield

A new round of transportation projects will move forward across the region

We begin today with Charlottesville City Council. As of today, there are only eight days left until the beginning of Fiscal Year 22. On Monday, June 21, the five elected officials got a glimpse of where things stand through the first eleven months of Fiscal Year 21. A shortfall related to the economic shutdown that began in Fiscal Year 20 is not as bad as initially reported.

“Based upon the current conditions of what we’re seeing in terms of revenues, things are continuing to trend in a positive direction,” said Ryan Davidson, a senior budget management analyst for the city.

In April, budget staff estimated there would be a $8.35 million gap, but revenues picked up and the current forecast is for a $7.42 million deficit for fiscal year 21. (staff report)

“We’re continuing to see some volatility month to month in some of our larger economic driven revenues,” Davidson said. “Sales, meals, lodging. But we’ve been seeing more of a positive trend in these areas.”

After the fiscal year, the accounts for FY21 will be audited which will take several months. The city will likely use a mixture of sources to make up the shortfall, including the American Recovery Plan Act (ARPA). Other options include the $7.3 million reserve set aside in previous federal funds and use of surpluses from previous years that have not been appropriated.

“Should we need to use the ARPA funds to cover any of the remaining budget variance that’s not covered by other means, we’ll know those figures after the close of the fiscal year and have those final audited amounts in the November or December timeframe,” Davidson said.

Let’s take a closer look at where the shortfalls are coming from. The adopted budget for FY21 estimated the city would bring in $14.3 million in meals taxes, $6.3 million from lodging taxes, and $1.34 million in income from parks and recreation. The current projections show the potential actual amounts as missing those targets by $3.5 million for meals, $2.6 million under for lodging, and $910,824 short for parks and recreation.

To get those numbers up for the soon-to-be-current fiscal year, the Economic Development Office is implementing a Recovery Roadmap and Economic Development Director Chris Engel provided an update on how it is going. (staff report)

“This process emanated out of a discussion the Council had at the beginning of the budget season late last year, November and December, where you indicated that helping businesses recover was one of your priorities,” Engel said.

Engel said there are 15 specific initiatives in the roadmap clustered in four categories. They are financial assistance, training and resource access, infrastructure needs, and marketing and advertising.

As of July 1, Virginia law pertaining to carrying alcohol outside of a licensed establishments will become more flexible to allow people to explore Designated Outdoor Refreshment Areas (DORA). Jason Ness is the Deputy Director of the Economic Development office.

“The designated outdoor refreshment area concept has been on the books with [Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority] for quite some time and really the fundamental change that takes effect on July 1 is that it is now localities have more control over these types of events,” Ness said. “In the past it was a permitted system both at the state and the locality. The new legislation will allow for cities to create ordinances to control these.”

Take a look at HB2266 if you want to see how what the legislation looks like and what it does. Ness said there would still be restrictions.

“You couldn’t take a cup from one ABC license holder to another, so you could not go from restaurant to restaurant but you could go into retailers if they would allow that,” Ness said.

Ness said the city is in talks with the Ix Park for a community block party for this fall. One idea would be to get the local DORA ordinance in place to allow that to be extended to the Downtown Mall.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker expressed concern that inviting alcohol consumption across a wider geographic area could lead to behavioral issues as well as unequal treatment.

“We’ve had a lot of concerns about drinking in public, drunk in public, those types of conversations,” Walker said. “I am hoping that we resolve those and that we’re not allowing some people just because they’ve purchased it in a restaurant when we know that other people are already drinking and there is different treatment.”

Councilor Michael Payne said he was open to the idea and shared Walker’s concerns.

“I couldn’t say that I’m 100 percent behind it at this point,” Payne said.

There was enough support from Council to give Engel the go ahead to work on pursuing an ordinance. Ness said he heard the concerns of Payne and Walker.

“Those are the important questions that we need to consider and flesh out all the answers on how things like that are going to be handled before we actually put that into place,” Ness said.

Vice Mayor Sena Magill said if the city seeks to explore a DORA then it needs to be about more than just one place.

“If we’re developing something like this, I don’t want it to be Mall-focused,” Magill said. “I want to make sure that if we’re developing it, that it can be developed for all areas of Charlottesville.”

Under the legislation, localities could set up three DORAS to explore.

Other ideas in the Recovery Roadmap include a twice-yearly clean-up day to address maintenance issues identified by businesses as well as a buy local effort.

Engel said his office is making a request for $1 million in American Rescue Plan funding to help boost the tourism sector. Part of that money would be used to replace revenue losses that have led to a decrease in available funds for the Charlottesville-Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau

“The Visitors’ Bureau revenue due to the transient occupancy tax in the city and [Albemarle] has been reduced by about $1.5 million and since the city and the county both fund that entity, the request that we’re both making through the ARP process if for half of that,” Engel said.

Walker asked whether this use of the ARP funding was the highest priority.

“If we do give those dollars, the $750,000, what are they used for and how do weigh the direct aid to businesses against the money to CACVB for their loss?” Walker asked.

Engel said the budget for the Visitors Bureau is based on previous years, so they won’t feel the effects until the new fiscal year begins.

“The funds are intended to replace the drop for next year and the year after,” Engel said.

Councilor Payne also questioned whether the city should use its share of the ARP funding to make up the losses. He suggested the General Assembly could vote later this summer to appropriate state money for the purpose of tourism marketing.

“If that money doesn’t come, or doesn’t cover the gap, I’m very curious to know what data and research exists about what is the actual return on investment to the tourism board and what return on investment do we actually expect and anticipate, recognizing that the ARP money is limited and its all about trade-offs and ensuring that we’re making an investment that’s having the most positive impact on our community,” Payne said.

Engel said if the General Assembly did allocate funding to tourism, it would most likely be in the form of grant funding and not a direct replacement of lost funds. He said he would return to Council with information along the lines that Payne requested.

I’ll have more from the rest of the Council meeting in a future newsletter.

The Charlottesville-Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau next meets on June 28.

The Commonwealth Transportation Board meets today and tomorrow virtually and in Richmond. The appointed body today coted to approve the Six-Year Improvement program for fiscal year 2022 through 2027, and that includes transportation projects in our area that come through the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process.

In all, 21 projects submitted in the VDOT’s Culpeper District have been recommended for funding, including a pedestrian bridge across U.S. 29 that would connect Stonefield with the Seminole Square Shopping Center. That project included funding left over from the Route 29 Solutions suite of projects and the CTB will vote to allocate an additional $5.7 million to allow it to move forward to the design phase.

Other projects include $5.3 million for a roundabout at Old Lynchburg Road and 5th Street Extended, $8.74 million to add safety improvements on Ridge Street, and $10.1 million for a roundabout at the John Warner Parkway and Rio Road East.

Smart Scale applications from across the Commonwealth are ranked according to a series of metrics including addressing safety, relieving traffic congestion, and providing economic development. The initial scores were released in January as I reported back then.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement, and it’s time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. The Rivanna Conservation Alliance is looking for a few good volunteers to help out on Clean Stream Tuesdays, a mile and a half paddle and clean-up to remove trash and debris from popular stretches of the Rivanna River. Trash bags, trash pickers, gloves, and hand sanitizer/wipes will be provided, though volunteers will need to transport themselves to and from the end points. Kayaks for the purpose can be rented from the Rivanna River Company. Visit the Rivanna Conservation Alliance's volunteer page to learn more about upcoming dates.

The Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee met on June 21 for a wide-ranging meeting that began with an update on crime statistics from a new county employee.

“My name is Andrew Friedman and I am the new crime analyst here with the Albemarle County Police Department,” Friedman said. “I am new to the county as well and I actually live within the area that we’re going over today.”

Friedman’s report was intended to cover the area within the jurisdiction of the CAC, but he gave some overall trends.

“We see that property crime has been trending upwards since 2018 in the county at least whereas violent crime has been trending downwards,” Friedman said. “This matches the trend that we do see nationally.”

In an area that is slightly bigger than the Places29-Hydraulic area, there have been 134 property crimes through June 14.

“We’re talking about stuff like burglaries, we’re talking stuff like motor vehicle thefts, and largely led by larcenies,” Friedman said.

Of those property crimes, 21 were thefts of catalytic converters.

“Catalytic converter thefts are trending upwards,” Friedman said. “They’ve been increasing drastically in recent years throughout the nation and that’s because the material they’re made out of go for a lot on the black market. They would be pawned for a lot of money.”

Friedman said police departments across the region are working together against this specific kind of larceny.

Of the 14 violent crimes reported this year in the area, four were rapes and in all four cases the victims knew the offender. The 10 other crimes were aggravated assaults, and four of them were classified as domestic violence.

There were 30 calls for service in the area for shots fired this year. Friedman said most of these calls are unsubstantiated, meaning no shell casings are found. In one of the substantiated cases, one individual was struck by a bullet. Friedman said patrols have been stepped up in these areas. (watch the Places29-Hydraulic video) (view the full report)

The next topic at the Places29-CAC meeting dealt with two topics on the minds of many, though not necessarily at the same time. Climate change and growth management. Cynthia Neff is the chair of the CAC.

“Every now and then we need to refresh ourselves with what the growth management policy is,” Neff said. “The growth area is different [from] the rural area. The growth area is where the development is and the necessary housing is.”

There’s an entire chapter - Chapter 3 - of the county’s Comprehensive Plan dedicated to growth management, a policy that dates back to a Comprehensive Plan update in the late 70’s. Last October, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted the first phase of a Climate Action Plan. Michaela Accardi is a planner with the county. (current Comprehensive Plan)

“The first objective in the county’s Comprehensive Plan is to consistently use the growth management policy as the basis on which to guide decisions on land-use, capital expenditures, and service provision,” Accardi said.

Around 95 percent of the county’s 726 square miles are designated as rural, and the rest is for development. Chapter 7 of the plan offers strategies for conserving land in the rural area and chapter 8 offers strategies for maximizing the use of land in the growth area. Objective four of the later chapter is to “Use Development Area land efficiently to prevent premature expansion of the Development Areas.”

In her presentation, Accardi also brought up some statistics included in Housing Albemarle, an update of the county’s housing policy that had a public hearing before the Board of Supervisors earlier this month.

“The median rent for rental units in 2019 was $1,278 a month and the income that a household will need to afford that rent is $50,640 a year,” Accardi said. “Approximately 31 percent of households in Albemarle have incomes less than $50,000.”

The Places29-Hydraulic CAC next heard from Gabe Dayley, the county’s new climate protection manager. In that role, he is the point person for Albemarle’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

“Emissions from vehicles traveling around burning gasoline is our highest slice of the pie in terms of greenhouse gas emissions in the community,” Dayley said.

If it’s expensive for people who work in Albemarle or Charlottesville to live there, meeting the goal of reducing carbon emissions by 45 percent by 2020 will be harder to accomplish.

“When housing is sometimes less affordable in a community but folks are working in that community, they may have to live in further outlying areas,” Dayley said. “That’s something that can increase traffic which has a variety of effects. One of those is larger greenhouse gas emissions.”

The Climate Action Plan has several chapters with strategies that seek to address specific areas of where emissions come from. One of these is on Transportation and Land Use which has the overarching goals of reducing vehicle miles traveled, shifting vehicles to those with lower or no emissions, reducing use of single-occupancy vehicles, and increasing transit, walking, and biking alternatives.

“Greater density can support fewer transportation emissions and better energy efficiency but that really requires a holistic approach to land use,” Dayley said. “Density, as well as mixed-use, where there’s maybe some businesses on the first floor serving local communities. Complete streets is a term that folks might have come across that has to do with the idea of a street that not just is functional for pedestrians and cyclists and cars and buses but is also pleasant and attractive for everyone to make use of.”

CAC member Vito Cetta said he was a supporter of the growth management policy.

“We have 1,200 to 1,500 people who move here a year and the Comprehensive Plan is really taking control of how we develop our county,” Cetta said.

However, Tom Olivier of the group Advocates for a Sustainable Albemarle Population said the county should limit the number of people who move to the community. Olivier lives outside of the Places29 area but made his comment at the end of the conversation.

“The primary drivers of greenhouse gas emissions are growth in both people numbers and gross domestic product and whether we add people to the development areas or to the rural areas, we add greenhouse gases and we also do that when we sort of expand economic activity,” Olivier said. “This is a very difficult issue, and basically I just wanted to say really I think there’s little chance of Albemarle County becoming carbon neutral if it doesn’t contain growth and I think that’s something the comp plan will have to address as we go forward.”

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors last updated the Comprehensive Plan in the summer of 2015 and a review and update is expected to begin in the not too distant future.

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On today’s show:

The Crozet Community Advisory Committee weighs in on the master plan update

The Downtown Crozet Initiative unveils its vision for a public plaza

The Community Climate Collaborative unveils the winners of its Better Business Challenge

Today’s show focuses on Crozet in western Albemarle County. Crozet is not a town, but it is a designated growth area under the county’s growth management policy.

But it is a place with traditions. Here’s an announcement made at the June 9, 2021 meeting of the Crozet Community Advisory Committee about an event coming up on Saturday, July 3.

“I’m Tim Tolson, president of the Crozet Community Association, and along with other civic groups in Crozet we’re hosting the annual Crozet Independence Day celebration parade at 5:00 p.m. as part of the Crozet Volunteer Fire Department that ends at the Crozet Park where the celebration will take part, take place. We’ll have fireworks around 9:30 or quarter to 10 when it gets dark.”

The Crozet Community Association is seeking donations to cover the cost of the fireworks. Visit their website to learn more.

The Albemarle Planning Commission will take up the Crozet Master Plan at a work session on Tuesday, June 22. At the June 9 CAC meeting, committee members and participating residents got a presentation on the implementation of projects intended to bolster Crozet’s urban character. They also had the chance to comment on the plan update to date.

But first, the implementation projects. The master plan is a large overview of the entire area, and further studies are suggested. The draft implementation chapter shows a list of ten potential topics ranging from a Downtown Neighborhood Architectural and Cultural Study to a stream health study for Parrot Branch, a local waterway. Initial feedback has already been submitted and planner Tori Kanellopoulos gave the rundown for how planning projects scored.

“The top ranked projects were the Crozet Avenue Shared-Use Path feasibility study, the Three Notch’d Trail feasibility study, and the Route 250 West design guidelines,” Kanellopoulos said. “And then the policy projects were also ranked and the top priority was updating residential zoning designations to allow for more preservation of natural resources.”

Potential capital projects were also ranked. Kanellopoulos said the highest ranking projects are the completion of Eastern Avenue, downtown Crozet intersection improvements, and sidewalk connections.

Let’s hear more about that Three Notch’d Trail.

“Lately there’s been a lot more focus and attention on the potential Three Notch’d Trail which would ideally connect from the Blue Ridge Tunnel along Crozet and over to Charlottesville,” Kanellopoulos said. “A feasibility study would look at this alignment and there are opportunities to partner with [the Virginia Department of Transportation] and the Planning District Commission and trails groups to look at the feasibility study for the alignment.”

Supervisor Ann Mallek said later in the meeting that VDOT planning may not have staff to conduct that feasibility study this year, but community work can be done now to prepare for that work possibly in 2022.

“And the other blessing that goes along with that is 2022 is when [Virginia] is going to take over the rail access right of way from CSX and therefore that increases greatly the possibility that we will be able to have a trail beside the rail,” Mallek said.

Another “catalyst” project now in the implementation chapter is Western Park, which has long been called for in the plan and for which the county received 36 acres in 2010 as part of the Old Trail rezoning. A master plan for that project was created in 2018 that identified three phases. The first is recommended for funding, a decision which would be made by the entire Board of Supervisors during the budget process.

“This phase one would include the access road with parking, a playground, and additional support of infrastructure and utilities,” Kanellopoulos said.

Committee member Sandy Hausman noted the rankings were based on responses from fewer than a hundred people.

“I wonder if anybody feels like this there needs to be a bit more outreach, like a mass mailing to everyone who lives in Crozet,” Hausman said. “It just feels to me that this is a relatively small group of people who tend to be paying attention to this stuff and everybody else will be unpleasantly surprised in a year or two when things start happening.”

Committee member Joe Fore said he wanted to see all three phases of Western Park listed as catalyst projects, meaning they would be prioritized first.

“I think just given the fact that it’s been in the works for so long, that the phases of at least getting started, the land is already there,” Fore said. “I understand it's expensive but it’s not an Eastern Avenue or Lickinghole Creek bridge expensive.”

Fore also said he would support the creation of a special taxation district to help pay for new infrastructure. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has previously been briefed on how service districts or a “business improvement district” could be levied in certain areas to fund amenities.

“I looked through currently, and this may be a comment for the full draft, there’s only one mention of service districts in the entire draft and that’s in reference to funding ongoing activities and services at the plaza and downtown,” Fore said. “But I would like to see maybe a little bit more and maybe a full suggestion saying maybe this is something we should explore in Crozet to fund some of these capital projects so we’re not constantly having these be projects are ten years out.”

The Board of Supervisors last had a formal presentation on service districts at their meeting on December 7, 2016. (presentation) (story)

Fore has looked up the section of Virginia code that allows for the creation of such districts.

“It’s a pretty broad statute as I read it,” Fore said. “Things like sidewalks, roads, programming, cultural events, economic development, beautification and landscaping. It’s a very broad statute. It seems to me you could raise money for most of the kinds of projects that we’re looking at. When we look at the list of priorities and say, yikes! Where are we going to get all the money for this? Well, rather than say let’s raise taxes on everybody in the county, you might be able to say let’s raise funds specifically from Crozet that would stay in Crozet for some of these projects we want to see in Crozet.”

CAC member David Mitchell is skeptical of the idea and said it would lead to Crozet receiving fewer direct funds from the county.

“Over time we will start to be looked at by the other Supervisors as ‘they have their own money, they can do their own thing’ and you’re going to slowly over time lose your share of the general fund,” Mitchell said.

Supervisor Mallek agreed.

“I would really discourage our citizenry from burdening themselves because I think David is right,” Mallek said. “We need to go to toe to toe, to say, this is a need that’s been on the books.”

Mallek singled out the Eastern Avenue connector road that will provide north-south travel. A major obstacle is the cost of a bridge required to cross Lickinghole Creek.

“We have made all of these zoning changes prior to 2007 that were counting on that bridge and we absolutely have a moral obligation to build it,” Mallek said.

Eastern Avenue is ranked #8 on the county’s transportation priority list and there was an update in May. There’s not yet a full cost estimate on what it will cost, but engineering work is underway.

“This project is currently being evaluated through an alignment study and conceptual design which is funded through the Transportation Leveraging Fund in the [Capital Improvement Program],” reads the update. “The alignment report was presented to the Board in January and the preferred alignment was selected. This project is being considered for a Revenue Sharing Grant application.”

Allie Pesch, the chair of the CAC, said she wanted Eastern Avenue to be the top implementation priority.

“I like seeing Eastern Avenue at the top of that list,” Pesch said. “That is a priority for everyone in our area and just so overdue.”

After this discussion of implementation, county planner Rachel Falkenstein turned the conversation to the working draft of the master plan. The draft that will be reviewed by the Planning Commission at their work session on Tuesday incorporates feedback from the June 9 CAC meeting. (download the draft)

“We still have a couple of steps to go before we get to our public hearings and we’ll continue to accept feedback and make revisions to the chapters and to the content,” Falkenstein said.

A work session with the Board of Supervisors will take place in August. (Watch the CAC meeting on YouTube)

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. On June 22 at 7 p.m., the Jefferson Madison Regional Library and the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society gives a glimpse into the cemeteries at Pen Park in Charlottesville. Tucked behind the Meadowcreek clubhouse are three, enclosed, family cemeteries, with the oldest dating back to the Colonial era.

Outside the enclosures of the family plots, the city has confirmed the presence of 40 or more unmarked graves, all likely those of people enslaved at Pen Park. Join us as a panel of three professionals discuss what led to the examination of this site, the process of the investigation, and the efforts to identify and commemorate those buried there. Register on the JMRL website.

A few days after the CAC meeting, the Downtown Crozet Initiative held a public meeting to talk about a 30,000 square foot plaza intended to be located at the former Barnes Lumberyard. The plaza would anchor a mixed-use building and a hotel through a public-private partnership. The idea involves construction of a connector road using revenue-sharing funds from VDOT. That process requires a local match.

Frank Stoner is a principal at Milestone Partners which seeks to redevelop the space. They’re putting up $2 million to serve as that match.

“This project started in 2014,” Stoner said. “We developed this road plan in 2016, 2017. Most of the design elements of the road have been resolved. We felt strongly and I think the community felt strongly and the county felt strongly that the streets had to be appropriate for the small town that is Crozet and not be a highway through the middle of downtown which is kind of where VDOT wanted to go with it.”

Albemarle County has contributed $1.6 million in cash to the project, and will provide another $1.6 million in rebates through a process known as tax increment financing. (read the June 2019 performance agreement)

Stoner said the idea is to build an urban plaza, not a park.

“And most importantly we wanted this plaza to be the heart not just of the neighborhood but the Crozet community,” Stoner said.

VDOT is contributing $2.5 million and the Downtown Crozet Initiative is seeking to raise over a million in private funds.

“Which will be used to fund essentially the furniture, fixtures and equipment, sculpture, artwork, seating, all of that kind of stuff that goes in the plaza,” Stoner said.

The designs aren’t close to final yet, but Stoner wanted to get feedback from the community. There are also no identified tenants for any of the spaces yet.

“We haven’t really been in the position to take commitments because there have been so many unknowns because of the VDOT plans and then we had some stormwater issues we had to work through and so it has just been one obstacle after another,” Stoner said.

Stoner said if all goes according to plan, construction could get underway next year. To Stoner, success means making sure it’s a place to expand what already makes Crozet Crozet.

“If we can’t create a place that’s affordable for local businesses, then we’re not going to succeed,” Stoner said.

In April 2020, the firm Downtown Strategies unveiled their report on a Downtown Strategic Vision for Crozet. Stoner suggested interested parties might take a look. (take a look)

Nearby there is a separate VDOT project to rebuild the existing Square to add sidewalks and address ongoing stormwater issues. (watch the June 14 presentation)

Finally today, last week the Community Climate Collaborative handed out the latest awards in its Better Business Challenge. Around 75 local businesses took part in an effort to reduce energy and water use.

Two groups were Momentum Medalists for their work to investigate energy-use and to make changes to lighting. The Legal Aid Justice Center came up with a plan to replace their heating, ventilation and air conditioning system at their headquarters and a plan to replace internal lighting. Loaves and Fishes, a food pantry on Lambs Road, looked at increasing energy efficiency and began plans to install solar in the future. Jane Colony Mills accepted the award.

“We also kind of did this last year because we were adding two additional walk-in refrigerators, and we knew that they were going to add to our energy burden, so we wanted to reduce what we were burning in the warehouse,” Colony Mills said.

The Iron Pillar award was granted “for perseverance through uncertain times” and went to the upscale resale boutique Twice as Nice. Sara Guerre is the assistant manager.

“The pandemic caused a lot of disruption but we took that opportunity to use the time to focus on as doing as many actions as we could no matter how small,” Guerre said. “And all of those little actions add up.”

The Changemaker Award went to an entity for “the strategic pursuit of an action with long-term impact.” Steve Haske teaches Studio Art at the Renaissance School, and also handles Facilities and Information Technology. The student Earth Club wanted changes.

“We put all new windows in this very old building here in downtown Charlottesville,” Haske said. “At the pushing of a lot of the students about being cleaner and more efficient, especially in winter time, getting the windows updated so they could open and close and actually seal.”

The Schools Champion award went to the Blue Ridge School, a boarding school in Greene County. Cory Woods is the Director of Natural Resources and assistant director of outdoor education.

“The Challenge provided us the opportunity to showcase some projects that were already underway like new LED lights and energy efficient windows in our dormitories and motivated us to explore some new opportunities,” Woods said.

One of those ideas was a composting program to reduce material that ends up in a landfill.

Six entities wound up as the Better Business Champions for scoring the most points in efforts to increase efficiency. In one of two Small Business awards, the Center at Belvedere was one of the winners. Scott Hilles is the director of finance and operations at the Center.

“The Center at Belvedere has created a brand new building and it has allowed us to provide a beautiful setting that promotes healthy living in its programs,” Hilles said.

For the new building, the Center entered into a purchase agreement with Sun Tribe Solar and have over 400 panels at the new location.

“That agreement has allowed us to provide 50 percent of our energy needs through the panels,” Hilles said. “It also allows us to mitigate risk by planning our costs pertaining to energy.”

For the other Small Business champion, Scivera transitioned entirely to a home-office based workplace during the pandemic, a move that will continue in 2021.

“We normally set up our office in Vault Virginia on the Downtown Mall but because of the pandemic we all had to like so many people scatter to our own home offices and get things going and it ended up working really well,” said Joseph Rinkevich.

Rinkevich said only a third of the company’s employees are based in Charlottesville, and going forward there could be less travel for regular internal meetings.

One of the medium-sized business awards went to ReadyKids for their work to install low-flow toilets and to begin the process of planning for a solar installation. Ashley Branch is an administrative specialist.

“We are very proud and have seen a tremendous saving from our action of doing work on the toilets and now we’re not wasting water, and it has shown profoundly in our water bill each month after we have made those changes,” Branch said.

SunTribe Solar was the other medium-sized business champion created an internal sustainability team and had its employees participate with C3’s Home Energy Challenge. Here’s their marketing manager, Summer Rain Ursomarso.

“First, we’re trying to help our team be empowered to be more sustainable so that means putting tools in place and providing enough resources to be more sustainable in their day to day actions,” Ursomarso said. “But it also means educating them to take that sustainability and those initiatives home so they can help their friends and family and community be more sustainable.”

On to the large entity champion. One of these awards goes to the City of Charlottesville. Kirk Vizzier is the energy management coordinator in the Public Works Department.

“Sustainability is something that the city has been very interested in coordinating what we do,” Vizzier said. “We have obviously a lot of municipal operations and services that we want and there are a lot of opportunities to improve those and embed sustainability in the way we do business.”

The city created an engagement program for employees called WE to reduce water and energy use. They’re also working on setting up an energy saving performance contract to help speed up the implementation of energy-efficiency measures in city buildings.

Finally, Sigora Solar received the other large business award for their plan to convert their fleet of vehicles to either electric or hybrid. Sarah Nerette is the company’s Director of Energy Efficiency and Sustainability.

“We’re actually going to be transitioning some of the sedans in our fleet to hybrid and electric vehicles,” Nerette said. “This is going to help make our fleet overall more efficient and more green in general.”

For more on the initiative, look up all the award winners at C3’s website.

At the DCI meeting, no members of the CAC were on the call because it was not an official meeting.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out: Code for Charlottesville is looking for volunteers to help with the Summer Session of their Pro Bono Tech Consulting Shop! The Shop is a pro bono IT consulting and problem-solving service for nonprofit organizations in Charlottesville and Central Virginia. Code for Charlottesville assigns small teams of volunteers to work directly with someone at a nonprofit to solve a specific issue with tech, data, or web design. RSVP for the info session Monday, June 21 at 7pm at this link.

In today’s edition:

Albemarle Supervisors say goodbye to some key staff members and get an update on how the county will utilize America Recovery Plan funding

The University of Virginia will soon close their community vaccination center at Seminole Square Shopping Center

A new connector road opens in Albemarle County

Tomorrow is Juneteenth, marking the end of two and a half centuries of slavery in British colonies in North America as well as the young United States of America. The day parks the day in 1865 federal troops entered Galveston, Texas two months after the Civil War to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation. Here’s Vice President Kamala Harris at a bill signing yesterday.

“Throughout history, Juneteenth has been known by many names,” Harris said. “Jubilee Day. Freedom Day. Liberation Day. Emancipation Day. And today? A national holiday.”

Harris said there is much more work to be done to address racism in the United States, but the creation of a national holiday makes a statement. In this case, it’s to acknowledge history that many continued to be enslaved in Confederate states long after the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect on January 1, 1863.

“For more than two years, the enslaved people of Texas were kept in servitude,” Harris said. “For more than two years, they were intentionally kept from their freedom. For more than two years!”

The Jefferson School African American Heritage Center will celebrate from noon to 4 p.m. on Saturday, June 19, with food, music, and “a non-sewing sewing event” from Stitch Please. That’s the podcast hosted by Lisa Woolfork. The event is free, but donations are encouraged. (register) For more on what’s happening this weekend to mark Juneteenth, visit this article on C-Ville Weekly.

Just under half of Virginians are fully vaccinated according to the Virginia Department of Health. Becker’s Hospital Review ranks the Commonwealth number 16 among the 50 states and D.C. for percent of the population vaccinated, with Vermont at number one and Mississippi last. What do those numbers look like locally? Dr. Costi Sifri is director of hospital epidemiology for the University of Virginia Health System.

“Right now 79.9 percent, you know, 80 percent of all adults in Albemarle County have received at least one dose of vaccine,” Dr. Sifri said. “In Charlottesville that number is 68.1 percent.”

Dr. Sifri said Nelson is also at 68.1 percent and Louisa is at 56.7 percent.

Tonight, UVA Health will hold a vaccine clinic at the first Friday’s After Five event in over 21 months. Justin Vesser is a pharmacy supervisor for UVA Health who said the event is in partnership with Red Light Management.

“We know we wanted to go to the Downtown Mall because that’s where people have gathered in Charlottesville from all different walks of life so they offered the perfect space at the Pavilion,” Vesser said. “We’ve had a fair number of vaccinations there but even more important I think we’ve had a great series of conversations with people especially about the topic of vaccine hesitancy. We’ve seen hesitancy head on down on the Downtown Mall.”

UVA Health will close their community vaccine center at Seminole Square by the end of July and move it back to the hospital’s west complex at Jefferson Park Avenue and Lee Street. Justin Vesser is a pharmacy supervisor for UVA Health.

“The Seminole Square vaccine site has been a huge boon to the community,” Vesser said. “We’ve been able to offer just a massive number of vaccines there with a really good experience for everyone who’s gone there. But the roster there has gone down and down and down. I think that shows signs of progress that we’re reaching most people who at this point want to get the vaccine.”

A program to bring vaccines to people in their homes will continue.

“Those patients are often the most vulnerable among us who would potentially have the worst outcome if they were to get sick with COVID,” Vesser said, “We will continue to work with the fire departments and with the Blue Ridge Health District to offer those homebound vaccines until there’s nobody left, until there’s no demand for that.”

The seven-day average for new cases is 139 a day and the seven-day average for positive results is 1.5 percent.

The state of emergency will lapse on June 30. Yesterday, the Commonwealth’s Attorney in both Albemarle and Charlottesville issued a joint statement that anyone who decides after that day to continue wearing a mask for COVID purposes will not be prosecuted.

“A state law making it unlawful to wear a mask in public with the intent to conceal one’s identity will go back into full effect on that day,” reads the statement. “The same law permits the wearing of masks to protect the safety of the wearer and other persons.”

A new piece of roadway in Albemarle County has opened this week. The $2.9 million Rio Mills Connector runs for a quarter mile between Berkmar Drive Extension and Rio Mills Road and is now complete. This road allows for a gravel road that had lead to U.S. 29 to be closed to traffic, including trucks that access the Luckstone Quarry in the vicinity.

This project is one of six designed and built by Curtis Consulting as part of a single contract. Two other recently completed projects are the new traffic light on U.S. 29 at Interstate 64, and improvements to the Fontaine Avenue interchange with U.S. 29. Coming up next is the diverging diamond at U.S. 250 and I-64 and roundabouts at U.S. 250 and Virginia Route 151 and Route 20 and Proffit Road. (VDOT’s design-build project page)

Time now for another subscriber-supported PSA!

The Rivanna Conservation Alliance is looking for a few good volunteers to help out on Clean Stream Tuesdays, a mile and a half paddle and clean-up to remove trash and debris from popular stretches of the Rivanna River. Trash bags, trash pickers, gloves, and hand sanitizer/wipes will be provided, though volunteers will need to transport themselves to and from the end points. Kayaks for the purpose can be rented from the Rivanna River Company. Visit the Rivanna Conservation Alliance's volunteer page to learn more about upcoming dates.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors said goodbye Wednesday to three employees, two of whom are retiring and one who is moving on to the School of Data Sciences at the University of Virginia.

Michael Frietas has been the Chief of Public Works for Albemarle for the past 15 years, and the resolution in his honor recognized his work to help the conversion of the former Yancey Elementary School into the Yancey School Community Center.

Phyllis Savides was honored for 22 years in the county’s social services department as well as the director for the past several years. Here’s Deputy County Executive Doug Walker.

“She is forever a champion of the underdog and that is a role that she relishes in all of our conversations by making sure that we don’t forget,” Walker said.

The next person recognized hasn’t been with the county as long but has played a significant role in the past few years. Here’s County Executive Jeff Richardson.

“I appreciate the Board’s formal resolution of recognition of Michael Freitas’ retirement and Phyllis Savides’ retirement,” Richardson said. “The third person this afternoon, Siri Russell, the situation is a little different. Siri will be leaving our organization at the end of the month and she will be taking a great opportunity to further her career.”

Russell has been the director of Equity and Inclusion for Albemarle and will now be the Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at the School of Data Science.

“”The good news is that Siri Russell will still be part of our community,” Richardson said. “She will still be part of our organization as a key partner agency.”

Richardson lauded Russell for her office’s recent annual report. For her part, Russell thanked the Board for taking the work seriously.

“It’s been a resolve for equity, a commitment to inclusion, to a diverse community, to justice, to recognizing lesser told histories and stories and to really furthering the work,” Russell said. “To collaboration with our partners like the city, the University of Virginia, and others.”

Russell and Supervisor Ann Mallek recently appeared together on a panel discussion run by the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society.

Later in the meeting, Supervisors discussed possible ways of using their share of American Rescue Plan (ARP) funding. At the public comment period, Roy Van Doorn of Charlottesville spoke on behalf of the area chapter of the Virginia Restaurant, Lodging, and Travel Association and asked for direct funding for recovery funds.

“The ARP stipulates that 25 percent of these local funds be devoted to hospitality but the legislative text is not specific on how local governments should meet that goal,” Van Doorn said.

Van Doorn pointed to a decline in property assessments for hotel properties, as well as the shuttering of the wedding industry for 15 months, as signs of how the hospitality sector has been hurt.

Courtney Cacatian, the executive director of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau, said tourism provided 3,400 jobs and generated $14 million in tax revenues for Albemarle. In 2020, that changed.

“COVID hit the tourism industry especially hard,” Cacatian said. “As our industry begins to climb back, it’s essential that we invest in promoting the county in order to have a strong recovery.”

The CACVB is funded in through transient lodging taxes, which means the budget for marketing is down. Cacatian asked the Board to consider using the ARP funds to make up the difference as well as support for the lodging industry.

“The lodging industry has not received local COVID relief to date and I humbly ask the Board of Supervisors to consider providing grants to the sector for recovery,” Cacatian said.

Chief Financial Officer Nelsie Birch then briefed the Board on what’s happening with the ARP. In all, the county will receive $21.2 million from the legislation, and half has already been distributed to the county.

Unlike with the previous federal CARES funding, the U.S. Treasury directly funded localities, bypassing state governments. Birch described the broad category for how $4 million of the first portion will be spent.

“We wanted to continue the work that we had started with the CARES CRF funding that we did on human services, economic activity and business support,” Birch said. “The Board also supported the use of about $3 million for broadband, knowing that that’s probably not all that we may want to contribute, but there was significant funding for broadband.”

The rest of the funding could go to help Albemarle government as an organization, but staff are still seeking to identify how the funding would comply with federal rules. The Treasury Department is still taking comments, and so Supervisors won’t be asked to take a final vote on how to use the money until July.

Birch recommended a flexible approach to using the balance of the funding, given there are multiple sources of funding.

“There is continued need right now because people are not out of the woods, businesses and households are not out of it,” Birch said. “The state is going to have a lot of funding available with respect to mortgage offset, rent relief, utility relief. We don’t yet know specifically how that is going to fund down to a local resident, but we know that there is something there.”

The Albemarle Broadband Authority could take up how to use the $3 million at their meeting next Wednesday. The Board of Supervisors will appropriate the full amount of ARP funding at their meeting on July 7.

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On today’s show:

City Manager Chip Boyles and city staff discuss infrastructure implementation in a growing city

The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality releases the solid waste report for 2020

An update on openings of Charlottesville’s polls and spray grounds

Area transportation official makes move to Northern Virginia permanent

The top official in the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Culpeper District has been hired as the District Engineer for the agency’s Northern Virginia District. John Lynch has held that role in the Culpeper District since 2013 and helped oversee construction of several major improvement projects including the Route 29 Solutions projects. Those included the construction of a grade-separated interchange at Rio Road and U.S. 29 and the Berkmar Drive extension. Melissa Shropshire is the acting district engineer.

The amount of solid waste sent to landfills and other processing facilities in Virginia slightly decreased in 2020, according to a report from the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality. A total of just over 22 million tons of waste was received, including 5.67 million tons sent from other states. The 2020 figure was 0.11 percent lower than 2019. (read the full report)

The report states that nearly three-quarters of the solid waste were landfilled, nearly 12 percent of materials were incinerated, and the rest was disposed of by other means. Another statistic is that 1.63 million tons of waste was diverted from landfills through recycling, mulching, or composting. The report is made up of 201 individual submissions.

The report also lists capacity remaining in existing landfills. The Amherst County Landfill has 44.5 years left and the Louisa County Sanitary Landfill has another nine.

The Morse Brothers Farm in Nelson County is one of 22 properties in the Commonwealth that has been awarded a land conservation grant. Last week, the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) announced more than $4.8 million from the Virginia Land Conservation Foundation for projects that will conserve up to 6,100 acres in the state. The award for the Morse Brothers Farm will place 106 acres of land under a conservation easement owned by third-generation African-American farmers, according to a press release from DCR. The project was made possible by the Virginia Outdoors Foundation.

This week, the University of Virginia resumed in-person college tours for the first time in 15 months. These groups used to have up to 100 participants at a time, but it’s been reduced to 10 at a time for now. The tours take place at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. For more, read Jane Kelly’s article on UVA Today.

The Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Department continues to ramp up operations slowly as the pandemic continues to recede. Deputy Director Vic Garber provided some updates last week to the Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee.

“Onesty Family Aquatic and Fitness Center remains closed and will remain closed unless there is an eruption of about 55 to 60 lifeguards,” Garber said. “Due to insufficient staff we are closed for the season.”

As of last week, there were 53 guards employed by the city. In order for the pool at the indoor Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center to open in August, he said he needs at least 17 more or hours at other facilities will need to be reduced. Garber said the contractors fixing air quality issues at Smith Aquatic Center will wrap up their work at the end of the month and the city will be performing tests throughout July.

Garber said one reason it’s been hard to get lifeguards is that many have moved on to other places.

“We’ve been closed for so long,” Garber said. “ACAC and the YMCA probably have collected quite a few of the guards and everyone across the board… I don’t want to say our competitors but within reason, everyone has gone to at least $15 an hour.”

Garber has paid $15 an hour for a couple of years, and the amount will increase by two percent to $15.30 an hour on July 1. Garber said during the pandemic, city lifeguards were terminated.

“And once you do that it’s hard to get people back,” Garber said.

The spray grounds at Tonsler, Belmont, and Greenleaf parks are open but the one at Forest Hills Park has been delayed and will open sometime this month.

Garber said planning is underway to build a fieldhouse at Tonsler Park for indoor sports, a walking path, and space for camps. This was called for in a 2013 master plan for the park. There’s $1.8 million in the budget for this purpose and a request for proposals for a design will be published soon.

Meanwhile, beaches at Albemarle’s lake parks will open tomorrow at 11 a.m. and will be open Thursdays through Sundays through August 22. Their lifeguards are also being $15 an hour, according to Emily Kilroy, Albemarle’s director of communications and public engagement.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time now for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. The Center for Civic Innovation is seeking applicants for its Civic Innovation Fellowship, a leadership development program that aims to build up an organization with a focus on: growth mindset, design process, business education, technology and data literacy skills, government and community relations, and other topics to build problem solving skills." Applications are due on Sunday, June 20. (apply)

It has now been four months since Chip Boyles took over as Charlottesville’s City Manager, a position he will hold for at least a year before a public search is conducted for a permanent replacement for Dr. Tarron Richardson, who held the position for not quite a year and a half. The Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association invited Boyles to attend their June meeting to answer questions and talk about the Cville Plans Together initiative.

Boyles has been bringing people into his management team after the last slate of deputy city managers all left. The city is currently advertising for a Deputy City Manager who will serve as the Chief Operating Officer. This position will oversee Finance, Budgeting, Human Resources, Economic Development, Information Technology, and Strategic Planning. The position closes on July 2. Ten days later, Sam Sanders will start work as the Deputy City Manager for Operations. Ashley Marshall has been Deputy City Manager for Racial Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity since March 10.

Boyles said one of the biggest issues in Charlottesville is housing and Virginia’s separation of cities and counties into distinct entities provides a challenge.

“To try to tackle some of the issues that we have for housing when you cannot expand your boundaries and you are very close to being built out, it makes it even more challenging,” Boyles said. “If you’re Houston, Texas, you just go annex more land, build more houses. Charlotte, North Carolina, you just annex more land and build to your needs. Virginia? Not so lucky.”

Boyles last worked as director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District, and under his tenure began working on regional housing and regional transit issues. The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership will release its regional affordable housing plan in the near future.

“Even though Charlottesville is the hub for our community and our region, how we can work with our surrounding localities to help shoulder some of this need we have, even if it’s to help with people moving in,” Boyles said. “So many people are wanting to move to our region. Working our neighbors to do that.”

One of the topics that came up at the Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association’s City Council forum in March was the subject of how projects get into the Capital Improvement Program (CIP), a multiyear budget of all the various infrastructure projects. Many in the neighborhood want sidewalk and other improvements on Stribling Avenue to mitigate the impacts of more housing. Jason Halbert is the co-president of the Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association.

“It seems to be a black box mystery for everyone,” Halbert said. “I know you’re dealing with a lot and you’re juggling chainsaws it seems like. Are you going to task this to your incoming deputy city manager to try to tackle with your public works director any indications of where this is heading in terms of the city residents understanding, regardless of how the staff turns over at the city, where we are with a plan on the CIP?”

Boyles said this will be one of the first things that Deputy City Manager Sanders works on after joining the city government. He said multiple departments need to learn how to work together to implement projects for the good of city residents.

“The one thing I do have to kind of question and one of the things I’m going to mention first to look at, is I don’t see how we can ask the neighborhoods to come up with the cost estimating for what it is you’re asking for,” Boyles said. “I know that I would have no idea how much it would cost to run X linear feet of sidewalk.”

Boyles also suggested more neighborhoods could their own develop small area plans. The Fifeville neighborhood did so with the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan for which the city hired the TJPDC to complete. That could better inform a new CIP process.

“Council has in the past also participated in what is called participatory budgeting,” Boyles said. “It never got off of the ground because of some changing of staffing but I think that’s another thing that we can look at where there’s the possibility of X amount of dollars being assigned to a neighborhood.”

Southern Development has submitted an application at 240 Stribling, and last year, the Planning Commission asked for additional residential density and the developer complied and is offering 170 units as well as some funding for the infrastructure improvements. Halbert said one concern is the non-urban quality of the roadway.

“An annexed county road originally that dead-ends into a gravel road and goes back into the county,” Halbert said.

Halbert said the neighborhood association will support the project, but only if there’s a guarantee the infrastructure will be in place when and if the development comes in.

“Without infrastructure improvements, the street cannot take that development,” Halbert said. “From our standpoint, to head off the typical NIMBY or reactionary reactions of saying ‘don’t put it here in my backyard’ I think the neighborhood, a bunch of us have tried to work with the city and the developer to try to achieve the goals of affordable housing, of more permanent affordable housing, and greater density in the city while improving the infrastructure everyone wants.”

Boyles said he needed to do more research of this proposal but described this as a classic chicken and egg scenario. He did say he would like the city and other localities across the Commonwealth to be able to charge developers impact fees to pay for infrastructure. That’s currently not allowed by Virginia law.

Boyles did warn that money for capital improvements will be tight in the coming years.

“There are some major expenditures that have to occur,” Boyles said. “I’m sure you’ve all seen the discussions with the schools and the work that needs to be done there, that has me very concerned with how that’s going to impact some of our bread and butter roads, mostly roads and sidewalks.”

The conversation then turned to the Cville Plans Together initiative, which just had a comment period close with thousands of comments. The next step is for the Planning Commission to hold a work session with the consultants on June 29. A group of 11 neighborhood associations sent a letter to the city requesting a further six month delay, but the director of the city’s Department of Neighborhood Development Services said there is plenty of time before the new Comprehensive Plan and its Future Land Use Map.

“The process is not over yet,” Ikefuna said. “It still has to go through the Planning Commission with the City Council for a joint public hearing. After that, it goes back to the City Council for final consideration. And then once its adopted, we still have another phase in the process which is the zoning rewrite. We have to rewrite the zoning ordinance which will implement the Comprehensive Plan.”

A new timeline will be developed in the coming weeks.

Before you go, thank you to the three people who have contributed since yesterday through Patreon. That’s a great way to provide a monthly contribution, allowing me to plan my budget for each month. I’m approaching the end of Year 1 of this experiment, and preparing to begin Year 2 in mid-July. Thank you for reading or listening!

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In this edition:

Charlottesville may try out open-carry containers in public spaces to boost economic recovery

Albemarle’s Places29-North group talks traffic, apartments, and congestion

Perrone Robotics continues to move its autonomous vehicles forward

The University of Virginia has a new Rector

A former member of the House of Delegates and a former Secretary of Transportation in Virginia has been named as the Rector of the University of Virginia Board of Visitors. Whittington Clement from southside Virginia will take over the position on July 1, succeeding James Murrary of Albemarle. Robert Hardie will become the vice rector. Read more on UVA Today.

Perrone Robotics of Crozet has recently demonstrated the use of its autonomous vehicles in the city of Westminster, Maryland, according to a press release distributed by the company. Perrone participated in the Mid-Atlantic Gigabit Innovation Collaboratory Autonomous Corridor Project by using its AV Star, which purports to be the world’s first and only fully autonomous vehicle and uses the company’s TONY software. TONY stands for To Navigate You and its use was pioneered in Albemarle with a three month trial in Crozet when a six-sheet shuttle reached something called Level 5 Autonomy. In Westminster, the AV Star operated on a “complex operational design domain” route that required it to make left and right turns, a four-way stop, and to drive through a historic city neighborhood. According to the release, Perrone has now installed the autonomous software on over 30 different kinds of vehicles.

The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation is seeking comments on a proposal from the Commonwealth Transportation Board to implement something called the Transit Ridership Incentive Program. Legislation passed the General Assembly in 2020 that seeks to improve transit service in urban areas of the Commonwealth with over 100,000. When TRIP goes live, transit agencies and localities will be able to apply for funding for regional projects. Like Smart Scale, candidate projects would be scored on how well they mitigate congestion and how they can provide connectivity to job centers. Review the resolution if you’re interested and send in a comment.

The Charlottesville Economic Development office has been working on a recovery plan for the city, and the Charlottesville Economic Development Authority got a look at their meeting on June 8. Director Chris Engel said his department will seek American Rescue Plan funding from City Council to pay for projects within the initiative.

“Essentially we met and did a series of outreach efforts including a series of phone calls that was led by Jason Ness on our team with previous recipients of our grants from last year to find out how they’re doing,” Engel said. “We found four basic buckets in which there was desire for additional assistance.

Items in the roadmap include direct financial assistance through continued grant programs and additional training programs including a “specific hospitality focused training program.” Other ideas include updating maps for business corridors and creating a marketing leverage program. There are also ideas to create new infrastructure.

“One of them is a unique opportunity that is now available to municipalities to seek out what are called designated outdoor refreshment areas,” Engel said. “These are areas where alcoholic beverages can be served in an outdoor environment without putting up the traditional hard barriers that people might be accustomed to for these types of things.”

That would allow people to walk on parts of the Downtown Mall while carrying their drinks with them.

“Some details to be worked out with that,” Engel said. “There’s a particular kind of cup that would have to be used and some things like that. Not quite Bourbon Street but a more toned-down version.”

City Council will be presented with the plan on June 21.

You're reading to Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time now for another subscriber supported public service announcement. This June, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library is hosting two virtual programs to commemorate Juneteenth.

On June 17th, JMRL is hosting a panel discussion on the lives of the enslaved populations on the Monticello, Montpelier, and Highland plantations. (register)

On June 22, JMRL will hold a program about the recently discovered unmarked graves outside the enclosures of the cemetery at Pen Park. (register)

Tonight, the Albemarle Planning Commission will once again consider a rezoning for about 19 acres near the Forest Lakes neighborhood for a multifamily complex. RST Development last went before the Planning Commission in March, and their proposal for 370 units was vehemently opposed in a coordinated effort from the Forest Lakes Community Association.

Members of the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee were presented with a revised plan on June 10. But they also heard two other items and a common thread throughout all of them was the impact new uses and developments have had and will have on existing roads.

The first item was a community meeting for an application from the Monticello United Soccer Club (MONU) to expand the number of fields from four to seven at their location on Polo Ground Roads, as well as the hours. The site is on the banks on the South Fork of Rivanna River and is directly south of the Brookhill community that’s currently under construction. Planner Scott Clark said that section of Polo Grounds Road has received capacity upgrades to handle the additional traffic for the development.

“We’ve got signalization, turn lanes in both directions, the westbound straight lane across to Rio Mills Road was closed, and also Rio Mills itself can no longer send traffic directly across to Polo Grounds,” Clark said.

Some residents to the east, however, are concerned that any increased use will bring new vehicles. Polo Grounds Road eventually gets to Proffit Road, but there’s a one-lane railroad underpass that prevents high levels of traffic.

The amendment to the existing special use permit has already been to the Planning Commission, but Clark wanted to bring it back to the CAC. That gave one man who lives on Proffit Road the chance to ask this question.

“Are you telling me that all the traffic is going to enter and exit from U.S. 29 and nobody’s coming under the railroad tunnel to get to Proffit Road?” said the man.

Clark said he could not guarantee that none of the people would go that way. The man responded that the Brookhill development is just getting started and any additional uses would affect the overall area.

Fred Gerke, a member of the Proffit Community Association, offered some perspective on how the community has changed over time.

“You know, I’ve lived out here for 35 years and I’ve watched Proffit Road turn from a dirt track,” Gerke said. “Polo Grounds when I moved out here was a dirt road. I’ve watched it paved and VDOT said it couldn’t get paved. It got paved. Our concerns are just with traffic. MONU is a good organization, does good things. No complaints about that. The objections with the original permit which we commented on all those years ago, that’s why those limits were in there, about traffic concerns.”

Gerke said the county’s plans have not kept up with increases in population and use in the area.

“Brookhill is great, but what are you going to do?” Gerke said. “We put in these sidewalks and paths and bike lanes that go nowhere. You have no choice. You live in Brookhill, you’re going to have to get in your car to go anywhere, and it’s the same with MONU.”

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors will hold their public hearing on MONU on August 4.

Next, the Places29-North CAC held the community meeting for a rezoning for the proposed Maplewood Community to be built on a vacant parcel of land at the intersection of Proffit Road and Worth Crossing. The 3.41 acres of land are currently zoned commercial, but the application is for Planned Residential Development to build a maximum of 102 units. Ashley Davies is with Riverbend Development.

“We’ve got some layouts now and it’s probably going to land somewhere closer to about 74 units total,” Davies said. “We think it’s a nice, complementary use to the other commercial uses in the area and we imagine sometime in the future the rest of this area will probably see some redevelopment.”

The layout shown to the CAC features housing units called a “two over two.”

“They’re a new unit type that is basically townhouse units but they have two units per townhouse, so it’s a four story unit,” Davies said. “You’ve got parking on the bottom and then one of the levels is one unit and then you have a two-level unit.”

One CAC member noted that there have been several applications in this area that are approaching the upper limits of allowed residential densities. County planner Mariah Gleason had some explanation.

“In terms of proposals coming in at higher level densities, yes, we have had several lately come in that are in this area,” Gleason said. “I think it’s a combination of where there’s availability and the desire to build from the development community.”

The applicant requested an indefinite deferral yesterday to respond to comments from staff. One issue in the letter is that staff interpreted the application as requesting five-story buildings, which aren’t allowed under zoning at that location or in the Comprehensive Plan. Davies said that was not the case.

“The buildings proposed are four stories so there’s no height issue,” Davies said.

The last item on the agenda was a discussion about the RST project. The applicant was not on the call, but members of the CAC talked about their official list of concerns for the revised project.

“Most are driven by concern for the very high density of units on this small parcel of land,” reads the comments. “We feel the sheer number of units proposed will not sustain even a relatively high quality of life for either current residents, or the people who will move into this development.”

The one and a half page list of comments points out three good things about the new proposal. They are the slightly reduced size, the provision of below-market units, and the “ethnic diversity” the project would bring.

But the rest of the comments are in opposition. Citing one of them, CAC member Steve Cameron said he was against a special exception request for a fifth story in the main apartment building.

“I don’t understand the reason for the five-story waiver or the necessity for that,” Cameron said. “Looking out the topography, this is a higher portion of ground. It’s going to be higher. Four stories. The density is still the same. And then when we look around, Brookhill certainly would have wanted to go to five stories if they could.”

Tony Pagnucco went next.

“I have three concerns about this development,” Pagnucco said. “First of all, the traffic. Second of all the transportation site so that if there’s ever public transportation, that there would be some place where people could get on and off of public transportation. And lastly the schools.”

However, Pagnucco said he was not sure the CAC should send out the document and he did not support it. He did suggest that high density multifamily units could be built in the rural areas.

“Where really the only people that would care about that are few and far between,” Pagnucco said.

Back in March, there was concern that there were no provisions for transit. Supervisor Bea LaPisto Kirtley said the new proposal does include considerations for future bus routes.

“There are three projected transit stops for the RST development,” LaPisto Kirtley said. “One on 29, one on Ashwood Boulevard, and one inside the actual development.”

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission will soon begin the public comment period before expanding transit in Albemarle. Charlottesville Area Transit is conducting a similar study in the whole area.

The CAC did not take a vote to officially endorse the comments. Planning Commissioner Corey Clayborne thanked the group for their discussion.

“Thank you guys for that conversation,” Clayborne said. “It was very helpful to be able to those concerns and document those.

Watch the whole meeting of the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee here.

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In this installment:

The TJPDC will try again to get grant to plan for future of Charlottesville Union Station, and other regional updates

Election updates for outlying Greene, Nelson and Louisa

The comment period is over for the Cville Plans Together initiative

Albemarle County’s diversity chief is heading to the UVA School of Data Science

Fashion Square Mall owner files for Chapter 11

The public comment period has now closed for the latest round of the Cville Plans Together initiative, two weeks after the initial deadline for people to submit feedback on the Future Land Use Map. Staff with Rhodeside & Harwell will now comb through the responses and will present that information to the Charlottesville Planning Commission on June 29.

On Wednesday, the Housing Advisory Committee will discuss at noon changes being suggested by the executive directors of Habitat for Humanity and the Piedmont Housing Alliance. (meeting info)

“They shared their early general concept/proposal with us,” said project manager Jennifer Koch. “However, the Cville Plans Together team is currently focused on summarizing the feedback we have received over the last six weeks and we are not yet proposing any [Future Land Use Map] revisions.”

More on the future land use use plan in a future installment of the newsletter.

While there are no contested races for Albemarle’s legislative body, that’s not the case in surrounding counties.

In Louisa County, two of the magisterial districts have contested races and another two have candidates who are running opposed. In the Green Springs district, incumbent Robert Babyok Jr. faces challenger Rachel Jones. In the Patrick Henry district, incumbent Fitzgerald Barnes faces William Woody Jr. Duane Adams is unopposed in the Mineral District and Tommy J. Barlow is unopposed in the Mountain Road District.

In Greene County, Bill Martin will not seek another term representing the Stanardsville District. Abbey Heflin and Tina Deane are running to replace him. Marie Durrer is unopposed in the Midway District.

Let’s move on to Nelson County. In the North District, incumbent Tommy Harvey will face Democrat Mary Cunningham. Harvey is an independent. In the Central District, incumbent Ernie Reed will face Republican Pamela Brice. Reed is a Democrat. Republican Jesse Rutherford faces no opposition in the East District.

The top official for diversity and equity in Albemarle County is moving on, but not going far. Siri Russell is the new Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the School of Data Science at the University of Virginia. Russell has been the Director of Equity and Inclusion for Albemarle since 2018 and helped oversee removal of a Confederate statue in front of the court house last summer. She’s already a member of President Jim Ryan’s Council on UVA-Community Partnerships.

In a press release on the School of Data Science’s website, Russell said she is excited about working to put theory into practice.

“I’m interested in exploring how data science can empower communities, individuals, and policy-makers to improve outcomes and maximize societal benefits,” Russell said.

The company that owns Fashion Square Mall has filed for bankruptcy to protect its assets and attempt to stay in business. Many media outlets are reporting that Washington Prime Group filed for Chapter 11 on Sunday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court of the Southern District of Texas.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. What are some of the factors that support, or inhibit, efforts to increase equity in our communities and housing developments? That’s the topic of an upcoming panel discussion held by the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership. Guests include Kathryn Howell of the RVA Eviction Lab, Hamilton Lombard of the Weldon Cooper Center, Andrew Mondschein at the UVA School of Architecture, and Stacy Pethia, Albemarle’s housing manager. The event begins at 12 p.m. on June 17, 2021. Register today!

Today’s newsletter ends with a recap of the June 3 meeting of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

The group will try again to get a federal grant for a planning study for the future of the Amtrak station on West Main Street. The agency applied last year when the grant program was known as a BUILD. Now it’s known as RAISE, for Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a transportation planner for the TJPDC.

“We applied for BUILD the last time it was available,” Hersh-Ballering said. “We requested $711,000 to create a Charlottesville regional multimodal transportation station master plan to meet the capacity, accessibility, and safety demands of Charlottesville’s union station.”

The application was not successful, but there’s still a need to expand the station in order to prepare for a future with more passenger service through the region. A second daily train between Roanoke and points north is expected in the near future.

“The station doesn’t have the infrastructure of the amenities to adequately serve the existing ridership, let alone the increased ridership projected for 2045,” Hersh-Ballering said.

It’s not just trains, though. The Virginia Breeze bus service between Danville and D.C. is expanding, and MegaBus also expects more service. Both currently stop at Arlington Boulevard at Barracks Road Shopping Center.

Hersh-Ballering said the goal is to come up with a shared community vision for the station site, which is privately owned. The station is currently not compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

“The station [is] missing a lot of important things, such as lighting, canopies to protect people from the weather, appropriate and useful signage, among other things,” Hersh-Ballering said. “There was also a lot of pooling of water on the platforms.”

The money being sought now is for planning, and other funds will have to be found to pay for the upgrades.

Hersh-Ballering made her comments at the June 3 edition of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. The TJPDC agreed to a resolution to move forward with the grant application. Charlottesville’s representatives on the Commission were not present at the meeting.

At that meeting, new officers were elected. Nelson County Supervisor Jesse Rutherford is the new chair. Greene County Supervisor Dale Herring is the new vice chair and Keith Smith of Fluvanna County is the treasurer.

Nelson County will use the services of the TJPDC to apply for a pair of several transportation grants. Interim executive director Christine Jacobs explains.

“One of them is for sidewalk infrastructure in downtown Lovingston and the other is for a potential application for the Gladstone Train Depot relocation of the old building,” Jacobs said.

Work also continues to implement a regional tax on cigarettes.

“At this time, we’ve had seven counties in our broader region endorsing resolutions and expressing interest in participating in the regional cigarette tax administration,” Jacobs said.

After a closed session, the Commissioner opted to extend Jacobs service as interim executive director until the end of the calendar year. A search for a permanent executive director to replace Chip Boyles will begin on July 1.

At a roundtable on happenings in each jurisdiction, Dylan Bishop of Nelson County had more information about the Gladstone project.

“The Friends of Gladstone Depot is a non-profit agency that purchased this property from the railway, from CSX,” Bishop said. “They’re going to be moving that train station, converting it to a community center and transportation museum for the community there.”

The Nelson County Board of Supervisors approved a rezoning for the project at its meeting last week.

On Wednesday, the Fluvanna Board of Supervisors will have a public hearing on rezoning of land adjacent to the Bremo Power Station from agricultural to industrial to allow for a lined landfill to store coal ash. Here’s Supervisor Tony O’Brien.

“They will retain their coal ash ponds tapped and sealed and covered in Fluvanna and they are proffering close to $50 million for that so that’s a big bonus for Fluvanna in terms of being able to ensure that the water quality in the Fork Union area remains stable and is not affected by any of their efforts,” O’Brien said.

The proffered funding includes $47.1 million for water supply improvements, $2 million for transportation improvements, and half a million for Green Infrastructure to mitigate the impacts of the landfill. (meeting info)

Greene Supervisor Dale Herring provided an update on the ongoing efforts of the county to leave the Rapidan Service Authority in order to build a reservoir that the entity has opted not to build.

“Madison and Orange County did vote to allow us to leave the authority so we should be out of the Rapidan Service Authority in the near future and what that means for us is that we can actually begin to build the reservoir that we’ve already spent between $11 million to $13 million on,”

The TJPDC will next meet on August 5 and will be in-person.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out: Help support Black-owned business in the Charlottesville area. Check out the Charlottesville Black Business Directory at cvilleblackbiz.com and choose between a variety of goods and services, ranging from beauty supplies, professional services, and e-commerce. Visit cvilleblackbiz.com as soon as you can to get started.

On today’s installment:

The slate is known for election day in Albemarle and Charlottesville

The University of Virginia’s board of visitors is briefed on the future of Ivy Gardens

A quick review of transit in the area, including a call for a new approach

Election returns are in for the Democratic primary in Virginia, and in Charlottesville, Juandiego Wade obtained the most votes with 4,910 in the unofficial count, with Brian Pinkston getting 3,601 votes. Carl Brown came in third with 1,797 votes, Wade and Pinkston raised a lot more money than Brown, with Pinkston reporting a total amount of $69,676 through May 27 and Wade reporting $68,670 for the same period. In contrast, Brown raised $1,675 according to data put together by the Virginia Public Access Project.

The two Democrats now go on to face two independents in the general election. Yas Washington had run as a Democrat but failed to qualify. She’s raised $315 so far this year. Incumbent Nikuyah Walker will also be running for a second term. She was the first independent to win since 1948.

In the primary for the Commonwealth’s Attorney race, incumbent Joe Platania fended off a challenge from Ray Szwabowski with 58.7 percent of the votes.

There were no contested primaries for local races in Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa or Nelson counties. In Albemarle, no Republicans or independents emerged to face three Democrats on the ballot. That means Jim Andrews, Ned Gallaway, and Diantha McKeel will all likely be elected for four-year terms without any opposition.

On Monday night, Charlottesville City Council officially adopted a resolution canceling a project to build a 300-space parking garage at the corner of East Market Street and 9th Street. Part of the decision hinged on a notion of whether the city was doing enough to get people out of their cars and into other modes of transportation.

In 2015, the firm Nelson Nygaard conducted a study of parking downtown, and one of the recommendations was to maintain existing supply through something called “transportation demand management.”

“Strong promotion of TDM efforts and continued enhancement of alternative travel options will serve Charlottesville well in maintaining its reputation and charm as an attractive, livable and sustainable city,” reads page 8 of the study, which was the most recent official review of parking downtown.

Specifically, the plan recommended creation of a “Transportation Management Association” to help encourage alternative modes of travel. In early 2008, local community member Randy Salzman brought the idea up to the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO). That’s the local body that makes decisions on regional transportation projects. Salzman arranged for them to hear from a professor of sustainability from Curtin University in Perth, Australia. Here’s Peter Newman, who co-authored a book with UVA professor Tim Beatley called Resilient Cities: Responding to Peak Oil and Climate Change.

“Now we’ve had all of our cities do regional plans in the last five years and they have all concluded the need for more sustainable future based on less car-dependence with transit prioritized with corridors and centers to make sure the structure of the city changes,” Newman said.

The idea at the time didn’t get much traction.

At the May 27 meeting of the Regional Transit Partnership — a sub-group of the MPO — Salzman once again appeared to promote the idea.

“We need to understand why people take the bus or don’t take the bus, why people bicycle or don’t bicycle, why people drive or don’t drive,” Salzman said. “There is another car culture that has done this exceptionally well and that culture is Australia where they have just as much of a car ownership culture as we have in the United States.”

Salzman mentioned a program called TravelSmart, which has now transformed into a program called Your Move. People who register are assisted in getting used to different forms of transportation. Salzman wants this community to take on the same approach, perhaps by expanding the existing RideShare program.

“Right now because of the stars aligning at the federal level, this area could go after a grant that would be the leadership for helping America,” Salzman said. “Understand the individuals and how we can help them change as opposed to building the change, building all the transit and then not using it.”

The Regional Transit Partnership consists of the University Transit Service, Charlottesville Area Transit, Jaunt, and other agencies. A non-voting member of the body is Sara Pennington, who runs the RideShare program as part of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District.

“Transportation doesn’t just work in a silo,” Pennington said. “There are so many moving parts and moving pieces and the more that we can work together and band together to help each other out, the better.”

Much of Pennington’s work this past year has focused on telework, which was crucial for many during the pandemic.

The TJPDC will soon hire a consultant to create a regional transit vision plan at a cost of $350,000, with half of that amount coming from a grant from the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation. A selection firm is reviewing three proposals for the project and an announcement on who will do the work may be made later this month.

The TJPDC is also working on a $106,215 study about expanded transit in Albemarle County, above and beyond a second study that Charlottesville Area Transit is conducting to add service to U.S. 29 north of its current terminus at the Wal-Mart. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a transportation planner and said the firm Michael Baker International has been hired to do the work.

“We are planning our first public engagement session for that project in late July or early August,” Hersh-Ballering said.

Karen Davis, the interim CEO of Jaunt, said her planning manager’s recent appearance at a Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership panel discussion may lead to the resumption of a discontinued service between the North Fork Research Park and points south. Stephen Johnson talked about the possibility of on-demand transit at the May 20 event. (watch)

“I got a call from UVA Foundation talking about a service we had done for them that is right now discontinued, Park Connect, he was so well-spoken that they called me and said ‘hey, on-demand could actually meet our needs better than the model we were using,” Davis said.

Later this summer, Charlottesville Area Transit will begin a public period for proposed route changes. There’s a story about that on my archive site, Information Charlottesville.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. It’s becoming more and more safe to go out and check out live music. If you’re interested in going out and hearing people who have been waiting to get out and play, check out the Charlottesville Jazz Society and their running list of events! The Charlottesville Jazz Society is dedicated to the promotion, preservation and perpetuation of all jazz, and that the best thing you can do now is to go check out some music.

Last week, the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors met, as did their Buildings and Grounds Committee. One of the items on the agenda was approval of a master plan for the redevelopment of Ivy Gardens, an apartment complex between Old Ivy Road and Leonard Sandridge Road that was built in the late 1960’s.

University Architect Alice Raucher explained the purpose of creating a master plan.

“It is in general always good to have a plan and physical master planning helps to set priorities to inform future plans,” Raucher said. “It often aligns limited physical resources with often equally limited financial resources and provides the opportunity for broad University and community engagement to create a shared vision.”

Ivy Gardens is made up of 17 acres and has 440 residential units close to North Grounds, Darden, the School of Law, and the Miller Center for Public Affairs, and the Center for Politics.

“In 2016, at the direction of the University, the Foundation purchased Ivy Gardens and although its structures are aging, the property is currently income producing with units that primarily house our graduate students in a low-density, automobile-oriented development,” Raucher said.

The proposed redevelopment plan would increase the number of units to 718 and would add about 46,000 square feet of academic space and 69,500 square feet for commercial uses. The latter would be clustered in a new Town Square that would front onto Old Ivy Road. To the immediate north would be a Residential Commons with different kinds of housing types. In the middle would be a Central Green. A pedestrian bridge would cross Leonard Sandridge Drive, allowing safe passage to Darden and the Law School.

The project would be phased.

“The success of this proposal does not depend on wholesale redevelopment,” Raucher said.

For more on the timing, let’s hear a question from Robert Hardie, the chair of the Buildings and Grounds Committee.

“From a density standpoint are you satisfied that, obviously greenspaces are wonderful and we need those, but we also need to provide enough housing for this area, for what’s going to a growing law school and a growing Darden School and other programs around that area,” Hardie said. “And secondly, can you give us a little about the time frame and how long this will take to come to fruition? Obviously it will be done in phases, but when we might see this start and when it might be complete?”

“Yes, Mr. Hardie, the density on this site is improved by 150 percent so we have not only the 440 units that currently are there but there’s an additional 250 or thereabouts,” Raucher said.

The Architect added that what was before the committee was a master plan, and not a schematic design for imminent building construction. She also said there’s no capital project yet associated with the area.

President Jim Ryan said the University has many projects it would like to work on.

“Increasing the supply of housing for second-year students remains a top priority,” Ryan said.

The committee voted on a resolution to approve the master plan. Afterwards, the group was given an update on plans to remove the George Rogers Clark statue on West Main Street.

“We are ready to move in to phase one of that work which is the removal of the statue,” said Colette Sheehy, senior vice president for operations and state government relations at UVA. “We’re prepared to an issue a [request for proposals] this month to a firm that would remove the statue and relocate it and store it.”

Sheehy said the cost to do the work will be around $400,000 and the work should be complete this summer. The second phase will be to engage with the indigenous community about what should be featured at the site in the future. (download the B&G presentation)

Before you go, thank you so much for reading. This is a free newsletter designed to spread information about this community. But, it’s also my full-time job! If you’re able to contribute financially, it will help me keep going well into the future. To do so:

Take a look at my Patreon page, which needs a bit of a refresh. But, in general, this is the best way to support my overall research, which includes a lot of things that aren’t this newsletter.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council votes to remove Confederate statues in city parks, and this time it’s a vote that doesn’t have to be cleared by the Virginia Supreme Court

A joint PTO group releases a final report on a special fund created to help improve virtual learning

One Albemarle County highway gets is shut down for a few hours, while another one remains closed indefinitely.

In a minute, we’ll get to a wrap-up of last night’s City Council meeting. But first, a couple other items.

Albemarle County Police shut down the U.S. 29 and Interstate 64 interchange yesterday for four hours as a response to “a call for a person in crisis at Teel Lane and Monacan Trail.” According to a news release, no additional information about the incident will be released. Teel Lane is several hundred feet southwest of the interchange.

Not related, but U.S. 250 remains closed at Afton Mountain due to a rockslide. According to to Virginia Department of Transportation spokesman Lou Hatter, work continues six days a week by two contractors.

“One is removing the unstable material, the other is coming behind to stabilize the areas,” Hatter said. “We still anticipate it will be mid-July to complete the work.”

Stay tuned.

Last year, all of the Parent-Teacher Organizations in Charlottesville came together to raise money to help students in households that did not have the resources to fully participate in virtual learning. Now the final report of the Ready to Teach, Ready to Learn CCS Reopening Fund is out, and the effort raised $165,097 from 201 donors. In addition to providing funds for teaching materials, funds were also spent to help the return to in-person learning including covering the cost of van transportation at a time when school buses were limited.

“Funding was divided and allocated quickly to PTOs at all seven elementary schools, Buford Middle, Charlottesville High, and Lugo McGinness Academy using distribution percentages based on each school’s population of students receiving free and reduced lunch,” reads the report. “The use of the funds was then determined by individual school level committees comprised of a PTO representative, teacher, administrator, and an equity committee representative.”

The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation partnered to administer the fund. The report lists several conclusions, including a sense that there is an untapped potential for public schools to raise money from private sources. (read the report)

Charlottesville City Council held a public hearing last night on whether to remove two Confederate statues in two city parks. I’ll have details on that in a moment, but first, some other highlights from the meeting.

It has now been about ten days since COVID restrictions in Virginia were fully lifted, but public health officials are still monitoring the situation. Dr. Denise Bonds of the Blue Ridge Health District gave a briefing. Daily case counts in the district have been dwindling since mid-April.

“We are frequently in single digits, often only one or two cases reported,” Dr. Bonds said.

Today that number is 3 new cases. There’s been a total of 15,937 cases and 224 fatalities since last March. Community engagement efforts are ongoing.

“Our hotline is still going strong,” Dr. Bonds said. “Since January we’ve had over 25,000 calls to our hotline.”

That’s 434-972-6261 if you need it for some reason.

Dr. Bonds said the district is continuing to get people vaccinated in order to meet the goal of having 70 percent of Americans vaccinated by July 4. As of today, 48.8 percent of the health district is fully vaccinated. Statewide, that number is at 46 percent. Children under the age of 12 are not yet eligible to be vaccinated but Dr. Bonds said approval of at least one vaccine may be approved by this fall.

The vaccination clinic at J.C. Penney will close this month, but will reopen in a smaller store inside Fashion Square Mall. The district is also working to vaccinate people who cannot travel at their homes. Vaccination events will also continue be held at other community events. Here’s City Manager Chip Boyles.

“It was a very good weekend with Sunday at Tonsler Park, we had the splash pad open, a basketball tournament, and vaccinations occurring taking advantage of the crowds that were there,” Boyles said.

City Hall remains closed to the public, but planning is underway to transition back to reopening.

Boyles also said Charlottesville has received its first payment from the American Recovery Plan. The amount is $9.8 million and another payment of the same amount is expected in the next calendar year.

“The first funding will go towards revenue replacement for the city, and then additional COVID improvements and then we will very shortly be rolling out for our nonprofit stakeholders in the community a program where they can apply,” Boyles said.

You're reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Time now for another subscriber supported public service announcement. This June, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library is hosting two virtual programs to commemorate Juneteenth.

On June 17th, JMRL is hosting a panel discussion on the lives of the enslaved populations on the Monticello, Montpelier, and Highland plantations. (info)

On June 22, JMRL will hold a program about the recently discovered unmarked graves outside the enclosures of the cemetery at Pen Park. (info)

Now, on to the statues.

Council waived its usual procedure of having people wait until the designated public hearing to allow people to use the Community Matters to speak out on the matter. One of these was Zyahna Bryant, who began a petition in 2016 to remove the statues when she was a student at Charlottesville High School. She pointed out Council’s original vote to remove the statues in 2017 was 3-2.

“The choice here is clear,” Bryant said. “What needs to happen is clear. It’s up to you make the right decision and there’s no opportunity left to straddle the fence. What side of history do you want to be on?”

Scott Warner grew up in Charlottesville but now lives in Albemarle County. He said the report from the Council-appointed Blue Ribbon Commission on Race, Memorials and Public Spaces offered up two alternatives for the Robert E. Lee statue.

“Move the sculpture to McIntire Park and confront its history there and number two, confront the sculpture in place and redesign and transfer Lee Park,” Warner said.

Bruce Williamson, an attorney who works downtown, said Council ultimately voted to reject the Blue Ribbon Commission’s recommendations.

“The preservation of history is not even an issue here,” Williamson said. “These statues preserve other things and many other people will speak eloquently about what those statues were meant for, what they preserve, and why they need to go.”

After these comments, City Manager Boyles gave an overview of the last five years and explained what the steps are ahead for the statues as laid out by the Virginia State Supreme Court and the General Assembly.

“Council now has before you tonight for consideration a resolution to remove, contextualize, relocate, or cover these statues after a 30 day period has expired that allows consideration of relocation to a museum, a historical society, government, of military battlefield,” Boyles said.

Then the official public hearing began. In the second session, several speakers asked that the city remove the statues but not let anyone else take them on.

“These statues must come down and not be put up anywhere else after this,” said Cali Gaston. “They are symbols of hate, of white supremacy, and as such must be removed and repurposed.”

In all, 55 people addressed Council during the public hearing, with all but a handful requesting removal. City Councilor Heather Hill spoke first.

“Really appreciate the engagement tonight and I think it was definitely a clear message to this Council,” Hill said.

Vice Mayor Sena Magill thanked those who spoke.

“And also to thank the people who started this work in all sorts of forms over a very long time,” Magill said.

City Councilor Michael Payne said he didn’t have much to add to what the speakers had said.

“Thoughts I have that come to mind as someone who was there on August 12 and turning on to 4th Street and as a survivor of August 12 like others is that I will be very proud to take a vote to remove these statues and to reimagine our public spaces in these areas and I hope it can be a small part of collective transformation here locally,” Payne said.

City Councilor Lloyd Snook also referenced August 2017 and the Unite the Right Rally that was held here because of Council’s original vote to remove the Robert E. Lee statue.

“Whatever anybody might have thought before August 12, since August 12 I think the answer has become crystal clear,” Snook said. “It’s crystal clear to me that the statues need to come down in some fashion. I have not yet solidified in my own mind what ought to happen thereafter.”

The statue requires the city to put out an offer for groups to take the statue and to give 30 days for a response. Snook said if the city were to deviate from that process, there could be further legal complications.

“So we’re going to do it carefully, we’re going to do it thoroughly, we’re going to do it absolutely by the law,” Snook said.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she was thinking about how Black children in the future will no longer have to see the statues.

“I immediately start thinking about how many 10-year-olds have had to live and be subjected to symbols throughout history that uphold whiteness over everything else,” Walker said.

Walker also said that people who are opposed to the proposed changes to the Future Land Use Map should also consider their views, and that supporters of removing the statues should enter that conversation.

“And I’m hoping that those individuals are having the same conversation with the same intensity with their neighbors who are forgetting redlining and racial covenants and wanting to maintain status quo but not able to associate that with the same power structure that put those statues up,” Walker said.

Councilor Payne made a motion, seconded by Snook. Council Clerk Kyna Thomas called the vote.

Within minutes, the city issued a Request for Statements of Interest (RFI) for entities who might want to take ownership of the statues. (read the RFI)

“On or after July 8, 2021, if the statutes, or either of them, has not been transferred to such an entity for relocation and placement, City Council may make other disposition(s),” reads the RFI’s description.

Before we go today, I wanted to follow up on the brief blurb in the June 5 newsletter about pollution reduction targets for the Chesapeake Bay. Sarah Vogelsong has a great story in the Virginia Mercury about the challenges to getting reductions in the agricultural sector, with a focus on efforts to fence cattle out of streams. It’s worth a read if you want to pay more attention to what’s known as the TMDL. That stands for Total Maximum Daily Load, and this is a story to follow in the next four years with a 2025 deadline looming.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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In today’s reader-supported public service announcement, the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards is getting ready for a series of fall classes for new volunteers. The Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards increase public awareness of the value of trees in all environments, rural and urban. The Fall 2021 class will involve a combination of online training sessions and field activities with a maximum of 32 students to facilitate the best field training possible.

The registration period opens on June 15 and slots will fill quickly! With a 15-week duration beginning August 7th and ending November 13th the online classes will precede the field activities held on every other Saturday at various locations in the Charlottesville area. Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

On today’s show:

A small hydroelectric plant on the Hardware River gets the nod from the Albemarle Planning Commission

The city will work with the USDA to introduce wasps to save younger ash trees

VMDO aims to build net zero building for PVCC

Virginia aims to reduce stormwater runoff on 400,000 acres of public land

As stated in the sub-headline, June 5 is World Environment Day. This program has many beats, representing various interests I have as a reporter and community member. Today’s installment has several segments about the natural world around us, and how we may fit in.

But, first, a quick update on the status of efforts to address climate change, perhaps the biggest environmental issue of our time. The city of Charlottesville, Albemarle County, and the University of Virginia all have adopted ambitious greenhouse gas reduction goals. There’s a joint website where activities are intended to be tracked.

Charlottesville completed an inventory in 2016, and have adopted a goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent by 2030 and net zero by 2050. The first measurement will be made from an inventory completed in 2011. The city is now putting together a climate action plan. (website) (emissions page)

Albemarle County adopted a climate action plan in October 2020 last year and are now working on an inventory of where emissions stand now. Supervisors have adopted a resolution seeking to be net zero by 2050 and to be 45 percent below where the numbers were in 2008. (Albemarle climate page)

UVA adopted a sustainability plan in October 2020 intended to build off of previous plans. This plan seeks for the University to become carbon neutral by 2030 and fossil fuel free by 2050. The plan also seeks to reduce water use and nitrogen emissions by 30 percent by 2030, as well as a 30 percent reduction for waste and an increase in sustainable food purchases by 30 percent. Read this plan here.

A new building under construction at Piedmont Virginia Community College aims to be a net zero energy building, the first of its kind at a higher education institution in the Commonwealth. VMDO Architects has designed the Advanced Technical Training Center which is expected to be completed in the spring of 2023. The Center will house laboratory space for robotics, advanced manufacturing, and cyber-security. The project has a budget of $21 million.

Governor Ralph Northam has signed an executive order directing state agencies and higher education facilities to take steps to reduce stormwater runoff on public land. Executive Directive Seventeen sets specific reduction targets for phosphorus and nitrogen. Those are two major pollutants that destroy habitat for aquatic species in the Chesapeake Bay by removing the oxygen.

Virginia and several other states must meet the terms of a 2009 mandate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to improve water quality in the bay by making the reductions. Northam’s directive covers about 400,000 acres of land.

“The Commonwealth of Virginia has pursued and achieved significant reductions in nutrient and sediment pollution to the Chesapeake Bay and the rivers and streams that are tributaries to the Bay,” reads the directive’s summary. “Despite real progress, continued reductions in nutrient and sediment pollution are necessary both to restore the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem and to meet federal Clean Water Act requirements.”For more details, read Sarah Vogelsong’s story posted on the Virginia Mercury.

At the local level, education efforts are coordinated by the Rivanna Stormwater Education Partnership. Local investments include millions to upgrade what’s now known as the Moores Creek Water Resource Recovery Facility - formerly known as a wastewater treatment plant. The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority spent $48 million to reduce the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus released into the river.

The city of Charlottesville is soon to receive some help from the United States Department of Agriculture in the fight against the Emerald Ash Borer, which is devastating ash trees across the east coast. Patrick Booz is a plant health safeguarding specialist with the USDA and he addressed the city’s Tree Commission on June 1. He said the agency had been relying on quarantining ash products as a way of stopping the spread of the ash borer, but that has not been an effective strategy. The new strategy is to introduce wasps to fight the invasive ash borer.

“There’s four different species now of parasitoid wasps that are found in the native range where Emerald Ash Borers was found and that’s in Russia and China,” Booz said. ‘So these wasps will predate. They’re stingless wasps and they’re not going to harm anybody else.”

Booz said when introduced nearby, the wasps will lay their eggs inside the eggs of Emerald Ash Borer. He said this treatment is best applied to younger trees that are not yet infested, and he’s proposing introducing the wasps at the Ragged Mountain Natural Area. One member of the Tree Commission asked if there would be any unintended consequences.

“USDA has reported that there weren’t any unintended consequences so far, but I mean who knows?” Booz said. “It’s pretty early in the process but so far we haven’t had any insect species that it was attacking.”

According to a press release, the wasps have been introduced in 28 other states so far.

The city has been treating 32 ash trees since 2016 to prevent infestation, and budget constraints have prevented a wider application. Once infested, trees can die after two or three years due to larvae burrowing for food.

The Commission voted to endorse the use of wasps, but member Peggy Van Yahres voted no due to the possibility of unintended consequences.

Watch the whole Tree Commission meeting on the city’s video channel.

A plan to update a hydroelectric plant at the Jefferson Mill Dam on the Hardware River obtained a recommendation of approval from the Albemarle Planning Commission on June 1, but not without a tough question intended as a softball. In beginning of the 21st century, construction of dams is strongly discouraged in most cases, with the exception of impoundment for water supply. But the Jefferson Mill Dam dates back to the beginning of the 19th century. Bill Fritz is the county’s development process manager. (staff report)

“The existing dam and the adjacent building date to the 1800’s and the mill building is now used as a home,” Fritz said.

Power has been generated at the location for much of that time, but the proposal is to update the turbine that’s within an underground water room through which a diverted portion of the river flows.

“The project will improve the outfall from the water room, install new inlets to bring water to the turbine,” Fritz said. “The applicant has submitted by far the most extensive and complete application I’ve seen in thirty plus years I’ve worked for the county.”

However, the applicant was not quite ready to give a presentation. While not required, it’s customary for a formal presentation to be made when making a land use request. But we’ll hear more about that in a moment.

Fritz said state agencies found no significant concerns and all potential issues have been resolved. Currently fish and eels cannot swim upstream past this point, but that will change after the work is complete.

“It’s not the subject of the special use permit but the applicant is proposing to install a ladder on the dam on the opposite side of the river from the mill building,” Fritz said.

The applicant did not prepare a presentation but was available to answer questions. At first it appeared no one would ask one, but Commissioner Tim Keller went ahead and offered one up. Keller is a professor emeritus of landscape architecture at Iowa State University.

“Let me preface this by saying that I do support it and this is the great conundrum between cultural resource protection and natural resource protection that I spent my professional lifetime thinking about,” Keller said. “But just to be a devil’s advocate here, wouldn’t best practices here be to remove this dam? Best environmental practice be to remove this dam completely?”

Fritz said that did not come up during the discussion with state agencies. The project manager said there was no compelling reason to remove the dam based on this application.

“The studies that we’ve done thus far and the information that’s publicly available indicates that the dam is not a huge hindrance to species, especially species of concern, going upstream any farther due to the amount of dams that are below the Jefferson site,” said Jessica Pendrod of Natel Energy.

Keller was satisfied with the answer, but civil engineer Joseph Head jumped on the Zoom call to offer this response.

“The best practices would probably be to tell us to tear up all of our freeways and turn them into meadows full of butterflies,” said Joseph Head. “But that would make it hard to get your truck around if you did that. So it’s a balance between human existence and the animals.”

Head said the stone dam has withstood years of being pummeled by the Hardware, which he called a “flashy” river that can go from an easy stream to a raging torrent in hours if there’s enough rainfall.

“This dam’s actually totally amazing,” Head said. “These guys built this and did it my hand 200 years ago. It’s just rock and mortar and it’s still there. This river has been pounding on this dam for 200 years and it’s still there.”

Commissioner Karen Firehock also supported the project, but said that the best practice would be to at least study a partial removal of the dam.

“From an environmental perspective, the best option would be a partial breach of this dam so that we don’t have a dam across the river and if anyone wants to study this, there are a multitude of dams that have been come down in Virginia including some major ones,” Firehock said. “There’s a whole host of problems that occur from warming water behind the dam, from preventing migration and passage, from trapping sediments, sometimes which are contaminated.”

Firehock supported the upgrade of the powerplant but did not want that vote to be interpreted as support for continued existence of dams.

“Just because something is historic doesn’t mean we should maintain it,” Firehock said. “There are historic coal mines. No one would make an argument for maintaining all of our historic coal mines so I just don’t think that argument holds water so to speak.”

To learn more about the dam removal at the Rivanna River, visit the Rivanna Conservation Alliance.

You can watch the whole item on the Albemarle County YouTube page.

Special thanks to the Valley Research Center for a donation in January that has helped provide music beds for the audio version of this. I strongly suggest listening to the program if you’ve not heard it before. Subscribe in Apple Podcasts or Spotify or Amazon or just hit the play button above!

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In this installment:

A look at the link between housing and transportation costs

Charlottesville City Council reviews possible changes to bus routes owned and operated by the Charlottesville municipal government

New campaign finance reports are in local races including Albemarle County and Charlottesville

The latest campaign finance reports have been filed with the Virginia Department of Elections, as reported by the Virginia Public Access Project. Let’s start with Albemarle County.

Incumbent Jack Jouett District Supervisor Diantha McKeel raised an additional $6,522 during the period and spent $9, leaving her campaign with a balance of $32,056 as of May 27. McKeel is a Democrat who currently faces no opposition on the November 2 ballot for a third term.

Incumbent Rio District Supervisor Ned Gallaway raised $10,150 in the period, with $10,000 of that coming from a single corporate donor known as Seminole Trail Management LLC. Gallaway spent $5 in the period and has a cash balance of $15,809. Gallaway is a Democrat who currently has no opposition on the November 2 ballot for a second term.

Newcomer Jim Andrews raised $10,139 during the period, including a $5,000 contribution from John Grisham. He spent $4,180 during the period with the majority of that going to pay for his campaign manager, Patty Haling. Andrews has a balance of $30,507 as of May 27. Andrews is running as a Democrat and currently faces no opposition on the November 2 ballot. The winner of the race will succeed two-term incumbent Liz Palmer.

In Charlottesville, Brian Pinkston reported $29,098 in contributions, including $7,325 in in-kind contributions. That means someone or some business offered services or a product for campaign purposes. In-kind donations include $3,500 from Lifeview Marketing LLC and $2,750 from Local Jurisdiction Consulting LLC. Pinkston also loaned himself $8,348 and raised $13,425 in cash. The candidate spent $29,763 during the period and had an ending balance of $24,074.

Juandiego Wade raised $13,126 during the period, all in cash. The top donor is the Realtors Political Action Committee of Virginia. He spent $22,151 and had an ending balance of $32,626.

Carl Brown raised significantly less money with $1,675. He spent $979 and had a balance of $720 as of May 27, 2021.

Independent Yas Washington reported no money raised or spent with no cash balance. VPAP did not have any report for Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker, an independent who announced in late May that she would seek an additional term.

For the first time, members of the public can register to receive emergency notifications via text from the University of Virginia. Text “UVA” to 226787 to enroll in the program.

“The types of emergencies for which an alert would be issued include, but are not limited to, tornadoes, building fires, hazardous materials releases and violent incidents. Alerts are sent for emergencies in both the academic division and UVA Health,” reads a press release about the information.

Previously, the service was only available for people directly associated with UVA.

At some point this year, we’ll know exactly how many people are believed to live in our communities when the U.S. Census is released. But, projections from the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia as well as their yearly estimates depict a growing region. As the cost of housing in Charlottesville and Albemarle’s urban ring continues to increase, many will choose or have already chosen to live in communities half an hour away or more. Data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey shows the vast majority of people commute to work in a single occupant vehicle? But does that have to be the case?

In May, the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership held a panel discussion on the topic. For background, housing is to be considered affordable if rent or a mortgage payment makes up thirty percent or less of household expenditures. Households that pay more than that are considered stressed.

Todd Litman is a founder and the executive director of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute. He said transportation costs also have to be factored in.

“It works out that a cheap house is not truly affordable if it has particularly high transportation costs [and] if it’s located in an area where people have to spend a lot of time and money traveling,” Litman said. “A lot of experts now recommend that instead of defining affordability as 30 percent of household budgets to housing, it’s defined as 45 percent of household budgets dedicated to housing and transportation combined.”

Litman said transportation costs are more volatile for low-income households because of the unpredictability of fuel prices and maintenance costs.

Stephen Johnson, a planning manager with Jaunt, said the cost of time must also be factored in.

“If I can only afford to take public transit, but that means my commute to work is going to take five to ten times longer, then that’s time that I’m losing to spend on other things,” Johnson said.

Johnson said people also can lose jobs if a transit connection doesn’t work out. He said this community has public transit options, but they are not compelling for many.

“When we put ourselves in the shoes of somebody’s who is deciding to take transit or drive, there are four factors that one would consider,” Johnson said. “The first would be the financial cost. The second would be the time cost. The third would be reliability. Can I rely on getting there on time? The fourth I think would be flexibility. Will my transportation allow me to make a last-minute change to my schedule? To travel with a friend, or to bring home a bunch of shopping.”

Johnson said public transit is cheaper to use than driving, but the other three factors are more difficult. He said transit in the area could be reformed by greater investments and better planning.

“An Albemarle planner might come to me and say ‘we’ve got this community, it’s got a lot of cul-de-sacs, a lot of houses, and we’re really struggling with congestion. Can you put a public transit band-aid on this and fix it?’” Johnson said. “In that case, the game board is already set and there’s only so much we can do as a player but I think if we can expand our idea of what transit planning is, when we think about things like density, how can we take those A’s and B’s and cluster them together so that when we put a bus out there we can cover a lot of trips?”

Litman said a goal is to not necessarily encourage people to go car-free, but to work to create areas where more trips can be taken in a walk, a bike-ride, or by getting on the bus. This was more common before the middle of the 20th century.

“So if you go back to the older neighborhoods, they’re all very walkable,” Litman said. “They have sidewalks on all the streets. You have local schools, and park, and stores that were designed. The neighborhood was organized around the idea that at least some people will rely on walking. We lost that for a while and now there’s a number of planning movements and approaches that are trying to establish that.”

Litman said developers and local governments should be working together to encourage more than just single-family housing.

“If you’re building new neighborhoods, those that allow what we call ‘the missing middle’, compact housing types like townhouses and low-rise apartments are going to be far more affordable and therefore far more inclusive,” Litman said.

But back to transit. Jaunt mostly provides on-demand service, but does have some fixed-route service. Johnson explained what works best in what situation.

“Fixed route options are much more appropriate public transit option for dense urban cores and we see that in downtown Charlottesville and urban Albemarle County,” Johnson said. “Demand response is a much more appropriate technology for more rural areas and that’s the majority of Jaunt’s service area are the counties around Charlottesville and Albemarle.”

However, Johnson said transit in urban areas could be transformed if systems adopt on-demand tech. Jaunt has been working on a pilot project to provide service to Loaves and Fishes on Lambs Road, a site not accessible via Charlottesville Area Transit.

In this community, there are three transit systems. They are the Charlottesville Area Transit (CAT), the University of Virginia Transit Service (UTS) and Jaunt. In September, BRITE will begin the Afton Express service between Staunton and Charlottesville. How do all of these many pieces come together? Here’s Stephen Johnson again.

“Charlottesville and Albemarle are working together through the Regional Transit Partnership to try to help build a cohesive vision there of how Jaunt and Charlottesville Area Transit and UTS can all work together to provide a cohesive transit system for the residents of Charlottesville and Albemarle,” Johnson said.

You can view the entire video on the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission’s YouTube page.

Up next, Charlottesville Area Transit updates City Council on upcoming service changes and the future.

Now it’s time for another Substack-fueled public service announcement. The Central Library in downtown Charlottesville will host a summer reading kick-off from 10 a.m. to 12 noon this Saturday, the 5th of June. Readers of all ages can come by and learn about the Jefferson Madison Regional Library Summer Reading Program. While here you can also enjoy music from the Charlottesville Municipal Band's Clarinet and Saxophone Ensembles and the JMRL Friends of the Library will be hosting a $5 per bag Pop-Up book sale under the tent at the Central Library. All events are outside, so if it rains, the event will be canceled.

Finally today, the city of Charlottesville is the sole owner and operator of Charlottesville Area Transit, and Albemarle County pays the city for service each year. Ridership on CAT has declined significantly in recent years. In 2013, ridership was at 2.4 million. By 2018, that dropped to 2.05 million. (view presentation)

Garland Williams has been director since August 2019 and previously served as director of Planning and Scheduling for the Greater Richmond Transit Company.

Near the beginning of the pandemic, the city hired Kimley Horn to review the system to recommend changes to make it more efficient on the other side.

“This is not designed to be a total revamp of our system,” Williams said. “This was kind of stop-gap measure because as you know, over the last six year CAT’s ridership has been declining precipitously so what we’re trying to do right now is stop that, build a nice foundation, and then build from there.”

Williams said work on the CAT is happening at the same time that the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is working on a planning effort for the long term.

As part of the more immediate work, the Connetics Transportation Group was directed to bring service to South First Street, bring service to the Center at Belvedere, and to restore Sunday service post pandemic. Jim Baker with Connetics Transportation explains a couple more directives.

“And getting more 30 minute or better service along some of the key corridors in the city,” Baker said. “Also there were a few routes pre-COVID that were running at worse than 60 minute frequencies so we didn’t want to have anything less than 60 minute frequencies. And then to get the trolley, which is such a key part of the CAT system, back to a 15 minute frequency. That was a route where service frequencies were reduced because of COVID.”

Routes will need to be changed in the short-term to avoid the Downtown Transit Center due to the eventual replacement of the Belmont Bridge. Under the proposal, Albemarle would for about 35 percent of service.

Route 2 would be split into two services, restoring service to Piedmont Virginia Community College and extending service to Mill Creek Drive and Monticello High School. One of the routes will also travel down Avon Street Extended in both directions.

“That change will make it easy to access the park and ride lot that’s sitting right beside CAT headquarters,” Williams said. “So it’s another opportunity potentially to use the route for our employees, city employees, to get to and from downtown.”

Route 3 would also be split into two, with one half traveling from Southwood to downtown and the other serving downtown and Belmont. This second route would come within walking distance of the Broadway Street corridor in Albemarle County.

“We really wanted to get 30 minute all-day service on 5th Street all the way down to Albemarle County’s office building,” Baker said.

Route 5 would be modified to travel between the UVA Hospital to Fashion Square Mall. Currently the northern terminus is Wal-Mart. Route 7 would be extended to the Rio Hill Shopping Center and the Wal-Mart but will no longer serve Stonefield.

Service on Prospect Avenue would be moved from Route 6 to a new Route 8, which would now travel between Stonefield and the Willoughby Shopping Center via the UVA Hospital.

“We thought this would be an opportunity to create a new crosstown route from south Charlottesville for residents on the south part of town to get up to the U.S. 29 corridor without having to go through downtown and without having to make a transfer,” Baker said.

Route 9 would be revamped to be another north-south service traveling between Fashion Square Mall and downtown via the YMCA in McIntire Park. Service to UVA Hospital would be dropped as would service near Charlottesville High School. Route 10 would no longer serve Stony Point Road to save time. Route 11 would serve the Center at Belvedere.

“That extension to the Center is an obligation that the city has to the Center so this answers that part of the agreement to provide public transportation,” Williams said.

The route changes will have to be reviewed to see if there are any violations of what’s known as Title VI, and there will need to be a public comment period.

Williams said CAT is also working on securing spaces at 5th Street Station for park and ride, as well as using Route 9 to access empty spaces at Fashion Square Mall for that purpose. Earlier in the work session, Council was briefed on a potential parking garage downtown.

“But we’re also working with Kimley Horn at a longer term study where we’re looking at the potential for some park and ride locations throughout the region, especially up on U.S. 29,” Williams said.

No decisions were made at the meeting. And coming up in a future episode of the program, more on transit from the May 27 meeting of the Regional Transit Partnership. Stay tuned!

Thanks for listening! Please share with someone you think would benefit from this program. The content is free, but subscriptions through Substack will keep it going. And Ting will match your payment!

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In today’s installment:

Albemarle Supervisors are briefed on status on economic development planning exercise for the area around the Woolen Mills

A conversation about policing and security at public housing sites

A new creative director at Live Arts

Martinsville and Henry County agree on reversion

This show is nearly a year old now, having launched to the public the second week of July during the pandemic. Sometimes the various segments come together as a theme. Sometimes, there are just things I want to get on the record, somewhere. In today’s show and for much of this first week of June, there will be a lot of catching up.

There’s a new artistic director at Live Arts. Susan E. Evans will take over effective today, arriving from the San Francisco Bay area where she most recently ran the 187-seat Old Town Theatre in Lafayette, California. Before that, she was artistic director at the Douglas Morrison Theatre in Hayward, California and before that she was with the Eastenders Repertory Company, also in the Bay area.

“I am drawn to the active verb in Live Arts’ mission: forging—theater and community striving toward bringing folx together, vigorously exchanging perspectives through art,” Evans is quoted in a press release.

There were over 140 applications for the position. Live Arts was founded in 1990.

The city of Martinsville and Henry County in southside Virginia have reached an agreement in which Martinsville will revert to a town. In late April, the two governing bodies met in a mediated closed session according to the minutes of the May meeting of the Virginia Commission on Local Government. That body must approve the agreement when it is finalized. According to the Martinsville Bulletin, the seven-member Martinsville City Council and the six-member Henry County Board of Supervisors met at a joint meeting on May 26 and agreed on a rough sketch of a memorandum of agreement for the reversion. The agreement doesn’t specify when the reversion will take place, but the two parties have agreed to let the Commission on Local Government pick the date.

In 2019, the Albemarle County Economic Development Department began a planning study of the roadway that leads to the Woolen Mills factory, a historic property that has renovated in recent years by developer Brian Roy. The main entrance is along Broadway Avenue, which extends from Carlton Avenue at the border between the city of Charlottesville and Albemarle County. In all, there are about 45 acres of land that were the subject of an interim study presented to the Board of Supervisors in November of 2019.

“The goal at that time was to leverage the public and private investment that had taken place and projected to take place at the Woolen Mills redevelopment and the Willow Tree relocation at that site,” said J.T. Newberry in the economic development department.

Much of the land is zoned for light industrial use, and several businesses are operating in the area. Construction of the new Woolen Mills Industrial Park is underway. The Board of Supervisors was to have seen the results of an implementation study in April 2020, but the pandemic put a pause on the work.

“Nevertheless we have tried to stay engaged with stakeholders on the corridor,” Newberry said. “There have been a number of projects that have continued on the private side.”

After the interim study, Albemarle staff met with city staff at least twice, and the blueprint has been run by the Planning Commission, the Economic Development Authority, and the Office of Equity and Inclusion. The latter suggested a new approach to the project following the signing of a memorandum of understanding on the topic by Charlottesville, Albemarle County and the University of Virginia. Roger Johnson is the director of economic development for Albemarle.

“We are going to pause our project and go back and review the Broadway corridor through an equity lens,” Johnson said. “We don’t know if that will change anything substantively or not but we expect that it will.”

That will include a meeting with the city’s new Deputy City Manager of Racial Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, Ashley Marshall.

Next steps could include creation of a business association for the area, similar to the Downtown Crozet Association. Another would be to create an arts and cultural district for the location.

“Some other types of activities we are contemplating are to complete pedestrian and bike connectivity, multimodal streetscape, enhanced public transportation,” Johnson said.

Those activities are now considered to be long-term goals.

The Piedmont Master Gardeners and Virginia Cooperative Extension will host an online presentation by author Douglas Tallamy on “The Nature of Oaks” at 7 p.m. Thursday, June 3. Admission is $15. Register by 5 p.m. Wednesday, June 2, at piedmontmastergardeners.org/events to reserve a spot in the program.

A longtime professor at the University of Delaware and author of widely acclaimed books such as Bringing Nature Home and Nature’s Best Hope, Tallamy has shown how we can help save nature’s ecological riches in our own backyards. In his latest book, The Nature of Oaks, he explains how adding native oak trees to our home landscapes is one of the best ways to help heal the planet.

At the beginning of May, a contract for a security firm to patrol public housing sites lapsed. At the same, a series of shootings has taken place, including an April 30 incident at Westhaven where bullets struck multiple vehicles and apartment buildings.

The Board of Commissioners of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority discussed the matter at their meeting on Monday, May 24. Commissioner Laura Goldblatt is a member of the CRHA safety committee and had an update.

“There was a lot of discussion and has been a lot of discussion at the past few about the roles that residents want to see for police and what they want policing to look like in their neighborhoods but also the role that they want various community-based safety initiatives to play,” Goldblatt said. “And also a perceived lack of services or a desire for creativity around certain services so we spent a lot of time discussing mental health and trauma services.”

Goldblatt said there is a need for trauma counselors who understand the experience of living in public housing. She said some residents have anxiety about the lack of security services at the moment.

“I know we have been working towards a [request for proposals] about the various kinds of services we would sent out for,” Goldblatt said.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she’s been meeting Police Chief RaShall Brackney and CRHA Executive Director John Sales about the security issue.

“Chief Brackney’s position is that in response to the security firm no longer being present, that they are being asked to increase police presence and this is coming on the heels of a lot of change but a loud community to not having cameras, not having police presence and now there is a request for that increase,” Walker said. “From a community that is asking to defund, where there is being a significant amount of resources being spent on increased patrol on the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday time frame right now.”

Charlottesville Police have stepped up patrols in the past few weeks to prevent additional shootings. Chief Brackney is seeking a letter from CRHA about the rules of engagement for future patrols in order to ensure everyone in the community is on the same page with regards to why officers are there.

“So that we could be clear that as we were being asked to increase our presence in the community, as we were being asked to use whatever tools and technologies that we have to be able to respond to the increase in violence in the community, as well as the fact that as of May 2, there was no security team or security profile there in the community,” Brackney said.

Chief Brackney said she wants the letter to guard against comments from the community about over-policing.

“So when there is a lot of presence, I want the community to understand that this is something the residents are asking for of us as well,” Brackney said.

Brackney said as of May 20, there had been 121 shootings in the city, with many of them taking place on or near CRHA properties. She said that’s up 51 percent over this time last year.

Shelby Edwards, the executive director of the Public Housing Association of Residents, said she was not certain her organization was ready to sign such a letter.

“And I love and appreciate the idea of uniformity as far as approach but what I think we always wonder as we continue to serve the community, if we sign a letter that says we co-signed, and to be clear to the public, we have not co-signed anything, there is no letter quite yet, I just wonder if anyone goes down on CPD’s watch, how would that look for us?”

Walker said she supported an agreement because it could set up better relations between police and the community into the future as people in positions of power change.

“In the past, police have just come into the community and policed how they want,” Walker said. “I think creating this kind of partnership, having it in writing also gives an example of what future policing looks like if its needed and hopefully we can prevent some of the harm by organization like CRHA and PHAR being able to say ‘hey, this is what we did in 2021 and we want to follow a model similar to that.’”

Goldblatt said if there is to be an increase in police presence at public housing sites, she wanted additional mental health services. Chief Brackney said she understood and hoped that police presence would not be required in the future.

“I would also wish that we should understand and appreciate that police presence isn’t the only things that are triggering events in our communities,” Brackney said. “It would seem to me that the reasons we’re getting called there should be triggering events for our communities as well. And I’m sure they are. I come from those communities and grew up in those communities.”

For the past four weekend, four officers have been dedicated overnight to sites Westhaven, South First Street and Sixth Street and there have been no shootings.

“Police presence does make a difference,” Brackney said. “We also know that police presence, people will find a different place to go, and they will find another pathway so we have to be careful that we don’t push it into another community or another area, but that we get to the root causes of it to start.”

CRHA Executive Director John Sales said in an email to me today that so far there is no letter, but one is in the works. Stay tuned and more from this CRHA meeting in an upcoming episode of this program.

Thanks for reading! If you’re new to the program, I’m Sean Tubbs and I’ve been writing about public policy of and on since I was a student at Virginia Tech. I’m producing this work as a way of helping members of my community better understand what’s happening in local and regional government, as well as the economy that fuels the area. My goal is to bring you information in a way that directs you to new information you may not yet have considered. Let me know if you have any questions!

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville officials press City Council for $7 million now for 7th Street Parking garage, but Council directs staff to take a pause on planning

Albemarle supervisors get an update on transportation projects

An update from the University of Virginia Health System on the ongoing pandemic.

As of midnight Friday, all COVID-19 restrictions in Virginia are lifted, more than two weeks before Governor Northam had originally announced that community health metrics were low enough to drop all of the rules that have been with us for months to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus. But the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System said no one should consider the pandemic over.

“COVID has not gone away completely,’” said Dr. Costi Sifri. “It is reduced. It is at some of the best levels we’ve seen in more than a year. But it’s still the case that we have patients being admitted at our hospital with COVID, that there is COVID being transmitted in the community. And we really cannot predict what will happen in a week or a month or three months.”

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports a seven-day average for new cases of 339. As of this morning, 44 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated.

Dr. Sifri said the restrictions can be lifted in part because of the trends.

“Vaccines are highly, highly effective,” Dr. Sifri said. “If you’re not vaccinated, nothing really changes. You should still be practicing the same precautions that you’ve been practicing.”

Many in the community may not feel comfortable with making the change back to a non-restricted world where masks are not required.

“In those situations I think it is understandable that people still want to wear a mask and we need to make sure that we with grace say that they can wear masks and feel comfortable doing that without judgement,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri stressed that the pandemic is not over.

“Please don’t go out and buy the book that talks about the history of the pandemic because its a story that is still being written,” Dr. Sifri said. “Only about four or five percent of the world’s population is vaccinated at this point so I think there’s a lot that will occur in the future. The virus isn’t done with us yet.”

Memorial Day Weekend is the traditional opening of outdoor pools and swimming areas. That’s that’s certainly the case in Charlottesville, where Washington Park is scheduled to open today as well as the spray grounds at Belmont Park, Greenleaf Park, and Tonsler Park. The Forest Hills spray park will open in June due to mechanical errors. However, today’s rain puts a damper on all of that.

Onesty Pool will remain closed due to staffing issues. However, swimming lakes run by Albemarle County will open later than usual. The season at Chris Greene Lake, Mint Springs, and Walnut Creek will begin on June 17.

At the height of the Great Recession earlier this century, Albemarle County froze many positions and slowed contributions to its capital improvement program. One job that was not filled for many years was transportation planning, but for the past few years, Albemarle has put together an organized list of potential projects to address road capacity issues as well as bike and pedestrian connections.

In July 2019, they adopted a priority list ranging from Hydraulic/29 Improvements at #1 to U.S. 250 West / Gillums Ridge Road Intersection Improvements at #89.

“That list provided all capital transportation projects that are recommended through the various county planning processes,” said Kevin McDermott , a chief of planning in Albemarle, in a May 19 to the Board of Supervisors. (review the update)

The list is intended to help planners identify funding sources for projects, such as the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale program as well as the county’s own capital improvement program.

“We have gotten 12 projects from that 2019 project list funded,” McDermott said.

Hydraulic 29 / Improvements, including a pedestrian bridge over U.S. 29 and a roundabout at Hillsdale and Hydraulic, are slated to be funded at $24 million by Commonwealth Transportation Board in June (#1)

U.S. Route 250 improvements to add median between Route 20 and Rolkin Road to receive $6 million in Smart Scale funding using $2 million in local funds (#2)

Route 20 / U.S. 250 intersection will be rebuilt using funding from 2018 Smart Scale round sometime in 2024 (#3)

Berkmar Drive will be extended further north to Lewis and Clark Drive, providing a continuous roadway to UVA North Fork Research Park. Funding came from VDOT’s revenue sharing program.

Further changes to Fontaine Avenue / U.S. 29 intersection including a shared-use path (#6)

A roundabout will be built at Old Lynchburg Road and 5th Street Extended with $5 million in VDOT funds and $2 million in Albemarle funds (#7)

A roundabout at Rio Road and the John Warner Parkway is recommended for $8 million funding in the current Smart Scale process and $2 million in Albemarle funds will be used (#15)

Bike and pedestrian improvements will be made on Old Lynchburg Road using Albemarle funds (#26)

A section of the Northtown Trail shared-use path will be built between Seminole Lane North and Carrsbrook Drive at a cost of $4 million (#35)

A greenway trail on Moores Creek and a trail hub at 5th Street Station will receive Smart Scale funds and has a total cost of $10 million (#40)

A park and ride lot will be constructed near Exit 107 and Crozet Park to serve Jaunt and the future Afton Express at a cost of $3 million (#82)

McDermott’s purpose for appearing before the supervisors was to get their preliminary support for the next round of transportation projects. At the top of a short list for this year’s cycle of VDOT revenue-sharing funds is the completion Eastern Avenue, a north-south roadway designed to increase connectivity and traffic circulation throughout Crozet.

“That project is currently being evaluated through an alignment study and conceptual design which the county has funded through our transportation leveraging project,” McDermott said. “We have just recently received the updated cost estimates from that consultant we have hired and their preliminary cost estimates are now at $19,983,000.”

That would require at least a $10 million match from county funds. However, if approved the state funding would not be available until 2027.

Another project on the list for potential revenue-sharing projects is one to build bike and pedestrian improvements on Mill Creek Drive to Peregory Lane, a top priority in a recent corridor study. That has a cost estimate of $2 million.

Applications for revenue-sharing projects are due this year. Next year Smart Scale projects will be due. Potential applications to be made next year include a roundabout at District Avenue and Hydraulic Road, a realignment of Hillsdale Drive, and a roundabout at the intersection of Belvedere Boulevard and Rio Road.

There’s plenty of time to get involved with these applications. Keep reading and stay tuned.

On Tuesday, May 25, City Council held a work session on two items related to transportation, though there was little in the materials presented to suggest the two are linked. The second item was on route changes for Charlottesville Area Transit, and we’ll come back to that in the next installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Would Council give staff permission to continue planning work on a proposed 300-space parking garage at the corner of East Market and 9th Street for which 90 spaces would be reserved for Albemarle County for their courts system. That’s codified in a December 2018 agreement between the two jurisdictions. (download the agreement) (staff report)

Here’s City Manager Chip Boyles.

“A previous Council had approved for the city to pursue building a parking structure as part of the MOA on the site of 7th Street and Market,” Boyles said. “We’ve been working on that and we’re here to discuss with you both that option as well as other options that perhaps meet more current needs and demands of the city and Council’s vision.”

Staff has been working off of a resolution adopted by Council in December 2019 to proceed with the plan, including the allocation of $1.28 million from a capital contingency account to cover the county’s share of the surface lot the two jurisdictions purchased in 2005 to support an eventual court expansion. (minutes from December 6, 2019 City Council meeting)

Alternatives in the MOA include selling that lot back to Albemarle, or providing 100 spaces in the Market Street Parking Garage. The deadline to provide any of these is November 30, 2023.

The city currently has a shortlist of three firms who would both design and build the structure.

“Those three are slightly on pause right now while we get through this meeting,” said Scott Hendrix, senior project manager for Charlottesville.

Each of the firms has submitted a request for qualifications at their own expense, and Hendrix said clarity from Council was needed. During development of the fiscal year 2022 budget, Council reduced the amount requested by staff from $8 million to $1 million, delaying the balance to FY2023. That would delay the project meaning it would not be complete in time for the November 2023 deadline.

Chris Engel, the city’s Economic Development Director, presented Council with a couple of alternatives to Council, both of which involve selling a share back to the surface lot back to Albemarle and only using the land paid $2.85 million for in January 2017. There are two commercial buildings on that lot whose tenants pay rent to Charlottesville.

Option 1B would be to build a smaller structure on the land with between 150 and 200 spaces, and Option 1C would be to just use the land for surface parking.

Engel said one of the city’s goals has been to continue to provide enough parking for visitors traveling downtown for either business or entertainment. For instance, he said 50 spaces under the Belmont Bridge will be lost after it is replaced.

Engel said Council will have to consider the future of the Market Street Parking garage, which he said is 46 years old.

“It’s about to have a structural reassessment as it does every five or seven years,” Engel said. “It’s probably in the city’s best interest to start thinking about what a plan for replacement looks like. Obviously having another facility nearby would help alleviate that when and if the day comes.”

The city owns the Market Street structure outright, whereas the Charlottesville Parking Center owns the Water Street Parking Garage. The city manages that structure, but leases the space to CPC. The two were involved in a series of lawsuits within the last decade. Albemarle County currently participates in the validation system for the two garages.

The most recently available official study of parking in Charlottesville is from 2015 when the firm Nelson Nygaard was hired to conduct a study of downtown parking. One recommendation was to create something called a Transportation Demand Management Plan. More specifically the idea was to create a “Transportation Management Association.” (read the study)

“A TMA can help to disseminate information about alternative commuting options, run events and campaigns to encourage workers to try alternate commutes, and develop tailored programs for both employers and employees that meet their needs,” reads page 68 of the study.

Councilor Michael Payne asked if a TDM program had been examined while plans for the proposed garage were penciled up.

“As a way to handle supposed parking demand issue throughout downtown throughout that strategy as opposed to purely meeting it through building new parking spaces or maximizing the amount of new parking spaces being built,” Payne said.

The Nelson Nygaard also suggested creating a parking department in city government. Rick Siebert was hired in 2017 to implement the Parking Action Plan and as well as a six-month pilot for on-street parking meters. He said TDM is not a magic solution.

“It is generally a very long-term solution and it requires a lot of comprehensive cooperation,” Siebert said. “If a lot of the people who work and visit downtown come from in the county or neighboring counties, then we need to work with those counties in working out mass transit options that are more attractive than driving your car or we have to work out park and ride lots that somehow are more attractive than driving to the Water Street or Market Street garages.”

A possible venue for that discussion would be the Regional Transit Partnership or the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization. As we’ll hear more tomorrow, Charlottesville Area Transit is looking to build park and ride lots.

Several members of the Parking Advisory Panel spoke. That group is divided. Joan Fenton wants more parking spaces downtown.

“If you look at the number of parking spots that have been lost downtown and will continue to be lost downtown, this is a neutral amount of parking spaces that are going to be added,” Fenton said.

However, Jamelle Bouie took an opposing view.

“When thinking about the necessity for additional parking, we really should be focused on whether or not there has been any demonstrated need for it,” Bouie said. “In the data the city collects and the 2015 parking study, both strongly suggest that with better parking management, there’s all the parking we need downtown. There’s no need for an additional structure.”

During their discussion, Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she did not think the full garage was necessary to meet the terms of the agreement. She suggested collecting new data post COVID to demonstrate how many people will no longer travel downtown to work.

“What is staff considering in terms of work from home and is there a possibility that to decrease the demand on parking, that that becomes part of our plan,” Walker said.

Walker pointed out that the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission already has a RideShare program in place for commuters. She also added that programs are in motion to reduce the number of people who go through the criminal justice system.

“If the city and county makes a commitment to keep their citizens out of the courtroom when it is possible, then that should also limit the impact on parking,” Walker said. “But I still think to cancel the project and not honor our parking needs with the county should not be an option.”

City Councilor Michael Payne said he felt the city could honor the agreement without building the garage, especially at a time when there are additional pressures on the Capital Improvement Program. He also wanted more data collected.

“You know we hear a lot about perceptions but I haven’t seen a lot of data to back up that there is a severe parking shortage,” Payne said.

Payne’s option would be to go with Option C combined with some form of transportation demand management.

Councilor Lloyd Snook spends a lot of time downtown as an attorney. Before COVID, he supported a new garage downtown to address long-term parking inventory. This spring, though, he supported delaying the $7 million in the budget to get new information on parking capacity with buildings like CODE, Apex Clean Energy, and the 3-Twenty-3 Building on 4th Street SE.

“You could reasonably expect to have something like a thousand more people coming to work in those buildings and apparently only about 500 parking spaces were being provided,” Snook said. “We can see that pre-COVID we were heading for a real problem with those places coming online. I decided a couple of months however that the changes from COVID were likely number one were significant right now, number two were likely to continue for at least a year or two or perhaps longer.”

Snook said the pause also comes at a time when the capital budget is under a crunch. He also said the 300-space garage may not be in the city’s long-term interests. He said he thought the city should take time to develop the garage with other uses on the same site.

“That particular spot, that particular lot, and that particular design don’t do very much for the way that I think that we want to be developing the city,” Snook said. “I’ve said before if we built that structure, we would probably look back ten years later and say ‘what we were thinking when we built only that parking garage?”

Councilor Heather Hill said she understood the concerns of her colleagues, but thought a garage would be needed sooner rather than later.

“The loss of the parking spaces is going to be real, especially for city employees and we have to figure out within the organization how we are going to accommodate our own employees and I think that’s going to have to be some creative thinking around how do we get our own employees into the downtown area without providing them with parking immediately adjacent to City Hall,” Hill said.

Perhaps a transportation demand management plan would be in order?

At the end of this event, Boyles said he heard direction to negotiate with Albemarle County on what new options they might be interested in to meet the needs of the agreement.

“The second thing if I’m hearing correctly is that we should cease the movement toward the 200 to 300 spot garage and pursue the option 1C with the surface parking so that is going along the same time frame as we’re discussing and presenting options to Albemarle County,” Boyles said.

Boyles said he will need a resolution to confirm that direction. That will happen at the June 7 meeting.

The surface lot would require demolition of the Lucky 7 and the Guadalajara. The city purchased the lot for $2.85 million in January 2017. With 38 spaces proposed, that’s $75,000 a space, before the costs of demolition are factored in.

In the next installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, we’ll hear about upcoming changes in coming up for Charlottesville Area Transit.

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In today’s edition:

A summary of a recent steering committee of the Cville Plans Together initiative

What do the three Democratic candidates for two party nominations think about the process to date?

The steering committee overseeing the Cville Plans Together initiative met on May 19 to take a mid-month review of the latest round of the public engagement efforts. To recap, Rhodeside & Harwell is overseeing an update of the city's Comprehensive Plan as well as a rewrite of the city's zoning code. They’ve already produced an affordable housing strategy that City Council adopted in March. (review the plan)

In February 2019, Council voted to approve spending up to $1 million to hire an outside consultant to take over oversight of the Comprehensive Plan. For background, read my story from then to explain the reasons behind the decision.

The work got underway in January 2020 and continued during the pandemic with virtual meetings. There were two previous community engagement periods last year in addition to the one underway now.

Jennifer Koch is a project manager with Rhodeside & Harwell.

"We fully recognize there are folks in the community who may not have been aware of this process that was going," Koch said. "We've been working hard to reach folks but it's been quite a year... We've been doing a lot of virtual engagement for the past year and we don't anticipate that will completely go away as we move forward but we also know it's really nice to speak with people in person."

First, members of the steering committee had the opportunity to weigh in. One of them is City Councilor Michael Payne, who will be one of five votes to adopt the Comprehensive Plan and the updated zoning code sometime next year. At this stage, he wanted to suggest a change in the title of one of the draft chapters.

"With the Economic Prosperity and Opportunity [chapter], I know it mentions community wealth building in the update but I still wonder if it may make more sense for the chapter itself to be focused on community wealth building, again to try to gear that chapter towards more system change thinking about things like community land trusts, community development corporations, [and] community gardens all interconnect as a system for wealth creation that's different than the normal way of doing economic development," Payne said.

Christine Jacobs, the interim executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, applauded language about regional partnerships. However, she wanted her organization to be more specifically referenced given the number of bodies it runs on which Charlottesville City Councilors serve.

"The TJPDC does have the Charlottesville-Albemarle MPO," Jacobs said. "It also has the Regional Transit Partnership and the Regional Housing Partnership."

Diana Dale represents the leaders of neighborhood associations in the city, some of which have expressed concern about too much density. She drew attention to the chapter on Land Use, Urban Form, and Historic and Cultural Preservation.

"And I'm thinking in particular of goal two," Dale said, reading from the chapter summary. "Protect and enhance existing distinct identitiess of the city's older neighborhoods while promoting housing options, a mix of uses, and sustainble reuses in the community."

Dale said some residents of neighborhoods are concerned that some of their portions have been changed from low-intensity to medium-intensity, such as most of the Lewis Mountain neighborhood and some of the Martha Jefferson neighborhood. That could allow between four to 12 units per lot, but that will remain unclear until it is time to rewrite the zoning code.

“What is aspirational? And what is actually codifiable?” Dale asked.

The zoning rewrite will be conducted by the firm Code Studio, a subcontractor whose work will be informed by the affordable housing plan and the Future Land Use Map.

“I’m not certain that we have a whole lot of the answers,” said Lee Einsweiler of Code Studio. “We were hoping we could work through things at the more generalized level of the Future Land Use Map and then begin to craft strategies for implementing those tools.”

Einsweiler said that each category on the future land use map will not be represented by a single zoning district.

“There would be two, three, four implementing zoning districts that might all have appropriate strategies for different types of the community but those can’t quite be figured out until we can understand where they are likely to be applied,” said Lee Einsweiler.

Dale remained concerned.

“The vagueness is not helping people’s confidence in the plan,” Dale said.

Dale also expressed concern about the impacts of a more people on the existing infrastructure. She said roads might need to be widened to accommodate additional traffic, and stated the city has issues delivering on infrastructure projects such as frequent buses and a consistent bike and sidewalk network.

“The guidance is recommending multimodal strategies, and that’s going to take time and funding to implement and that’s been a long struggle for a lot of improvements over time for those of who have been in the city,” Dale said.

There are 19 neighborhoods across the city, and the 2007 Comprehensive Plan contains an entire appendix of specific requests from neighborhoods that came from a city-wide design day arranged by a now-defunct non-profit called the Charlottesville Community Design Center. That approach was abandoned for the 2013 Comprehensive Plan and the 2017 process did not seek a thorough capturing of what residents of neighborhoods wanted.

Ashley Davies, who represents the Charlottesville Area Development Roundtable on the steering committee, suggested an approach that built upon previous efforts to plan at a neighborhood level.

“I think people are hungry to give you feedback that is more specific to their area and I think it’s a shame that we can’t have the time right now to do the small area planning because I think that’s what a lot of people want to inform the land use plan,” Davies said.

There’s a lot of discussion of what role the Future Land Use Map plays. Is it advisory? If so, what does that mean? Ron Sessoms is with Rhodeside and Harwell.

“The future land use map is a critical component of a Comprehensive Plan and sets the stage for the city’s long-term vision of how it’s going to grow,” said Ron Sessoms of Rhodeside & Harwell (RHI). “You can think of this as the 10,000 foot view of the city and defining where there are opportunities for growth.”

Sessoms said the land use map is a guide for development, but is not binding like zoning.

“As we think about the future land use map, it’s much more broad and the zoning code is much more detailed with specifics of what it means to fulfil the future land use map,” Sessoms said.

The medium intensity residential category is new with this comp plan update, and encourages construction between four and 12 units per lot. Sessoms said that did not have to be out of scale with existing buildings.

“They can be integrated into the fabric of a neighborhood,” Sessoms said. “They don’t have to be five stories to get fourplexes or any of the medium intensity development types.”

Ashley Davies said she liked that the future land use map begins a process of reducing the amount of areas colored as low-intensity residential, but thought there should be some sense of what types of housing units are prioritized.

“It seems to me the strategy for adding units in the city and adding residential, maybe we need to talk about the hierarchy of that can truly happen in Charlottesville,” Davies said.

Dale said the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood Association’s Board of Directors supports soft density by adding accessory units and permitting apartments within structures. But they don’t support being colored as medium intensity.

“Is there an opportunity to merge the ambitions of transforming Charlottesville to general residential, which is a big step to begin with, and to merge some of the intentions of the medium intensity?” Dale asked. “I recognize this may happen as you move to more strata, more levels of medium density.”

This draft also includes a name change for Low Density Residential to General Residential, which recommends up to three units per lot.

Lena Seville, a Belmont resident who is on the steering committee, wanted to know why General Residential didn’t recommend allowing four units per lot.

“There are plenty of little houses that are split into four,” Seville said. “At two stories, it’s four apartments. They’re easier to build. They mirror each other. They have the same footprint.”

Much of what is happening in Charlottesville is patterned off an effort in Minneapolis, where their City Council voted to permit duplexes and triplexes in all R-1 areas. Here’s Lee Einsweiler with Code Studio again.

“You may have followed the exercise in Minneapolis in which they began talking about four but ended up adopting three,” Einsweiler said. “Part of the conversation was about the likelihood that the existing house would be replaced as opposed to split. The three is most likely an additional building on the property and a main unit carved out of the main house.”

At the meeting, some members expressed concern about a perceived lack of engagement. Valerie Washington represents the Charlottesville Low Income Housing Coalition.

“While this process has been going on for a while now there are still many folks in the community that I’ve spoken to who have no idea about this process,” Washington said. “Is there any plan to really put some education out there for folks who are having difficulty understanding the planning process so they can better participate?”

LaToya Thomas of the firm Brick and Story acknowledges that many people are not knowledgeable in planning issues, but the Cville Plans Together initiative wants to educate more people especially as the pandemic recedes.

“We are reaching out to as many people that we can get connected to, but we also know that many of you are connected to folks and so we will continue to make ourselves available if there are groups of folks that you want to convene,” Thomas said.

Dale suggested a pause while people get caught up on the planning process. That would give people the chance to read the many recommendations in the affordable housing plan adopted by Council in March.

“Most of the community doesn’t really understand how it informs the plan,” Dale said. “It was previewed with the public last fall when everyone had their head down dealing with Zoom school and Zoom work and health care and everything else. It was a 100-year health event.”

S. Lisa Herndon is a Realtor on the steering committee who wants to see a map that depicts where redlining occurred which overlays areas proposed for more intense development.

“Going back to the history of Vinegar Hill and Gospel Hill, there [are] communities that were negatively impacted and now we’re going through redevelopment again and we see a lack of equity in terms of participation and I see nothing within this which shows where we were and how we’re going to prevent that negative effect in communities of African-American historical context,” Hernson said. “I don’t see that.”

Sunshine Mathon, executive director of the Piedmont Housing Alliance, said he has been through this process in other communities where he has worked. He reminded people the intent of the initiative is to guide change.

“One of the things that gets lost in the translation is that change is constant and people have this assumption that their neighborhoods are a thing and have always been that thing which is fundamentally not true,” Mathon said. “One of the changes that we are seeing across the city regardless of the form of the city, one of the real changes is a dramatic increase in the cost of living in the city. That’s a fundamental change. The plan itself can’t be the change that solves that on its own, but it is an ingredient in that tool set.”

Comments will be accepted through June 13 now that a two-week extension has been granted. The Planning Commission is expected to have a work session on June 29.

You’re reading to Charlottesville Community Engagement and time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. It’s becoming more and more safe to go out and check out live music. If you’re interested in going out and hearing people who have been waiting to get out and play, check out the Charlottesville Jazz Society and their running list of events! The Charlottesville Jazz Society is dedicated to the promotion, preservation and perpetuation of all jazz, and that the best thing you can do now is to go check out some music.

Last week, the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood Association held a candidate forum for the three Democratic candidates running for two party nominations. The Future Land Use Map and the Comprehensive Plan came up. Moderator Paul Miller asked this question:

“Charlottesville is currently undergoing a significant update in Comprehensive land use plan and zoning in decades,” Miller said. “Proposals significantly change the approach to residential areas, eliminating single-family lot zoning and replacing it with three new categories that allow increasing densities of multifamily through subdivision, infill and redevelopment. A significant section of the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood may undergo significant change. Since the vote on these proposals will occur under the next City Council, we hope you have been paying attention. What do you think of the public engagement process that has been conducted under the pandemic? What do you think about these new approaches to residential areas to address housing and affordability issues?”

Juandiego Wade went first. To hear the full response, listen to the podcast version. The following text are just highlights.

“We know that single lot zoning was established as an exclusionary type of zoning many, many, many years ago and we’re dealing with that today,” Wade said. “As a Councilor, I would have a more engaged public input process because I had input on the last process but it was virtual and I think this was as engaged as it should be.”

“Maybe we need to look at some type of rezoning but I think there’s so much more we can do before we touch that third rail,” Wade added. “Like work with the University of Virginia to address affordable housing and that is something that they are doing. Work with places like Habitat for Humanity and [Albemarle Home Improvement Program] to address that. But more importantly, also get the localities to address affordable housing. Right now Charlottesville is the main player in the game putting in $6 million or $7 million in and I think the place I work for, Albemarle County, is putting in barely $1 million in. We need to get other players as well and I think that would alleviate some of the burden on Charlottesville.”

Next, Carl Brown but did not seem to directly address the Cville Plans Together initiative in his response.

“The Realtor’s association is a big player in this that we haven’t included and haven’t been included for a long-time in terms of how we solve this problem,” Brown said. “There are a lot of individuals in this area but we don’t bring them all together.

(S. Lisa Herndon represents the Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors on the steering committee. Here is a link to the full list of members.)

Brian Pinkston went next.

“Two year ago we were all talking about having a plan for affordable housing when I ran and by golly if they didn’t go out what I think is a decent consultant,” Pinkston said. “I feel like the affordable housing plan… is a strong good plan. The density is one component of it, but only one component of it. There’s a whole lot of other stuff that’s included that plan.”

“I largely agree with the sentiments of the folks on the Planning Commission that are really working with the consultant to have higher density,” Pinkston said. “I think we need to think closely about what increased density looks like and how we can operationalize that as opposed to just talking about it. My sense in looking at the map and the conversations I’ve had is that it is a tad too aggressive. I don’t think we’re ready for that. Having said that, I think we’re ready for something. We’re ready for accessory dwelling units. We’re ready for soft density. I do think we need to put out money where our moral mouth is in terms of creating affordability and part of that is going to be a denser city.”

Pinkston said the real details will come in with the zoning ordinance.

What do you think? Have you made your comment?

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville Mayor Walker will seek a second term on Council following soul searching

Three Democrats seeking two party nominations answer questions from the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood

In February 2020, Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker declared she would seek a second term back, but has so far not participated in any of the candidate forums that have been open to all candidates. Earlier this week, Walker said she would decide on whether to run by the end of the week. On Friday, she once again took to Facebook Live to tell her followers that City Council has always been fractious.

“But of course when you put a Black woman at the center of this, and a Black woman who is really unafraid to kind of be on the frontlines of a battle by herself, that has really changed the lengths of what people are willing to go to attempt to destroy me,” Walker said.

Walker said she has felt under attack her entire time on Council, but has been ready to do the work. She ran as an independent in 2017 and was the top vote-getter in a race for two seats with 7,906 votes.

The person who came in second that year, Heather Hill, opted not to run for re-election. That makes Walker the first incumbent to seek re-election since Kathy Galvin in 2015.

Walker said will run again in order to carry on her fight against racism, despite the toll public service has taken on her.

“I’m not choosing me, even though I’m exhausted, my hair is turning gray, someone asked me last night ‘what is your body is telling you?’, and my body is telling me that you all will destroy me,” Walker said. ”But then there’s a flip side to all of the people who I talk to when I see them randomly who say ‘I’m a little more comfortable in this world’ because I get to watch you in it.’”

Walker will be on the ballot with fellow independent Yas Washington. Washington had campaigned as a Democrat but failed the qualify for the ballot in the June 8 primary.

Three other Democrats did qualify, and they met on Thursday at a campaign forum held by the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood Association. UVA Project Manager Brian Pinkston and Locust Grove resident went first when it was time to give speeches. Pinkston ran for the Democratic nomination in 2019 and placed fourth.

“The reason I’m running for Council is simply because I think I have something to offer,” Pinkston said. “I feel like my professional background and my personal temperament and just the desire to see good things happen for the city are such that I have something to contribute.”

Pinkston said he is a good listener who can work toward compromise. He said he would work to implement the affordable housing plan adopted by Council in March, which includes an annual $10 million in projects to bring the cost of housing below market. Pinkston also supports the reconfiguration of the city’s middle schools and reopening the search for a new city manager next year.

“We’ve been really fortunate to have Chip Boyles in the position now but we’re going to have to recruit for that position so I want that process to be open [and] transparent,” Pinkston said.

Carl Brown is a native Charlottesville resident whose grandfather C.H. Brown was a builder back in the 1960’s.

“My grandfather was a stable in helping the first housing crisis that they had back in the 60’s when they were transferring from Vinegar Hill to Westhaven so my grandfather was able to be creative and create cinderblock homes in the 12th Street area for low-income housing so I have some ideas about community service and work and what needs to be done at the ground level,” Brown said.

Brown said he is a team player and cited experience playing sports at Charlottesville High School. He said he has been working behind the scenes for nearly 30 years on legal and housing issues.

“I run my own consultant business and so I do management development consulting and I still work with the reentry population, the schools, just getting kids to have a vision of their own success,” Brown said.

Juandiego Wade came to Charlottesville to get a master’s in urban and environmental planning at the University of Virginia. He met his wife and opted to settle here. He’ll finish sixteen years on the Charlottesville School Board at the end of 2021. Wade said Charlottesville is a diverse community, based on who is being educated now.

“Fifty-one languages are spoken at Charlottesville High School and so it represents our community,” Wade said. “I had the vision to serve Charlottesville last year when the shutdown happened. I recall it vividly last March, the second week of the shutdown. I was walking through the 10th and Page neighborhood and I I knew I wasn’t going to serve on the school board again but I wanted to continue to serve the city.”

Topics covered at the forum include whether there’s been enough Comprehensive Plan, increasing the amount of subsidized housing units, and what recent decisions by Council they did not agree with.

On the latter point, Carl Brown said the city should have been more strategic in pursuing removal of Confederate statues by changing the legislation at the General Assembly rather than being drawn into an expensive legal process.

“Now the state has now said that [we] can do it and so we wasted a lot of money in litigation,” Brown said.

Wade said he disagreed with Council’s decision in 2013 to study the possibility of replacing the Belmont Bridge with a tunnel under the railroad tracks.

“And I think that we’ve finally come to a resolution but i think we need all our digits to count the number of studies they’ve done on that over the last years,” Wade said.

Last week, Council voted to use an additional $4.28 million in bridge repair funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation to bridge a shortfall between the lowest bid and the project budget of $31 million. That $31 million includes $7.5 million in capital improvement funds to help pay for the years of design work.

Pinkston did not single out one issue, but said there is a missing dynamic among the five people elected to make decisions for Charlottesville.

“For whatever reason, this past Council and the Council before that, recent Councils have just struggled to work as a team.” Pinkston said.

The final joint candidate event before the June 8 primary will be held virtually on May 27 and will be hosted by Neil Williamson of the Free Enterprise Forum and myself. Register here to attend!

Other campaign forums so far this season:

Audio and written summary of the March 11, 2021 Fry’s Spring Neighborhood forum

Candidate forum on the I Love Cville show from April 6, 2021 (includes Yas Washington)

May 12, 2021 candidate forum hosted by Public Housing Association of Residents, Charlottesville Low-Income Housing Coalition, and the People’s Coalition (includes Yas Washington)

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On today’s show, a lot of catching up on older items in Albemarle:

The Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee considers a neighborhood proposal much less dense than it had been

The Places-29 North Community Advisory Committee does the same thing

City Manager Chip Boyles continues to fill key positions

Three months after becoming city manager, much of Chip Boyles’s leadership team is in place. This week, Boyles announced the hiring of Sam Sanders as Deputy City Manager of Operations. For the past 15 years, Sanders has been the executive director of the Mid City Redevelopment Alliance near Baton Rouge.

“He’ll be bringing some extensive knowledge in the areas of affordable housing, community development, as well as small business development,” Boyles said.

Sanders begins work on July 12. Among other things, he’ll oversee the Departments of Neighborhood Development Services, Parks and Recreation, and Public Works.

Ashley Marshall began work as the Deputy City Manager of Racial Equity, Diversity and Inclusion on May 10. Among other things, the position oversees the Office of Human Rights and the Police Civilian Review Board, as well as the Human Services Department.

Earlier this month, Lisa Robertson was named as City Attorney, removing the acting in front of the position. Robertson served as deputy city attorney from 1994 to 2006 when she became administrator of Madison County. She returned to Charlottesville in 2013 to once again be deputy. How she’s the first woman to hold the position. City Councilor Lloyd Snook offered some words shortly before her appointment was confirmed by Council on May 3.

“Anybody who has seen Lisa in action over the last couple of years in particular on all of the statue litigation cannot help but be impressed and cannot help but recognize that we have someone already here and already known to us who is an excellent city attorney and will be an excellent city attorney,” Snook said.

The Fitch Ratings agency has downgraded the creditworthiness of the company that owns Fashion Square Mall in Albemarle County. The Washington Prime Group is now listed as RD, for “restricted default” from C which brings it one step above default. Washington Prime missed an interest payment in February, triggering speculation the company will enter bankruptcy.

“Fitch believes that the only resolution of the company's capital structure is through a near-term restructuring event or a potential bankruptcy filing,” reads a news release.

The former J.C. Penney has been the site of a mass vaccination center operated by the Blue Ridge Health District, but that use will stop by the end of June according to the Daily Progress.

At the May 10, 2021 meeting of the Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee, Southern Development held a community meeting for a reduced version of their Breezy Hill development in eastern Albemarle along U.S. 250. The property is within a growth area and had been since December 1989. At the time, the expected density was 1.3 units per acres but that increased to three to six units in the 1996 Comprehensive Plan. Since then, many nearby residents have spoken out against any rezonings at that higher level. (watch the meeting on YouTube)

Last summer, Breezy Hill was a proposal for 160 units on about 84 acres. The Planning Commission recommended denial of that proposal last July, followed by another denial in November when the project was reduced further to 130. Charlie Armstrong described the proposal to committee members on May 10.

“We are proposing R-1 zoning for this property,” Armstrong said. “It’s the lowest conventional district that Albemarle has in its zoning ordinance.”

Armstrong said they will add a maximum residential density of 80 lots before the plan goes to the Albemarle Planning Commission.

Members of the committee wanted Armstrong to remove a proposed road that leads to Running Deer Road or to depict it as emergency access only. VDOT required a second entrance to planned subdivisions that have more than fifty units.

“Running Deer is not really a road within the development area,” said Dennis Odinov. “Half of it is and half of it isn’t. And so we’re saying there should be an exception there.”

Armstong said he would consider making a request for an exemption from VDOT, but that county staff favor the road and it is called for in the Village of Rivanna Master Plan.

The next step for the reduced proposal is for the Albemarle Planning Commission at some point in the near future.

Later that week, the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee got a first look at a second submittal of the RST Residences, an apartment and townhome complex proposed at the site of a recently closed mobile home adjacent to the Forest Lakes neighborhood. On March 2, the Forest Lakes Community Association dominated the project’s public hearing before the Albemarle Planning Commission, which resulted in a deferral. (read or hear that story)

Andy Reitelbach is an Albemarle County planner who reminded the Places-29 North that the RST project is intended to be on about 19 acres of land.

“The applicant is requesting that the property be rezoned from its current zoning of R-1 Residential which allows one dwelling unit per acre to Planned Residential Development which allows for up to 34 dwelling units per acre,” Reitelbach said. “And in the Places29 Master Plan, this property is designated as Urban Density Residential and privately owned open space. Most is Urban Density Residential and then there is a narrow strip along 29 that is the open space.”

Valerie Long is an attorney with Williams Mullen who said the project has the same basic alignment of the original plan but there are changes.

“The number of total dwelling units has been reduced from 370 to 340 units,” Long said.

One building closed to the Ashwood subdivision has had a story removed in order to fit in closer with their scale.

“We also have enhanced buffers and screening on the site,” Long said. “It was always the attention to retain the berm along Ashwood Boulevard but we recognized after the Planning Commission meeting that we could have highlighted that [more].”

Long said the plans now clearly state that the affordability goals will exceed the county’s current requirements for some units to be made available at below-market rates. That currently means that 15 percent of units must be rented or sold to households with annual incomes of 80 percent the area median income.

“Seventy-five percent of the apartment units within the project will be affordable for a 30 year period,” Long said. “The average level of affordability would be to those making 60 percent of the area median income.”

Members of the CAC had the opportunity to ask questions about the project. You can watch all of that on the Albemarle County YouTube page. The next public hearing for the Planning Commission is scheduled for June 15.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council gets an update on city finances and how cost overruns for an infamously planned piece of Belmont infrastructure will be bridged

The Commonwealth Transportation Board hears about items in Louisa County and Nelson County

And the Board of Equalization spent all day hearing appeals of property assessments, but not one for the Omni Hotel

There are only about six weeks left in the current fiscal year and there’s no change in the projected $8.35 million shortfall between what the city will spend and what revenues will come. Senior Budget Analyst Ryan Davidson told City Council yesterday that staff don’t think it will get worse and they are no longer considering a worst case scenario.

“Based upon the current conditions and what we’re seeing in terms of revenues, things are trending in a positive direction,” Davidson said. “We’ve removed that further downturn scenario as it seems very unlikely at this point that we would revert back to the worst case scenario.”

Davidson said sales and lodging revenues are still volatile, but things are trending in the right direction.

“Receipts collected for January, February, and March were much better compared to prior months and therefore based on those new receipts we have increased those projections in our last revision,” Davidson said. “And in this past month, our collections again have slightly exceeded our projections.”

How to close the shortfall? Davidson said the city has not yet tapped into the $6.7 million COVID reserve fund it set aside in the current fiscal year, and the shortfall does not include use of a surplus from fiscal year 2019 or department savings in the current. But, there’s no rush to balance the books until after the fiscal year has ended.

“We know those figures around November, December, January time frame towards the end of the year, and we’re currently working to come up with some estimates but nothing can be finalized until later in the year and we’ll be discussing that with Council as we move through the year,” Davidson said.

After that financial report, the executive director of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority had an update on a program approved by Council in fiscal year 2018 to provide additional funding for rental assistance. The program is known as the Charlottesville Supplemental Rental Assistance Program and allows CRHA to issue more vouchers to households who have incomes less than 60 percent of the area median income. (Sales’ report)

“We currently have 70 families that are enrolled in the program and two of those families are searching for homes in the city of Charlottesville and 68 of them are already housed,” said John Sales. “With 36 of them living in the city of Charlottesville and 32 living in the county but working in the city.”

Sales said 58 percent of the recipients have incomes below 30 percent of the area median income.

“A majority of those families are working, so they are working but just not earning enough wages to pay for their housing,” Sales said.

There are 122 families on the waitlist for the program. Sales said no new families were processed in 2020 due to the pandemic. Because many participating families lost income during the shutdown, Sales said CRHA has been paying larger amounts to landlords.

“There were a lot of increases in what CRHA’s obligation was,” Sales said.

Sales said one policy consideration going forward is whether there should be a time limit on the assistance to make sure more people can take part in the program.

“There aren’t any guidelines on how long someone can be assisted in the program, but without adding a whole lot of new funding, you’re always going to be assisting the same families,” Sales said.

Sales said another conversation that needs to happen is related to fair market rents. He said the CSRAP program is capped at paying no more than 110 percent of fair market rent. The fair market rent for a three bedroom unit in the Charlottesville MSA is $1,575 a month.

“That really limits where individuals can rent in the city to where they have to go to the county and normally they are in the same communities,” Sales said. “In the HCV program, we probably have 40 or 50 families in one housing community just because that is typically a low-rent community. And it’s like that in most of the communities so if we really want to put members, low-income individuals, in all sectors of the community, we really need to do some work around the fair market rents.”

Sales recommend increasing the maximum fair market rate to 125 percent for Charlottesville properties and decreasing the amount for Albemarle to 100 percent. Later on in the meeting, Council adopted a new agreement to govern the program that made those changes. They did not reach conclusion on whether CSRAP funding should be used to help cover the cost of security deposits. A second program for that function was authorized by a previous Council but has not yet been implemented by city staff. Vice Mayor Sena Magill expressed interest.

“I do think it’s really important that we are looking for security deposit help,” Magill said. “I know when I worked at Region 10, that was always probably the hardest thing to try to find was security deposits for people.”

But the main event at Council’s meeting was direction to proceed with a plan to use millions of funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation to cover another cost overrun for the long-planned Belmont Bridge replacement. The project was put out for construction bids in February with a $31 million cost estimate. According to the city’s Urban Construction Initiative manager Jeanette Janiczek, that wasn’t enough money.

“The lowest responsive, responsible bid can be awarded with existing project funds, however there is a need for additional funding, $4.2 million, to cover contingency, construction inspection services, VDOT oversight, as well as utility relocation,” Janiczek said.

VDOT has suggested adding funds from its bridge maintenance account, something referred to as State of Good Repair. Janiczek said possible reasons for the higher estimate include inflation, increases in material costs, and potential issues related to the pandemic.

Janiczek said one choice would have been to remove items from the project, such as a pedestrian tunnel on the southern end.

“Any of these options would result in us having to rebid the project,” Janiczek said. “This adds at least a year in time but most importantly it doesn’t fulfil the commitments we’ve made to the public as well as the Board of Architectural Review.”

Janiczek if the appropriation of the VDOT goes forward in June, construction could begin this summer. Another public meeting will be held when the contractor is hired to explain how traffic will continue to use the bridge during construction.

“So once they submit their baseline schedule, we’ll release that to the public and let people know what to expect during construction,” Janiczek said.

Asked by Council if the project costs could increase, Janiczek said many of the prices for materials would be locked in as soon as the construction contract begins.

City Manager Chip Boyles said he thought construction costs would increase as the federal government prepares to make billions of investments in infrastructure projects. That’s why he r

“If this project is delayed, we’re already seeing very substantial inflationary projections into the near future,” Boyles said. “If President Biden’s infrastructure package that is in Congress is approved, you will see multiple fold of capital projects underway. If this had to be rebid, I would say that we would end up with less product and at least the same amount or more of the cost.”

The second reading of the appropriation will be on the consent agenda for Council’s June 7 meeting. They’ll next meet on May 25 to have a work session on the 7th Street Parking garage followed by a May 26 joint meeting with the city School Board on the reconfiguration of the city’s middle schools.

Council adjourned their meeting before 8 p.m. something that newcomers to city government should never ever expect.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and it’s time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement.

This spring, the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership is holding a speaker series to illustrate various topics related to affordability. This time around, the guests discuss the role that transportation costs factor into household budgets. They are: Todd Littman of the Victoria Policy Institute; Steven Johnson, Planning Manager for Jaunt; Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel, chair of the Regional Transit Partnership. The event begins at noon. (register)

The Commonwealth Transportation Board met all over the state today in what might be their last all-virtual meeting. Items at the meeting today included a discussion of an economic development project to pay for design of road improvements to support the Shannon Hill Regional Business Park in Louisa County. The funding would come from something called a Major Employment and Investment grant. Russell Dudley is with VDOT’s local assistance division.

“It is a project that supports a facility that is expected to generate $250 million of capital investment and create more than 400 full-time jobs,” Dudley said.

The Shannon Hill Regional Business Park is about half a mile from Louisa’s border with Goochland County and three-quarters of a mile from I-64.

“The business park totals 700 acres and design plans call for an 8,000 feet of roadway improvements along Route 605 with improvements to begin at the I-64 westbound ramp and end at the northern end of the business park,” Dudley said.

The current funding is to cover some of the cost of design of the project. Dudley said there is an “undisclosed business” that Louisa County is working to be a major tenant of the park.

Allison DeTuncq, the Culpeper District representative on the CTB, said she supported the project.

“I think it’s a great opportunity for Louisa County and the surrounding areas,” DeTuncq said.

The CTB also agreed to cancel a funded Smart Scale project in Nelson County. There had been a plan to create a Restricted Crossing U-Turn at the intersection of U.S. 29 and Virginia Route 6 north of Lovingston. Kimberly Pryor is VDOT’s director of infrastructure investment.

“This project was submitted by Nelson County in round 3 of Smart Scale,” Pryor said. “The total original project was $2.7 million.”

A separate project to address safety through less expensive means has been installed in the meantime.

“They installed some traffic-activated flashing beacons, they improved the pavement markings, and also installed some signage improvements,” Pryor said. “Since completion of that project there’s been significant improvements in the safety issues. There’s been a significant decrease in accidents. Total crashes and angle crashes have been reduced by about 50 percent.”

As a result, staff are recommending not proceeding with the project and the Nelson Board of Supervisors endorsed the idea in April. The funding will go back into the pool for other Smart Scale projects.

Finally today, the Board of Equalization met for their annual meeting to hear appeals of property assessments. Fifteen different requests from property owners went before the BOE, and before the first item began, board members discussed various items. Members are appointed by the Circuit Court to serve as independent arbiters of property assessments.

As reported in the Daily Progress in April, The Omni Hotel has filed a lawsuit against the city of Charlottesville for the 2020 assessment of $46.5 million for the land and structure, but have not challenged the 2021 assessment of $34.84 million according to city assessor Jeffrey Davis.

“They were comfortable for the values that we had assigned this year so they did not go to the Board,” Davis said.

Overall, total property assessments were up by 2.3 percent on 2021, with residential properties increasing an average of 4.3 percent and commercial properties decreasing by 0.19 percent.

“I think everybody was probably expecting a reduction rather than going in the other direction,” Davis said. “And it is absolutely crazy this year, I tell you so far it’s been, you all know I’m sure. You see it every day.”

However, Davis said the market could change as conditions change. I will have more from this meeting in a future installment.

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On today’s show:

Consultants with the Cville Plans Together consultants explain more about the land use policy reform they’re overseeing

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker will make a decision running this year by Friday

Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau launches new campaign to attract Black tourists to the area

There are four declared candidates in the race for two seats on Charlottesville City Council, and none of them are incumbents. Mayor Nikuyah Walker announced her reelection campaign in February of 2020 and took to Facebook Live today to say she will decide by Friday whether to go through with her candidacy. In her comments, she cited a series of deaths in her family as one reason why she has not been campaigning yet. In mourning, she’s realized how much public service has taken from her life.

“It consumes every day all of my time,” Walker said. “It has been very difficult to serve in Charlottesville.” (watch the video)

Walker said she had heard from former City Councilor Holly Edwards as well as Councilor Wes Bellamy that being a Black person in office was difficult.

“They didn’t come blazing the way I’ve been blazing,” Walker said. “It was still a challenge for them. One thing I’ve learned is that really no matter who you are, if you’re Black and female, or just Black, people don’t want to listen to you.”

Walker said if she doesn’t run, she will continue to hold people accountable. If Walker does run she will be on the ballot as an independent as she was in 2017 when she became the first non-party affiliated candidate to win election since 1948. She’ll be on the ballot with fellow independent. Yas Washington, who did not qualify for the Democratic Primary on June 8. In that race, three candidates are seeking two nominations. The candidates are School Board member Juandiego Wade, 2019 candidate Brian Pinkston, and political newcomer Carl E. Brown.

Last week, the Public Housing Association of Residents and two other organizations held a campaign forum for all declared candidates in which Walker did not participate. (watch the event on YouTube)

On Thursday, the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood Association will hold a forum beginning at 7 p.m., and I’ll hold a joint forum with the Free Enterprise Forum on May 27, also at 7 p.m.

The quasi-governmental organization that seeks to attract tourists to Albemarle and Charlottesville has formally begun a campaign to bring people to the area to learn about Black stories. The Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau has launched Discover Black Cville across social media and other channels, including Facebook and Instagram. According to a press release, the initiative is the result of nine months of meetings with dozens of community members

“Discover Black Cville marks the beginning of ongoing efforts to tell modern, historically accurate, and inclusive Black stories in Charlottesville and Albemarle County,” reads the release. “These efforts will be guided by a steering committee of engaged community members

highlighting the arts, outdoor recreation, local food and beverage, thriving culture, and strong community.”

The goals of Discover Black Cville are to support Black-owned businesses while attracting more Black visitors to the community, and to change “the view of Charlottesville in the national perspective while simultaneously working toward real change.”

More on the campaign is available on the CACVB website.

There are two weeks left to get in your input for the current round of community engagement for the Cville Plans Together initiative. To recap, that’s a project commissioned by a former City Council in 2019 to oversee creation of an affordable housing plan, the update of the Comprehensive Plan, and a rewriting of the zoning code.

Council adopted the affordable housing plan in March, and the public is being asked now to comment on something called the Future Land Use Map as well as draft chapters of the Comprehensive Plan. This is all a precursor to an update of the zoning code.

Last week, staff with Rhodeside & Harwell held the first of two webinars to update the latest changes. I wrote up a summary of a March 30, 2021 Planning Commission work session with the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan as well as a preview of the May 10, 2021 webinar. Jennifer Koch is a project manager with the company. (watch the May 10 webinar)

“The Comprehensive Plan is a document that describes and illustrates community goals for the future and guides decision-making for various matters including land use and development, transportation, economic development, etcetera,” Koch said. “Once this document is adopted, it is a statement of the city’s intentions and policies regarding development.”

Once adopted, Rhodeside & Harwell will get to work on the next phase.

“In order for the land use and design policies and guidelines to be truly effective, they must be reflected in the zoning ordinance,” Koch said. “That’s why after the Comprehensive Plan update process, we’re going to be moving forward to the zoning rewrite.”

But until then, May is a time for community engagement. The next scheduled meeting with the Planning Commission is slated for late June. The May 10 webinar and a series of pop-up community engagement exercises are intended to educate people before they submit comment in several ways:

Complete the survey

Leave comments on the Future Land Use Map

Send an email to engage@cvilleplanstogether.com

Call 1-833-752-6428

There is one consolidated chapter called Land Use, Urban Form, and Historic and Cultural Preservation. Many of its goals and strategies are taken from the affordable housing plan adopted by Council in March. That plan has influenced other chapters, too.

“With the housing chapter, we pulled in a lot of the recommendations from the affordable housing plan,” Koch said. “Actually, all of the recommendations from the affordable housing plan are within the Comprehensive Plan draft and that includes everything from the land use recommendations to the funding, governance, tenants rights, and subsidy recommendations.”

Many of the areas being suggested for a higher intensity on the Future Land Use Map are locations where there are high concentrations of places with deeds with covenants that prevented sale, rental, or occupation by anyone deemed to be non-white. This was a common practice in much of the United States in the mid-20th century after being validated in 1926 by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Corrigan v Buckley case. In 1948, a later court ruled against the practice in Shelley v. Kraemer.

The practice continued anyway, with many deeds in Charlottesville recording the covenants until 1968 when the Federal Fair Housing Act explicitly banned them and made it illegal to discriminate on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, national origin, or disability.

Journalist and researcher Jordy Yager has been working to document the location of these covenants. The Mapping Cville Project is informing the Comprehensive Plan.

“They are mapping where racial covenants were historically located in the city and these racial covenants really define where particularly Black citizens were able to live within the city,” said Ron Sessoms of Rhodeside & Harwell.

Sessoms said many of these areas are focused north of downtown and he named the Venable and Rugby neighborhoods as well as land between Preston Avenue and U.S. 250.

“As a result, the African-American community was not able to live there and today these communities remain largely white and not diverse,” Sessoms said.

Sessoms continued his history lesson and here are some of the highlights. The first Comprehensive Plan in 1958 called for elimination of slums which led to the urban renewal first of Vinegar Hill in the 60’s and then Garrett Street in the late 70’s. Parking standards were adopted as well as road-building projects to ease congestion. These projects disproportionately affected Black households.

“There’s still some community hurt related to that,” Sessoms said.

A zoning update in 1991 emphasized single-family zoning through the city. Twelve years later in 2013, another rezoning up-zoned several transportation corridors and created the Neighborhood Commercial Corridor zoning. And the city is poised to act on a comprehensive rezoning rewrite in the near future and that begins with the adoption of the Future Land Use Map which colors different parts of Charlottesville with different intensities of development.

“It is a guide that can be used in evaluating development proposals in the future for rezoning, but it is not a legally binding plan and is not legally required so it’s a plan that is visionary but it is not legally binding which is different from zoning,” Sessoms said. “Zoning really is a legally binding set of ordinances.”

The details about what can be developed, either by-right or through a special use permit, depends on the zoning.

“There will be much more refinement of the future land use map recommendations,” Sessoms said.

Between March 30 and May 10, the land use map and its legend had been updated. What had been described as Low Intensity Residential is now described as General Residential which seeks to encourage more than just single-family housing by allowing up to three units per lot.

“Right now a lot of the areas that are shown as General Residential are now zoned at least R-1, or one unit per lot,” Sessoms said.

Koch said part of the intention is to support wealth-building in the community by encouraging construction of smaller-scale homes for homeownership.

“The land use policies can not do any of these things on their own,” Koch said. “We can’t have a fully equitable land use program unless the land use map is paired with other programs to ensure affordability and protection for communities.”

Koch acknowledged on the May 10 webinar that many had concerns about what they saw on the map. Someone asked in the virtual chat if the consultants have walked around the city.

“Fully understand and we’re glad that people have raised potential concerns in your neighborhood,” Koch said. “You all have a much deeper understanding than we do but we have been around and we understand that looking at these potential changes for the future can be overwhelming and concerning but we have built in a requirement to consider the existing neighborhood context.”

The steering committee for the Cville Plans Together initiative next meets virtually on May 19 at 5:30 p.m. (register) The next webinar is scheduled for May 25 at 6 p.m. (register)

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On today’s show:

Jim Andrews officially announces his race for the Samuel Miller District in Albemarle County

The CEO of Tiger Fuel Company talks about the fuel emergency

The Jefferson-Madison Regional Library will open without appointments on Monday at most branches

We begin today with fuel. When I drove to an Exxon station run by the Tiger Fuel Company this morning, there was gas in the pumps and no line to get to them. The same was the case five hours later when I drove home again after being a guest on “Real Talk with Keith Smith.” (take a look!)

How long that will last is uncertain, as the supply line is still suffering from the Colonial Pipeline shutdown which has led to another state of emergency in Virginia. Gordon Sutton is the president of Tiger Fuel Company and when I spoke with him yesterday, he said it will take time to get back to normal operations.

“Everything on the whole East Coast has been depleted and the system isn’t really designed to keep up with that kind of replenishment, so it’s going to take us a while to dig out,” Sutton said.

Sutton said he initially thought the situation would be much worse, but his company was able to move fuel around to somewhat delay putting bags over the pumps. But this disruption was not like others in the past and there was no fuel for much of Wednesday and Thursday.

“You know we’ve had supply disruptions in the past from hurricanes and things like that, but you usually have a couple of days to sort of prepare for that and the disruption would be from 24 to 48 hours,” Sutton said. “In our 40 years of existence, we’ve never seen a disruption like this.”

Sutton said he’s had many people call to ask if they should postpone travel this weekend. He said people should play it safe while the system replenishes.

“I don’t think we’ll be back to normal for at least a couple of weeks,” Sutton said.

Sutton himself delayed business-related travel this week.

Yesterday, Colonial Pipeline issued a statement that the pipeline was fully operational as of Thursday morning but that delays may continue.

“Following this restart, it will take several days for the product delivery supply chain to return to normal. Some markets served by Colonial Pipeline may experience, or continue to experience, intermittent service interruptions during this start-up period,” reads the release.

The only candidate filed so far to run for Supervisor in Albemarle’s Samuel Miller District formally kicked off his campaign yesterday on the steps of the County Office Building in downtown Charlottesville. It is a political tradition for candidates to appear here, and fellow Democrats Diantha McKeel and Ned Gallaway did so, though there were fewer people at those events due being in an earlier of the pandemic recovery. But around two dozen people gathered there Thursday afternoon when political newcomer Jim Andrews declared his candidacy in public.

“I’m running for the Samuel Miller District Board of Supervisors because I am committed to Albemarle’s economic and environmental resilience and sustainability," Andrews said. “I’ll work to achieve fairness, equity, and inclusion for all who call Albemarle home. We envision a bright future. I look forward to devoting my time and efforts to fostering resilience and to overcoming our economic, equity, education and environmental challenges.”

We’ll hear more from him in a moment.

If elected, he would replace Supervisor Liz Palmer. She opted not to run for a third term. She had made her announcement on the same steps back in April 2013.

“I can’t believe that it really has been seven and a half years since I was on the Board but it’s true,” Palmer said. “I’ve served as Supervisor of the Samuel Miller District. I feel like I’ve gotten a lot of what I set out to do done or at least I’m confident that stuff will be completed.”

Among those accomplishments include video coverage of Supervisor meetings, continued support of the water supply plan, and construction of the Materials Utilization Center at the Ivy Landfill.

“And then there’s rural broadband, which as a member of the Board of Supervisors I’ve served on the broadband authority, helping position us to take advantage of state and federal money for fiber to the home for rural residents,” Palmer said.

Palmer said she was confident Jim Andrews, a fellow Democrat, would be able to continue representing the Samuel Miller district as the county updates the zoning code and the Comprehensive Plan. The next Board of Supervisors will be the ones to vote on whatever changes are made, and Palmer said Andrews is up for the task.

Mark Lorenzoni, an owner of the Ragged Mountain Running and Walking Shop, is serving as one of Andrews’ campaign advisors. He listed several traits he saw in Andrews.

“Time, talent, temperament and a passion and desire to serve his neighbors,” Lorenzoni said.

Lorenzoni said he’s known Andrews for several decades.

“That sometimes brash, argumentative, and sarcastic young law student I remember from 40 years ago has seasoned beautifully into the complete package of what it takes to serve in the role of selfless and benevolent leadership,” Lorenzoni said.

For his part, Andrews said Lorenzoni was the first person he spoke with when he was considering running. Andrews came to the community in 1979 to enter UVA Law School. In 2021, the nation is beginning to coming out of the pandemic.

“There’s no doubt that the pandemic has at least temporarily changed our lives,” Andrews said. “I think some of it we’re getting back to normal but the long-term effects. We’re going to have some businesses that closed and may not reopen. There are new ways of doing business. There are changed property uses, an increased need for broadband and ways of communicating and ensuring government transparency. These changes don’t come without stresses and I’ve seen some of that in my work with the Legal Aid Justice Center on housing issues.”

Andrews said if elected he looks forward to the update of the Comprehensive Plan and the update of the zoning code. He also said work to implement the Climate Action Plan can help the community be more prepared for extreme weather events and challenges to infrastructure.

“The rural areas of the Samuel Miller District are important as a carbon sink and for biodiversity,” Andrews said. “I’m committed to facing these challenges that threaten clean water, forests, fields, and farms that we are fortunate to have in abundance in our county and district.”

Andrews addressed the high cost of housing in the community and said he would support policies to increase the number of below-market units by working with private developers and nonprofit developers.

Andrews faces no opposition in the June 8 Democratic primary and as of this moment faces no opposition in the general election this fall. Neither do Gallaway or McKeel.

For over a year, it has been impossible to just show up at a branch of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library for simple browsing. In the early days of the pandemic, the library system moved to tier 5 in its COVID response plan, which was to shut everything down. Gradually they have loosened restrictions, and currently allow limited in-person browsing - as long as you have an appointment. That changes Monday, according to JMRL Director David Plunkett.

“The library is preparing to enter tier two of our COVID-19 response protocols,” Plunkett said. “Tier 4 was curbside and contactless pick-up only. Tier 3 was appointment service inside the branches where we allowed five people at each location with some variations. And tier 2 now is a more general opening of the doors pretty close to normal service hours. Some capacity limits based on the number of staff that we have available.”

Public meetings are not yet available and library programs will remain virtual for now. Also, fines will continue to be waived for the foreseeable future.

“We have not been collecting any fines since March of last year, of 2020, and will not be collecting any fines as long as we have to continue to quarantine materials for 24 hours which is still the case in Tier 2,” Plunkett said.

During the pandemic, a building in Lovingston off of U.S. 29 was renovated to be the new Nelson County branch. It’s open for appointment now and will also be open in Tier 2 on Monday. Don’t expect a large ceremony to serve as a grand opening just yet. Still, Plunkett said the building is something to celebrate.

“Nelson County really led the way here in supporting this project and funding this project and picking the very best architects and construction companies for this,” Plunkett said.

When was the last time you went to the library? Do you plan to go back? Let me know!

And finally today, the University of Virginia has appointed Malo A. Hutson as the next Dean of the School of Architecture. Hutson is currently director of the urban planning Ph.D. program at the Columbia University in New York City. He’s also the director of the school’s Urban Community and Health Equity Program. Hutson succeeds Dean Ila Berman, who will return to the faculty in the school. Hutson will begin his tenure at the A-School on July 2, 2021. (read more in the press release)

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On this installment:

Albemarle’s Planning Commission endorses the Housing Albemarle plan

Charlottesville will to hold a design public hearing tonight for Fontaine Street pedestrian and bike upgrade

Woodward Properties purchases a major site on Cherry Avenue

Virginia is in the second day of a new state of emergency declared by Governor Ralph Northam to deal with the shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline, which is the primary source of gasoline in the Commonwealth as well as other southeast states.

“While current gasoline reserves in the Commonwealth are sufficient to address immediate supply concerns, a long-term disruption in the pipelines will require transportation of fuel and other oil-derivatives via interstate and state roadways,” reads the order.

Among other things, the executive order enacts a provision intended to fight price gouging, allows state and local services to coordinate on emergency services, and allows for agency heads to conduct some contract purchases outside of the normal process.

Have you changed your habits for the day? Did you go looking for fuel? I’d love to hear your stories.

A major commercial property and several vacant residential lots in Fifeville are under new ownership. Woodard Properties has purchased the Cherry Avenue Shopping Center for $1.9 million and five vacant lots behind it for $1.4 million. Anthony Woodward said in an email that there are no plans to develop the property and the purchase is an investment. The commercial property is within the Cherry Avenue zoning corridor and the residential lots are zoned R-2. Earlier this year, Council adopted the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan as an advisory guide for future development.

It has now been 18 months since Albemarle County and Charlottesville opted to end participation with the University of Virginia in a public body called the Planning and Coordination Council. The PACC convened for over three decades in open sessions before giving way to a closed-door body known as the Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee (LUEPC), which met last on April 16.

Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell sits on the LUPEC body and updated his colleagues last night on a presentation on UVa’s plans for their property at the intersection of Emmet and Ivy Road.

“The corridor starts at the intersection and Emmet and Ivy and runs all the way down to Copeley,” Mitchell said. “UVA is going to build and manage and own a hotel there. And they’re going to build a manage a convention center there and it will be the largest convention center in our region. And what I really like about this is that even though it is going to be UVA owned and operated, it will be a tax-generating entity for our region, so good news there.”

Mitchell said the new UVA School of Data Science will also operate out of the Emmet-Ivy area. He said LUEPC members learned about a couple of other projects, but those are not ready to be disclosed to the public yet.

UVa is also a participant in a VDOT-funded project known as the Emmet Street Streetscape which seeks to make it safer and more welcoming to walk or bike along Emmet Street between Ivy Road and Arlington Boulevard. This was funded in the first round of VDOT’s Smart Scale process at $12.1 million. Construction is expected to begin in the spring of 2023 according to a schedule on the project website.

Mitchell also gave an update on the $8.6 million project to improve the intersection of Barracks Road and build a wider pathway on Barracks up toward Preston Avenue.

“They’re hoping to begin this in the spring of 2023 and looking worse case to be wrapping this up in early 2025,” Mitchell said.

Another project funded in that first round is the $11.7 million Fontaine Avenue Streetscape, which has its design public hearing tonight. That’s a key step in the process in how a VDOT project moves from concept to construction. A video that will be shown on the webinar is already posted on the project website. The narrator explains that there are four goals of the project. (meeting materials)

“In line with the city of Charlottesville overall transportation goals, the project seeks to make Fontaine Avenue a complete street which improves accommodations for all users, ensuring safe passage for pedestrians and bicyclists, understanding that this serves as a gateway corridor into the city and ensuring that the impression is attractive, and improving access to local facilities and ensuring these connections are also easily accessed by pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit users.”

You can watch the presentation at any time on the project website and see an animation of what the project might look like. As with the other two projects, the goal is to have this project under construction in the spring of 2023. (review the materials)

The cost of housing is one of the most pressing issues in our community. This is an affluent place. With many very wealthy individuals, the annual area median income skews the federal definitions that set levels of subsidization for housing. Charlottesville City Council adopted a new affordable housing update in March. Albemarle County is also updating its housing policy and a draft went before the Planning Commission on May 4. Stacy Pethia is the county’s housing coordinator. (read the May 4 draft)

“The recommendations to update [the plan] came out of the 2019 Housing Needs Assessment that was released by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission,” Pethia said. (link)

The plan update takes into account population projections from the Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia which shows Albemarle continuing to grow in the next couple of decades to 138,485 by 2020, an increase of over 27,000 people over the current estimate. The plan has 12 objectives and dozens of strategies.

“And these strategies include increasing the amount of affordable housing required in special use permits and rezoning applications from 15 percent to 20 percent [and] expanding the definition of affordable housing to include workforce housing category,” Pethia said.

There are many other strategies, such as finding ways to lower the cost to connect to water and sewer, as well as reduced regulatory burdens for projects with additional below-market units. Some short-term ideas include exploring the idea of using county-owned land to develop permanent below-market units, creation of an affordable housing trust fund, creation of an affordable housing committee in the county, and increased partnerships with public and private groups to build more units.

Luis Carrazana, the University of Virginia’s not-voting representative on the Albemarle Planning Commission, noted that a home priced to sell to someone at 60 percent of the area median income is still beyond the reach of many.

“We’re talking about a home that’s over $200,000,” Carrazana said. “I guess it depends on your definition of affordable. We’re in a high AMI area.”

There’s also language in the plan about renovating existing houses that are currently below market. However, Chair Julian Bivins said that can make some residents skittish about speaking up.

“People are nervous about saying something because they don’t want to be displaced by their landlords or they just don’t want to go out and engage with ‘authorities’ because they don’t want that kind of attention,” Bivins said.

Bivins also noted that many of Albemarle’s residents make their money through existing wealth, and not through employment.

“And how do we have this conversation in our community about how do we increase or how do we attract or what do we do to bring [payrolls] here so people can think about climbing up or having ladders they can ascend for better salaries and for better compensation?” Bivins asked.

During the public hearing, the town administrator for Scottsville said that incorporated section of Albemarle would like to work with the county to provide some space for housing.

“Town Council adopted an updated Comprehensive Plan in 2018 and then followed up with two planning grants and a West Downtown Small Area Plan in 2020,” said Matt Lawless. “I expect to see about ten percent population growth over the past decade when Census results come out and our Comp Plan calls for roughly doubling the population by 2040.”

Lawless said the zoning will be changed to allow for quadplexes in town and to encourage upstairs apartments downtown. He himself lives in one of these units and pays less than a thousand a month in rent. The Planning Commission agreed that Scottsville should be listed as a partner.

The Board of Supervisors will have their public hearing on the plan on June 16. In the meantime, you can watch the entire public hearing at the Albemarle Planning Commission at this link, which goes right to the item.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is from an anonymous supporter: It may seem like we just had an election, but 2021 is once again a city, county, and state election year. Party primaries are coming soon on June 8, 2021. The deadline to register to vote, or update an existing registration is Monday, May 17, 2021. Visit the Virginia Department of Elections to learn more at elections.virginia.gov.

On today’s show:

Planning continues for a waterline to connect area reservoirs

A quick overview of projects underway in McIntire Park

The city comes up with a plan to deal with the ash tree state of emergency

The gradual trend toward fewer COVID cases continues. The seven-day average for percent positivity today is at 4.1 percent and the seven-day average for new cases at 699 today. Also dropping is the number of vaccines administered each day, with the seven-day average now at 50,633 doses a day. There have been 6.83 million doses administered in Virginia and 35.5 percent of the Commonwealth’s population are now fully vaccinated. This week federal emergency authorization could come to reduce age eligibility for the Pfizer vaccine to people over the age of 12.

Tonight, the Charlottesville Planning Commission will have a joint public hearing with the City Council on a rezoning on a cul-de-sac on the western edge of Fifeville. A property owner on Valley Road Extended seeks the rezoning and a special use permit to build four apartment units on just under two-thirds of land. The applicant is proffering $48,000 to build a portion of sidewalk and have suggested it could be part of a larger network. (meeting info)

“Sidewalk improvements along the new parcel frontage along Valley Road Extended that ultimately may be incorporated into a more robust pedestrian and bicycle improvement network if the multi-use tunnel under the railroad right of way, as called for in the [2015] Bike and Pedestrian Master Plan,” reads the narrative.

The narrative references a map on page 38 of the plan that depicts many desired projects throughout the city. One of them is this underpass at the northern end of Valley Road Extended.

However, there is no active project planned for such a tunnel at this site to occur, according to city Communications Director Brian Wheeler. In all, there is a distance of 4,500 feet where the railroad bisects the Fifeville neighborhood from the University of Virginia without a pedestrian or vehicular crossing, between Shamrock Road and Roosevelt Brown Boulevard.

The University of Virginia is also not planning for a tunnel at that location, according to its non-voting representative on the Planning Commission. After the city agreed to hand over right of way for the Brandon Avenue corridor, UVA agreed to study for a railroad crossing and settled on a different planning concept closer to Monroe Lane and Paton Street. However, they are not pursuing a crossing at this time but will work with the city on an easement should it choose to proceed.

One of the largest capital expenses facing any governmental entity in the community is the nine and a half mile waterline the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA) has planned. Long planned, the line will connect the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir and the Ragged Mountain Reservoir. Ragged Mountain is currently fed by a pipeline from Sugar Hollow Reservoir, one that is nearing a hundred years old. The new waterline won’t be built for several more years, but the RWSA has been acquiring the right of way for the project. Executive Director Bill Mawyer gave his Board an update on April 27, 2021.

“The Albemarle County School Board granted about a one mile easement for the Rivanna to Ragged Mountain project this month,” Mawyer said.

In all, the RWSA has easements for about six of the 9.5 miles and is in negotiations with the University of Foundation and private property owners for the rest. The RWSA has a 40 year lease with the city of Charlottesville to operate the Ragged Mountain reservoir which expires in 2052. There’s talk already of extending those terms given the community investment in the water supply plan.

“So as an example based on our current schedule, we would finish the new pipeline say around 2033, and then in effect we would only have 20 years left on the lease of a major water supply facility that we’ve just spent a lot of money on to expand and build the pipeline so we can fill it,” Mawyer said.

The RWSA Board also got an update on the health of the five reservoirs maintained by the authority. Their usable storage volume is updated every ten years according to water resources manager Andrea Bowles.

“We get this information from our bathymetries that we do,” Bowles said. “We do bathymetries for the urban system reservoirs every ten years.”

One of the concerns is the presence of algae in reservoirs, which can lead to oxygen depletion that threatens aquatic life. Each of the five reservoirs has a slightly different balance and Bowles explained how algae is managed. Beaver Creek Reservoir is currently the one most prone to blooms. There were five at the Crozet waterway in 2020, but none of them were problematic enough to require treatment.

“That is the reservoir that we’re going to do an alternative of hypolimnetic oxygenation to try to help with blooms,” Bowles said.

An algae bloom at Ragged Mountain Reservoir is underway and treatment was expected to begin last week.

“We are having an issue with an algae called dinobryon which is a golden algae, not a blue-green algae, it doesn’t produce the toxins,” Bowles said. “We have that right now going on in Ragged Mountain. It is a big taste and odor producer and we have a threshold and it is slightly over the threshold.”

The RWSA next meets on May 25.

The Charlottesville Tree Commission got an update on several topics at its meeting on May 4, including an update on several projects planned for Charlottesville’s McIntire Park.

“In McIntire Park there are three projects going on that are really private-public partnerships,” said Peggy Van Yahres, a member of the Tree Commission.

Van Yahres is part of one project to install a memorial grove in McIntire Park to commemorate people who have been awarded the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce’s citizenship award.

“We wanted to preserve the landmark oak trees on the top of McIntire Park on the east side,” Van Yahres said. “The other objective was just to enliven the park and make it a better place for people to go and sit underneath these beautiful trees.”

The memorial would be a stone terrace on which the names of the past and future award winners would be displayed.

“There will be a beautiful lawn, people can play, a walkway, and of course, a lot more oak trees to continue the tradition,” Van Yahres said.

Van Yahres said the grove has been added to the schematic design for the Botanical Garden of the Piedmont. That’s the new name for the nonprofit that entered into a memorandum of agreement with the City of Charlottesville to operate in the northeast section of McIntire Park. She said the grove will hopefully be installed by this fall.

As for the garden, Jill Trischman-Marks is executive director of the newly renamed organization. There was a naming contest.

“We had over two hundred responses and selected Botanical Garden of the Piedmont because it was precise and concise,” Trischman-Marks said. “It not only identified where the garden is located but it also talked about the trees and other plants that will be highlighted in this garden.”

The nonprofit is on the hook to raise funds to pay for infrastructure and to install the garden.

“The city of Charlottesville has dedicated the land to this project but that’s where the taxpayer burden ends,” Trischman-Marks said. “All of the funds that are needed to design, construct, and maintain the garden will be privately raised but once it is built just like any other city park, the Botanical Garden will be free and accessible to all.”

Trischman-Marks said the plan for the garden is to utilize native species and demonstrate the ecosystem of our area. You can weigh in on a survey they have listed on their website.

“And share the survey with your friends, families, and neighbors because the more feedback we get, the better this garden will be,” Trischman-Marks said

Trischman-Marks will update the Charlottesville Planning Commission at their meeting on Tuesday.

The third project is a more low-key initiative from the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards to plant new specimens.

Later in the meeting, the Tree Commission got an update on plans to fight the Emerald Ash Borer from the city arborist, Mike Ronayne.

“The Emerald Ash borer is an invasive insect from Siberia and it will be killing all of our untreated ash trees in Charlottesville,” Ronayne said. “And now it seems like it’s come through other parts of Virginia like northern Virginia and now we’re really just starting to deal with all the dead ash trees that we’re finding in Charlottesville.”

The goal is to protect 31 individual trees in the city, and have sought additional funding from City Council for the purpose and to remove the dead trees. About one to two percent of trees in the city’s parkland are ash trees. A draft cost estimate to remove the trees over five years is $480,000. That does not cover the cost of planting replacements. The cost to annually treat those 31 trees will be $8,425 a year. Todd Brown is the city’s director of parks and recreation.

“Basically this is a state of emergency situation,” Brown said. “These trees are dying. Ninety-nine percent of them are going to die and right now we’ve been hitting at a tiny fraction of them. For everyone we’re doing, there are ten more that need to be done and ten more that die. We’re chasing a moving target that’s eventually going to stop and eventually we are going to have to catch up to it.”

Brown said that presents a safety issue and more and more limbs become prone to falling. For more on the Emerald Ash Borer, take a look at the Virginia Department of Forestry website. The agency is offering a cost share program for individual removals. (learn more)

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On today’s edition:

Governor Northam set to lift most pandemic restrictions on June 15

U.S. Route 250 at Afton Mountain is still closed

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission releases a report on the 2021 General Assembly

The Cville Plans Together initiative has its first public event post pandemic on Saturday

Governor Ralph Northam took to the stage in Richmond yesterday to announce that favorable trends in Virginia’s COVID caseloads and vaccination are pointing in the right direction.

“We are seeing a welcome drop in our daily count of COVID cases,” Northam said. “Our seven day average is now lower than it has been since last October. Seven months ago. That’s a big deal after a hard year and we should all celebrate that.”

Today the seven-day average for new cases is down to 820 and the percent positivity is 4.4 percent.

There has also been a decrease in the number of hospitalization and deaths. Northam said since the beginning of the pandemic fourteen months ago, decisions of the emergency team and the Virginia Department of Health have been led by the data.

“And today the data give us a very clear message,” Northam said. “The vaccines are working. They’re helping reduce the spread of this disease. Fewer people are getting sick. Fewer people are going to the hospital and fewer people are dying.”

Northam said that vaccinations may be opened up to people over the age of 12 as early as next week.

“Parents are eager for their children to be able to get this shot,” Northam said. “Preliminary results from a VCU survey tell us that a large majority of parents, 66 percent, plan to get their adolescents vaccinated. Sixty-three percent will vaccinate their younger children when it is available.”

Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia Health System said they are ready.

“We at UVA are poised and ready to do that,” Dr. Sifri said. “We would and will use our current mechanisms for providing vaccines for residents of the health district including the vaccine center at Seminole Square and our outreach systems.”

As of today, Exactly one-third of Virginians are fully vaccinated at 33.3 percent and 45.9 percent have had at least one dose. The average doses administered per day has declined this week and is currently at 66,343 a day. A month ago on April 7, that number was 78,785.

“We still have a lot of work ahead to meet President Biden’s new goal of 70 percent of American adults getting at least a first shot by the Fourth of July,” Northam said.

Northam warned that COVID remains a serious threat and continued vigilance. Though many carried the disease asymptomatically, others such as himself have lasting effects from their illness.

“As you all know I had COVID myself last October and seven months later, I still can’t smell or taste anything,” Northam said. “Many long-lasting side effects are much worse. If you haven’t gotten the vaccine, remember this. COVID can make you truly sick for months. The variants that are now circulating raise the risk of getting sick.”

Dr. Sifri said some studies suggest that a third of people who contracted COVID developed long-term symptoms.

“And it includes people that had mild disease or even didn’t recognize they had the disease, they had the so-called asymptomatic disease,” Dr. Sifri said.

UVA will be continuing to study this phenomenon.

Northam has previously announced relaxation of several restrictions on May 15, such as allowing 250-person events outdoors and increases in the number of people who can attend entertainment and sporting events. He said if the trends continue, almost all restrictions will be lifted.

“If our COVID numbers keep trending down and our vaccination numbers keep going up, we plant to lift our mitigation measures, capacity restrictions and social distancing requirements on June 15,” Northam said.

The mask requirement will remain in place for at least a couple of weeks longer, however. Clark Mercer is Northam’s chief of staff and he mentioned an important date to keep in mind as well as well as a logistic hurdle to the legality of even wearing one in public.

“The Governor’s executive authority and emergency declaration expires on June 30 and like the governor said, he will revisit it in a future press conference how we talk about masks,” Mercer said. “Even voluntarily wearing a mask in Virginia, you have to have a state of emergency in effect to do so. There’s a law on the books that doesn’t even allow even voluntarily to wear a mask in public so there are some issues we have to work through between now and the end of June.”

Governor’s legal counsel, Rita Davis, explained further about the forthcoming end of the emergency.

“By code, all declarations of states of emergency end on June 30 so the governor has the prerogative to reissue a declaration a state of emergency,” Davis said.

Northam said he would like to avoid extending the emergency if possible, so this will be something to continue to watch. Another thing to consider is that public meetings at the local level will have to resume being held in person.

But, as you heard, one of the concerns remains the possibility of variants emerging. Research continues at the University of Virginia Health System into increasing surveillance and analysis to identify their presence. Dr. Amy Mathers is an associate professor of medicine and pathology.

“We have recently signed a contract with the state for the UVA Clinical Lab to do whole genome sequencing of the SARS-COVID variants,” Dr. Mathers said. “The plan as it stands right now in on behalf of the Virginia Department of Health to do up to 250 sequences a week.”

That allows for scientists to have a better sense of what variants are circulating. Dr. Mathers said that will help detect emerging strains as well understanding patterns behind patients who might one day contract COVID even after being vaccinated. The UVA labs have been attempting to sequence DNA from as many positive cases as possible and the results show what strains are in the area.

“We definitely have a predominance here like we see elsewhere in the state of the U.K. variant so that is widely circulating and does account for over 50 percent of the cases that we’re seeing now in April.” Dr. Mathers said. “And that shift occurred quite quickly and dramatically toward the end of March. We went from ten percent to over 50 percent kind of when we turned over into April.”

Dr. Mathers said the variants from Brazil and South Africa are also in the community, but at a lower level. Even lower but present are variants from California and New York. With more data, there will be more of an accurate record of what variants are moving where. So far, vaccines are effective against this strains, according to Dr. Sifri.

“The most common variant in the United States, the U.K. variant, the B.1.1.7 variant, is very effectively prevented by current vaccines,” Dr. Sifri said.

For the foreseeable future, the surveillance of existing cases and continued research will continue. As Governor Northam, the data is pointing in the direction that vaccinations after a long period of mitigation has lead to the ability to lift restrictions.

“It’s very encouraging to see the biostatisticians and modelers who are taking a look at the trajectory of cases here both locally, regionally, and around the United States to see what their modeling is showing data,” Dr. Sifri said.

To review the model, take a look at a dashboard on the Virginia Department of Health website.

You’re listening to Charlotteville Community Engagement, and it’s time for a quick subscriber-supported public service announcement.

Are you a master at literary trivia? Or maybe you just want to play along for something to do on a Monday night! The Friends of the Jefferson Madison Regional Library are going to hold a Trivia Night on Monday, May 24 to help raise funds to support the library system. Teams or individuals can register for $15. Register here or visit the Friends of JMRL Facebook Page.

U.S. 250 will remain closed indefinitely between Route 6 and the top of Afton Mountain while the Virginia Department of Transportation works to stabilize the roadway. A rockslide began on Monday and debris, soil, and rocks continue to crumble away from the hillside.

“The road will likely be closed for a period of weeks while the excavation and stabilization is done,” reads a press release. “A better estimate of the time required will be made once work begins early next week.”

Passenger vehicles are allowed on Route 6, but through-truck traffic is prohibited.

For more details on the geology involved, take a look at a blog post by Chuck Bailey of Structural Geology and Tectonics Research Group at the College of William and Mary. (hat-tip to Pete Armetta for that link!)

Want to know what happened in this year’s General Assembly? The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has released a sixteen-page report that takes a look at what passed in the session, which was extended from what was to have been a 45-day session.

Some highlights:

Albemarle County obtained the ability to carry over capital funds from year to year without re-appropriating the money, giving additional flexibility for project management. (HB1949)

Any locality in Virginia can now create a local tourism improvement district that can raise funding through fees to businesses to fund tourism activities and capital improvements (SB1298)

Single-use polystyrene containers will be banned in a phased process beginning July 1, 2023 (HB1902)

Localities can now reduce speed limits below 25 miles per hour in business or residential districts (HB1903)

Regional cigarette tax board can be formed to collect revenue on behalf of localities (SB1326)

Minimum fines for dumping of litter or trash increases from $250 to $500 (HB1801)

A state revolving fund can now be created to help localities purchase, operate, and maintain body cameras for law enforcement officers (SB1119)

A report will be made on whether Virginia should have a model policy for crosswalk design and installation (HB1841)

Localities can now amend their Comprehensive Plans to encourage waiving or reducing of parking requirements when promoting transit-oriented development (HB2054)

A Local Food and Farming Infrastructure Grant Program will be created to help support local food production (HB2068)

Marijuana possession of up to one ounce will be legalized as will ability to grow up to four plants. Retail sales will not be be allowed until January 1, 2024 (HB2312)

Read the report for more. What stands out for you?

It’s a busy month for anyone interested in having a say on Charlottesville’s Comprehensive Plan. I’m working on a longer story which will come out shortly about what’s changed since March 30 when the Planning Commission last weighed in. The first main webinar on the changes will be held by Cville Plans Together on Monday, and my report will be out by then. However, the first public event begins tomorrow with an event at Riverview Park from noon to 2 p.m. Stay tuned for my story, and in the meantime, read my report or listen to my podcast from the March 30 meeting.

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On today’s installment:

Charlottesville City Schools begin official consideration of names for Clark and Venable elementary schools

The Green Business Alliance launches on a mission to meet greenhouse gas reduction goals ahead of schedule

Legislation is signed in Christiansburg for an authority to work towards a new passenger rail to the New River Valley

To begin today’s installment, U.S. 250 at Afton Mountain is still closed, three days after a rockfall began. There’s no timetable for when the roadway might reopen.

“On Wednesday, rocks, soil and debris continue to slide down the steep slope into the roadway,” reads a press release. “Geologists and engineers with the Virginia Department of Transportation are continuing their assessment of the site and the extent of the slide area. Then they can determine how to safely remove debris from the road as well as unstable material still on the slope above the road. The slope must also be stabilized before the road can be reopened to traffic.”

Stay tuned.

Sixteen companies and nonprofits in the greater Charlottesville area have launched the creation of something called the Green Business Alliance as a way of providing leadership on the way toward meeting the community’s goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Susan Kruse is the executive director of the Community Climate Collaborative, which goes by C3.

“This is the decade where we must act to prevent the most catastrophic impacts of climate change,” Kruse said. “Our nation, our Commonwealth, and our community have all set ambitious goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Yet we cannot reach those goals without working together in our homes, in our schools, and in our businesses.”

Kruse said C3 selected these businesses based on their past commitments to energy efficiency, and a dedication to being bold.

“I am pleased to announce their collective greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent by 2025,” Kruse said. “That is five years faster than the goal set by the city of Charlottesville and Albemarle County and well ahead of the Commonwealth’s goal to hit net zero by 2045.”

Kruse estimated that if they meet these goals, that will reduce 13,156 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. The groups selected provided three years worth of energy data and have agreed to continue submitting that information to C3 to audit the data going forward.

One of the groups is the CFA Institute, and Kelli Palmer was on hand to speak on their behalf. Palmer is the head of Global Inclusion & Diversity and Corporate Citizenship at CFA and she remarked at being at an in-person event.

“This is the first time I’ve been in community in real life with other people in over a year so that alone is a cause for celebration,” Palmer said.

Palmer said CFA’s mission is to be a worldwide leader, and participation in greenhouse gas reduction at its headquarters is consistent.

“It is our mission, CFA Institute that is, to lead the investment profession globally by promoting the highest standards of ethics, education, and professional excellent for the ultimate benefit of society,” Palmer said.

Another member of the Green Business Alliance is Sentara Martha Jefferson, which moved from the city of Charlottesville to Albemarle County nearly ten years ago. Catherine Hughes is the executive director.

“We almost doubled our physical plant from approximately 300,000 square feet at our downtown location which Kelli [and CFA Institute] now resides in to 600,000 square feet approximately and we were able to do so without increasing our energy consumption,” Hughes said. “That came with a lot of work. Every decision as far as building the building is part of that.”

The Tiger Fuel Company may not be the one of the first that jump to mind when you think of green businesses, but President Gordon Sutton is on board to prepare his firm for the future.

“Our business is in large part focused on the distribution of fossil fuels which makes me somewhat of an outsider in this setting,” Sutton said. “I’m proud to tell you however that we have for years now been working on ways to reduce our carbon footprint. One of the compelling ways we have achieved that has been through embracing solar and installing solar arrays on our facilities.”

Sutton said Tiger Fuel was so satisfied with the results that decided to get into the business.

“We have decided to completely immerse ourselves in the industry by acquiring a small solar company with a national footprint but roots right here in Virginia,” Sutton said.

That company is Altenergy, which Sutton said has over 16 years of experience and has installed 21 megawatts of solar generation capacity across ten different states. Sutton said he knows that reduction of greenhouse gases will require dramatic reductions in or cessation of the use of fossil fuels.

The final Green Business Alliance member who spoke at the event was Liza Borches, the President and CEO of Carter Myers Automotive.

“We all know that transportation is the largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in the United States,” Borches said. “And as a part of this industry, we have a choice. We can put our head down, keep pushing forward selling a lot of cars, and not be proud of what our industry is doing to contribute to our climate impact, or we can pull up a chair to the table, be a part of the conversation and help find the strategic solutions that we need for our future.”

Borches said part of her company’s role is to educate consumers about the benefits of alternative-fuel vehicles, and this year she and her staff helped push for Virginia legislation known as the Clean Cars Act which directs the State Air Pollution Control Board to create a program for low-emissions and no-emissions vehicles.

It was at about this point in the recording that the wind began to become an issue. Governor Ralph Northam was also in attendance to watch as members of the Green Business Alliance received certificates indicating their participation in the program. Northam is in his last year and said he has tried to get something done while in office.

“We’ve had these climate commissions in Virginia and we’ve listened to the data and we’ve said at the meeting that we need to take action, and we really never have,” Northam said. “The past few years we have been able to work together and really understand what we’re up against in society.”

It was around this point in the recording that the wind picked, and I would be curious to know how much energy that would have generated. So, we’re going to wait until later in the program to hear more from Northam on the story from Christiansburg.

The Charlottesville Public School system has begun the process of evaluating the names of two elementary schools to see if they should be changed. On Monday, the Schools Naming Committee held a community forum with breakout sessions on the appropriateness of the current names of Clark Elementary School and Venable Elementary School. In all, there are ten schools for the city to review, and the process will go from oldest to newest. Beth Baptist is interim director of student services and achievement.

“Clark and Venable are our older schools so those are the schools that we are starting with,” Baptist said. “We are not on a timeline for this project. We want to do it right.”

Committee member Phil Varner prepared information for the break-out groups to consider before they spent time in breakout areas. He said he began research two years ago after watching a presentation from filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson about the work that went into one of his films.

“So he had done some work on researching Black schools pre-desegregation in Albemarle for his documentary Albemarle’s Black Classrooms ,” Varner said. “And sort of almost tangentially to that there was work and a bit in his presentation before the Albemarle School Board about Paul Cale, who previously had an elementary school named after him.”

What is now known as Mountain View Elementary had been named after Paul Cale, who served as superintendent of Albemarle Schools from 1947 to 1967 according to a September 2019 article by Katherine Knott in the Daily Progress. Superintendent Matt Haas said at the time he wanted the school renamed because Cale did not act swiftly to fully integrate schools after the Brown v. Board of Education ruling in 1954.

“And that got me thinking who are our elementary schools named for, and surprisingly it was hard to find good information,” Varner said. “Surprisingly it was hard to find good information. For many of the people they were named after, I could literally only find a sentence that described what they taught and where. Clark and Venable were famous in their own right but don’t really have a very strong connection with the actual school system.”

Varner said naming schools memorializes a person in the same way that putting up a statue memorializes a person. He said philanthropist Paul McIntire, who donated Confederate statues, also played a role in naming Clark after George Rogers Clark, a Revolutionary War general who inherited several enslaved people as property.

“They were always done by whoever the dominant group was in Charlottesville, whoever held the power and using these names to enforce and entrench their power and I really wanted to see this devolve into letting the people who are actually affected by this, students, teachers, parents in the buildings, make these decisions about what their school represents and who it is named for,” Varner said.

To learn more about the names of the ten Charlottesville school facilities, visit the website correctingthenarrative.org to learn more. To keep up with the project, visit the page on the Charlottesville School system.

Three hours after being present in Albemarle at the launch of the Green Business Alliance yesterday, Governor Northam traveled southwest to Christiansburg to sign legislation authorizing the creation of a new authority to help build a new railway station to serve the New River Valley. Mike Barber is the mayor of the Town of Christiansburg.

“The Town of Christiansburg is proud to have been selected for the site for the future passenger rail station,” Barber said. “We believe this station will meet many of the town’s current goals and priorities in relationship to transportation, connectivity, economic development and promotion of regional tourism, not just in Christiansburg but in the entire New River Valley.”

Barber said rail has played an important role in history in the history of southwest Virginia, but the last passenger rail train traveled through in 1979. In recent years, efforts have been underway to bring one back, and the goal is to eventually extend the Northeast Regional Service that terminates in Roanoke to Christiansburg. The Northeast Regional Services dates back to October 2009 as part of a three-year pilot project that has been wildly successful.

Shannon Valentine is Virginia’s Secretary of Transportation.

“And over the next 12 years, so much has changed,” Valentine said. “Virginia sponsored rail has grown from one route to four, one train to six round-trips, [and yearly] ridership from 125,000 to 971,000.”

Valentine said the route is one of the most profitable in the United States. The original cost for the three-year pilot cost $17.5 million. The Northam administration has decided to try again to make an investment to give people a way to get around the state without driving.

“When we started three and a half years ago we had a lot of discussions and said, you know, we really can’t pave our way out of congestion across this great Commonwealth and we’ve got to look at other means of transportation and so certainly rail and transit have been part of that.”

The creation of the New River Valley Passenger Rail Authority is just one part of the infrastructure improvements that will be required to get the trains there on time.

“Today we are making a commitment to invest $257 million to create this vital connection between southwest Virginia and other parts of the Commonwealth and beyond,” Northam said. “And yes while we are bringing rail to Blacksburg and Christiansburg, we’re not finished and we want to take it all the way out to Bristol to open it up to the great southwest .”

When regular passenger service eventually begins between Charlottesville and Richmond, it will do so on tracks owned by the state of Virginia. Now the state is working to secure right of way in the western part of Virginia where Norfolk Southern owns the lines to make sure passenger and freight can coexist.

“Through the western rail initiative, we will acquire approximately 28.5 miles of the Virginia line from the Salem crossovers west of Roanoke, to Merrimac and Christiansburg,” Northam said. “We’ll make improvements to the Roanoke yard, and invest in infrastructure upgrades along the 29-81 corridor to accommodate the new service… And up at the northern end of this line we’ll build a seven-mile siding from Nokesville to Halverton creating a continuous two-track corridor for 22 miles from Manassas to Remington.”

Northam said a second daily train on the Northeast Regional Service between Roanoke and D.C.’s Union Station will begin in 2022.

“When improvements are completed in 2025, both trains will be extended to the New River Valley,” Northam said.

Sixth District Congressman Morgan Griffith was also present at the signing of the legislation. He said he had initially been skeptical of the idea but came around when he saw ridership numbers continue to grow.

“I have to confess and anybody who studies the record would know that I missed the train in Lynchburg and I missed the train in Roanoke, so I wanted to make sure I got on in Christiansburg,” Griffith said.

Delegate Chris Hurst of the 12th District was the patron of legislation that created the authority. He credited the group New River Valley Passenger Rail for their work in moving the idea from concept to an official entity that can now work to have the station in place. He’s also a member of an advisory board overseeing improvements on Interstate-81 Advisory Board. That includes some funding for the western rail initiative.

“We are really addressing things up and down the entire Interstate-81 corridor with different modes of transportation,” Hurst said. “It was also mentioned in our 81 advisory committee the other week that we are going to be increasing capacity for the Virginia Breeze bus system which has been incredibly popular for us along the 81 corridor. We are doing amazing things in the New River Valley.”

Later this month, Amtrak is expected to lift their restrictions on capacity on their trains. Are you planning a journey? I’d love to hear about it if you do have tickets, or want to? Let me know!

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out from an anonymous supporter: It may seem like we just had an election, but 2021 is once again a city, county, and state election year. Party primaries are coming soon on June 8, 2021. The deadline to register to vote, or update an existing registration is Monday, May 17, 2021. Visit the Virginia Department of Elections to learn more at .elections.virginia.gov.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council begins the process to remove Confederate statues

The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation is working on a new statewide plan that includes expanded service

U.S. Route 250 remains closed at Afton Mountain one day after a rockslide and there’s no time yet for when the roadway might be reopen. Actually, that last one is the whole update. That’s all I know.

The seven-day average for new COVID-cases has now dropped below 1,000 for the first time in many months. The seven-day average for positive test results has declined to 4.5 percent. Nearly a third of Virginians are now fully vaccinated. Blue Ridge Health District Director Dr. Denise Bonds briefed City Council last night.

“And when you look at the absolute numbers, in Charlottesville, 53 percent of the population has received at least one dose and 37 percent of our population is fully vaccinated,” Dr. Bonds said. “Charlottesville when you look is number five in the state for the percent of the population with at least one vaccine. We’re actually surrounded by Albemarle County which is number one in the state.”

Dr. Bonds said there is a push now to get vaccines to people who are homebound, as well as specialized vaccine clinics across the city.

“We’ve really tried to meet people where they are at to get them vaccinated and make sure they are safe from COVID,” Dr. Bonds said.

However, Dr. Bonds said there’s a long way to get to the figure of 75 percent vaccinated and that means targeting specific demographics.

“To target some of our key populations, we have assisted the Albemarle-Charlottesville NAACP and the Latino Health Initiative who have developed public service announcements with funding by the Move 2 Health Equity Coalition,” Dr. Bonds said.

Also at Council last night, several people spoke to a consent agenda item that authorizes a public hearing on removal of Confederate statues on June 7. That’s an official step required to remove the statues under legislation that passed the General Assembly in 2020. Albemarle County used this process to remove a Confederate statue in Court Square last September.

Don Gathers was a member of the Blue Ribbon Commission on Race, Memorials and Public Spaces.

“Through the diligence and hard work and determination of the nine members of that board, we’ve done our job,” Gathers said. “And now we call on Council to say it is time for you to do yours, it’s time for those statues to go with all expedient speed. And if they cannot be gone expeditiously then they do need to be covered and they need to be put in storage.”

Council adopted a resolution last night on their consent agenda to move the process forward. Here’s City Manager Chip Boyles. (read the resolution)

“Thank you for passing the consent agenda that includes the Lee and Jackson Statues movement,” Boyles said. “We intend to publish the notice so that you can have that public hearing at your June 7 Council meeting.”

That prompted a follow-up from Vice Mayor Sena Magill.

“What would the timeline if the notice gets published than we had the meeting on the 7th, what would the earliest time if it passed on the 7th?” Magill asked.

“Thirty days after June 7,” Boyles said.

In the case of the At Ready statue in Court Square, Albemarle County passed their resolution of intent on July 1, 2021, the first day they were eligible to do so under the new law. They held their public hearing on August 6th and the statue was removed on September 12th.

Boyles also said the city has received supplemental affordable housing funds from the federal American Rescue Plan which was passed by Congress earlier this year.

“The city of Charlottesville will be receiving $270,000 that we’ll be able to spend on affordable housing programs within the city,” Boyles said. “Along the lines of the American Rescue Fund, we are still waiting to get the full total dollar amount that we will be receiving as well as the regulations.”

Boyles also said there were 64 applicants from across the country for someone to be the executive director of the Police Civilian Review Board. He also said he has resumed a practice of meeting with leaders of neighborhood associations and the next meeting will be on July 15.

More from City Council in a future episode of the program.

An architect with ties to Charlottesville has been named by a trade organization as one of two winners of its 2021 Award for Excellence in Public Architecture. The American Institute of Architects has recognized Katie Swenson for her role in creating public facilities. While a graduate student at the University of Virginia School of Architecture, Swenson worked with the Piedmont Housing Alliance and helped lead their 10th and Page Street Neighborhood Revitalization Project, which built many single-family homes in that section of Charlottesville in the 2000’s.

Swenson was the first executive director of the Charlottesville Community Design Center, a now-defunct nonprofit that sought to help area residents become more knowledgeable about planning issues. The organization folded in early 2011. Swenson left in 2006 to direct the Enterprise Community Partners Rose Fellowship Program. She also co-founded Enterprise’s Affordable Housing Design Leadership Institute Program along with former Charlottesville Mayor Maurice Cox. Read more on the AIA website.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Let’s end today with a subscriber-fueled public service announcement. the group Resilient Virginia has a mission to help communities in the Commonwealth be prepared to adapt to a changing climate. They kick off their three-part Spring Resiliency Academy on May 6 with a workshop on funding for flood-prone communities. It’s $25 for the one event, but $60 for if you want to also attend the May 27 event on resilient buildings and the June 17 installment on economic recovery, jobs, and justice. Register at resilientvirginia.org where you can also learn more about their upcoming virtual conference.

The Center for Nonprofit Excellence (CNE) will hold a Virtual Town Hall on Wednesday, May 5, 2021 to launch a new tool intended to help its members build better relationships with their donors. At noon, they will publicly launch an initiative called “7 Actionable Principles for a Strong Social Sector.” These range from Create Strategic Budgets to Evaluate Impact.

“As CNE has worked intensively with nonprofits and our local partners towards sustaining our social impact sector and supporting positive outcomes in difficult times, the need for bold thought and creative approaches to community solutions has become paramount,” said CNE Executive Director Cristine Nardi. “7 AP is a flexible, accessible tool that gives nonprofits and funders across Virginia and beyond a proven structure for assessing their organizational health and using resources effectively.”

The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation is working on a new statewide rail plan, the first such document since Governor Northam announced a $3.7 billion investment in passenger rail in December 2019. Emily Stock is manager for rail planning for the DRPT.

“The rail plan is required by the Federal Railroad Administration every four years and the last statewide was adopted by the [Commonwealth Transportation Board] in 2018,” Stock said.

One of the items called for in the draft plan is to implement a study called for in the 2020 General Assembly to review logistics for the Commonwealth Corridor, a proposed east-west passenger service that would travel from Hampton Roads to the New River Valley. That report is due by the next General Assembly Session, before the overall plan is complete.

“It would be examining how the service could integrate with service on the western rail service and also the I-95 corridor so it would be an opportunity to develop the Commonwealth Corridor expansion policies,” Stock said.

There will also be a review of extending service westward to Bristol, as well as a potential stop in Bedford. The statewide rail plan is expected to be completed in early 2022. Approval by the Commonwealth Transportation Board will happen soon afterward.

One change in the future will be that the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority or the DRPT will be responsible for operating and maintaining stations, but the details aren’t yet known.

“DRPT is in the process of working out how things will change and we’re developing a new policy and prioritization to spell it out based on our recent agreements with CSX, Amtrak and [Virginia Railway Express],” Stock said.

A study of the long range needs for Charlottesville’s train station is underway. An issue at many stations across Virginia is the need to become compliant with the Americans for Disabilities Act.

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The Fall 2021 class will involve a combination of online training sessions and field activities with a maximum of 32 students to facilitate the best field training possible. The registration period opens on June 15 and slots will fill quickly! With a 15-week duration beginning August 7th and ending November 13th, the online classes will precede the field activities held on every other Saturday at various locations in the Charlottesville area. Learn more at charlottesvilleareatreestewards.org.

On today’s installment:

The Pantops Community Advisory Committee got a review last week on the update of Albemarle’s affordable housing plan

A quick tour of the CODE Building under construction in Downtown Charlottesville

Charlottesville Parks and Recreation announces further easing of pandemic shutdowns

Charlottesville Police are investigating four shooting incidents that took place over the weekend, including an incident in Westhaven at which the filming of a rap video on a playground was interrupted by gunfire. One person went to the hospital with a gunshot wound. That’s according to a press release from Charlottesville Police, which also detailed incidents on Longwood Drive, 12th Street NW and Swanson Drive. (press release)

The Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Department has unveiled the further easing of restrictions, including the opening of the Charlottesville City Market to in-person attendance on May 15. That’s with COVID protocols in place, including wearing masks and temperature checks before admittance.

Carver Recreation Center and Key Recreation Center will open on May 17 and the Tonsler Recreation Center will open May 24. The Spray Grounds at Belmont Park, Forest Hills Park, Greenleaf Park, and Tonsler Park will open on May 29. Crow Indoor Pool and Washington Park Pool will also reopen on May 29.

Except for Tonsler, attendees must make reservations in advance at www.webtrac.charlottesville.gov or by telephoning the facility.

The Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center will not open until August 1 given ongoing repairs to the internal ventilation system. There is no time set for the outdoor Onesty Family Aquatic Center, which will remain closed due to staff constraints. Visit the city’s website for more information.

At production time today, a rock slide has closed U.S. 250 on Afton Mountain, and the Virginia Department of Transportation is advising people to use I-64 as an alternative through tomorrow.

“Personnel from the Virginia Department of Transportation are on the scene assessing the extent of the slide and how to remove the material from the road and ensure the slope is stabilized,” reads a release.

No one was injured in the rock slide.

On Tuesday, May 4, the Albemarle Planning Commission will take up the Housing Albemarle plan, which is intended to update the county’s policies to encourage the production and sustaining of affordable places for people to live. Stacy Pethia, the county’s housing coordinator, has been making the rounds of the county’s Community Advisory Committees and spoke to the Pantops group on April 26.

“Our current affordable housing policy was updated in 2004, and that became Chapter 9 of the Comprehensive Plan and the policy itself is an appendix to the current comp plan,” Pethia said. “In July 2019, the Albemarle Planning Commission passed a resolution of intent to update the current housing policy.”

The Planning Commission had a work session in March and their public hearing will be held on Tuesday, May 4. Much of the work is built off of a regional housing needs assessment conducted in 2019 by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. The work is based on four conclusions from that study.

“One is that our population is going to continue to grow,” Pethia said. “It’s currently projected to grow by about 27 percent over the next twenty years so we will need to find housing and make sure we have appropriate housing stock for that increased population.”

The current policy expands the number of policy objectives from five to 12, and has 39 recommended strategies. These include ideas to increase the overall number of houses in Albemarle, preserving existing affordable options, expanding community engagement opportunities about housing, and more.

“Really addressing fair housing and community equity throughout the county,” Pethia said. “Housing for the homeless and special populations, and then how we can fit all of this together to support sustainable communities.”

The new plan also amends and expands the county’s definition of affordable housing to include sub-definitions such as workforce housing. Currently the definition of “affordable” is set at anything below 80 percent of the area median. Under that term, housing costs should make up no more than 30 percent of a family’s yearly income.

“The new policy recommends redefining affordable housing so that when it is renter-occupied housing, that those units would be available to households with incomes of 60 percent or less,” Pethia said.

But what about units for sale?

“For owner-occupied housing those units would still be available to households at the 80 percent AMI category or less,” Pethia said. “And we would set the maximum for-sale price at 65 percent of the federal HOME program one-unit purchase price limit for existing housing, it’s a really long title. As of today that maximum sales price would be under $200,000.”

The maximum is now much higher at $243,750, which is out of reach for many households. Pethia said the median sales price in the county is $405,000.

“So this I think will open the door to home-ownership to a lot of different families that have not been able to react it,” Pethia said.

In the new plan, Albemarle would adopt a new affordable dwelling unit ordinance to replace the current system where rezonings or special use permits trigger the developer to designate fifteen percent of the total number of units as below-market to households with incomes less than 80 percent of the AMI.

“With an affordable dwelling unit ordinance, that would become mandatory so the developers would have to provide a percentage of affordable housing with rezonings and special use permits,” Pethis said. “The policy proposes increasing that percentage from 15 to 20 percent.”

Developers would still have the ability to make a payment in lieu of providing the housing. Pethia also said that the county would have the right of first refusal to purchase those units when they are ready for sale.

“We could purchase up to one-third of those right off the bat,” Pethia said.

A current issue with the home-ownership system is that proffered for-sale units required to be below-market only have a 90-day eligibility window, after which they can be sold on the open market.

“Right now we have a very difficult time getting proffered for-sale units purchased as affordable units,” Pethia said. “And finally an affordable dwelling unit ordinance would allow the county to set affordability periods and control the resale price.”

Other planks in the plan include exploring county land that could be used to develop below-market housing for public employees, incentives and fee reductions for developers who limit their profit, and more.

The Albemarle Planning Commission’s public hearing is the second scheduled on the agenda. Read the latest version of the plan before you watch. Or, watch the Pantops meeting on the county’s YouTube page.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement and time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. It’s becoming more and more safe to go out and check out live music. If you’re interested in going out and hearing people who have been waiting to get out and play, check out the Charlottesville Jazz Society and their running list of events! The Charlottesville Jazz Society is dedicated to the promotion, preservation and perpetuation of all jazz, and that the best thing you can do now is to go check out some music. Check out the event listing on their website!

The following segment is best heard as an audio piece. This is a podcast as well, after all!

Finally today, last week, the developers of the new CODE Building on the eastern end of the Charlottesville Downtown Mall opened up for a preview for the press. The name of the structure at 240 West Main Street stands for Center of Developing Entrepreneurs.

“So, we have not done an on-site tour for those of you that have come before, we’ve met at the Omni,” said Andrew Boninti of CSH Development, the firm overseeing the site’s development.

“This time it’s so cool to get on the site. Hourigan Construction team is with us.”

The site of the former Main Street Arena was purchased by a firm associated with Jaffray Woodriff in March 2017 for $5.7 million. That building was razed and construction on a triangular replacement is nearing completion.

One of the main features of the new building will be the CODEBASE co-working space, which will be managed by Rob Archer. He leads the group of hard-hat wearing media into the building.

“So we’ve just walked into the main entrance right here,” Archer said. “We come through the vestibule area and we are here in what we like to call the hotel lobby.”

The walls are made of concrete and nothing has been furnished yet. But Archer holds up a picture depicting neatly-arranged couches and coffee tables. This will be a public space which leads both to the small working spaces as well as the offices on the upper floors. Fred Wolf of the firm Wolf Ackerman explains the purpose of the lobby.

“So the lobby is basically a big mixing bowl for all of the people in the building obviously, that’s why we have this bar that’s going to serve nitro coffee, wine, beer, get a newspaper,” Wolf said. “This could be event space if they have like a reception.”

There will be room for two pop-up restaurants to come and go, as well as a retail space that will face the Downtown Mall.

“The idea is that you can have to bring energy and people, you want to be able to feed them as well,” Archer said.

They’ll also need energy to climb the stairs, which were the only way to climb up the nine stories to the top of the part of the building that faces Water Street. The elevator wasn’t yet installed on the day we took the tour. On the way there, we passed through an 200-person auditorium that can be used for a variety of different purposes. Along the way, I asked Wolf a question.

“Is this the biggest thing you’ve ever worked on?” I asked.

“Yes,” Wolf said.

Being an active construction site, it was far too noisy to conduct interviews, so we’ll get to that in a moment. There’s only one level of parking in the basement. I asked Wolf how many spaces.

“I think we ended up with 74,” Wolf said. They didn’t have to build any spaces given the site’s location in a parking exempt zone.

“The spirit of this building, which had a lot to do about the health of the work environment, the health of the tenants and occupants and the belief there is going to continue to be advances in driverless vehicles, Uber, electric bikes,” Wolf said. “All of these other things instead of parking spaces that parking could become in the next ten or fifteen years kind of an obsolete notion.”

We climbed to the top of the building, passing through spaces that will one day be private offices for tenants. From the top of the Water Street side, you can see the three open rooftops connected to the offices on the Downtown Mall side.

Back down on the ground, I asked Rob Archer to talk about what CODE Base will be like.

“CODE Base Co-Working is really designed to serve business professionals and entrepreneurs do its specifically designed to aid in getting work done so what we always say is that Code Base Co-Working is a space to do your very best work,” Archer said.

“Obviously, this this thing happened and you started building this thing at the beginning of the pandemic, and a lot of people have said, ‘Why should we ever have to go back to work?’ What would you say to that?” I asked.

“So, a really interesting phenomenon has happened in terms of the timing of things,” Archer said. “With the real estate market changing, corporate entities have realized that the lagging asset in terms of change and flexibility is usually real estate. And so now bringing on a model that allows for flexibility, it really is a benefit to the corporate structure. It’s also a benefit to those who are tired of working at home, who need to join community.”

In all there are 38 private offices and another 15,000 square feet of open space to be shared. The rest of the space will be leased to companies. From the top of the building you can see the Apex building under construction to the south, and the 3-Twenty-3 building to the east. You also can’t help but notice the skeleton of the Landmark two blocks away. Does Charlottesville have enough companies that want this much office space? Here’s Andrew Boninti again.

“When we first started before the pandemic, I really felt pretty confident with interest that we had and letters of intent and things of that nature that we would have been 100 percent occupied when we open this September,” Boninti said. “But, everyone pressed paused for a moment and so we’ve been in the pause mode for about 12 months, but I think really with the roll-out with the vaccine we’ve really seen activity starting to pick up. We are in the process of signing several small tenant leases and I feel comfortable saying we’ll be 75 to 80 percent leased when we open. In this environment I feel very good about that.”

“Now, you’ve got a couple of other buildings that are coming online,” I said. “3-Twenty-3, the Apex Building. There’s a lot coming on the market all at once. Does that change things?”

“I think that it does,” Bointi said. “They’re both very good buildings and gives people good choices anyway. Obviously, if you’re a Monopoly player we consider ourselves to be Boardwalk and Park Place, but the other buildings are extremely nice. Apex, which is obviously predominantly taken by Apex, really did not have a lot of space that would be offered to the community and 3-Twenty-3 has been ahead of us so they’ve been signing up tenants at a little quicker pace. I think the real key for leasing here in Charlottesville is can we bring new businesses from out of town? I think what you see is a circulation of moving the same tenants around. We need to see new blood come into the community and that’s what we’re hoping to attract here at CODE but right now our tenants are existing tenants that are in the community already.”

Stay tuned.

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Today’s installment is just two segments

The University of Virginia details the early days of their initiative to build up to 1,500 affordable housing units on property they control

The latest in pandemic news from the UVA Health System

Yesterday, the University of Virginia Health System administered the 100,000th shot in its effort to assist the Blue Ridge Health District with community vaccinations. In all, UVA Health has helped 42,800 people become vaccinated against COVID, initially at a location in a hospital but for the past two months in the Seminole Shopping Center run by the Great Eastern Management company. The 100,000 dose happened at what’s become known as Big Shots.

As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports that 30.6 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated, and those numbers are higher in the Blue Ridge Health District. Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology at UVA Health said there’s a lot more work to do.

“We think that there’s still many, many people left to be vaccinated,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s only been two weeks since vaccinations were open to everybody.”

Wendy Horton, chief operating officer for UVA Health System said the next step is to encourage people to get the vaccine.

“We do have supply now and so I think it’s encouraging others and addressing vaccine hesitancy,” Horton said.

Another step will be to prepare to vaccinate younger people when the age limit for vaccine doses drops below 16. Dr. Craig Kent is the medical director of the UVA Health System.

“The goal is to get to whatever that percent is that reaches herd immunity so the higher percentage of folks that are vaccinated, the less likely we are to have continued problems with the pandemic,” Dr. Kent said.

But what is that percent? Dr. Sifri said there is not an agreed upon number and there won’t be an on/off switch. Let’s hear him at length.

“And the reason for that is that there’s a lot of variables that go into what constitutes herd immunity, and it’s probably even reasonable to take a step back and say what is herd immunity. I think the way we most often use that term is sort of when do things look like they’re back to normal where we’re doing the same types of things we were doing before the pandemic or maybe with just some minor modifications. And I think that’s a reasonable definition of herd immunity.”

“Whereas I think maybe in some other contexts we would think about herd immunity being a situation where there’s no more virus, that there’s no more transmission. I think that latter part is something that’s going to be difficult. We don’t know some of the factors that go into this. One the virus is changing, becoming more transmissible with some of these variants. The second is that we don’t know how long the vaccines will provide us protection. They appear very robust at six months and based on that trajectory we think they’re going to be much longer than that. And the third component of this is that there are some people, probably around ten percent that have some level of immunity based on prior infection.”

Today the Virginia Department of Health reported another 1,249 new cases of COVID and the seven day average is 1,038. The seven-day average for positive tests is at 4.7, a figure that has not been that low since mid-October.

But think for a moment about India, which is experiencing a nightmare third wave that is seeing an unbelievable number of cases and a health care system in absolute crisis. Yesterday there were 379,257 new cases reported and 3,645 deaths. The actual numbers are expected to be much higher. Dr. Sifri said he has been in communications with others involved in the global effort to help.

“This is such a dire situation and some of the advice we can provide is important but I think what is really needed is large, institutional, governmental and non-governmental assistance to India,” Dr. Sifri said. “I think it’s a tragedy and it’s something that we our hearts are pouring out for what’s occurring there.”

Dr. Sifri said the experience in India is a cautionary tale for the rest of the world to not lift restrictions prematurely.

“We’re not done with this virus,” Dr. Sifri said. “We’re not done with this virus world-wide. The United States, and I would include our community, need to be partners to turn the tide on this pandemic world-wide.”

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. Thanks! If you’re interested in supporting the public policy research that goes into this community resource, there are ways to do so financially. In addition to a Substack subscription, there’s also a Patreon account that helps cover the cost of the business, Town Crier Productions. I’m nine and a half months into this experiment, and through Patreon you can get additional behind the scenes audio, or help promote a nonprofit through a shout-out. Thanks to all of those who are supporting me so far, and if you can’t, this newsletter and podcast will remain free as long as I’m able to continue publishing it.

The University of Virginia has begun planning work to implement their pledge to build up to 1,500 housing units to be designated for people at certain income-levels on land owned by UVA or the UVA real estate foundation. At a virtual event Thursday night, President Jim Ryan said housing is one of five areas identified for community partnership. The original announcement of the UVA housing initiative was made on March 10, and the news was quickly overshadowed by the World Health Organization declaration the next day of the COVID pandemic.

“So, a year later I’d like to begin by restating our goal upfront, and the goal is really simple,” Ryan said. “It’s to support the development of a thousand to 1,500 of affordable housing units across Charlottesville and Albemarle County over the next ten years. We’ll do this by contributing land and partnering with a third-party developer. I will say that financial profit is not at all our driver and that our goal has the support of the Board of Visitors and the entire leadership team at the University.”

In the past year, Charlottesville City Council has adopted a new affordable housing strategy. The Albemarle Planning Commission has a public hearing next Tuesday about the update of the county’s policy. And the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership has been holding a speakers’ series on views from the development community.

UVA’s work will happen in that regional background, as UVA steps into a role they’ve not played before. Chief Operating Officer J.J. Davis is serving as chair of the UVA Affordable Housing Advisory Group which includes community members.

“The goal for this initial phase of this work is to learn more about how you see the University contributing to affordable housing solutions in our community and to collect input that will help this stage,” Davis said.

(visit the Working Group’s website to watch the video and learn more)

No sites have yet been determined for where new units might be. A quick look at area GIS records shows that the UVA Foundation owns around three dozen properties in Charlottesville, and that the Rector and Visitors of the University own around 90. UVA-proper owns over 70 parcels in Albemarle and the foundation owns several dozen.

To sort through the possibilities and to establish criteria for hiring that third-party developer, UVA has hired Gina Merritt of Northern Real Estate Urban Ventures to work through this phase, which will result in the development of a “request for proposals.”

“My team’s role in the University’s affordable housing initiative is to help UVA to develop a framework for implementing this initiative,” Merritt said. “The University plans to solicit developers to help develop University property in a way that meets our collective goals.”

This will include market research, review of previous studies, and discussion of comparative examples.

“And once the sites are selected for development, we will evaluate zoning, determine what housing and income types should be located on each site, and then draw diagrams to show the potential scale of these buildings,” Merritt said. “We will run financial models to determine the best way to finance the development and identify possible resources to fund the project.”

Merritt presented three examples of developments she’s been involved with. One of these is the 70-unit Nannie Hellen at 4800 in Washington D.C. where one-third of the units were replacement units for public housing, and the rest were financed through Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC).

The trio took questions from those on the virtual call. J.J. Davis asked the first.

“A lot of organizations are already doing affordable housing work,” Davis asked. “Where will UVA fit in so that they are not competing or duplicating efforts. Jim?”

“That’s a great question and in some respects that’s part of the community engagement process,” Ryan said. “The landscape is filled with people who are working on this issue already and we want to figure out the best way we can fit into this landscape so that we’re not duplicating efforts or competing but instead complementing the efforts.”

“Next question,” Davis asked. “When will the units be built?”

“Well, we want to get started as soon as possible,” Ryan said. “As I mentioned earlier, the goal is to complete a thousand to 1,500 units over ten years. Our thought is that we will start with one project. We are not that experienced with this so what we want to do is start with one project and take the lessons we’ve learned there when we move on to the second or third projects.”

Near the end of the presentation, Merritt took advantage of the poll feature in Zoom to take the pulse of those attending. Nearly ninety percent of those participating supported the idea of UVA developing housing for the community on its property.

President Jim Ryan concluded the event.

“UVA and our neighbors in Charlottesville, Albemarle, and the surrounding counties are linked together and our fates are tied together and one of the reasons for us to be a good neighbor is because of that. I think helping to contribute to… increasing the supply of affordable housing is one part of that,” Ryan said.

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In this installment:

Charlottesville’s public housing board gets an update on safety, demand for housing choice vouchers, and a status report on Crescent Halls renovation

Albemarle cuts the ribbon on its new community engagement van… no relation to this newsletter!

An informal partnership came together this month to rebuild a boat launch in Riverview Park

A very brief question about the Alberene Soapstone quarry

The pandemic is not over, but there are many signs that public life is returning. On Wednesday, members of the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and senior staff gathered at Darden Towe Park to cut the ribbon on a new van that will be used to support community engagement efforts. Jeff Richardson is the county executive.

“It is really good to be with everyone today and I think it’s very fitting that today we are at Darden Towe Park, which I would like everyone to know was our busiest park over the last 14 months as we’ve worked through this crisis,” Richardson said.

In all, the parks system had a million visitors in the last year as people sought open space. This event was the first in-person celebration of a county service since January 31, 2020.

“And on January 31, 2020, we had skate night at Yancey School Community Center, which was the kickoff for the community programming at that new community center,” Richardson said.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said the idea for the van came about last summer as community engagement staff visited parts of Albemarle.

“They were popping up in the county at country stores, neighborhoods, parks with regularity to distribute cloth face coverings as needed,” Gallaway said. “And a lot of time went into packing and moving and unpacking materials and stuff spent the events out in the elements for several hours. This van provides a central location to store things and move materials.”

The money for the van came from the county’s share of federal pandemic relief funds.

But, the event was not just to show off the new community engagement van. The event was held to showcase the series of little libraries by stocking them with a pamphlet on Monacan history written by the late Karenne Wood and Diane Shields.

Shields’ and her daughter Teresa Pollak spoke at the event. Let’s hear a long segment.

“The land we are on is but a small portion of land inhabited by people who called themselves Yesan, which means ‘the people,’” said Teresa Pollak. “[The people] inhabited the land in the interior portion of what today we call Virginia from the New River to the fall line at Richmond for hundreds of generations before the arrival of Europeans. Through years of warfare, disease, forced migration, and broken treaties, the original people were reduced to a fraction of their original members, living on a small portion of their original land. They were forced into assimilation by the dominant culture.

“The descendants of the original inhabitants are still here today. I am one of those descendants. We are known as Monacan and we understand that the land is the people, and the people is the land and we are not strangers on any of that land that was once considered our territory. As we are able to have air to breathe, water to drink, remember that the original people, my ancestors have been stewards of the land for centuries and they have made it possible for us to enjoy many of our natural resources that we still have.”

Diane Shields spoke as well.

“For so many generations, the Monacan people were overlooked, or misdiagnosed, or miscalculated, or mis a lot of things,” Shields said. “Our people have been classified as different races than what they were. A lot of that has been corrected. I’m sure all of you are familiar with the Racial Integrity Law. That was a very difficult time for our people as well as all the other Indian communities because of the way we were classified. But those times are pretty much behind us. Now we work with the state to be able to correct birth certificates.”

To learn more, go visit a county park and pick up the pamphlet.

The Rivanna River meanders down from Darden-Towe Park to Riverview Park which is on the western shore in the city of Charlottesville. Just in time for the Rivanna River Fest, work has wrapped up on an initiative to replace a boat launch and stairway at the park which washed away this past winter. According to a city press release, Woolen Mills resident Bill Emory approached the city this March with a plan to put in a new stairway using donated materials and labor. The Rivanna River Company, the Rivanna Conservation Alliance, and the Piedmont Environmental Council helped coordinate construction, which took place over a three-day period earlier this month.

“The result is a new and improved river access point stairway engineered to withstand exposure to strong currents and future flooding events,” reads the press release.

We’re living in these days, but others have lived here before, spending days in built environments that are no longer with us and places of work that have long been out of business. In southern Albemarle and northern Nelson County, the Alberene Soapstone Company for many years operated out a quarry in Schuyler, fueling the economic fortunes of the village of Esmont. Peggy Denby of the group Friends of Esmont is hoping to encourage the Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee and the county to take note of the remnants of the former quarry.

“They’re beautiful,” Denby said. “I just wanted somebody to know other than me that these things do exist. And I think a story could be written to talk about every one of the pieces of building that are discovered and the process that happened when the quarry was operational.”

This includes a canal, a system of trains, and so many other functions that are now gone. The land is in private ownership now. Denby wants the county to consider buying the land.

Supervisor Ann Mallek said she purchased material directly from the quarry back in the 1980’s.

“It is an incredible place but it will take a special owner to facilitate telling the story,” Mallek said.

Mallek pointed out that most of the parkland the county receives comes about my donation. That’s been the case for the Byrom Reserve, Preddy Creek and the new Brook Hill river park.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. This show has now been produced for nine and a half months, for people to listen to or read for free. I’m grateful for those who have been able to spend a little money to keep me self-employed, doing this work seven days a week. If you can spare the funds and want to support this show, right now if you pay for a subscription through Substack, Ting will match the amount! So if you’re paying $5 a month, $50 a year, or the very generous $200 a year founder’s subscription, Ting will match the amount in the name of supporting local journalism. This is how I want to spend my time, and every dollar spent goes to build up what is becoming a community resource. Click here to learn more about why Ting is making this effort! Pass it on!

For the rest of the show, we drop in on the April 26, 2021 meeting of the Board of Commissioners of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

This is the first week of the year with temperatures coming close to summer-like levels. That’s raising the concern of some Charlottesville residents who are concerned that hotter nights may lead to violence.

Laura Goldblatt is one of seven commissioners on the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority, and at Monday’s CRHA Board meeting, she reported from the Safety Committee, which has been reviewing what comes next when a contract with a security firm expires this May.

“If there’s going to be security or any groups in public housing communities, the ways that they want them to behave, the ways that they want to behave, what they expect from them, and what they think safety means to them,” Goldblatt said. “The other thing that I’ve heard very clearly from residents in those meetings is a real sense of urgency. People are really concerned about the change in the seasons and the summer coming on and they feel they need a concrete and firm plan and they need to understand what’s going on and they need that to be communicated.”

Work has now begun on both renovation of Crescent Halls and construction of new units at the South First Street site. CRHA Chair Betsy Roettger said the time is coming when the CRHA’s development subcommittee will soon turn its attention to what will come next for redevelopment.

“We really need to get moving on what we’re going to do next, the next moves and get it in front of residents quickly to get feedback,” Roettger said.

Roettger said many of the new CRHA commissioners are relatively new to the group and it would be good for them to get a sense of how the CRHA got to this point.

“It needs to be soon because we’re going to be moving quickly with whatever site is next due to the tax credit application cycle,” Roettger said.

The next deadline to apply for low-income housing tax credits from Virginia Housing is next March. There will be an update on redevelopment at a committee meeting next Thursday that members said they would attend, but the idea of an in-person retreat was floated.

One Commission said she would prefer to continue meeting virtually for the foreseeable future. Virtual meetings are allowed under the state of emergency, but won’t be once Governor Ralph Northam lifts the order. David Oberg is the legal counsel for the CRHA.

“State law does not allow at this point, but it’s very possible it’s going to be changed but at this moment, if the governor removes his emergency order, all local entities will be required to meet in person,” Oberg said.

Roettger said she felt the in-person meetings had a dynamic to them created by the physical space in City Council Chambers.

“To have us all sitting up high and residents that come sitting in the seats looking up,” Roettger said.

There were other updates at the April 26 meeting as well. The wait list for federal housing vouchers opened for a week long period in late March. John Sales is the CRHA executive director.

“We now have a total of 1,311 individuals on the waiting list for the [Housing Choice Voucher] program,” Sales said. “We’ve sent out 50 eligibility letters. About a fifth of those are living in public housing now.”

Work at Crescent Halls is now underway, according to CRHA Deputy Director Kathleen Glenn-Matthews.

“There’s a construction fence up, gravel driveway in the back, they’re getting prepped on the 8th floor,” Glenn-Matthews said. “Work on the first floor is starting May 17 and the substantial completion date right now is set for November 25, 2022.”

Residents involved in planning for the second phase of the South First Street redevelopment have begun to meet once more. There was a meeting last night, in fact. The CRHA was awarded low-income housing tax credits for that project in the 2020 cycle.

Mixing up the end here to let you know about an upcoming podcast coming up that celebrates a place none of us have been able to go to for a year - Italy!

Tour guide Tullia Maffei hasn’t been able to lead any of her usual adventures, but during the pandemic she teamed up with award winning journalist and producer, Allison Salerno to bring a little bit of that country’s people to your kitchen table or wherever you listen to your podcasts. You’ll now hear a quick promo of Italy - from the Heart!

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out wants you to consider a new adventure this Sunday. The Rivanna Conservation Alliance resumes the tradition of the Rivanna River Race! Contestants will travel 6.8 miles downriver via kayak or canoe from the Rio Mills Bridge to the Rivanna River Company. Registration costs $40 a person or $50 for tandem, and proceeds go to the Rivanna Conservation Alliance.

Don’t have a boat? Rent one from the Rivanna River Company! Visit the sign-up page in the newsletter to learn more and register. It’s all part of the Rivanna Riverfest which runs from May 1 to May 9.

In this installment:

Tourism industry officials want reform of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors’ Bureau

Updates on transit planning

There are no qualifying bids yet for the reconstruction of the Belmont Bridge

Virginia DEQ creates an environmental justice office

VDOT wants you to drive slow in work zones - this and every other week!

The long-awaited construction of the Belmont Bridge in Charlottesville will not begin this spring, and City Council might be briefed on Monday about how to move the long-planned project forward. Several firms submitted bids in time for the March 16, 2021 but the city has not released any further information at this time.

“The submitted bid proposals for the Belmont Bridge replacement are being evaluated by the City staff and its consultant in accordance with the planned project scope,” reads an email from Brian Wheeler, the city’s director of communications. “This evaluation also includes consideration of the project’s planned budget.”

The current bridge was built in 1962, and city staff recommended in April 2009 that it should be replaced rather than repaired. The firm MMM Design was hired to conduct the design process for what was then a project with a $9 million cost estimate. But there was a fierce public debate about whether the bridge should even be replaced, or if a tunnel underneath the railroad tracks should proceed. MMM Design went out of business soon after Council selected to go with a bridge in July 2014.

Soon after that, the firm Kimley Horn was selected and began a new review in April 2017. Last August, Council voted to authorize $15.26 million in federal and state funding for the project, which by then had a $31 million cost estimate. At least $7.5 million of that amount are city capital improvement funds. The project was advertised for construction bids earlier this year, but the process is now stalled pending new direction from Council.

“A recommendation for moving forward is being developed, as are possible options,” Wheeler wrote.

Check tomorrow to see if the item is on the City Council’s agenda for the May 3 meeting.

Want to show support for those people who work on road and transportation projects in Virginia? Tomorrow, April 28, is the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Go Orange Day, where people are asked to wear orange to mark National Work Zone Awareness Week. If you do, take a selfie and send it to VDOT in one of two ways:

Email to William.Merritt@vdot.virginia.gov and Lou.Hatter@vdot.virginia.gov Please include names, where the photo was taken and the company's name.

Text 540-717-8376 (be sure to include your name)

Take a look at their gallery to see examples.

Preparations continue for a study of how transit could work better in Albemarle County. Some fixed-route service is provided by Charlottesville Area Transit, which is owned by the City of Charlottesville. Jaunt provides fixed-route service between Crozet and Charlottesville as well as paratransit service throughout the region.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is shepherding a Regional Transit Vision as well as a study of additional service to serve Albemarle’s urban areas. A kick-off meeting for the study will take place in early June. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a planner with the TJPDC. She spoke at the April 22 meeting of the Regional Transit Partnership.

“This is a project to determine the best way to expand transit service to three priority locations in Albemarle, and those priority locations are Pantops, north 29, and Monticello,” Hersh-Ballering said. “The goal is to apply for funding to implement that service in fiscal year 2023.”

To do that, the study will need to be completed, including public review, in order to apply for a demonstration grant by next February.

Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel is the chair of the Regional Transit Partnership.

“I just have a comment, Jessica,” McKeel said. “I looked at that February date in February and thought, wow, that is a tight timeline but I’m sure you all have figured it out.”

The University Transit System is a member of the Regional Transit Partnership and they updated community officials on the results of a recent passenger survey. The pandemic skewed ridership last year, with almost 90 percent of people taking shuttle routes to the Health Complex, a figure that was 57.25 percent in 2019. Academic routes usually make up just over forty percent ridership, but that dropped to ten percent last year.

The University Transit System is completely separate from Charlottesville Area Transit, but does offer some service on some streets in the City of Charlottesville.

“We are the public provider on 14th Street, Grady, Rugby, Arlington, Massey,” said Becca White, the director of Parking and Transportation at UVA. “People who have been around long enough know that CAT used to serve some of those corridors and were able to concentrate elsewhere while UTS agreed to be the public provider on those corridors.”

However, Charlottesville Area Transit said they are in talks with UTS about whether that will continue.

CAT Senior Project Steve MacNally told the Regional Transit Partnership about upcoming capital projects, including the potential for a transit hub and park and ride lot on U.S. 29. They’re looking for a suitable two acre lot.

“I’ve been busy looking at some vacant or unoccupied properties, looking at right of way issues, the access to those, and a number of other criteria,” MacNally said.

CAT is about to begin work on two studies of its own. One will look at the need for future facilities and a more dedicated look at the park and ride possibility with the firm Kimley Horn.

In response to a question from White, CAT director Garland Williams said he has not been in touch with anyone from the University of Virginia Foundation, which owns many properties in the 29 North corridor, including the North Fork Research Park.

“This is our kickoff to bring all those elements together, so the study is really going to look at whether the corridor itself is ripe for transit,” Williams said. “We do believe that it is.”

Williams added this could help CAT increase ridership which would in turn bring in more funding.

“Initially we have looked at potentially the airport to [the University of Virginia] as the initial corridor of looking at, kind of the route, but that’s up for discussion as we’re working with our consultant,” Williams said.

The work by Kimley Horn is separate from the work being done by the TJPDC on behalf of Albemarle County. Williams said the work is complementary and will function together. A third transit-related land use study in the same geographical area is a potential relocation of Albemarle school bus fleet to land somewhere in the U.S. 29 corridor.

Christine Jacobs, the interim director of the TJPDC, said the conversation was a sign of the role the Regional Transit Partnership can play.

“I think this is really exciting because there’s a lot of synergy and coordination that is occurring between some of these corridors and I just want to make sure I remind you that the PDC we will also be doing through the MPO in their North 29 study corridor from Airport Road all the way up into Greene,” Jacobs said.

The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality has opened a new Office of Environmental Justice. Renee Hoyos will serve as the first director of the office, which will oversee the implementation of an environmental justice program at DEQ. The office stems from an executive order from Governor Ralph Northam from 2018. A report from Skeo Solutions and the Metropolitan Group completed in the fall of 2020 further outlined how the office might work.

Hoyos most recently served as the executive director of the Tennessee Clean Water Network. Hoyos will work with Jerome Brooks as the Environmental Justice Coordinator. Brooks has been at DEQ for a decade and a half as the manager of the office of water compliance and director of the office of air compliance coordination. Even before the creation of the office, Brooks has been serving as DEQ's environmental justice coordinator for the past 13 years.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement and time for another subscriber-supported public service announcement. It’s becoming more and more safe to go out and check out live music. If you’re interested in going out and hearing people who have been waiting to get out and play, check out the Charlottesville Jazz Society and their running list of events! The Charlottesville Jazz Society is dedicated to the promotion, preservation and perpetuation of all jazz, and that the best thing you can do now is to go check out some music.

Check them out in the link in the newsletter.

To close out the show today, a long look at the April 26, 2021 meeting of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau, a public body that since 2018 made up of appointed and elected officials from Albemarle and Charlottesville.

The CACVB was originally formed in 1979 and exists today to serve as a clearinghouse for information on tourism, as well as to discuss strategies for how to market the area. Different entities in the community want to bring in more visitors for different reasons.

At the beginning of the April 26 meeting, Susan Krischel is with the Ix Art Park, a centrally-located and flexible destination space. The organization has put together a new campaign called Charlottesville Excursions with $20,000 in funding from the Virginia Tourism Office to attract people in neighboring states to come to the area to experience the many arts in the community.

“We are such a strong and vital arts destination that we wanted to position Charlottesville as a city to come and really immerse yourself in arts,” Krischel said. “We thought that that not only could help spur economic activity here in Charlottesville. It could also encourage tourists to come back to Charlottesville.”

The Ix Art Park partnered with the CACVB, the Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville, the Bridge Performing Arts Initiative and the Quirk Hotel Charlottesville on the project. The latter would offer a discount during the duration of the campaign.

“This campaign is going to run every weekend in September and October of this year and this would be an example of what we might suggest to someone who comes in for a four-day weekend,” Krischel said.

For most of its history, elected officials did not serve on the CACVB’s governing body. Until 2004, there was a Tourism Council that advised the tourism agency’s executive director but that was abandoned at the time in favor of a larger Board of Directors. In 2017, city and county officials both to add more oversight and altered the make-up of the Board to allow two elected officials from both Albemarle and Charlottesville.

Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel said the program is exciting, but noted that much of the presentation was centered on Charlottesville.

“I understand the city-centric nature of the proposal,” McKeel said. “What was your outreach to Woolen Mills or Stonefield, some of the areas that are really close by but not in the city?”

Krischel responded that the Ix Art Park is small, and personnel limitations forced them to focus on their immediate environment.

“Some of it quite frankly came down to what we were just physically able to manage,” Krichel said. “We’re a small organization so we really felt we needed to keep it as close to the downtown center as possible just because we thought that was what we were able to manage.”

Krischel said the program could grow if it is successful. She said arts organizations have not been showcased to potential tourists.

“So this is sort of stepping our toe in the water to a more comprehensive arts campaign but I truly hope this will be a first step toward something that will be more permanent and long-term,” Krischel said.

Supervisor Ann Mallek said she wanted the Ix Art Park’s program to highlight fall festivals and to put a spotlight on excursions into Albemarle.

“And certainly everyone of those wineries and breweries that people mention, many of them have art galleries and have resident studio people there,” Mallek said.

Krischel said she would be happy to consider adding that information, but they’ve used up all of the $20,000 in funding so far.

“If you think that there are arts organizations that would like to be involved in this and would like to be willing to do a little bit of the footwork to get them involved and to help us tie them in, we’d be more than happy to speak to them,” Krischel said. “I think it’s just a lack of knowledge as to who everyone is and what’s going on.”

In February, the CACVB Board talked about the exploring ways to change the working dynamics of the Board to reflect best practices used by similar entities across the country which seek to market themselves as destinations.

An informal work group has looked at the issue since, including City Council Heather Hill. They looked at four other groups in Virginia and concluded the make-up of the CACVB skews heavily to government representation. Of the 15 members of the Board, eight are elected or appointed officials from Albemarle and Charlottesville.

“”We see ourselves as pretty unique in this position of being quasi-governmental with board oversight,” Hill said.

The working group met with industry representatives to find out what people thought about the CACVB and its ability to promote tourism.

“There’s just a sense that there’s not enough dialogue among the sectors and just being able to have more of those seats at the table so they can kind of be a conduit for that sector dialog that can happen across the region,” Hill said.

Hill said some representatives said there were power dynamics on the Board that intimidated people from approaching the agency for help and assistance.

Chris Eure, executive director of the Paramount, is another member of the working group. She said she wanted the Board to operate in a way that would lead to more connections, and referenced the presentation from the Ix Art Park.

“I would love to know how the arts could help better,” Eure said. “What nights do they need to be filled? What weeks, what months? And then have all these different sectors perhaps come up with plans for what activities to stage!”

Eure suggested adjusting the agendas for the meeting to invite more organizations to the table to get feedback from Board members.

The working group also suggested changing the composition of the Board itself.

“Overarching, I think a lot of the themes that we were hearing was just that there feels like a disconnect between the work of the Board and representatives in the industry,” Hill said.

Eure said the current make-up of the CACVB came at a time when there was suspicion from government officials about how their tax money was being spent.

“That’s by and large while we are here because there wasn’t the confidence from the elected officials that their funds that were their tax revenues were being used according to how they thought it should strategically be done,” Eure said.

McKeel said that was part of the discussion, but not the whole reason why she supported the board realignment in 2018. She said she wanted to expand the kinds of work the CACVB did and it wasn’t just about the money.

“Every time we asked about vineyards, every time we asked about the work that we are doing in this community around African-American history and some of the trails, every time we asked about something besides one group which was at that time was ‘heads and beds.’ We were told ‘we don’t do that, we can’t do that, we’re not interested in all of that other stuff,’” McKeel said.

There appeared to be support for reform of the board, but there was a warning about how much the members could do to reform itself. Roger Johnson is the chair of the CACVB Board and Albemarle Economic Development Director.

“I don’t think we can entertain any Board changes whatsoever,” Johnson said. “That’s part of the operating agreement and outside the scope of what this Board has the authority to do.”

However, Johnson will meet with his counterpart in Charlottesville as well as CACVB Executive director Courtney Cacatian to discuss next steps.

The meeting then moved on a presentation on Virginia’s tourism industry. The final speaker was Travis Wilburn of Stay Charlottesville. Wilburn went back to the discussion of the Board’s make-up. He said he has spoken with many people who feel the presence of elected officials on the CACVB Board was intimidating.

“As I speak representing these folks, I personally and honestly fear political retribution for the businesses that I’m involved in, which is exactly how many of your board members feel and fear on a regular basis,” Wilburn said. “We’ve created a toxic environment and we call on you to try and right this ship.”

Wilburn said data from the Virginia Tourism Office showed that tourism had a $683 million economic impact on the Charlottesville community in 2019.

“That was roughly 6,100 jobs and those are jobs we’d desperately like to bring back,” Wilburn said. “We very much need the help of this bureau.”

Wilburn cited a letter that Senator Creigh Deeds wrote to Susan Payne last Friday in which he appears to critique the make-up of the CACVB Board. Payne is the president of the Blue Ridge Group and chair of the Virginia Tourism Corporation. Let’s hear Wilburn read Deeds’ words.

“Several years ago I supported legislation to allow an elected official from both the county and the city to serve on the CACVB,” Deeds wrote to Payne. “I did so to encourage cooperation and work between the public and private sectors. I understand that membership has grown beyond what was intended, and it seems to me that you have to have more industry representation, so that the people who know the work can guide its growth.”

In response, Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker said her priority as an elected official is addressing race and labor issues.

“No matter how you spend it, we have an economy that has been built on a university and tourism that leaves the majority of the individuals who happen to be people of color, Black people and other people of color, to service those industries who can never make it out of poverty wages job even though we’re talking about a [nearly] $700 [million] industry,” Walker said. “That should be unacceptable to all of us.”

Walker said she would not be silent about her views.

“Besides the guests on this call, two of the four, I am the only Black person or person of color represented on this screen, so part of Heather and Chris [Eure]’s conversation about how to change that is a very important conversation.”

The conversations will continue at the CACVB’s next meeting.

Phew. This was a long one. Thanks for reading if you made it this far. Never a dull moment.

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On today’s show:

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors gets an update on the courts expansion and renovation

The Moton Museum in Farmville commemorates 70 years since an important walkout

There’s a new version of a planned multifamily development planned near Forest Lakes

There are three upcoming forums for the Democratic City Council nomination race

On Friday, federal officials lifted the pause on the administration of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. An advisory panel recommended that additional information about the risk of blood clots be given to people, and the Centers for Disease Control and the Food and Drug Administration quickly urged states to proceed. Virginia Vaccine Coordinator Danny Avula issued a statement soon after stating that the pause should give additional assurances about the safety of the vaccination process. (more in the Virginia Mercury)

As of this morning, 28.7 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated and just over 5.9 million doses have been administered. The Johnson and Johnson pause did not slow down the pace as there the seven-day average has remained in the mid-70,000’s.

The number of new cases continues to decline this week. For two days in a row, the number of new cases has been under 1,000. That’s the first time that’s happened since late October. The seven-day average is at 1,117 today and the percent positivity is down to 5.4 percent.

There are still six weeks until the Democratic Primary on June 8, but early voting has begun across Virginia. As of yesterday, 631 mail-in ballots had been requested in Charlottesville according to data contextualized by the Virginia Public Access Project. That figure in Albemarle is 2,276, 260 in Fluvanna, 153 in Greene, 238 in Louisa, and 118 in Nelson.

There are three remaining campaign forums for the three Democratic candidates for the two nominations for Charlottesville City Council. The Public Housing Association of Residents will hold an event on May 12, followed by the Martha Jefferson Neighborhood Association on May 20. I’ll be holding an event with Neil Williamson of the Free Enterprise Forum on May 27.

The Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association on March 10 which you can access the audio on Information Charlottesville. There was also an April 6, 2021 event on the I Love Cville video platform.

In March, residents of the Forest Lakes neighborhood dominated an Albemarle Planning Commission public hearing for a multifamily apartment complex planned for the intersection of U.S. 29. Go back and read that story if you have a moment.

Now RST Development has filed a revised plan with the county that among other things reduces the number of units from 370 to 340. They’ll get there by eliminating 32 townhomes, planting more green space, and adding more landscaping to serve as a buffer. The new proposed unit mix is 254 apartments and 86 townhouses

“The proposed buildings in RST Residences are carefully sited to mitigate any adverse visual impact to neighboring properties or public roads,” reads the narrative for the new application. “The tallest proposed building is the 5-story apartment building at the center of the Project. This building would be 540 feet from the intersection of Route 29 and Ashwood Boulevard, and over 320 feet from the property line with Ashland Townhomes.”

The narrative states that 75 percent of the multifamily units will comply with affordability guidelines. There is not yet a date when the project is expected to return to the Planning Commission to resume the rezoning process.

A Farmville museum dedicated to that community’s role in the long legal battle to desegregate America’s public schools held a ten-hour live virtual event on Friday to commemorate an important event in of Virginia history. Cynthia Hudson is on the Board of Trustees at the which for twenty years has operated out of the R. R. Moton School, which was designated for Black students by the public school system.

“Seventy years ago in 1951, students stood right here on this stage, stood up and walked out to protest overcrowding and other poor conditions in their high school,” Hudson said. “Although they didn’t know it at the time, the course of an entire nation would shift as a result of their actions.”

A lawsuit was filed against Prince Edward County by the NAACP, and the case became one of five that resulted in the Brown vs. Board of Education case that ended legal segregation and the doctrine of separate but equal. (learn more on Wikipedia)

“For decades, the Moton Museum has made itself the home of this vital, ongoing conversation that is just as alive today as it was then,” Hudson said.

The walkout in 1951 was led by Barbara Johns, who will be the subject of the new statue that will represent Virginia in the U.S. Capitol. Here’s Delegate Jeion Ward of Virginia’s 92nd District with an update.

“We are at the point now where we are looking at hiring a sculptor and making sure that we follow all state procurement laws and after the statue has been designed than we also have to have approval of the sculptor and that’s at three different stages of production by the architect of the U.S. Capitol,” said Delegate Ward.

Ward said she credited the work of Johns and her fellow students for leading the way to desegregated education, but that did not end a divided society.

“I always referred to myself as a Brown baby because it was the Brown vs Board of Education decision,” Ward said. “Although I was born when the decision was made, I never went to an integrated school and I should have gone my entire school years but I never went until my 12th grade year.”

Cameron Patterson is the executive director of the Moton Museum.

“What a powerful thing it will be when Barbara Johns’ statue takes its rightful place in the Statuary Hall collection,” Patterson said. “I think it will speak loudly to those young students across the commonwealth that they too can utilize their voice to create change.”

The entire ten hour Moton Live event is available for review on YouTube. Up next, a brief look at the Albemarle County Courts expansion and renovation.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement.

Tomorrow night at 6 p.m., the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will have another of their “Unregulated Historical Meanderings” series. This time around Siri Russell of Albemarle County’s Office of Equity and Inclusion joins White Hall District Supervisor Ann Mallek on the county’s work “to support the sharing of Albemarle County history to broaden the scope of our publicly told histories to be more inclusive of our complete community.” The event begins at 6 p.m. Register on Zoom or watch on Facebook Live.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors got the first verbal update in a couple years on the renovation and expansion of the Courts Complex In Court Square. In December 2018, the Board agreed to proceed with a plan to work with the city of Charlottesville on a joint General District Court. That ended a few years where the Board entertained the idea of moving the courts to a new location outside of downtown Charlottesville. Trevor Henry is the Assistant County Executive.

“This is a $44 million cost investment by the county and we believe it’s the largest capital investment the county has made in decades,” Henry said.

The current fiscal year includes $5.3 million for the courts project and the draft capital budget for next fiscal year includes $25.17 million. The rest of the funding would come in future years. The costs are based on projections of future caseloads.

Supervisors got an update at their April 21 meeting with new information compiled by Fentress Inc, a firm hired to review the planning work done to date.

Kurt Schlauch is a senior consultant with Fentress, a company that has no relation with the firm Fentress Architects which has also been working on the design. Fentress Inc’s job has been to review how much would be need to accommodate future workloads of the court.

“We look at how much business each court handles on an annual basis and look at the trends, then the number of judgeships and staff that are required to manage that caseload and handle that caseload and interface with the public,” Schlauch said.

Fentress Inc. was hired during the pandemic at a time when so many ways of doing business were re-examined.

“You know, how might space planning change and what technologies might be involved in the future that maybe have not been involved in the past,” Schlauch said. “Those items were really front and center for us.”

Fentress Inc’s work also included consultation from Neal Goodloe, a planner with the Thomas Jefferson Criminal Justice Board.

“We had some very important conversations with him about recent trends in law enforcement and prosecution locally and what we were seeing in some of the numbers,” Schlauch said.

Albemarle is within Virginia’s 16th Judicial Circuit which has six judges. Currently Albemarle is handled by an equivalent of 1.4 judges with Judge Cheryl Higgins being the only one serving full-time.

Steve White is with Fentress Architects. He said the court design will also take into account the ability for business to be conducted remotely.

“There are a lot of things that actually COVID has accelerated,” White said. “Things like video arraignments now are very common as a result which are actually safer environments.”

A reanalysis of cases under this new lens has caused both Fentress Architects and Fentress Inc to rethink how the new buildings will be laid out.

“One full judgeship for that county caseload appears that it will be sufficient both in the short-term and at this juncture, even in the long-term” Schlauch said.

Schlauch said an analysis of Charlottesville’s cases in addition to Albemarle’s means changes to the joint General District Court, which covers more routine infractions. Here’s Steve White again, talking about the second floor of the district court building.

“One key difference between this court set and what was done a few years ago is that each of these courtrooms is now 400 square feet larger per courtroom and the reason for that is in discussions with the two judges that volume of traffic court is highly efficient if they can get as many people in the courtroom as possible,” White said.

At the conclusion of the presentation, Supervisors approved a request to proceed to schematic design.

Last week, Albemarle County announced the creation of the Office of Broadband Accessibility and Affordability and the appointment of Michael Culp as its first director. Culp has been the county’s information technology director and has been spending time in that position recent initiatives to expand access to internet in rural portions of the county. Under his tenure, the Board of Supervisors authorized creation of the Albemarle Broadband Authority that has been awarded about $3.5 million in grants and helped put together public-private partnerships. The authority, which goes by acronym ABBA, meets next on Monday at 5 p.m.

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On today’s show:

Governor Northam announces the easing of some COVID restrictions

The Albemarle Architectural Review takes a look at the I-64 corridor west of Charlottesville

Greene County takes a look at their Comprehensive Plan

Vaccinations are up in Virginia, and new COVD cases are down. Yesterday, Governor Ralph Northam announced the easing of some restrictions in a YouTube video on posted yesterday.

“Starting May 15, social gatherings can have a few more people,” Northam said. “More people can go to theaters and entertainment venues, and more people at sporting events. But we all need to keep spreading out.”

Last night, the owners of many Virginia restaurants posted pictures showing they immediately jumped on the ability to return customers to one kind of area that has been banned.

“Restaurants can go back to seating patrons in their bar areas, but we all need to spread out there, too,” Northam said.

But back to the amendments that go into effect on May 15. Private bookings at restaurants and event venues can increase to 100 people in doors, and 250 people outdoors. Gyms and fitness centers can open to 75 percent of capacity, though people must stay ten feet apart. Pools can also increase to three-quarter’s capacity. Capacity at entertainment venues will be at 50 percent.

Northam said if the numbers continue along these trends, more restrictions will be eased in June.

“We’re aiming to significantly ramp up vaccinations even further and aim to reduce mitigation measures in June, hopefully all the way,” Northam said.

Northam said vaccinations may be able to children over the age of 12 this summer. Until then, Northam said everyone needs to keep wearing masks and keeping distance.

No word yet on whether karaoke will happen ever again.

Greene County is slowly reviewing their Comprehensive Plan, which was last updated in 2016. This past week, the Greene Planning Commission discussed the Natural Resources Chapter as well as the Agriculture and Forestry Chapter. During a conversation about riparian buffers, Deputy Planning Director Stephanie Golon suggested one area for the commissioners to think about.

“In the world we’re in today, a climate action plan might be something that we’d want to include as one of the goals,” Golon said.

The Agriculture chapter from 2016 acknowledges that farming in Greene faces challenges as the community grows.

“Greene County is facing the prospect of gradually losing farmland and forests,” reads the plan. “Each year a portion of land in the county is converted from growing food or harvesting timber to other uses, such as residential or commercial development. At the same time, some individual farmers are finding it more difficult to sustain a viable business or recruit the next generation to carry on their role of providing food.”

Commissioner Jay Willer suggested that Greene should measure the level of farming in the county through acreage and not the number of farms.

“We’ve talked later in this document we talk about encouraging small farming, niche farming, etc,” Willer said. “We could hang on to the same number of farms and increase the number of farms but lose acreage, or lose production, if our only marker is the number of farms.”

Willer said the document should also be more specific about the kind of agriculture practiced in Greene County.

“The other part of it is a question of what’s a farm,” Willer said. “We don’t have a lot of acreage in Greene County dedicated to row crops or wheat and beans just because we don’t have the soil and terrain to do that. Most of our agricultural land is cattle or forestry.”

To learn more about the Greene County Comprehensive Plan process, there’s a five minute video on YouTube that’s worth a look. (watch )

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. This patron-supported public service announcement is from an anonymous supporter. Do you want to support your public library by picking up a mystery bag of books? The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are resuming their Pop-up Book Sale this Sunday at the Gordon Avenue library. For $5, you can pick up a sealed, pre-selected bag, choosing from mystery, popular fiction, literary fiction, classic literature, biographies, sci-fi / fantasy. The JMRL Pop-Up sale begins this Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Gordon Avenue Library. (learn more on their website)

The agendas of the Albemarle Architectural Review Board include proposals for all kinds of developments whose detailed site plans might not otherwise go before the Planning Commission or the Board of Supervisors. On April 5, 2021, the group took a look at the I-64 corridor heading west from the 5th Street interchange to the county line with Nelson. ARB member Frank Stoner led the presentation.

“It’s about a 20 mile stretch, most of which is rural,” Stoner said. “Most of the commercial development, really most of all the development along the corridor is pretty effectively screened and I know that’s generally been a priority for us in evaluating anything along that corridor.”

One prominent landmark is the Albemarle Charlottesville Regional Jail.

“Probably one of the more dominant architectural features of the corridor, slightly east of where we’re starting, but I thought I’d share it anyway,” Stone said.

In the past few years, new residential complexes have been constructed and are highly visible from I-64.

“Buildings in the urban area are generally oriented away from the corridor,” Stoner said. “In the case of these two multifamily projects that got built on the south side, they do in fact sort of front not directly but they do front the corridor in that they are forward facing or have a significant architectural presence on the corridor.”

A principle of development all across America has been the location of easily visible commercial destinations from highways and highway interchanges. That’s not the case for so much of I-64 in Virginia, including Exit 118 at U.S. 29.

“When you’re at this interchange, you actually can’t see any of the surrounding development, and that pattern persists as you head west,” Stoner said.

If you’re driving west, you can briefly see the reservoir to the north, but don’t blink. There’s very little development along the route, and even the Yancey Mills lumberyard can’t been seen from I-64. When you get to the top of Afton Mountain, though, that changes.

“When you get to the Afton interchange, which is a little beyond the scope of what we’re technically responsible for, but it’s close enough and I figured I would include it,” Stoner said. “You have some commercial development on 250 kind of at the interchange with the Blue Ridge Parkway. You’ve got the abandoned motel up there and a couple of other smaller commercial buildings that are generally not in good condition.”

In a future update, we’ll hear information about the U.S. 29 / U.S. 250 area covered by the ARB.

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In today’s Substack-fueled shout-out, would you like to use your tech, data, design, or research skills in the name of community service? Code for Charlottesville may be the place for you! Code for Charlottesville will be holding an orientation session on April 21 where you can learn more about their streetlight mapping project, criminal record expungement data analysis, or their pro-bono tech consulting for local nonprofits. Learn more on the Code for Charlottesville website.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council gets an update on the current year’s financial shorta

Albemarle’s Places29-Hydraulic Committee gets updates on Boys and Girls Club, Charlotte Humphris park, and Stonefield

Even though the Charlottesville City Council meeting from April 19, 2021 was the shortest in recent memory, the next two newsletters will include info from that event. They were finished with business by 8:30 p.m, something that almost never happens.

Last week, Charlottesville City Council adopted a $192.2 million budget for the fiscal year that begins on July 1, 2021. Yesterday the five Councilors got an update on efforts to plug the revenue shortfall expected in the current fiscal year due to declines in meals and lodging taxes.

“We’re now projecting revenues will come in at approximately $8.3 million lower than what our adopted budget amounts are,” said Ryan Davidson, a senior budget management analyst with the city of Charlottesville.

That estimate is based on meals tax revenues that are $3.7 million less than anticipated and lodging taxes that are $2.73 million less. This is the last quarterly report of the fiscal year, which now means staff will have to identify ways to make up the shortfall.

“We’ve talked about the COVID reserve of approximately $6.7 million and and on top of that there was also CARES funding from the first round of federal funding that came through that was previously authorized for FY21 operating expenses,” Davidson said. “We have some revenue decreases that should have some corresponding expenditure decreases.”

The budget will be further reconciled as actual revenues come in, as well as the city’s first receipt of proceeds from the American Rescue Plan. Davidson said he would share more about that with Council and the public as more information become available.

Council also got a preview of the United Way of Greater Charlottesville’s Envision campaign. Ravi Respeto is the organization’s president.

“It’s really about looking to the future of what Charlottesville can be while we work together to look at reducing poverty in our community, working as nonprofit partners and peers toward a common goal,” Respeto said.

The plan has two strategic goals. One called Financial Stability seeks to help 1,800 families out of poverty by 2026 by getting them to a household income of $45,000, which is considered the threshold for survival in Charlottesville. The second is a School Readiness goal to increase the number of kindergarteners who pass literacy benchmarks.

“We’ve been doing school readiness in our community for many, many years but financial stability is becoming really our key focus and sort of the bedrock for all of the work that we’re doing,” Respeto said.

Respeto also detailed the United Way’s increasing move toward providing direct services in collaboration with governments and other nonprofits. She said the Community Emergency Relief Fund helpline receives between 250 and 300 calls a day.

“And we suspect that the need isn’t going to go away any time soon,” Respeto said.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker noted that one resource known as the Pathway Fund is running out of money. She wanted the city to find a way to provide additional revenue out of a sense of urgency.

“One thing can set a family back and it could be some one thing as simple as a car repair but it has that kind of domino effect,” Walker said.

“It absolutely does,” Respeto said.

“Families who are already living under constant poverty, it’s hard for them to get out of it,” Walker said.

Later in the meeting, Council discussed replenishing the Pathway fund. We’ll have more from that discussion in a moment.

At the same time Charlottesville City Council’s work session was wrapping up, the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee was getting underway. They learned that the Boys and Girls Club of Central Virginia is going to break ground in June on their new facility at the Albemarle County’s Lambs Lane Campus. James Pierce is the CEO.

“We’re very excited about all of the county support we have received to this point,” Pierce said. “That means we have a target date for completion and opening with the school year of 2022.”

The facility is expected to provide after-school education and activities for around 300 people a day who are between the ages of 13 and 16. A special use permit request will be made to turn the area into a community center that can be used by more than just the Club.

The CAC also got an update on an effort to refurbish Charlotte Humphris Park, one of the largest parks in Albemarle’s growth area. Kimberly Swanson is a member of the Places29-Hydraulic CAC.

“So the park itself is 23 acres without about one and a half miles of paved trails,” Swanson said. “There’s a forested portion. Towards the back is a meadowed, more open area and there’s also a wetland area.”

Benches and a natural play area are two of the amenities that have been added to the park.

The CAC also got an update from the manager of Stonefield, Samantha Strong. The commercial area’s main tenant is just about to reopen after over a year of being shutdown for the pandemic.

“We do have a date for the movie theater,” Strong said. “We are less than a month away so we are working diligently away on getting everything ready.”

Strong said Splendoras will reopen in Stonefield and is working on inspections. The space formerly used by Pier One will be divided into three spaces, one of which will become a Torchy’s Tacos franchise.

“They’re out of Texas and this is their first location on the east coast area here,” Strong said.

Stonefield was rezoned by the Board of Supervisors in 2003, but ground was not broken until May 2011 for many reasons including the Great Recession. The original developer had rezoned the land for a 65 acre development that was originally promoted to have more of an urban form, with multiple story buildings.

A second developer brought the property and first built single-story retail establishments. A third development firm, O’Connor Capital Partners, purchased the property in late 2016 and has since returned to the original vision. Construction of new multifamily apartments has also led to more pedestrian interconnectivity to nearby streets. Supervisor Diantha McKeel had this description, though the handrails aren’t yet installed.

“If you think about where the Thai restaurant is, down, there’s a staircase there you can walk down into Stonefield, which is pretty cool,” McKeel said.

Albemarle County has agreed to participate in a partnership to build below-market units for people at risk for being homeless at the site of the Red Carpet Inn. Albemarle’s Office of Housing will commit 80 of its federal housing vouchers to Virginia Supportive Housing, one of three nonprofits working to redevelop the site in a project now known as Premier Circle. Virginia Supportive Housing worked with the City of Charlottesville on the 60-unit Crossings at 4th and Preston which opened in March 2012.

Virginia Supportive Housing has submitted an application for low-income housing tax credits (LIHTC) for their portion of the Premier Circle project, which also includes 60 units being pursued by Piedmont Housing. Last month, the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation awarded a $4.25 million grant for the project. For all of the details on the project to date, there’s this article from Allison Wrabel in the Daily Progress.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out, supporter Lonnie Murray wants you to know about a series of seminars on spring and fall landscaping with native plants. Plant Virginia Natives has held four of these already, but the next one is coming up on April 20 with Beth Mizell of Blue Ridge Prism on how to identify and eradicate invasive plants in Virginia.

On today’s show:

Charlottesville’s registrar has resigned, effective immediately

Virginia’s purchase of CSX rail lines in Virginia moves forward

A look at why the Franklin Street sidewalk project stalled and how it can get back on track

A quarter of Virginians are now fully vaccinated

Today is only the second time this year that the number of new COVID-19 cases has dipped below 1,000 with 978 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health. The seven-day average is 1,464 a day and the percent positivity is at 6.1 percent. As of today, one-fourth of Virginians are fully vaccinated.

Governor Ralph Northam appeared this afternoon at the opening of a new mass vaccination clinic in Fairfax County.

“Over the past four months we have made tremendous progress vaccinating Virginians against the COVID-19 virus,” Northam said. “This has been a very tough year for everyone.”

As of this weekend, everyone over the age of 16 is eligible to sign up for an appointment at vaccinate.virginia.gov.

“Not everyone can get a shot today or even this week,” Northam said. “And while demand still outstrips supply, our supply is much larger than it used to be.”

Northam did not have many changes to the current restrictions, but there were a few specific amendments.

“Cross country will be allowed to have 68 runners at the starting lines, which is up from 50,” Northam said. “Performance events like drama and musicals are considered social gatherings. I’ve heard a lot of feedback from parents and students that these events should be treated the same as athletic events, and I agree. So we’ll increase the number of people to 100 indoors or thirty percent of that venue’s capacity. If it it’s outdoors it will be increased to 500 or 30 percent.”

This past weekend, the Virginia Department of Health reported the presence of the P.1 variant in the Commonwealth. Northam said people in the state should remain vigilant.

Last week, Pfizer announced it is likely a third shot will be required within 12 months. Dr. Costi Sifri is the director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia, and he spoke at a media briefing on April 16.

“I think that there is a very good chance that Moderna may need to have a booster if it appears that Pfizer does as well at 12 months but I think we’ll just have to follow the science and I know that Moderna will be doing those studies,” Dr. Sifri said. “I think we’ve always anticipated that a booster could be needed but not for durability of immunity but also for potentially to be able to address the rise of variants.”

Dr. Sifri said that while the number of cases of clotting with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine is small, he supports the pause as a precaution.

“The pause is a reasonable and important thing to do to understand the biology of it, but even if proves out to be caused by this vaccine, it’s going to be a rare, rare event and far outweighed by COVID itself,” Dr. Sifri said.

The Centers for Disease Control is expected to meet this Friday to discuss next steps for the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, which was withdrawn from the supply due to reported incidents of blood clotting.

Railroad company CSX has closed the first transaction with the Commonwealth of Virginia for hundreds of miles of railway and right of way, according to a press release issued last week. The first of three phases in the $525 million exchange takes the form of a permanent land easement between Petersburg and Washington D.C. The other two phases are a line from Doswell to Clifton Forge, and another line from Petersburg to Ridgeway, North Carolina.

Charlottesville is looking for a new registrar. Last week, Melissa Morton notified the three-member Electoral Board of her resignation for personal reasons, according to the minutes of the Board’s April 12 meeting. The Board has approved Taylor Yowell to serve as acting registrar until a permanent replacement is found. Morton became the assistant registrar in 2014, and replaced Rosanna Bencoach who left the position in 2019 when the Board told her she would need to reapply for the position.

Albemarle County is requesting $1 million in Community Development Block Grant funds to help cover the $8.5 million cost to build 20 owner-occupied housing units in the first phase of the Southwood. That’s according to a public notice in today’s Daily Progress which announces that Albemarle County has made a ruling of Finding Of No Significant Impact, or a FONSI, on the human environment. The county is taking public comments on this through May 3. (Daily Progress public notice)

In this Substack-fueled public service announcement… are you of Scottish ancestry? The Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society and the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library will hold another of their Ask A Genealogist series at 7 p.m. on Thursday, April 22. Special guest Deborah Harvey will demonstrate how she traced some of her ancestors from Fluvanna County to Scotland. Sign up at jmrl.org and email your questions to library@albemarlehistory.org before the virtual event.

Earlier this year, City Council agreed to transfer federal funding that had been allocated to add a sidewalk on Franklin Street, which serves as part of its eastern border with Albemarle County. The project was within the jurisdiction of a task force that was put together to recommend projects eligible for Community Development Block Grant funding distributed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD. Erin Atak is a grants coordinator with the city of Charlottesville.

“This is funding that’s issued by HUD,” Atak said. “These are federal funds that the city receives each year as an entitlement community.”

The city selects a neighborhood every three years to receive the money for infrastructure and a task force is put together to make recommendations to Council. One recent project funded through this process is a pocket park in the 10th and Neighborhood. The current neighborhood receiving funds is the Ridge Street neighborhood. The Belmont task force last met in February 12, 2019.

“And in this case, the Belmont Priority Neighborhood [Task Force] recommended to City Council the Franklin Street sidewalk which was approved to create a new sidewalk on the west side between north Moores Creek Lane and Nassau Street, which was approximately 1,600 feet of new sidewalk.”

This process is separate from the city’s sidewalk priority process. The Belmont neighborhood was allocated a total of $449,214 and the sidewalk made up a portion of that amount.

Tim Motsch is a transportation project manager with the city, hired in the summer of 2017.

“Myself and Kyle Kling were hired in order to manage transportation projects including the sidewalks which I have been involved in as well as Smart Scale projects that I’ve been involved in such as the East High Streetscape and the Emmet Streetscape.”

More on those projects in a future newsletter. For now, Motsch explained that design for the Frankin Street sidewalk began in late 2018 when the engineering firm A. Morton Thomas was hired to do the work. Complications happened.

“It is a challenging plan from the point of the view of stormwater management depending on which map you look at and which datum you refer to, the sidewalk is either right next to the floodplain or in the floodplain,” Motsch said.

That delayed the design for the project, which included the need to purchase easements from landowners on which mitigating features and drainafe could be built. The pandemic’s effect on the city’s budget also led to a delay.

“Add to the fact that last year, for several months all sidewalk projects were on hold due to the possibility of having to use city funds,” Motsch said.

Construction is now slated for next spring, but that’s if the right of way can be acquired from around a dozen property owners.

However, Atak explained that HUD has time limits by which its money can be spent and this project did not make the deadline.

“Normally funds are required to be spent within one year of receiving CDBG dollars,” Atak said.

In February, Council transferred the funding to a rent relief initiative for public housing, but Atak said the funding will be restored on July 1, 2022. Everything has to be in place for the project to move forward.

“It’s very important that we receive public support with the right of way moving forward so that we can secure this funding and there aren’t any delays moving forward,” Atak said.

Atak said HUD has already issued a warning on the project.

Motsch said a round of certified letters are being sent out to property owners this week for negotiations, and that the city wants to avoid taking properties by condemnation. One of the abutting landowners is Sunshine Court, which owns a six and a half acre mobile home park on Carlton Avenue. The property has a land value of $2.4 million.

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On today’s show:

Campaign finance reports are in for candidates in Albemarle and Charlottesville

A developer of below-market housing units explains some of the financial details

The Free Enterprise Forum takes a look at the make-up of local government revenues

The first campaign finance reports are in for the Charlottesville City Council race and the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors. The Virginia Public Access Project has updated their campaign finance database with new reports from all of the Democrats who have filed in both races.

Let’s start with the two seats for City Council. City Councilor Heather Hill is not running for re-election. Independent Mayor Nikuyah Walker announced re-election last year, but the Virginia Public Access Project does not yet include a report from her campaign.

Four-term Charlottesville School Board member Juandiego Wade raised $55,544 in the first quarter of the year, with 77 contributions of over $500. That includes one $5,000 donations from Sonjia Smith and another $5,000 from Seminole Trail Management LLC. So far Wade has spent $13,893.

Brian Pinkston, who ran for the Democratic nomination in 2019, raised $40,578 between February 7 and March 31 according to material published on VPAP. That includes 53 contributions of more than $100 including a $5,000 contribution from Seminole Trail Management LLC. Pinkston has spent $828 in itemized expenses and the total amount raised includes $7,685 in in-kind expenses.

The report from Charlottesville Businessman Carl Brown shows the candidate has raised no money and spent no money, and has a campaign balance of $25.

The VPAP update also does not include a report from independent candidate Yas Washington.

In Albemarle County, there are reports for the three Democrats in the three magisterial district races. So far there are no independents or Republicans.

Newcomer Jim Andrews raised $25,876 in his campaign to succeed Liz Palmer as the supervisor for the Samuel Miller district. That includes $2,518 from Liz Palmer’s campaign, and $5,000 donations a piece from Sonjia Smith and Michael Bills. Andrews’ campaign spent $928 and recorded $400 in in-kind expenses.

Jack Jouett District incumbent Diantha McKeel raised $11,605 in the first quarter, and had a balance of $25,543 on March 31. McKeel spent $532.

Rio District incumbent Ned Gallaway raised no money in the first quarter but began the year with a balance of $5,693. His campaign spent $28.

So far, there are no independents or Republican candidates in any of the three supervisors races.

One of the biggest issues facing any of the candidates elected this November is housing. There are many calls for local governments to invest more in subsidizing the cost to provide units to people whose household incomes are below the area median income.

To educate policymakers throughout the wider area, the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership has been holding a speaker series to illustrate the challenges and obstacles from the perspective of the building and development community. Yesterday, on April 15, the guest was William Park, the president of Pinnacle Construction. He went through the many line items that go into a financial calculation about how much it costs to build new housing.

He said at the moment, one of the major factors is rising prices for materials, with some elements costing as high as four times as much as they did a year ago.

“Give you an example, I was just writing a purchase order the other day that I struggled to sign it,” Park said. “OSB 716 that we use many times for sheeting on our walls and our roofs. In an apartment project, we may have 30,000 sheets of OSB. Typically I’m in the $10 range. I signed a PO the other day for $42 a sheet.”

Another factors are permits, taxes, insurance, recording fees, financial statements, legal fees, and everything it takes in order to get a building permit.

“And then reserves that we have to set aside for working capital and initial operating deficit,” Park said.

Park also detailed ways to help cover the costs in order to deliver housing units that can be rented out below what the market could bring in. These include grants from the federal or state government, as well as tax-exempt bonds from entities such as economic development authorities. Many projects Park has worked on involve Virginia Housing, formerly known as the Virginia Housing Development Authority.

“They get a large portion of the tax-exempt bond allocation that goes to the state,” Park said. “The other tool that we use almost extensively for anything below the 60 percent area median income is the low-income housing tax credit.”

You’ll often hear the acronym LIHTC for low-income housing tax credits. This has helped subsidize construction of “affordable” projects in Albemarle County ranging from Crozet Meadows to Wood’s Edge. In Charlottesville, recent projects with low-income housing tax credits include Carlton Views. There are different kinds of tax credits for different kinds of projects. (Virginia Housing page on low-income housing tax credits)

“If we’re allocated tax credits, we sell those tax credits to a corporate entity and they in return get a dollar for dollar credit against their federal tax liability,” Park said.

This builds equity in the project which brings down the amount that needs to be financed. This is a competitive process. In this year’s cycle, Virginia Supportive Housing is applying for tax credits for their portion of the redevelopment of the Red Carpet Inn. Piedmont Housing is applying for the tax credits for the 70 apartment units they are building at Southwood. (current applications)

Park said there are other options for projects that seek to provide an affordable rent for households who make between 60 percent and 80 percent of the area median income. Virginia Housing has a mixed-income financing program.

“They have a particular program where they use taxable bonds,” Park said. “Twenty percent would have to be set aside for those tenants at AMI 80 percent or less. The other 80 percent could be unrestricted as far as rents, or you could choose the 40/60 option which would be 40 percent below 100 percent AMI and the balance 60 percent unrestricted.”

The concept of “affordable housing” means different things to different people. Park said there are a lot of misunderstandings based on biases and prejudices.

“When the low-income housing tax credit was first promulgated, one of the worst things they ever did was entitle it the ‘low-income housing tax credit’ because I think at that point everybody thinks you’re talking about people that don’t work, that have no other chance to provide anything to society, which is totally wrong.”

Park said interventions to reduce rents provide places to live for service workers, including first responders and teachers. In an affluent community like Charlottesville, the area median income is high, at $93,900, putting many homes out of reach.

Park suggested ways to help developers lower the cost of projects include expedited initial reviews, reduced parking requirements, and increased building heights. He also said a less adversarial relationship between developer and local government would also help.

“The planning staff needs to be an advocate and really help get us through the process for this affordable housing because time is money and if we’re sitting there with a deal that we’ve looked at and the interest rate needs to be five percent, and all of a sudden this thing has taken eight or nine months to get through, and now interest rates are now six percent, well the deal may not work anymore, and that’s the reality of it,” Park said.

The full recording of the event will soon be made available on the YouTube page for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

City Council adopted their budget for Fiscal Year 2022 this week, and we still wait to see the details on how a multimillion revenue shortfall will be closed for the current fiscal year. City Council will get an update on Monday. Albemarle will hold a public hearing on their budget on April 28 followed by adoption on May 5.

But how did things go in fiscal year 2020, which ended last June 30. The Free Enterprise Forum has released its annual revenue report which analyzes how each government in the planning district gets it tax money.

“The analysis seeks to develop comparative metrics to examine the taxation trends in each locality and determine if these trends can be correlated to other localities,” reads the introduction to the Revenue Report. “In addition, The Revenue Report seeks to promote understanding of the impact of business and economic development to diversify a locality’s tax revenue streams.”

The report found that Charlottesville gets 35.7 percent of its local tax revenue from commercial sources, including property taxes paid by businesses. That compares to 27.3 percent in Albemarle, nearly 8 percent in Fluvanna County, nearly 20 percent in Greene County, 13 percent in Louisa, and 20.4 percent in Greene.

For more on the report, check out the Free Enterprise Forum’s blog.

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On today’s show:

Scottsville Town Council briefed on various infrastructure projects

Albemarle Supervisor Ned Gallaway seeks a second term

Ground is finally broken for Crescent Halls rehabilitation

For the second time in the past six weeks, an official ceremony has been held to begin major construction at a public housing site in Charlottesville. Crescent Halls was built in 1976 at the intersection of Monticello Avenue and 2nd Street SE. Brandon Collins is with the Public Housing Association of Residents.

“As we all know, urban renewal happened in Charlottesville in the 60’s and we hear a lot about Vinegar Hill but it also happened here on Garrett Street and that was the birth of this building, Crescent Halls,” Collins said.

Collins said a lack of investment in the facility has led to a series of well-documented maintenance problems, including a lack of air conditioning during the summer months. He said the Public Housing Association of Residents pushed to create a Bill of Rights to protect citizen rights during relocation.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority was created to serve as an instrument of what was termed “slum clearance” following a narrow referendum held on April 15, 1954, 67 years ago today. The proposal won by only 36 votes. At the time, The Daily Progress reported that approval of the new authority carried three of the city’s four wards in the referendum. A master plan intended to guide redevelopment of all the sites was adopted in the summer of 2010 but nothing happened.

The events of the summer of 2017 moved the rehabilitation project forward. In October 2020, Council approved a performance agreement with CRHA that governs the use of $3 million in direct city investment in Crescent Halls as well as the first phase of South First Street. Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker also serves on the CRHA Board of Commissioners.

“By doing this today we also show that promises that have been broken for decades are finally being fulfilled,” Walker said. “People shouldn’t have to wait for decades for their basic needs to be met and that happens when a community doesn’t own its responsibilities.”

Walker said construction should take about 18 months.

Riverbend Development has shepherded design and financial planning for the project. Part of the project is funded through low-income housing tax credits (LIHTC) that are used to encourage private investment. The credits were granted by the Virginia Housing Development Authority in 2019 to Crescent Halls Reno LLC, which is made up of the CRHA and its nonprofit arm known as the Charlottesville Community Development Corporation (CCDC). (VHDA application)

Under the terms of the arrangement, the Crescent Halls building will no longer be owned by the CRHA but will instead be owned by a limited liability company (LLC) created specifically for the project. That’s the same arrangement for the first phase of South First Street which broke ground on March 7.

Unlike the CRHA, the CCDC must pay to pay property taxes to the city of Charlottesville for the rehabilitated structure. An agreement signed on March 5 between the city, CRHA and CCDC compels the city to make a subsidy to CRHA to cover the costs for CCDC’s tax liability for a period of 15 years.

Cornelius Griggs, president and CEO of GMA Construction, also spoke at the dedication ceremony.

“We are here today partnering with our great partners at Martin Horn who are going to assist us and work with us to deliver an excellent facility to the residents of Crescent Halls,” Griggs said.

CRHA Executive Director John Sales also spoke at the event. He took that job last August after serving for a brief time as Charlottesville’s housing coordinator.

“One of the things that really excited me about taking this job was an opportunity to work with the residents to build a future that they saw themselves living in and I think this project as well as South First Street and all the other future projects will have that same aspect,” Sales said.

Scottsville’s Town Council met this past Monday and got several updates on several infrastructure projects. Planning continues for a park in west downtown funded through a $80,000 grant from the Virginia Outdoors Foundation. Scottsville Town Attorney Jim Bowling said the next step is to sign an easement document for public access on land owned by prominent landowner Dr. Charles Hurt.

“All of this land is in the flood plain and its proposed to be a permanent recreational easement for the benefit of the town and its citizens,” Bowling said. “The easement will be jointly owned as proposed by the Virginia Outdoors Foundation and the town.”

The Council also got a briefing from the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority, which withdraws water from Totier Creek or the Totier Creek Reservoir. RWSA Executive Director Bill Mawyer said the reservoir was built in 1971 and holds 155 million gallons.

“We get water out of the creek most of the time,” Mawyer said. “Totier Creek Reservoir tends to have a high turbidity and sediment load.”

Mawyer said RWSA is planning for an $11 million upgrade to the water treatment plant that was originally built in 1964. That won’t happen for at least five years.

Much sooner than that, Albemarle is working on a facility where residents can bring household waste in southern Albemarle to a collection site known as a “convenience center.” The project will be built in the unincorporated area of Keene on land owned by the county, north of Scottsville on Route 20. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has allocated $1.1 million for this project.

“And that would include all of the containers and compactors necessary to open the operation,” said Lance Stewart, the county’s director of facilities and environmental services. “That of course would be done in cooperation with the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority.”

The county purchased the land in 1990 for a potential trash transfer facility, but that project was never built. Stewart stressed this is not the site of the now-closed Keene landfill.

But what is a convenience center, exactly?

“It’s a place to take bagged household waste or in containers, not bulk household waste,” Stewart said. “Also compostable food waste or array of recyclables, glass, plastics, paper, cardboard, tin, and other metals.”

Stewart said the project helps the county implement its Climate Action Plan by moving forward with a project to reduce greenhouse gases.

“That food waste that’s compostable is the largest greenhouse gas emitter among the solid waste components so from a climate action plan perspective that’s a significant and growing opportunity for us,” Stewart said.

For the project to move forward, it will need to be reviewed against the Comprehensive Plan by the Albemarle Planning Commission. The hope is to have the facility to be open in the fall of 2022. The Scottsville Town Council will vote on a resolution of support at its meeting on Monday, April 19.

Ned Gallaway has announced he will seek a second term to represent the Rio District on the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. Gallaway was first elected in 2017 as a Democrat after running unopposed.

“Four years ago when I ran, I said that my priorities would be public education, public safety and economic development and I feel that after four budgets and many votes that I have stayed true or focused on those priorities,” Gallaway said.

Gallaway said highlights of the last four years have been adoption of the Project Enable economic development plan, adoption of the Rio and 29 Small Area Plan, and passage of the Climate action plan.

So far, no one has filed to run against Gallaway as an independent or a Republican. The deadline to challenge him in the Democratic primary on June 8 has passed. Currently all members of the Board are Democrats, but Gallaway said that does not make them a monolith.

“I think people think that because we are all of the same party that we are automatically of the same mind on things and we’re not,” Gallaway said.

Gallaway previously served on the Albemarle School Board. He moved to the community in 2002 and lived on Old Ivy Road before moving to Fluvanna County for a brief time. He moved back to Albemarle in 2007. Since then, he said there has been a lot of growth.

“A lot has changed in a quick amount of time,” Gallaway said. “I remember driving back from D.C. and you weren’t really feeling like you were in town until you started to get to the Kroger on Woodbrook. And now that’s a whole different animal, even through Greene County.”

Last week, Supervisor Diantha McKeel announced she would seek a third term to represent the Jack Jouett District. Democrat Jim Andrews is the only candidate who has filed in the Samuel Miller District race to succeed outgoing Supervisor Liz Palmer.

No independents have yet filed for any of those three seats, and would-be candidates have until June 8 to qualify for the ballot. No Republicans have filed either, according to Albemarle Republican Chairman George Urban.

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On today’s program:

Albemarle’s Planning Commission gets an update on planning for the Comprehensive Plan

The Board of Supervisors takes up the land use chapter of the Crozet Master Plan

And a few brief headlines about UVA tuition, the Johnson and Johnson pause, and more

The state of Virginia will follow a directive from the Centers for Disease Control to pause the administration of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. That includes the Blue Ridge Health District.

“Currently, there are six known cases of this possible side effect out of 6.8 million doses administered,” reads an email the BRHD sent out yesterday evening. “Individuals in BRHD who were scheduled to receive the Johnson & Johnson vaccine at a partnering provider or pharmacy may reschedule their appointment for a Pfizer or Moderna vaccine provided by the Blue Ridge Health District.”

Follow this link if that includes you. Today, the percentage of Virginians fully vaccinated has climbed to 22.2 percent, and over 4.9 million doses have been administered. The number of cases continues to be steady with a seven-day average of 1,579. The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 61 cases and has now had an even 15,000 COVID cases with 213 deaths.

Tuition for undergraduate study at the University of Virginia for the next academic year will remain the same as the current year, according to UVA Today and the Cavalier Daily. President Jim Ryan told the Board of Visitors that UVA has lost a lot of revenues and had a lot of unexpected costs due to the pandemic that may total up to $140 million.

“If there were ever a year not to raise undergraduate tuition it is also this year given the pandemic and the financial hardship facing a lot of our our students and their families,” Ryan said.

Following the vote from the Board of Visitors, graduate tuition will increase by up to 6.4 percent and fees will increased by $114 in part to help support the cost of the new student wellness center. Room and board will increase by 2.3 percent and 2.7 percent respectively.

You can watch the meeting on the Board of Visitors’ YouTube Channel.

Plans have been filed to bring a WaWa convenience store at the intersection of U.S. 29 and Greenbrier Road in Albemarle County. The existing zoning allows for this use but the project will need approval from the Architectural Review Board. That’s scheduled for May 17, 2021. WaWa now has two other stores in development in Albemarle County. One is in the northwest corner of U.S. 29 and Airport and the other is in the northeast corner of U.S. 250 and Stony Point Road.

Last night, the Albemarle Planning Commission got an update on the Comprehensive Plan. We’ll hear more about the Crozet Master Plan update in the next segment, but it is important to note that all master plans in Albemarle are subsets of the Comprehensive Plan.

“As you all know, we do this kind of on a rolling basis in the county because our master plans are actually part of our Comprehensive Plan so every master plan update is a comp plan update,” said Rachel Falkenstein, a planning manager in the county. “We also do topic updates periodically. Our most recent one was the Biodiversity Action Plan and Housing Albemarle is working its way through the process right now.”

We’ll hear more about the Comprehensive Plan update later.

First, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors reviewed the draft land use chapter of an updated Crozet Master Plan at their meeting on April 7. The plan was first adopted in 2004 and last revised in 2010, and it is intended to guide development in one of Albemarle’s growth areas. For background, read my account of a discussion of the plan at the March meeting of the Crozet Community Advisory Committee. (watch the BOS discuss this item)

One of the new aspects of the plan is the creation of a new category in the Comprehensive Plan of “middle density residential” which would allow for more units closer to downtown in duplexes, bungalow courts, and other places to live with smaller footprints. Rachel Falkenstein is a planning manager with the county.

“The community wanted smaller housing types and not large apartments and we thought that there could be a new land use category that could accommodate those smaller housing types and have the appropriate density applied,” Falkenstein said.

Falkenstein noted that the Crozet Community Advisory Committee took non-binding votes in November 2020 on staff’s proposed changes.

“They voted against the majority of the proposed changes,” Falkenstein said.

That included the middle residential density category. The Planning Commission, however, supported the idea but asked for the density to be reduced. The current draft was released in early March. Tori Kanellopoulos is another Albemarle planner. (read the draft)

“The major revision included a second draft of the middle density residential land use category which has been revised from the maximum recommended density of 24 units per acre up to 18 units per acre if missing middle housing types are provided,” Kanellopoulos said.

Before the Board took up the plan, Falkenstein summarized the growth potential included in this update.

“The draft plan does not add significant additional development potential on vacant properties or areas where we expect any significant redevelopment,” Falkenstein said. “We hope this plan is a reflection of the overall feedback we’ve heard throughout the master plan engagement process. A desire we’ve heard from the community to keep Crozet’s small-town identity and not to encourage significant growth but also to provide additional housing choices and affordability on areas where remaining development potential exists.”

Crozet is an unincorporated community within the White Hall Magisterial District, which is represented by Supervisor Ann Mallek. She explained why many were opposed to the middle density category.

“One thing to point out that has been with the Crozet Master Plan all along has been their description of urban density was 6 to 12 [units per acre] so that threw us down a tunnel at the beginning because middle density seemed to be so much bigger,” Mallek said. She noted there was support from some CAC members for the revised definition and referred to a new development called Bamboo Grove that fits the description.

“Everybody is completely charmed by the idea of the Bamboo Grove small houses development and that’s really what people will want to see for infill,” Mallek said.

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District said she supported making it easier for developers to build more housing in the growth areas.

“The more we reduce or have restrictions, especially in height perhaps in certain areas, how is that going to affect the areas for affordable housing?” LaPisto-Kirtley asked. “And it’s not just for Crozet. It’s in all the other districts. What are we going to do? It’s kind of like put up or shut up because everyone wants small, wonderful little cottages. We all want that. But that’s not realistic if we have an affordable housing plan and if we need to get affordable rentals, we have to go up at some point.”

Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District said she thought the plan should do more to encourage affordability through increased density.

“I understand that people may not be in favor of large apartment complexes,” Price said. “I totally understand that and I’m not necessarily pushing for that. Can you define for me what a bungalow consists of? I have a sense of what a tiny home is. I don’t necessarily see either of those being housing for families.”

Falkenstein said bungalow courts could be two story buildings with 1,200 square feet.

“The defining feature of these is that they are situated around a common amenity space and either don’t have individual lots or very small individual lots lots,” Falkenstein said. “That helps with the affordability component.”

“Tiny Homes” are defined in the state building code as being 400 square feet or less.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel of the Jack Jouett District agreed that the plan as written did not seem to encourage production of meaningful amounts of affordable housing.

“I just don’t think this is encouraging affordability and its setting us up to have one development area very different from other development areas,” McKeel said.

McKeel was also concerned that the Crozet CAC took votes. County regulations do allow them, but McKeel said she didn’t think they had been.

‘I have been operating under the understanding and telling my CAC that they are providing input, advisory in nature, and we really are not supposed to be voting on issues,” McKeel said.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District said he was also concerned about the appearance that the CAC’s votes are binding. He was particularly concerned that the account of the March 10 CAC meeting states that one member said the middle density issue had been decided.

“That third bullet point says ‘comment that MDR concept is already voted on and decided,’” Gallaway said. “The ‘and decided’ is what.. What is that? I get that they’re going to take votes but it’s always advisory… Just because you vote a certain way doesn’t mean staff will be required to follow.”

Gallaway said the conversation about affordable housing in Crozet is also happening in other development area where existing residents ask for moratoriums on any more new homes.

“What do we do with growth? What do we with density? And what do we with the infrastructure that’s currently in place whether it supports it, or doesn’t support it?” Gallaway asked. “We’ve seen it play out 250 East with a recent application. It was the conversation around Parkway Place. It’s going to be the conversation about projects that come to us up 29 north.”

Mallek said the specific concern about additional density through the middle density residential category relates to a sense much of the community is already built out.

“The reason there was concern about having higher density and having everyone of those houses have accessory units, for example, was ‘where is the traffic going to go’ and ‘how are these streets going to be able to handle doubling the population?’” Mallek said.

Mallek acknowledged that there was one CAC member at the March 10 who insisted that the CAC’s vote should be binding.

“There was one member who was very upset and he tried to make a motion and it didn’t get a second,” Mallek said.

The Crozet Community Advisory Committee next meets this evening.

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Now back to the overall Comprehensive Plan. The Comprehensive document was last updated in the summer of 2015, and Virginia’s state code states that Planning Commissions are to “prepare and recommend” a document to guide development.

So far this year, Albemarle planning staff have taken a scope of work for a revision to the Board of Supervisors twice. When they presented a plan for a three-year process, Supervisors urged staff to speed up the process and to also work on the county’s zoning code. Until now, the Albemarle Planning Commission had not been presented with the plan but that changed on April 13, 2021. (watch the Planning Commission meeting)

Planning Manager Rachel Falkenstein explained Albemarle has made several changes in policy direction since 2015. These include the adoption of the first phase of a Climate Action Plan and adoption of the economic development policy known as Project Enable.

“We’ve also developed a new office of the Office of Equity and Inclusion and a new community core value that focuses on the topics of equity, inclusion and diversity,” Falkenstein said.

Falkenstein said there has been a lot of growth and demand for urban services.

“There are portions of our urban ring that are getting more urban and our service needs are changing because of that,” Falkenstein said.

However, Falkenstein said any work on the plan would need to be prioritized due to limited resources. A major goal would be to update the zoning ordinance, which has not gone through a major review since 1980.

“Ideally our zoning ordinance would match the Comprehensive Plan and we think this update could give us an opportunity to realign the zoning ordinance with our Comprehensive Plan,” Falkensein said.

Staff had initially planned for a three-year and five-phase process to go through the Plan, particularly with an equity lens. The Board asked for the process to be sped up.

“They kind of expressed some urgency with doing the zoning ordinance update work and didn’t want to see that work wait until we completed a three-year Comprehensive Plan update process,” Falkenstein said.

Staff went back to the drawing board. Under the new process, the plan would be updated gradually, piece by piece, in four phases organized by topic.

“The comp plan phases would be sequenced so that related zoning work could happen parallel to the comp plan update,” Falkenstein said.

The first phase would have the title “capacity and growth.”

“So in the first one we would look at our introduction chapter, our vision chapter, and our growth management plan,” Falkenstein said. “We would do our capacity analysis. Our current comp plan tells us we should look at our capacity for growth for a 20 year horizon to make sure our development areas as they are now can accommodate the projected growth.”

The Board of Supervisors will get the chance to respond again at their meeting on May 5. Commissioners had the chance to make comments. Karen Firehock said the county has to be prepared for continued growth.

“We’re building a city around a city in the urban ring and we lack a lot of the traditional city planning tools that we need,” Firehock said.

Commission Chair Julian Bivins said the update gives the county a chance to build off of the Project Enable plan to make Albemarle a place where businesses want to locate, especially businesses that might spin off from the University of Virginia.

“How do we look at big ways to be able to accommodate that and still stay true to who we are as both a rural and intellectually and economically evolving community?” Bivins asked.

Several commissioners expressed the need for resources to cover the cost of additional staff to conduct the work.

Jodie Filardo, Albemarle’s Director of Community Development, had good news on that score.

“In the budget that is going to the Board for approval on May 5, there is a set-aside of funding to support resourcing for the Comprehensive Plan work and the zoning re-do,” Filardo said. “So you are all on to something and fortunately the budget is prepped up ready go ready to support that, too.”

Stay tuned.

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On March 30, 2021, the Charlottesville Planning Commission once again took up discussion of a map which is intended to signal to property owners and the public what uses are desired for specific properties across the city’s 10.3 square miles.

The firm Rhodeside & Harwell unveiled a draft of what is known as the Future Land Use Map in the same month that Charlottesville City Council endorsed an affordable housing strategy they put together that is intended in part to find more locations to build new units to increase the overall housing stock.

“This is where the conversation will get more difficult,” said Jennifer Koch of Rhodeside & Harwell. “We know this is a first draft and there’s going to be refinements and revisions as we move forward.”

Commissioners clashed in 2018 over a previous version of the map. Some commissioners insisted on designating more land for intense residential use. Others wanted a more gradual approach.

The March 30, 2021 presentation was led by Ron Sessoms, a Rhodeside & Harwell veteran who previously worked on the West Main Streetscape project. One change from the 2018 draft future land use map is that colors correspond to specific parcels, rather than a gradient that had been used.

“The parcel-based approach is very similar to what was developed in 2013 when you had crisp lines between different land uses based on parcels,” Sessoms said. “The land use gradient approach would be more of a fuzzy boundary. There’s not hard edges. It wouldn’t be defined by parcels themselves, but it allows flexibility in the future because the lines are not as crisp as a parcel-based map.”

Sessoms said RHI is recommending a parcel-based approach because that will more clearly inform the rewriting of the zoning code, which is the next step in the Cville Plans Together initiative. He also said a gradient-approach would involve less certainty for developers. Individual land use decisions in Virginia most always take the Comprehensive Plan into account, but its guidance is not legally binding.

Sessoms said changes in this map have been with nine principles in mind. The first is to build upon recent studies and the recently endorsed affordable housing plan.

“We’re providing more housing opportunities including affordable housing and we’re including those areas where people want to live,” Sessoms said. “This would be places near parks, schools, transit, city services, and employment centers.”

Sessoms said an emphasis is placed on the need to provide a variety of different housing types. One of the equity considerations that is being taken into account is to increase “the availability of housing in single-family neighborhoods that have historically had exclusionary zoning, while minimizing community disruption and displacement pressures in low-income neighborhoods.”

“We’ve heard a lot about how we can begin to provide equitable housing distribution throughout the city and doing that through introducing a variety of housing types in different areas of the city who historically have not included that type of approach,” Sessoms said.

However, Sessoms cautioned against seeing the future land use map as the only way to accomplish these goals. And already locations of various nodes have been shifted around the draft map from February to March. They will further shift as the map is discussed by more people.

“This is the first draft of the land use map,” Koch said “We know there are going to things that need to be adjusted.”

The most intense use shown on the map is dark purple for downtown core. Sessoms said that building heights in this area could be as high as 10 stories to match the Landmark skeleton. He said that future development should include residential uses to offer people the chance to live there.

Commissioner Jody Lahendro noted that the downtown core is also covered by the downtown historic and architectural district. He said the Landmark is anomaly in the historic district.

“What is there in here that references the historic districts and their coordinated overlays for your intense urban mix and residential and commercial uses?” Lahendro asked. “There are opportunities provided by those historic districts that if they are delisted due to inappropriate development, it takes away economic opportunities for landowners in those districts.”

Sessoms said the map takes a high level approach to the city’s land uses, but would incorporate existing districts.

“With the building heights, we do say range up to 10,” Sessoms said. “We note there is always a ten story building in downtown and we will have to have architectural control over for these new developments that will control the character and scale of these buildings.”

But the city is more than downtown. The second most intense node in the draft map is “urban-mixed use” which is being used in the Strategic Investment Area (SIA) as well as the U.S. 29 / Emmet corridor.

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg said he thought one of these two areas might have been painted too broadly.

“I feel like this is a little bit too aggressive in places to go with the entire SIA for example,” Stolzenberg said.

Stolzenberg added that much of the SIA is built out as low-density and that a smaller designation there might be more appropriate.

“I think in the SIA plan, it’s a little bit more nuanced than that,” Stolzenberg said. “It really sees the redevelopment being focused in the big grayfield areas sites like Ix and then stepping down from there.”

Stolzenberg said other areas should receive this urban mixed-designation such as the area around the former Martha Jefferson Hospital which has been redeveloped as a mixed-use site. He also suggested the site of a scrapyard on Carlton Avenue would also be appropriate.

“So put as much density into there as we can in order to help alleviate the pressure on the rest of the city,” Stolzenberg said.

Stolzenberg said he thought the city should designate the Vinegar Hill Shopping Center and the City Yard as a more intense use.

“The Starr Hill Vision Plan that recently passed calls for that to be the most intensely developed part of that area,” Stolzenberg said.

Earlier this month, the City Council added that plan as an appendix to the city’s 2013 Comprehensive Plan. The draft map currently insteads shows the City Yard as “neighborhood mixed use node” which calls for buildings up to four stories.

“Four stories because we don’t want to get too high where it becomes out of context with these finer-grain residential communities that surround many of these areas,” Sessoms said.

Other mixed-use nodes designated on the draft land use map include the Fry’s Spring Beach Club, the intersection of Grove Road and Melbourne Road, and Market Street/Carlton Road east of Meade Avenue. The recommended heights for both neighborhood mixed use corridor and neighborhood mixed use node are four stories.

Commissioner Lyle Solla-Yates said that four stories is not enough in these areas.

“Some of these should be way over four stories,” Solla-Yates said. “Some of them probably under four stories. When we talked about this in 2018, we said five stories as sort of… frankly it’s all arbitrary and it doesn’t make much sense.”

Sessoms said one factor limiting heights in buildings is the need to provide parking to people who live there.

“The higher you go, the more surface parking you get,” Sessoms said. “So if we start going up to five stories, even four, four stories, with that residential or office component, and the commercial on the ground floor, you’re going to need a lot of parking.”

Koch said requirements for parking will come up later in the Comprehensive Plan and zoning re-write.

“The other thing we will be considering these nodes and these corridors is that I think as we’ve said before is how we can provide multimodal access to all of these and along them,” Koch said.

Solla-Yates still wanted the heights to be at least five stories for the neighborhood areas.

“I’m asking why none of them could be five stories,” Solla-Yates said. “What is the public harm?”

Sessoms said there is no public harm, but that there are other considerations to take into account. One of them is thoughts from people who would live nearby.

“We can look at maybe some areas where it may be appropriate to go up to five stories, particularly looking at some of these areas where we have wider parcels that could have more of that potential,” Sessoms said. “We also take into consideration shading and buildings adjacent to residential areas. I remember when we did the future land use framework for West Main Street, there was a lot of concern from the community about looming buildings next to adjacent residential areas. So when we start to suggest these lower heights in the fabric of these communities, we want to be careful how tall we get.”

Planning never really ends and this draft Future Land Use Map incorporates smaller plans that have been adopted, as well as ones underway such as the Urban Rivanna River Corridor plan which is being shepherded by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. Reviewing the draft map and a little bit of research reveals all kinds of plans for specific neighborhoods.

As stated earlier by Sessoms, the goal of this future land use map is to encourage the production of more housing. Let’s review the definition of “missing middle” housing, which is one of the purposes of the “medium-intensity residential” category.

“These are beginning to encompass many of those missing middle housing types including row houses, townhouses, multi-unit buildings, small house size multi-unit buildings that are compatible with low-intensity neighborhoods,” Sessoms said. “The height of these range up to two and a half stories. That is a residential scale so that they fit.”

Under the draft map, the low-intensity residential category would also include more density through duplexes, triplexes, and accessory dwelling units.

The map will be revised following input from the Planning Commission before a round of community input begins in April.

Commissioner Liz Russell, appointed last September, expressed the concern that higher heights would encourage tear-downs of existing units.

“We need to say that unless a neighborhood has an existing historic district overlay… it’s going to be ripe for tear-downs to build density and not result in affordability,” Russell said.

At the meeting, Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg sent around a map which depicted the city by assessed property value. He said many of the wealthiest areas in the city are being depicted as low-intensity residential. He suggested that should change.

“All of those bright red areas in north downtown in particular which is so close to all of the jobs and amenities, and in the Rugby Hills areas and to a little less extent Lewis Mountain, those are all kept as low-density residential in this new map and I think in particular for North Downtown, that really needs to go a lot more of it in a lot higher,” Stolzenberg said.

Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell said many Black households live in neighborhoods that are zoned for single-family residential. He warned of unintended consequences.

“So as you guys begin to think about increasing our density, just remember that you need to also bring equity into the equation and think about how much of the Black community in certain parts of the city are living in R-1 areas, and we to make sure we protect [them],” Mitchell said.

Next steps

Koch and Sessoms said they would take the feedback from Commissioners and will revise the draft land use map once more. The next step will be to begin another round of community input by the end of March.

But the beginning of that process began at the tail end of the March 30 meeting with comments from the public.

Cecilia Mills of the Locust Grove neighborhood said many of the people in her aeighborhood are shocked at being designated as middle-intensity core.

“I know that the consultants are doing their best but there still needs to be better outreach so people know this is coming,” Mills said.

Andrea Massey, a representative of the Charlottesville Low Income Housing Coalition, said the draft map did not go far enough to address what the organization describes as racist zoning practices.

“We need you to go further,” Massey said. “The map right now looking at side by side looks almost exactly the same as it has for decades following the same segregationist lines that were intentionally drawn.”

Thank you for reading. This summary first goes to paid subscribers of Charlottesville Community Engagement and will be posted publicly on April 14.

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In today’s subscriber-supported shout-out, the cost of housing continues to be one of the most vexing social issues of our time. What does it take to build new units that can be sold or rented to be people who can’t afford the market rate? This Thursday, the Central Virginia Housing Regional Partnership will hold the second of its spring speaker series at noon with a presentation from William Park, the president of Pinnacle Construction and Development who will go through what it takes to secure financing for such projects. Register here.

On today’s show:

An update from the UVA Health System on the pandemic

Albemarle County Supervisors come closer to matching Governor Northam’s COVID restrictions

Get ready for “ozone forecasting season” which begins on Monday

As of today, more than one in five Virginians is now fully vaccinated against COVID-19 according to the latest data from the Virginia Department of Health. The current seven-day average for doses per day is 77,847.

However, that number could drop in the next week as a national reduction of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine means fewer doses will be distributed to all states including Virginia. This past week, the Centers for Disease Control sent out nearly 5 million shots nationwide of the Johnson and Johnson but will only distribute 700,000 this week due to a production error that affected millions of doses. (CDC page)

Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at the University of Virginia, said he is watching the issue.

“Any decrement, any reduction in vaccine allocation or vaccine production is unfortunate right now,” Dr. Sifri said. “Certainly this is a complication that none of us are excited to do see.”

However, Dr. Sifri said the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines are available.

“We are seeing just a steep ramp up of other vaccines,” Dr. Sifri said. “The messenger RNA vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna are being shipped in large quantities and so while it is a stumbling block, we still have a lot of vaccine and we’re moving into Phase 2.”

That means that everyone over the age of 16 in the Blue Ridge Health District can now schedule an appointment for a vaccine.

Dr. Sifri’s comments came at the media briefing on April 9, 2021. He and his colleagues were asked when students would get the vaccine, and whether it would be required before students return in the fall and whether it will be safe for them to do so.

‘I think it’s a little premature to anticipate exactly what the landscape will look like,” Dr. Sifri said. “The first step of course is that everybody has the opportunity to receive a vaccine and we’re in that transition where we are at the precipice of being able to do that and the next two months are really going to be important. Maybe even less that hopefully.”

An open question is whether booster shots will be needed in the future to retain immunity from COVID-19. Dr. Sifri said research indicates the shots last for “a good period of time to come.” But what about a year from now?

“I’ll offer my crystal ball,” Dr. Sifri said. “I do think that there’s two potential needs for a booster shot. One is the potential of waning immunity. As I just said, at six months things look really good and depending on that trajectory, maybe that’s a year, maybe that’s a couple of years. Difficult to say. The second that we’ve often discussed is the rise of variants. If there are variants that are able to get around pre-existing immunity whether it is natural infection or provided by sort of what we call first-generation vaccine, then there may be a need for a booster there. I think with both of those scenarios we would be more likely than less likely a need for a booster at some point.”

Stay tuned.

The number of new COVID cases in Virginia remains relatively high. Today the VDH reports another 1,700 cases. The percent positivity is at 6.1 percent today. The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 26 cases today and the number of deaths in the district is at 211.

Last Monday, Charlottesville City Council held the first of two readings on a proposal to repeal the local COVID ordinance to make Charlottesville’s rules in line with Governor Ralph Northam’s latest executive order. (covered in April 7 edition)

On Wednesday, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors considered whether to amend its ordinance to be more in line the governor. Deputy County Executive Doug Walker explained that Albemarle’s ordinance dates back to last July when there was concern about UVA students returning to the area from all across the country.

“The board adopted its ordinance at the time the state was moving to Phase 3 and the county at the time had an interest in retaining some of the restrictions that applied in Phase 2,” Walker said. “The board did adopt an ordinance to restrict indoor occupancy in establishments that serve food and drink, they capped gathering sizes, and they required face coverings in all public settings.”

This ordinance was readopted several times and amended last November to reflect Virginia’s return to more stringent rules. Albemarle’s ordinance was set to expire on April 7, the day of the most recent Board meeting. Walker said risk for community spread is lower now than it was last July.

“The case counts, incidence rates, and percent positivity rates are at their lowest point since November 2020 and one of the lowest in Virginia,” Walker said.

Albemarle will not repeal its ordinance but adopted one that matches Governor Northam’s Executive Order 72. The only difference is a requirement that anyone who wants to seek an exception to masking requirements must demonstrate a note from a medical doctor. (Albemarle’s COVID ordinance)

Before the vote, Dr. Denise Bonds of the Blue Ridge Health District made the case for increased investments in community health across the entire nation. She said many of her employees have been working long hours for over a year to respond to the COVID-19 emergency.

“It’s really hard to upstaff an organization and be quick and nimble to respond to something,” Dr. Bonds said. “I think if there’s any lesson that can come out of this, it’s that public health needs sustained support, so that we have appropriate resources and staff that are trained and ready to go when the next incident like this occurs.”

Walker agreed that reform of Virginia’s system of health districts will be needed to prepare for the next time around.

“This experience has revealed some of the flaws I believe in our relationship between a state agency operating at a local level and regionally and local government and how important it is that we not only work close together as partners, but that we work together in a much more cohesive, unified, and uniform way,” Walker said. “That’s not the system we have.”

Supervisor Ned Gallaway cautioned against debriefing on the pandemic before it is over.

“At some point we will be there,” Gallaway said. “This will be a massive debrief effort to go back and look at everything.”

In so many many ways, 2021 will be different from 2020. Last year, Albemarle County closed beaches at its parks. This summer, Albemarle County is planning on opening its swimming lakes and is now hiring lifeguards. The position starts at $15 an hour. (apply)

The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality issues alerts for particulate pollution 12 months out of the year and issues air quality forecasts and alerts. They do the same for ozone from April to September and that will be added to the reports beginning on Monday. Ozone is a colorless gas present in automotive exhaust and industrial emissions that can lead to a variety of responses, particularly in people with asthma.

The DEQ monitors air quality from 36 locations across Virginia. Including a station at Albemarle High School. A press release states ozone pollution has dropped in the decades since it has been monitored.

“In 1993, Virginia experienced a high of 108 high ozone days in at least one locality,” reads the press release. “In 2020, there was only one such high ozone day in Northern Virginia, and none in the rest of the state.”

The DEQ’s Air and Renewable Energy Director attributes the steep decline last year to reduced vehicle travel over the summer.

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On today’s show:

A review of Charlottesville City Council’s meeting from this past Monday, including a first reading of the budget and a discussion of performance metrics

Council also adds the Starr Hill Vision Plan to the 2013 Comprehensive Plan as part of the appendix

The eastern entrance to the Blue Ridge Tunnel will close for repairs to the parking lot beginning this Monday

The University of Virginia will live-stream the dedication of the Memorial to Enslaved Workers Saturday morning

The bulk of today’s show deals with the Charlottesville City Council meeting from Monday, April 5. But before we get to that, here’s a few quicker stories.

The unemployment rate in the Charlottesville Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) dropped to 4.8 percent February, down from 5.1 percent in January. That’s according to data released Wednesday by the Virginia Employment Commission. Statewide the rate in February was 5.4 percent, down from 5.7 percent in January. The unemployment rate in February 2020 was 2.1 percent in the Charlottesville MSA and 2.5 percent statewide.

Over in the Shenandoah Valley, the Staunton-Waynesboro MSA has an unemployment rate of 4.6 in February, down from 4.8 in 4.8 in January. In February 2020, those communities had an unemployment rate of 2.2 percent.

Tomorrow morning at 11 a.m., the University of Virginia will hold a ceremony to formally dedicate the Memorial to Enslaved Laborers, which was completed last year but the pandemic prevented a public dedication. There are at least 4,000 people who built and maintained the University of Virginia from 1819 until Liberation Day in 1865. The event will be live-streamed. (UVA Today article)

Tonight at 6 p.m., a group called the Descendants of Enslaved Communities at the University of Virginia will have its public launch on a virtual event that begins at 6 p.m. Speakers will be Dr. Andrea Douglass of the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, Dr. Jody Allen of The Lemon Project at William and Mary, and Dr. Michael Blakey of the Montpelier Descendant Committee. Registration is limited. (Descendant’s Day event)

The eastern parking lot of the Blue Ridge Tunnel in Nelson County will be closed for at least three weeks beginning Monday, April 12 so that it can be expanded. The director of the Nelson County Parks and Recreation department sent out an email stating that barriers will be placed on Afton Depot Lane and people will be stationed outside to direct people to the western trailhead which is in Waynesboro. Traffic congestion, over-parking, and litter have been issues on the eastern side since it opened last November. (more information)

The rest of this newsletter is dedicated to the Charlottesville City Council meeting from Monday, April 5. Let’s just go through it, more or less in order.

As reported elsewhere, the Charlottesville School Board has entered into a $1.47 million contract with architectural firm VMDO to conduct design services for the reconfiguration of the city’s middle schools. VMDO has also been hired to put together growth and capacity scenarios for the entire school system.

The capital budget before the City Council includes a placeholder of $50 million for the project, but more detailed analysis will yield a more accurate cost estimate.

“The initial analysis of the existing buildings of the schools, the two buildings being Buford Middle School and Walker Upper Elementary School, have been completed including building envelope assessments, general building condition analysis, a building 3D digital modeling, and site survey,” Boyles said.

A kick-off meeting will be held next week and community engagement will begin in early May.

“An initial assessment of the findings are due back in June,” Boyles said. “While these will be preliminary and an initial assessment, it will begin to start giving feedback and data to the City Council and the Charlottesville School Board.”

This week, several housing advocacy groups asked Council to help cover the legal costs of preventing evictions. The entire nation is currently under a moratorium imposed by the Centers for Disease Control that has now been extended to June 30, and groups are concerned that tenants will face renewed pressures once it is lifted. Boyles said Council has provided direction at work sessions this spring to provide resources. (CDC order)

“We have engaged discussions with the Legal Aid Justice Center,” Boyles said. “They have presented some ideas of how this could move forward. At this point our recommendation is to utilize the American Recovery Plan funds that the city should be receiving.”

Boyles said one possibility is for a two-year agreement between the Legal Aid Justice Center and the city. A community outreach person would be funded as part of this arrangement.

“I do believe that the right direction to go is with contracting with someone like Legal Aid Justice Center and they have begun to work up what the cost estimates would be as soon as the American Recovery Funds are available, we can present that to Council for approval,” Boyles said.

Virginia is also continuing to offer a rent relief program related to the pandemic.

Councilor Lloyd Snook noted that many in Albemarle County had asked Council to increase funding for eviction prevention and to push for policies to protect tenants’ rights.

“I would hope that there would be also be conversations with Albemarle County just as they are having with the city of Charlottesville,” Snook said. “I’ve been interested to note that roughly half of the letters that we have received in the last few days imploring the city to do something have been from county residents. And I’ve asked some of them if they’ve sent a comparable letter to the Board of Supervisors.”

Boyles said he has already reached out to Albemarle to begin the conversations of working together.

I put the question to Emily Kilroy, the county’s Director of Communications and Public Engagement. She said Albemarle does not have a specific eviction prevention program, but does fund Legal Aid Justice Center and Piedmont Housing Alliance to provide direct services.

“Over the course of the pandemic, the Emergency Financial Assistance Program that the County is sponsoring through United Way has provided funds for rent, including referrals from the General District Court related to eviction petitions,” Kilroy said in an email. “The Housing Choice Voucher program has been able to increase subsidy payments to owners on behalf of our participants who may have lost their income during COVID and have done so, on several occasions.

Later in the meeting, Council held a public hearing on the budget for FY22 which so far does not include any funding from the American Recovery Plan because staff wants to have a full sense of restrictions that may come with the money. However, Boyles said one of the first uses will be to fill the revenue shortfalls from FY21. Staff have been working to close a multimillion dollar budget gap.

“While revenue projections are improving for FY21, we still estimate a $9.2 revenue loss for fiscal year 21,” Boyles said.

Final budget adoption is scheduled for April 13. After that, Boyles is hoping to relaunch the city’s strategic planning process in order to inform future budgets. The current strategic plan was adopted in June 2017 and no one is left on Council from that time.

“My vision is that as soon as we get through with this budget process, then we begin a strategic planning process that will start to lead us toward the FY23 budget,” Boyles said.

A strategic plan is not to be confused with the Comprehensive Plan, which is a document intended to direct the development of land and public infrastructure. The strategic plan is intended to create policy objectives which then direct the work of the city’s employees as well as what the city chooses to fund.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker said one of her main objectives is to ensure city funding for non-profits is tied to performance.

“One of the major points that came out of the task force or working group meeting I convened or whatever we called it was to figure out how to get citizens input directly and not just have nonprofits be able to say that X people of number participated and thereby just by participating they get the dollars that there are allocated,” Walker said.

For many years, Albemarle and Charlottesville participated in something called the Agency Budget Review Team in which a sixteen member team evaluated requests jointly.

However, Council opted to go its own way beginning with the development of the FY21 budget in favor of something the Vibrant Community Fund. In her comments above, Walker was referring to the Measurement and Solutions Group which had been intended to meet to “identify appropriate measurements, benchmarks, solutions and metrics for the designated priority areas for use in The Vibrant Community Funding process.” Those priority areas are “Jobs/Wages, Affordable Housing, Public Health Care, and Education.”

However, that process has been delayed by the pandemic. Boyles said the process would be improved for the next fiscal year.

“For FY23 we want to come up with a means to be able to identify some of our nonprofit and community stakeholders and partners that will become more of a line item within the budget so that even though it is an annual basis, it be a little bit more definitive for them to know they’re going to get a funding of a certain amount every year,” Boyles said.

A work session on the process going into the next fiscal year will be held in May.

You’re listening to Charlottesville Community Engagement. What do you know about rock music? Want to put it to the test? Join WTJU virtually on April 16 for their first-ever Trivia Night at 8 p.m. Join a team in the virtual pub and put your screens together to answer rounds of questions with themes that relate to rock, radio, and local lore. There will be merriment! There will be prizes! Trivia Night is just three days before the beginning of the rock marathon, a seven-day extravaganza to help fund the station. Visit wtju.net to learn more!

Council next took up the adoption of the Starr Hill Vision Planto the City’s Comprehensive Plan. In November 2018, Council used $500,000 from its Equity Fund to pay the nonprofit New Hill Development Corporation to create a small area plan. Alex Ikefuna is the deputy director of the Neighborhood Development Services department.

“Planning Commission and staff worked together,” Ikefuna said. “Originally it was a small area plan that because of the contents and the efficiencies in the land use it was agreed with the consultant that it would be submitted to the Planning Commission and subsequently to the City Council as a vision plan,” Ikefuna said.

Yolunda Harrell is with New Hill Development Corporation, which was formed following conversations that began in July 2017 with former Councilors Wes Bellamy and Kathy Galvin.

“This plan intentionally centers the Black community, not to the exclusion of others, but rather to the intentional inclusion of us,” Harrell said. “This plan specifically looks at opportunities to increase the street-level presence of sustainable, well-capitalized, existing and start-up Black-owned businesses.”

Harrell said part of the work going forward will involved providing gap money to finance entrepreneurial efforts. From the land use perspective, the idea is to create multiple types of housing so as to cover different affordability ranges.

“Whether you are a first-time homebuyer, a voucher-holder, or someone looking for the next phase of housing along their financial growth path, in this plan we have demonstrated how those opportunities can and will exist,” Harrell said.

Harrell said the plan would build off of the work the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center has done to curate local Black history. The Jefferson School received $450,000 from the city’s Strategic Initiatives fund in FY2018 and another $500,000 in FY2019.

“This plan also speaks to the need for gathering spaces where folks can connect or just simply be,” Harrell said. “Where they can be empowered to congregate and co-create, build and own, and innovate and learn.”

Harrell said the 10.4 acre City Yard property offers the best chance to create new housing. Currently the city’s public works department is located in the space. City Council agreed to fund a $300,000 environmental remediation plan in FY20. Ikefuna said that money has not yet been spent.

“While City Yard represents a genuine opportunity for new affordable housing as part of a mixed-use development, Starr Hill’s existing residential neighborhood must be sustained and strengthened,” Harrell said.

Harrell said the plan offers suggestions on what could happen immediately.

“Which is, creating housing on Brown Street, thus shoring up and strengthening the integrity of the existing residential neighborhood,” Harrell said. “This can be done while we explore other opportunities in the larger plan.”

Brown Street runs east-west between Cream Street and 5th Street NW and most of the parcels on the northern side are vacant. The city’s property records indicate there are 14 landowners on the street. In addition to the City Yard, the City of Charlottesville owns a 0.13 acre vacant lot at 609 Brown Street. Harrell suggested these properties could be be subdivided to create between 10 and 46 new residential units, including homeownership opportunities to first-time home buyers.

As for the greater City Yard, Harrell said the vision could yield many more places to live.

“If we just look for a moment at the proposed vision, our city could gain upwards of 250 additional housing units not to mention the additional office and retail space to support the presence of Main Street, Black-owned businesses which can significantly change the social fabric of our community,” Harrell said.

The plan also calls for the identification of 50 parking spaces for First Baptist Church on West Main Street, which Harrell said will eventually lose 50 spaces when the Amtrak parking lot is eventually redeveloped. There are no plans for that now, but Harrell said the Starr Hill Vision Plan identified that need for the future. But the main idea is to reconnect the city after decades of fragmentation using new infrastructure.

“There is an important opportunity to restore and strengthen the connections between Starr Hill to a broader network of neighborhoods from Westhaven, 10th and Page, and Rose Hill to the Downtown Mall,” Harrell said.

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he was interested to come up with a future for the City Yard, but had some concerns about adding this specific vision to the Comprehensive Plan.

“A Comprehensive Plan, it seems to me, needs to be more than just here’s a possibility,” Snook said. “It has to be ‘we’ve made a decision that this is the possibility not just a possibility.’”

Snook said the visioning work was a start, but the city is in the middle of a Comprehensive Plan process through the Cville Plans Together initiative.

“I’m not sure we’re there yet,” Snook said. “I think you’ve given us a great start for a lot of discussions that we need to be having.”

Harrell said they have met with the Cville Plans Together consultants, Rhodeside & Harwell, and have updated them on the plan.

“They are just waiting for this plan to be adopted so that they can then roll it up into consideration of the overall plan,” Harrell said. “We did make suggestions on what zoning should happen and what ways the land could be used.”

Ikefuna said the Starr Hill Vision Plan did not have enough land use analysis and the level of detail required for a small area plan.

“However, it has several contents such as housing, economic development, and placemaking part of which is the connectivity concept which Yolunda alluded to in her presentation

For City Yard to be developed, City Council would need to approve a plan to move Public Works elsewhere and there is no estimate for how much that would cost the city. But redevelopment would begin with remediation.

“I don’t think you can reuse that site without remediation,” Ikefuna said. “Maybe the areas around Brown Street could be carved out and developed. It has a good potential for development for housing. But in terms of redevelopment of City Yard, there has to be remediation.”

Harrell said the vision plan addresses remediation. The plan suggests the city consider enrolling in the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality’s Voluntary Remediation Program which can lead to grants to pay for clean-up efforts. The plan also lists previous efforts to document contamination at the site and noted that remediation may have a preliminary cost estimate of $3.4 million.

Harrell said that the plan has taken previous studies into consideration and designates commercial uses in areas that might need remediation.

Council voted unanimously to approve a motion to add the Starr Hill Vision Plan to the appendix of 2013 Comprehensive Plan, the same way that the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan and the Hydraulic Area Plan were added. (see all approved city plans)

That’s still not all from the Council meeting. I’ve clipped out audio for potential future segments on the 4-1 vote for an amendment of the special use permit for new apartments on Harris Street, action on changes to City Council rules related to expenditures of funds, and a presentation on the latest version of the Orange Dot Report from Piedmont Virginia Community College’s Division of Community Self-Sufficiency Programs.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority adopts budget

Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel announces bid for a third term representing the county’s most dense district

The Tom Tom Foundation explores Ascension in the Black Community

Blue Ridge Health District will move to Phase 2 on April 12

Charlottesville City Council takes a first step toward repealing its COVID ordinance

The Blue Ridge Health District will soon open up vaccine appointments to all residents over the age of 16. Dr. Denise Bonds gave an update to City Council on Monday.

“The governor has asked that all health districts be in Phase 2 by April 18 and so we will certainly meet that and I really expect that we will exceed that moving into phase 2 certainly by the beginning of next week,” Dr. Bonds said.

Just minutes after Dr. Bonds finished her presentation, BRHD announced on their Facebook page that they would indeed open up to Phase 2 on Monday, April 12. She encouraged people to register on vaccinate.virginia.gov and for people in Phase 1A, 1B, and 1C to schedule shots now.

Later in the meeting, Council held the first reading of a repeal of ts local COVID-19 ordinance which was adopted last July shortly before University of Virginia students began to arrive. Councilor Heather Hill requested the item be on the agenda.

“Separately from the Governor’s executive orders, the city’s local ordinance continues to impose local restrictions on the number of persons allowed in food establishments,” Hill said. “I have concerns and I don’t think I’m alone but as things progress relative to reopening over the next several months, there continues to be confusion and discrepancy between what is being directed at both the state and local level.”

That’s meant the Council has had to update its ordinance a couple of times in order to align with the state’s executive order. Governor Northam’s executive order 72 was last updated on March 23.

Councilor Michael Payne has been opposed to previous attempts to repeal the ordinance, but he changed his mind.

*At this point if the only difference is the in-person dining, it seems like it’s at a point where it’s not even enforceable at this point,” Payne said. “Just for clarity with the vaccine roll-out beginning and the clarity of the rules it may be just better to just go with the state level ordinances.”

Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she would not support the repeal and cited concern about the potential for another surge.

“I think that we are still feeding into what we wish our current state would be versus where we actually are,” Walker said.

A second reading of the repeal vote will come back to the Council at another meeting. Walker requested it be on the regular agenda rather than the consent agenda.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports that 18.8 percent of Virginians are fully vaccinated and the seven-day average for doses per day is now 78,785. VDH also reports another 1,505 new cases today and the seven-day percent positivity is 6.2 percent. There have now been 206 COVID-deaths in the Blue Ridge Health District.

Albemarle Supervisor Diantha McKeel took to the steps of the county office building in downtown Charlottesville Tuesday morning to announce her campaign to seek a third term representing the Jack Jouett District on the Board of Supervisors.

“Four years ago I promised collaborative work in regional partnerships to strengthen business retention and expansion to create mid-level job opportunities,” McKeel said. “To integrate land use and multimodal transportation improvements, strengthen our investment in public safety services, expand affordable housing, and create a community resiliency plan to addres the damaging impacts from climate change.”

McKeel said that since she has been on the Board, the county has a focus on economic development with a dedicated office devoted to the task. She also pointed to the creation of the Regional Transit Partnership. She said if she is elected to a third term, she will work on connectivity and continue to advance the goal of community resiliency.

“I’d also like to give a shout-out to the community for their patience and flexibility in working with us over the last year,” McKeel said.

McKeel is the first candidate this year to announce on the steps of the County Office Building, a traditional spot for people to launch their bids. She said after a year of virtual meetings, she wanted to make a statement with her socially-distanced announcement.

“I chose to do this announcement not over Zoom or Facebook but to do it in person because I’ve missed seeing everybody and I’ve missed being out and I think with our social distancing we can do it safely outside,” McKeel said.

McKeel said she has lived in the Jack Jouett District for over 40 years. When she arrived, Albemarle was like a bedroom community for Charlottesville, particularly in her district. Now things are different.

“It really has changed,” McKeel said. “The Jouett District is the smallest district geographically but we’re the densest district because if you think about it, many of the apartment complexes and we’re sort of in what I call the urban ring area. There are certainly other urban rings in other magisterial districts but we have the densehave urban rings.”

The seats in the Samuel Miller District and Rio District are also up this November. Liz Palmer will not seek a third term in Samuel Miller District. Jim Andrews is on the ballot in the June 8 Democratic primary, as is Ned Gallaway for the Rio District.

The Greene County Board of Supervisors has voted to formally request Madison County and Orange County to release Greene County from the Rapidan Service Authority. All three counties are members of the RSA, and there is a disagreement about whether to proceed with a new reservoir to serve Greene. Last summer, the RSA blocked the use of facility fees paid by Greene ratepayers to pay for the project, which has a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

County Administrator Mark B. Taylor explained at a special meeting Monday night that the RSA is now willing to let Greene go, but there is a process.

“The RSA Board last week [urged] that week that we come back to the Board of Supervisors and ask for a resolution to be passed to reinitiate or reactivate our request to withdraw from the Rapidan Service Authority,” Taylor said. “Greene County is at a situation of wanting and needing to withdraw or depart by whatever means from the Rapidan Service Authority.

The special meeting was held yesterday in order to get the item on the agendas of the Madison and Orange Boards. The Greene County Board of Supervisors will be briefed on the status of litigation against the RSA at a closed meeting next week. (Greene website on the White Run project)

The fiscal year for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority began on April 1 and the Board of Commissioners formally adopted a budget at their meeting on March 30. A week before, they had discussed the possibility of ending a $240,000 contract with Sentry Force Security for security patrols of CRHA properties.

Brandon Collins, an employee of the Public Housing Association of Residents, got right to the point in the public comment period on March 30.

“We know that the big question before you is what to do about the security contract and the massive amount of money you’re spending for security contract that from you all’s perspective and from many residents’ perspective is not really accomplishing much, especially for the amount of money being spent,” Collins said.

Tim Sansone with Sentry Force Security once again appeared to make the case for his company to continue being paid to patrol CRHA properties.

“Since we last met last Monday, there’s now over 167 incidents that have occurred since January since we started,” Sansone said. “That’s an increase of 20 since last Monday.”

Sansone said Sentry Force personnel had also stopped patrolling at Crescent Halls and were instead focusing on checking IDs, a decision made after discussion with CRHA Director John Sales.

During the discussion of the budget, Sales said he put two positions in the document to pay for CRHA employees to run the door at Crescent Halls. But he also said CRHA is on track to set aside enough reserves to meet a requirement from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development by the end of fiscal year on March 31, 2022.

“HUD has us meeting it in two years so we’ll beat that by a year which is really nice so that will get us out of troubled status for our financial situation,” Sales said.

Before the vote, much of the discussion was about the security issue. Sales said a community group called the B.U.C.K. Squad has been patrolling the area.

“I think the B.U.C.K. Squad is actively working in the communities already even without having a contract or anything in place,” Sales said.

There is $133,000 in the FY22 budget for a line item called tenant protection. The CRHA Safety Committee will determine how the money in the budget is spent, and it could involve the B.U.C.K. Squad or Peace in the Streets being paid. Commissioner Lisa Green, who joined the CRHA Board last summer, said she was concerned these groups’ work might not be sustainable.

“I feel like some of this was formed on emotion, on the death of someone and I am concerned that the momentum can keep going when that emotion starts to [dissipate],” Green said. “I do think what is being done is extremely admirable and we talk about thinking outside the box a lot.”

Dr. A’Lelia Henry, a resident who is also on the CRHA Board, heard the concern but felt they would have staying power.

“A lot of the folks involved in the B.U.C.K. Squad have also been involved in generational issues involving crime within this very community and I think that’s why they feel somewhat closer to what’s going on,” Henry said.

The contract with Sentry Force will end in May.

You’re reading to Charlottesville Community Engagement. This patron-supported public service announcement is from an anonymous supporter. Do you want to support your public library by picking up a mystery bag of books? The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are resuming their Pop-up Book Sale this Sunday at the Gordon Avenue library. For $5, you can pick up a sealed, pre-selected bag, choosing from mystery, popular fiction, literary fiction, classic literature, biographies, sci-fi / fantasy. The JMRL Pop-Up sale begins this Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Gordon Avenue Library. (learn more on their website)

Including today, there are still two more days in the Tom Tom Foundation’s Race and Equity Conference, which has the name From the Classroom to the Boardroom. Last Tuesday, the first panel dealt how art and community can play a role in lifting up the Black community.

Sarad Davenport, the first executive director of City of Promise was the moderator for Ascension: Joining Together to Rewrite the Code and he explained how the concept came up during the program’s development. (watch on YouTube)

“You know, what’s going on? Who’s doing amazing things, and this concept of ascension came up and who is like innovating at a higher level and taking the community to new levels that have never been seen before and who can offer insight to the rest of us?” Davenport asked.

One of the panelists was Lisa Woolfork, who has risen to notoriety for her work advancing the art and science of sewing through her Instagram account and podcast.

“Black Women Stitch is the sewing group where Black Lives Matter and the Stitch Please podcast is an extension and the official podcast of Black Women Stitch and Stitch Please podcast centers Black women, girls and femmes in sewing,” Woolfork said. “This may sound like a very niche type of podcast which I believe it is, but it reflects the larger need for Black women, girls and femmes to see ourselves, to be centered, to build community and among one another.”

Woolfork said she did not see anyone else doing the work, so she took it upon herself to create the platform to craft a community based in creativity.

“But is also committed to racial justice and Black liberation and radical self-love,” Woolfork said. “These are things that all work together in how we operate as a project.”

Woolfork said at the end of 2019 she was approaching 10,000 downloads of the show.

“And at the end of 2020, I was like, wouldn’t it be amazing if we could get 100,000 downloads?” Woolfork asked. “That would be like ten times the amount that we started with. Wouldn’t that be great? And at the end of day we ended up with 125,000 downloads.”

Sahara Clemons was a guest on the September 9, 2020 edition of Stitch Please, and went next on the Ascension panel.

“I think my approach to art is really centered, or where it started, is looking at the intersectionality between being a woman and being Black and also just my love of fashion and apparel and how those things kind of mesh together in creating works that really highlight Black women in these pops of color and these designs of these clothing that I work into the painting themselves to create this holistic narrative of lifting these people up in a way that I feel like hasn’t been show in this particularly light,” Wilson said.

The final panelist was William Jones, the creator of the Prolyfyck Run Creww which organizes early morning runs through Black neighborhoods three days a week. According to an article in Runner’s World that was published on March 23, Jones moved to Charlottesville in 2009. Davenport set up the introduction.

“Often times, Charlottesville doesn’t necessarily get good press in some of these national publications but the Prolyfyck Run Creww was a bright light and other national media organizations like running magazines recently did a feature on you all,” Davenport said. “Just to set it off for the Prolyfyck Run Creww, tell the people who might not know kind of about the origins and the conception of the Prolyfyck Run Creww movement.”

“It started just from running,” Jones said. “Honestly, I never really paid attention that running was like in there the way that I understand it to be in there now but in my journey to Virginia I stopped in Maryland for a week or two but when I was there I got to see Black people living really healthy lifestyles and part of that was running. Like they would just for no reason run on the street and that just seemed really weird to me.”

But when he got to Charlottesville, he did not see Black people running. He worked at a barber’s shop on Cherry Avenue and was able to see people in the community. He later moved to a shop on Emmet Street that was not the same.

“I was a little more disconnected,” Jones said. “I was only seeing my clientele but I wasn’t able to just see the young boys walking down the street and stuff. So unconsciously just like to fix that I just would go out at night, park at First Street, and I would just connect all of the hoods. I would go First Street, through Sixth Street, through Garrett. I would just run this route that one day I took Wes Bellamy on with me and it whooped him, and he was like, ‘man, this is dope though because I live in Charlottesville and I know these communities but I’ve never run through them.”

Jones said if he had grown up in Charlottesville, he would have grown up in these neighborhoods. He needed to run on the streets to ground himself in the community. Working at a barber shop, he began to invite people.

“So, I would invite brothers to come out and run, like, yo, you all want to do something, let’s take care of ourselves and I would invite brothers so many times that some of them just came,” Jones said.

During the pandemic, the idea took off. Videos were posted on Instagram and number of people running grew.

“I think white people were really looking for something to do with their energy to help answer some of the injustice issues that were going on, and to like put their energy somewhere to better learn about the community that they don’t know and I think this Black-led run group just fit,” Jones said.

You can watch the rest of the presentation on the Tom Tom Foundation’s YouTube page. The Classroom to Boardroom Race and Equity Conference continues through Thursday. (watch on YouTube) (watch all programs on YouTube)

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville hires a deputy manager for racial equity, diversion, and inclusion

Area counties consider a cigarette tax

Charlottesville Police seeks help in addressing a string of shootings this weekend

The Environmental Resilience Institute at the University of Virginia begins the Climate Ambition Summit tomorrow

Albemarle launches a grant program aimed at agribusiness

Charlottesville has hired its first-ever Deputy City Manager for Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. Ashley Reynolds Marshall is currently the chief executive office of the YWCA of Central Virginia in Lynchburg. Marshall is a Roanoke native with degrees from Hollins University, William of Mary School of Law and Virginia Tech, where she is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in public administration and policy. The new position will oversee the Human Services and Social Service Departments as well as the Police Civilian Review Board and the Office of Human Rights. Marshall begins work on May 10, 2021.

The city is also seeking a new city attorney, neighborhood services development director, social services director, and a deputy city manager for operations.

The Charlottesville Police Department issued a press release this afternoon asking for community support in the wake of a series of shootings this month. The release lists four incidents where officers reported to shots fired. One man was shot Sunday evening in the 100 block of Hammond Street, a cul-de-sac in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood.

“In addition to the major events over the weekend, CPD responded to 3 additional shots fired calls, 3 stolen vehicles, 29 disorders, and numerous mental health related calls,” the release continued.

The cases are under investigation.

Last Thursday, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission got an update on the possibility of a regional cigarette tax. The TJPDC is leading efforts to create a body that would collect and distribute the revenues to participating localities.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors had received an update at their budget work session on March 22. Lori Allshouse is the director of budget and performance management for Albemarle County.

“During the 2020 General Assembly, they authorized the county to impose a cigarette tax of up to 40 cents per pack for counties,” Allshouse said. “Up until this time, only Virginia cities, Virginia towns, and Arlington and Fairfax counties have been able to impose a cigarette tax,” Allshouse said.

If Albemarle proceeds with going through the various steps to levy the tax, any revenues would go to the general fund. Those steps include adoption of an ordinance following a public hearing. The tax has also been reviewed by the county’s Office of Equity and Inclusion (OEI)

“As part of that process we began our consideration of this proposed tax by seeking first to understand who could be most affected by this tax and how could those impacts be experienced and mitigated,” Allshouse said.

The Board will hold a work session on the equity impact assessment in August. Research on this topic found the cigarette tax would impact the poor and black, indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC). Jason Inofuentes is a project and policy associate in OEI who cited a University of Pittsburgh study on the effects of taxation and smoking rates.

“Where you see the highest decrease in smoking is in the highest incomes,” Inofuentes said. “There is overall some amount of decrease. There isn’t however any noticeable decrease in low-income communities.”

If implemented, the goal is to have all localities in the area impose the tax so no one locality has a competitive advantage. David Blount is the legislative liaison for the TJPDC and he addressed the Board of Commissioner on Thursday.

“I think from here we see that following this meeting within the next week or so that we would send out some materials to every jurisdiction in our region, which would be the city and the five counties as well as the four towns in our region, but also casting the net a little bit wider to some of the counties that adjoin our member counties,” Blount said.

Blount is asking localities to consider resolutions to express interest in participating and to authorize their staff to participate in the discussion.

“Certainly not asking anybody at this point to commit to anything, commit to participating, or commit to anything beyond just an interest,” Blount said. “I think by the time we get to summer time with June and July rolling around, we really want to be looking at what does this regional board look like? What are its functions? What is the make-up of the board? What is the legal makeup? Those types of things.”

Greene County Supervisor Dale Herring representatives said his locality was interested.

“I think what the TJPDC is doing is the direction we need to go on,” Herring said.

Fluvanna’s representatives also said they were interested. Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price told the TJPDC that her county wants to pursue the regional approach.

“We don’t anticipate that the revenue that is generated is going to be significant enough to result in a reduction of our property tax,” Price said.

No referendum would be required if localities agree. More information as it becomes available.

Regional budget updates

At the end of the TJPDC meeting, Commissioners from all six localities had the chance to give updates. Jesse Rutherford is on the Nelson County Board of Supervisors.

“Real quick, just want to say we’re looking at lowering our machine and tools tax as well as lowering our personal property tax rates,” Rutherford said.

The public hearing for the Nelson County’s $41.7 million budget is scheduled for May 4 with adoption expected on May 11. (budget website)

Tommy Barlow is on the Louisa County Board of Supervisors.

“We’re still struggling along with our budget trying to figure out what to do with that and get it resolved,” Barlow said.

Louisa’s proposed budget does not appear to be available on the county’s budget website. Adoption is expected on April 19.

Albemarle has completed their cycle of five budget work sessions and adoption is scheduled for May 5.

“We were able to cancel the last work session that we were going to have on the budget,” Price said. “We’re looking at getting about $10 million in the first tranche of funds from the federal government in May and the same amount next year. We know that at some point the federal government can’t continue to be providing these funds but they really have been a lifesaver for us this year.”

Fluvanna County will have its public hearing on its budget on April 14 with adoption scheduled for April 21. Their proposed budget is based on a property tax rate of $0.884 per $100 of assessed value, down from the current rate of $0.925. Tony O’Brien is a member of the Board of Supervisors.

“In our budget we’ve included taking out a loan of about $25 million to work on a new administration building and update some of our fire and rescue vehicles as well as the sheriff and busses as well too,” O’Brien said.

Herring gave an update on Greene County’s budget.

“Our tax rate will stay the same,” Herring said. “Our assessments did go up. We would have probably looked at lowering our [tax rate] this year if it wasn’t for our debt associated with our [Rapidan Service Authority] water authority.”

For more details on that issue, read Terry Beigie’s story on the on-going issue. The Greene County Board of Supervisors convened this afternoon to vote on a resolution requesting that Orange and Madison counties allow Greene to leave the Rapidan Service Authority. The RSA objects with a plan to impound White Run to create a new reservoir and did not allow Greene to use a facility fee that had been charged to cover the cost of the project.

The application window opened today on a new grant program Albemarle County is offering to a specific industry affected by COVID-19. The Albemarle Agribusiness Resiliency Grant Program is aimed at farms and agricultural operations who have bit hit by the downturn. Awards of up to $10,000 are available for direct-market agribusinesses such as orchards, wineries, cideries and more.

“One of our region’s greatest assets is the wealth of local farms, food businesses, and the resilience of our food system,” reads the pre-application. “COVID-19 has caused this system to be challenged in ways unimaginable.”

The window closes on April 21.

Finally today, local governments in the area as well as the University of Virginia have set ambitious goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 45 percent by 2030 and to be carbon neutral by 2050. Tomorrow, the Environmental Resilience Institute at UVA begins a series of virtual events designed to help connect many of the pieces together. Karen McGlathery is the director of ERI.

“We decided to call it the Climate Ambition Summit because we have ambitious goals that we need to reach by 2050 if we’re going to have any chance of bending the curve with regard to climate change and climate warming,” McGlathery said.

At 1:30 p.m. UVA Provost Liz Magill will interview Environmental Sciences Professor Scott Doney on what’s been learned in the last five years since the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

“Frontiers of Climate Science is essentially what we’re calling it,” McGlathery said. “Essentially what’s happened in the last five years in terms of climate research that can really help us develop realistic strategies to address climate change both in terms of reducing the amount of carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere but also taking it out of the atmosphere.”

The next event on Friday at 2 p.m. explores Climate Risk and the Opportunity for Private Capital. A Climate Justice panel will be held on April 13 at 2 p.m.

“So we’ll be thinking about [how] every climate change issue is an environmental justice issue so both on the local scale but also on the broader regional and national scale,” McGlathery said.

The final event in the four-part series is another interview between a top UVA official and an expert in the field.

“The final event we have in the series is a conversation between President Jim Ryan and Dr. Arun Majumdar from Stanford University who was the head of the transition team for President Biden for the Department of Energy,” McGlathery said. “They’re going to be having a conversation about how we can as a society meet these ambitious net-zero carbon goals in the future.”

The events are open to the public and will be recorded, very much in keeping with how our lives have been lived in the past year. McGlathery said there are lessons to be learned from the pandemic.

“What the pandemic has taught us is that it’s possible to come together to address a broad societal issues that’s urgent and that seems almost insurmountable in the beginning, but the success of coming out with a vaccine in such a small time period shows that it’s possible to have a global strategy, to have an actual strategy,” McGlathery said.

Visit the ERI website to learn more.

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Today’s anonymous support comes from something we’ll call the Valley Research Center and thanks to a generous contribution that provides much of the bumper music you’re hearing on the program. This came in the form of a donation through the Zelle platform, and I am grateful for the support.

On today’s show:

Blue Ridge Health District opens up Phase1C

The latest from UVA Health System on the pandemic

Virginia’s vaccine coordinator provides an update on Johnson and Johnson supply, which may be affected by a mixing error

On Thursday, the Blue Ridge Health District held another press briefing to explain how things would work as another phase of the vaccination schedule opens up. But first, policy and operations director Ryan McKay gave some context on recent history,

“It’s been really just over three months, maybe three and a half months, since the vaccination campaign began first with our health care systems in the health district and then in January when we began as a health district really vaccinating in earnest members of the community in Phase 1A,” McKay said.

As of March 31, BRHD had administered 135,000 doses in the six localities under its jurisdiction, with nearly 50,000 fully vaccinated.

“We do know that there is approximately 200,000 to 205,000 individuals 16 and above who technically will be eligible at some point to get vaccinated so we still have a ways to go,” McKay said.

McKay said that a “significant increase” in doses was due to hit the district in April. A slide in the presentation listed about 14,620 first doses of both Moderna and Pfizer vaccines would be available the week of April 5.

“I think our increase is a little bit more than we had anticipated,” McKay said.

McKay said 4,000 doses of the one-shot Johnson and Johnson would be administered on Friday and Monday at the former J.C. Penney location.

“So we’re beginning to see that significant increase that we need in order to move more quickly in the vaccination campaign,” McKay said.

On Thursday, the Blue Ridge Health District opened up to Phase1C. Kathryn Goodman is the communication manager for BRHD.

“We are opening up to Phase1C,” Goodman said. “We want to make sure that everybody has the opportunity to schedule appointments and so the VAMS system has many appointments available over the next two months. There are plenty of appointments that we we want people to get in there and schedule.”

Governor Ralph Northam said vaccinations will be open to everyone beginning on April 18, but for now, it’s the turn for Phase1C.

“The Blue Ridge Health District has officially launched today into Phase1C of our vaccine distribution,” Goodman said. “This includes everyone you can see here, everyone from restaurant workers to finance workers and other public figures, public works individuals who are really important to keep our community operating.”

Indulge me for a moment as I peel pack the fourth wall a little. About half an hour before the briefing began, I got an email from the Centers for Disease Control saying it was my time to schedule an appointment. I pre-registered with the Virginia Department of Health a few weeks ago. I asked probably one of the most personal questions I’ve ever asked as a reporter.

“Sean Tubbs, you are on with the Blue Ridge Health district,” said Lachen Parks, Charlottesville’s marketing and social media coordinator.

“Something strange just happened,” I said. “I just got a notification from VAMS at 1:30 p.m. I am not in a priority category. I now have an appointment for tomorrow at Fashion Square Mall. How did that happen?”

“So, all of the appointments that we’re pulling right now are based off of prioritization on either Phase1A, 1B, or 1C, so it is likely that somehow in the information you shared you fell into one of those categories. Media do fall into phase 1C so if you indicated that as an option that would be why. But we haven’t sent it out to everybody just yet that’s preregistered.”

Goodman said the Health District would be sending out notifications over the next week.

“We are working weekends at this point so we will certainly send invitation out tomorrow and over the weekend so if individuals in 1C don’t hear from us by mid to late next week, they should email us or give us a call and we will help them schedule an appointment,” Goodman said.

If you have not registered yet and you want a vaccine through the Health District, register now. Phase 2 opens up on April 18.

“That’s going to be way we know that individuals want to get vaccinated and how we would send you the invitation to create the account in VAMS and then to schedule the appointment,” McKay said. (watch the BRHD briefing)

The following day, the University of Virginia Health System held its weekly briefing for the press. Depending on supply, the Seminole Square Shopping Center is also ready to get shots in arms. Dr. Costi Sifri is the director of hospital epidemiology.

“At full operation, we can vaccinate on the order of 14,000 to 15,000 people per week just at our Seminole Square location,” Dr. Sifri said. He added the influx of new Johnson and Johnson doses will allow that number to be realized.

“We are hearing about and are anticipating increase allocations from federal sources so we are looking at expanding our days of operation at Seminole Square,” Dr. Sifri said.

One of the issues with moving rapidly to mass vaccination has been uncertainties in the supply lines for vaccines. Dr. Sifri said it has so far been difficult to schedule appointments several weeks into the future not quite knowing what the supply will be.

“It’s very difficult to do that two or three weeks from today because we don’t exactly know how much vaccine we’ll have on hand,” Dr. Sifri said. “However, I think we’re pretty confident at this point. We’re not 100 percent confident. But we’re pretty confident we’re going to be able to open up appointments that are going to occur later, several weeks, three or four weeks in the future compared to what we’ve been doing in the past. There were some weeks that we had no new first dose vaccines. The supply to us was zero for a week. I think we’re past that point and we can become a little more liberal and I think that will help everybody. It will help us with our planning and it will certainly help people to be able to get their vaccines scheduled.”

Yesterday, the number of doses administered in the Commonwealth crossed the 4 million mark as reported by the Virginia Department of Health. The seven-day average is now 73,218 doses administered per day.

“We’re reaching a point where 35 to 50 percent of individuals have at least some level if not a high level of immunity to COVID-19, so we’re making some progress,” said Dr. Sifri. “However that does mean we still have something on the order of half the population that remains susceptible to COVID infection and its serious consequences.”

One of the big questions is whether enough people will get vaccinated quick enough to avoid another surge. The number of new cases reported each day is still quite high, with a seven-day average of 1,415 a day. Today the seven-day percent positivity continued its gradual climb and is at 6.4 percent. That metric was 5.7 percent a week ago. Dr. Sifri said now is not the time to stop wearing masks and following all of the other mitigation steps.

“I am concerned about a fourth wave,” Dr. Sifti. “There are places in the U.S. in Michigan around Detroit and the New York City area where we are seeing increased case counts and those have been trending up for the last three or four weeks so that is a concern. The second issue is that we’re seeing in Europe some significant increases in cases in different countries of Europe. I don’t think we should anticipate that spring is going to be a respite from this. It certainly wasn’t a respite last year where we saw a significant wave of infection that occurred in April and May of last year. There’s no reason to think that couldn’t occur now.”

On Friday, UVA President Jim Ryan announced that Final Exercises will be held in a modified manner on May 20.

“All graduating students will have the opportunity to walk the Lawn and process to Scott Stadium for their ceremony,” Ryan wrote in a posting on the Major Events website. “Each graduate will be permitted two guests in Scott Stadium.”

Ryan said students who graduated from the Class of 2020 will also have an opportunity to walk the Lawn in a special ceremony on May 16. A year ago, none of these events were happening.

Dr. Sifri said as long as mitigation measures are taken, he is okay with Final Exercises proceeding.

“Which are going to be things like social distancing and wearing masks and limiting gathering sizes that we should be able to provide graduation and it should be a great experience,” Dr. Sifri said. “If the weather will allow, graduations occur outside. They occur with close families that are together. If you limit the size of groups and have social distancing and can do things outdoors, which allow things like the virus to disperse. And finally, as much as possible, have people vaccinated.”

I’m one of those people who is now vaccinated. Knowing I would be getting my dose a few hours after the UVA briefing, I asked what side effects might happen with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine.

“They’re actually not too bad,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s going to be for the most part local pain and discomfort at the injection site and some fatigue and perhaps some low-grade fever for up tp several days afterward.”

As I record this, it’s been just over 24 hours. I woke up in the middle of night with chills, a few digestion issues, and fatigue. I’ve slept on and off today, but for the most part, I feel okay. Still reeling from the new information and wondering what this all means for our future.

However, it’s important to not get too far ahead of ourselves. At the time I was getting my shot, Virginia vaccine coordinator Dr. Danny Avula was giving his own briefing, and there may be an issue with further Johnson and Johnson supply making its way into the logistics chain. (Baltimore Sun article)

“We are waiting to hear the impact of the news from the Johnson and Johnson production plant up in Baltimore on Wednesday,” Dr. Avula said. “Fifteen million doses were sequestered as a result of poor mixing and so I think those doses will be completely taken offline which means that the future delivery schedule is a bit up in the air. It does appear that our doses that are coming next week will still be coming which is good news because that’s over 200,000 doses that we were expecting and that we had ordered and will be coming in next week. I don’t yet know what that will mean for future weeks but we are eagerly anticipating updates from the federal government about Johnson and Johnson’s production schedule.”

Dr. Avula said the goal is for Virginia to have 125,000 Johnson and Johnson doses per week.

Beginning tomorrow, April 4, health districts across Virginia have permission to move into Phase 2. That doesn’t necessarily mean people will get appointments right away.

“That means open eligibility, it does not mean open pods,” Dr. Avula said. “People won’t be showing up for walk-in pods but it does mean that people will be open to openly self-schedule into appointments regardless of any eligibility criteria.”

To be clear, Phase 2 will be open to everyone over the age of 16. Testing is still underway for vaccines in children.

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Today’s show is brought to you by the quarter of the audience who has stepped up to make a financial contribution to the show in the form of a Substack subscription, a monthly Patreon amount to help support general research, Venmo, PayPal, or simply by sending in a check to Town Crier Productions. In the past eight months, we’ve begun to build together something intended to engage the community with information about local decision-points about the future. I’m grateful to each of you, and I will soon have an announcement about another way this project will be made sustainable. Until then let’s get on with the information.

On today’s show:

Governor Northam finalizes a $3.7 billion investment in rail in Virginia

An update on the Regional Transit Partnership including news that fare-free will continue for area systems

Charlottesville City Council agrees to wait a year to make a final decision on West Main Streetscape

How do our localities fare in a new rankings for health metrics?

The Virginia Supreme Court rules that the Confederate statues can come down

Some breaking news came in just as I was finalizing the script. The Virginia Supreme Court has ruled that Charlottesville can remove two Confederate statues in city parks that were erected in the early 1920’s. In February 2017, Council voted to remove statues of two Confederate generals and were soon sued by a group who argued the statues were protected war memorials under a law that passed the General Assembly in 1997. A Charlottesville Circuit Court judge backed them up the plaintiffs in an October 2019 ruling.

However, the opinion written by Justice Bernard Goodwyn found that the Circuit Court Judge

“It has long been the law of the Commonwealth that retroactive application of statutes disfavored,” reads the opinion.

We’ll have more on this in tomorrow’s program.

On Tuesday, a ceremony was held at the Alexandria train station that is the culmination of an announcement in December 2019 from Governor Ralph Northam about a $3.7 billion investment in Virginia rail.

That includes:

A $1.9 billion bridge over the Potomac River dedicated to passenger rail

Public purchase of 223 miles of track and 386 miles of right of way from CSX

$1 billion in related infrastructure improvements in Virginia

Shannon Valentine is Virginia’s Secretary of Transportation.

“From the moment that this agreement in principle, the concept, was negotiated with CSX and announced in December 2019, with our partners Amtrak and [Virginia Railway Express], we have been working deliberately and sequentially over these past 15 months,” Valentine said.

The expansion of Long Bridge has cleared at many environmental hurdles. An authority to expand passenger rail has been created. Congress has given approval to transfer some parkland to the project. (read press release)

The ceremony was held at the Alexandria train station to sign the agreements governing how CSX, Amtrak and VRE will work together.

“Through an extraordinary year, often with great uncertainty, there has been steadfast commitment to reaching this destination,” Valentine said.

The initiative includes purchase of a freight corridor between Charlottesville and Doswell north of Richmond for eventual passenger rail service. Also included is funding to extend rail service to Christiansburg and planning to hear further west to Bristol.

“This transformative plan will make travel faster and safer,” Northam said. “It will make it easier to move up and down our east coast and it will connect urban and rural Virginia.”

Also in attendance was U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg who said the recently signed American Rescue Plan will help ensure public transit makes it through the pandemic.

“The rescue plan has more than $30 billion in funding for public transit agencies helping them to avoid layoffs and service cuts,” Buttigieg said. “We know that the cuts these agencies were facing disproportionately harm workers who depend on public transportation including so many of the workers we have belatedly come to call essential workers.”

The statewide rail network will make it more possible for people to choose not to own an automobile. But how will the regional public transportation be improved to provide alternatives to driving?

Since October 2017, the Regional Transit Partnership has met as a program of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission (TJPDC). The group consists of Charlottesville and Albemarle officials, and the University of Virginia joined the partnership by the end of 2019. The idea is to share information with an eye to having the city-owned Charlottesville Area Transit, the public service corporation Jaunt, and the University Transit System work better together.

Last week, regional leaders got an update on the creation of a regional transit vision that the TJPDC is working on that will serve as a blueprint for a more efficient system. The next milestone is for a committee to select a firm to work on the project. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a transportation planner with the TJPDC who spoke at March 25 RTP meeting.

“The regional transit vision plan requires technical assistance from a consulting team and the role of the selection committee is to review proposals from those firms to the vision plan [request for proposals] and then to recommend to the Regional Transit Partnership a preferred firm to complete the vision plan,” said Hersh-Ballering.

The committee will review the proposals in May.

Charlottesville Area Transit Director Garland Williams gave an update on the forthcoming revision to bus routes after presenting an overview at the February RTP meeting. There will be a change to the route that travels between downtown and U.S. 29 in Albemarle County’s designated growth area. (FY22 CAT service proposals)

“We’re doing some extensions, we’re trading some of the components of the 7 and extending it out to Wal-Mart so it will be seven days a week,” Williams said. “It looks like we’ll be able to have final iterations that we will be able to share with the public probably in a couple of weeks.”

Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act requires two rounds of public input before the routes can be approved.

One effect of the pandemic has been a reduction in demand for parking at the UVA Health System. UVA parking and transportation director Becca White said that’s coming to an end.

“We’re back up to about 90 percent of the pre-COVID demand at the hospital,” White said. “Of course, as you know we transport all those people that last mile. We intercept them in a big parking area and shuttle them to their final destination.”

White said parking demand in the academic campus is at about 55 percent of pre-COVID levels.

“So many of the classes are still not in person or are hybrid such that that whole class change thing isn’t really, still isn’t happening,” White said.

The last day of classes is May 6 and the last day of exams is on May 15. Graduation is on May 20, and UVA is expected to make an announcement this Friday about how what they call Final Exercises will proceed.

Jaunt is also seeing a small return to pre-COVID traffic. Karen Davis is the interim director.

“Our ridership is starting to tick up and we’re putting more drivers out on the road,” Davis said. “More of them are able to have a full schedule although we are at reduced capacity and we’re actively keeping an eye on how COVID rules will change transit, and also reopening our main office.”

Davis said Jaunt will soon survey riders of the Crozet Connect route which began in the summer of 2019. The service has changed due to the pandemic.

“Up until this point, we have pretty much changed our service structure to demand and so we’ll do the same in Crozet,” Davis said. “It’s such a shame because it was flourishing and growing so strong and then COVID hit and it’s just like, oh gosh!”

After Davis’s update, Williams dropped this information.

“Karen and I, I believe, are still contemplating in our FY22 budgets operating fare-free,” Williams said. He added the idea is to use a portion of COVID relief funds to cover the cost of fares, which makes up about ten percent of the CAT budget.

“We have it in our numbers for three years,” Williams said.

Williams added study will soon get under way to see if CAT can permanently remove the farebox. The system will also soon add automated passenger counters to buses to track ridership.

Jaunt can’t quite make that commitment, but will be fare-free in fiscal year 2022, which begins on July 1.

“Especially going fare-free in this next year will really enable us to get out ridership back, up and running,” Davis said. “When you take that barrier away for passengers, the risk of trying to use transit is so low and people, why not get on the bus and see where it goes? I think it’s really exciting if we can make this work.”

One item called for in the Regional Transit Partnership’s strategic plan is a visit to a community similar to Charlottesville to see how transit works. A possible trip to Blacksburg was put on hold a year ago when the pandemic began. Here’s Albemarle County Supervisor Diantha McKeel.

“I just think it’s always good if we can take a look at what other communities are doing,” McKeel said.

However, Williams said CAT is planning to work with the firm Kimley Horn on a peer review of its own.

“That’s a necessary component for us as we start to build out and ask for more for our alternative fuel vehicles and facilities,” Williams said. “We need to see how we match up as we are starting to ask for more capital projects.”

Williams said as part of that work, they are looking for a location for a park and ride lot on U.S. 29. Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley asked for more information.

“Garland, are you looking for your park and ride up in the area around… North Pointe?” LaPisto-Kirtley asked. “They’re really building out up there.”

“I will just say that what we don’t want to do is give the developers a chance to grab the pieces of property from us that we are looking at,” Williams said.

Williams said he has had conversations with Albemarle officials about the idea. And that’s where the Regional Transit Vision plan and a separate Albemarle transit plan are intended to come in. The TJPDC is also studying the North 29 Corridor in both Albemarle and Greene counties.

In today’s subscriber-supported public service announcement:

There are many fewer monarch butterflies than there were in the past and efforts are underway to study and implement solutions. On April 19, Wild Virginia welcomes Virginia Master Naturalist Michelle Prysby for a virtual talk where she will describe several programs underway, ranging from the Monarch Larva Monitoring Project to Project Monarch Heath. Sign up now at Wild Virginia for this talk on the Biology, Ecology, and Conservation of Monarch Butterflies.

Charlottesville City Council will have a public hearing on the proposed fiscal year on Monday, April 5. On March 25 they held a work session on the proposed capital improvement program as well as what to do with some additional revenue that budget staff now anticipates receiving during the year that begins on July 1.

For months, budget staff have been telling Council that the city is close to its capacity to raise additional debt. (link to presentation) (watch on city website)

“With the proposed CIP we are projecting a five year debt financing of roughly $121 million,” said senior budget management analyst Krissy Hammill. “WIth the bonds that we’ve previously committed but not issued, and the CIP before you, we are committing to a debt capacity of about $195 million.”

To cover that amount, budget staff are anticipating increasing the property tax rate for a total of ten cents over five years to cover the additional debt service. The actual vote to do so will be made by Council next year, including any new Councilors that are elected this November.

That $195 million Hammill mentioned includes about $18 million in bonds that have not yet been sold for the West Main Streetscape, which was split into four phases in order to obtain funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation. David Brown is the city’s public works director.

“The funding that’s being proposed right now covers Phase 1 but there is $6.5 million that is needed to complete Phase 2,” Brown said.

A third phase is recommended to be fully funded by VDOT with no match of local tax dollars, unlike in phase 1 and 2. Phase 4 is currently unfunded. City Manager Chip Boyles said VDOT is willing to delay the projects another year in order for them to be done at the same time, if the city comes up with the $6.5 million or scales back the project.

One of the biggest costs of the program is to place utility lines underground. This has a $4.3 million cost in Phase 1 and a $5 million cost in Phase 2 according to a budget presented to Council last September.

Another decision point was how to use some additional revenues freed up by other budget reductions and higher estimates for business licenses. About $1.3 million was found. A million is proposed for a two percent cost of living increase for city employees and another $60,000 would go to fully fund a deputy city manager position. Staff had recommended using the rest for personnel to support a climate action plan when one is drafted. Kristel Riddervold is the city’s environmental administrator.

“The anticipation is that when we have a climate action plan adopted, there will be a range of initiatives be it on the municipal side or the community support side that actually exceed the capacity staff has to deliver.

A majority of Council supported the climate position, but Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker favored a “measurement and solutions” position intended to track how the city is achieving its goals. A committee had been expected to produce a report last summer but the work was delayed by the pandemic.

City Manager Boyles said he would try to find a way to fund the measurement position as well.

The public hearing for the budget will be held at Council’s meeting on Monday night. A wrap-up work session is scheduled for April 8 and the budget is expected to be adopted at a special meeting on April 13.

A community health research firm at the University of Wisconsin has recently updated its rankings for how Virginia counties measure up in health. The Population Health Institute has ranked Albemarle as the 7th healthiest locality in the Commonwealth, based on several metrics including life expectancy. Life expectancy in 82.7 years according to the data.

Charlottesville is ranked 23rd (79.8 years), Fluvanna County is ranked 26th (80.1 years), Greene County is ranked 33rd (79.5 years), Louisa is ranked 60th (78 years) and Nelson is ranked 58th (78.3 years). Arlington is ranked first (85.9 years) and the city of Petersburg is ranked last at 133 (67.4 years).

The data is worth exploring and in this year where community health has become so important, this is an invaluable resource that I’ve only just begun to explore. This link will take you to a comparison among all of the localities in the TJPDC. Included on that list is a metric that relates to the segment earlier on transit.

Seventy-seven percent of working Virginians drive alone to work. In Charlottesville, the figure is 59 percent according to the database. That number is higher in the other communities.

Take a look and let me know what you see in the data.

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On today’s show:

Housing updates from Regional Housing Partnership

UVA President Jim Ryan kicks off the Tom Tom Foundation’s Race and Equity Conference

The City of Charlottesville is advertising for a slew of management positions

Crescent Halls renovation moving forward with a date scheduled for a virtual kickoff

A brief look at the pandemic

Today marks the beginning of the Tom Tom Foundation’s Race and Equity Conference which is a pay-what-you-can virtual event that seeks to explore “the intersection of workplace and community.”

The title of the multi-day series is From the Classroom to the Boardroom and is intended to address income disparities. The conference website cites the latest report on family self-sufficiency from Ridge Schuyler of the Network2Work program at Piedmont Virginina Community College. (Orange Dot Report 4.0, January 20, 2021)

“In our hometown, Charlottesville, Virginia, 35% of Black families do not currently earn enough money to meet their basic needs, compared to 14% of white families,” reads the conference website. “Targeted interventions can help address this racial inequity where its impact is most often felt—in our classrooms, boardrooms, and on the pathways in between.”

University of Virginia President Jim Ryan kicked off the event this morning.

“As we focus on re-building community, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic, innovation and collaboration remain critically important, especially around issues of diversity, equity and inclusion,” Ryan said.

Ryan said efforts to improve the overall community are underway and that the Classroom to Boardroom conference would provide highlights.

“Throughout this week you’ll hear from local and national leaders on their experiences and perspectives,” Ryan said.

One of those national leaders is Symone Sanders, who served as press secretary to U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders during his 2016 presidential campaign before becoming spokesperson for Vice President Kamala Harris. Symone Sanders was the keynote conversation this morning. She was asked to speak about some of the challenges and barriers she has experienced as a Black woman.

“I think we can all identify with the ‘isms’ and Donna Brazile, a good mentor of mine, a former chair of the Democratic National Committee and a former CNN political commentator, Donna Brazile was a political commentator before people had jobs as political commentators!” Sanders said. “She said something to me that I will never forget and will share it with you now because I think it is the best encapsulation of the answer to your question. She said racism, sexism, ageism are not going anywhere tomorrow. We have to work to eradicate it. We have to call it out.”

The event continues this afternoon with two more panel discussions. At 1 p.m. the topic is “Ascension: Joining Together to Rewrite the Code” and will be a discussion of the social fabric required for art and community to grow featuring Sahara Clemons, William Jones, and Lisa Woolfork moderated by Sarad Davenport. At 3 p.m. the topic is The Transformative Value of Diversity and Inclusion and is moderated by Mary Coleman, the executive director of the City of Promise.

Visit the Tom Tom Foundation’s site to learn more and register for the pay-as-you-can event which runs through April 8. (website)

A groundbreaking date has been announced for the renovation of Crescent Halls. The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority will hold a virtual renovation kickoff celebration at 4 p.m. on April 14 at 4 p.m.

“The ‘skeleton’ of the building will be preserved, but all of the residential units, building systems, underground infrastructure, common areas, exterior spaces, parking areas, etc. will be as-new,” reads a description of the renovations on the CRHA website.

For more information on the project, read a four-page design overview produced by the Public Housing Association of Residents (PHAR). Last October, City Council approved a performance agreement that will be used by the CRHA’s redevelopment nonprofit to govern how $3 million in city funds will be used both for Crescent Halls and the first phase of South First Street. Groundbreaking for the latter took place on March 7. (watch groundbreaking) (read previous story)

The CRHA will hold a work session tonight at 5 p.m. at which they are expected to adopt a budget for FY22. Following that, the CRHA’s safety committee will meet. (Zoom registration)

Do you or someone you know want the chance to be Charlottesville’s next Director of Neighborhood Development Services? The city is taking applications through April 2 for the position, for which a vacancy was created when Alex Ikefuna was demoted to deputy director in February 2020. (Daily Progress article)

‘The ideal candidate must have experience and knowledge with all aspects of Planning and Development operations and a proven track record in managing a complex organization while demonstrating the ability to work with many stakeholders in a highly engaged community,” reads the application for the job, which has a salary range between $100,000 and $150,000.

The NDS director is not the only position that is open:

City Attorney - $150K to $176K - application closes April 2

Director of Social Services - $100K to $150K - application closes April 2

Office of Human Rights Manager - $73 to $81K - application closes April 2

Deputy City Manager for Operations - $100K to $158K - application closes April 9

“Recent retirements, natural attrition and newly created positions of several key leadership posts have positioned the City to be able to make a major organizational culture change in serving our community and meeting the contemporary needs of our governmental staff,” reads a line posted within each of the above applications.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. In this subscriber-supported public service announcement, the days of live music at clubs are in our future, but if you feel safe and want to check out people playing together in a safe environment, the Charlottesville Jazz Society has a running list of events coming up on their website. The Charlottesville Jazz Society is dedicated to the promotion, preservation and perpetuation of all jazz. Check them out in the link in the newsletter.

The Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnershipmet earlier this month and got updates on various initiatives underway. One of them involves helping outlying communities write policies for ensuring the existence of housing affordable to people with lower incomes. Christine Jacobs is the interim director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

“We are creating a draft Comprehensive Plan chapter for each of the jurisdictions within the planning district commission,” Jacobs said. “The City of Charlottesville, Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa and Nelson.”

Jacobs said there will also be a chapter in the regional plan that offers strategies on how the localities can work together to increase the overall supply of housing.

“We now have a draft of all six of the locality chapters,” Jacobs said. “We have been working directly with staff specifically in Albemarle and Charlottesville since they have been doing so much work on their end with their affordable housing plans.”

Jacobs said the regional plan will also include a map which shows the areas in each locality where zoning exists for multifamily buildings and other dense residential uses. A draft of the regional plan will come to the RHP’s executive committee in May and will come to the full RHP board in June. The plans will be presented to localities in the summer and will go to the TJPDC Board in August.

Albemarle’s Housing Plan next goes to the Albemarle Planning Commission in May. Charlottesville’s City Council endorsed an affordable housing plan earlier this month.

“Basically we’re taking their very large plans and condensing it into our chapter so that they are a part of this entire regional plan,” Jacobs said.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel asked where the University of Virginia’s housing plans fit into the region. On March 10, 2020, UVA announced a ten year plan to build up to 1,500 units on land currently owned by UVA or its real estate foundation. Colette Sheehy, senior vice president for operations and government relations at UVA, gave an update.

“We did a solicitation and we have hired a consultant to help us, her name is Gina Merrett,” Sheehy said.

Merrett is with Northern Real Estate Urban Ventures.

“This is not a consultant who will build affordable housing for us,” Sheehy said. “This is a consultant to guide the University through the process to get to the point where we would do a [request for proposals] to the developer community to build affordable housing.”

Sheehy said UVA’s main contribution will come in the form of land and that a community engagement process is being developed now.

During the meeting, members of the RHP were asked to give a “value proposition” for the body. Jacobs went first with her thoughts.

“I think by having a regional body that’s looking at this issue comprehensively, how it relates to transit and transportation, how it relates to equity and health, I think we put ourselves in a position to be considered to administer the Emergency Rent and Mortgage relief program,” Jacobs said. The TJPDC administered over $1.6 million in relief in the second half of calendar year 2020.

Architect Greg Powe went next.

“This is a regional crisis,” Powe said. “It affects all of us. This is the only group I’m aware of that brings together all of us that are impacted by and can positively resolve the problem. I think there’s incredible value to have the private sector interfacing with the municipalities and with the nonprofits interacting with the institutions.”

Chris Henry of the Stony Point Development Group followed.

“We’re one community and this group represents that community and how we come together to solve that problem so I think that’s the fundamental essence of the Regional Housing Partnership,” Henry said.

RHP Chair Keith Smith of Fluvanna County said he has been discussing the possibility of bringing Augusta County and Waynesboro into the group. The TJPDC has worked with the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission on planning for a transit route now known as the Afton Express.

Charlottesville City Councilor Lloyd Snook played off of that theme.

“A value of doing this Regional Housing Partnership through the TJPDC also ties in with the Regional Transit Partnership,” Snook said. “I’ve always said these days, affordable housing for the Charlottesville market is in Waynesboro or Buckingham County. It’s not in Charlottesville. It’s really not in Albemarle very much.”

City Councilor Michael Payne agreed.

“There’s really only been one project since I’ve been on Council where Council hasn’t approved greater density than what’s allowed by-right so I definitely agree that something is going to need to happen regionally because the supply-side solutions, if only Charlottesville is doing supply-side solutions, it’s going to have a much smaller impact than regionally,” Payne said.

Before we go today, a brief update on the pandemic. The number of new cases reported each day by the Virginia Department of Health remains steady, even as the number of vaccinations each day continues to increase. Today there are another 1,432 new cases and the percent positive rate is at 5.8 percent. Last week that metric was 5.6 percent.

Over 1.3 million Virginians are now fully vaccinated, or 15.5 percent of the total population. The seven-day average for doses administered per day is 61,681 a day.

Yesterday the Blue Ridge Health District announced it would receive 1,500 first doses and 1,000 second doses of Moderna, 2,340 Pfizer first doses, and 4,000 Johnson and Johnson doses. That does not include allocations that now go directly to the UVA Hospital.

The announcement also stated the health district is not yet able to expand to Phase 1C.

“Unfortunately, our supply of COVID-19 vaccines remains limited this week, despite our numerous requests for an increase in supply,” reads the announcement. “We are unable to meet the demand for the number of people in our District who currently qualify for a vaccine.”

Take a look at the Blue Ridge Health District’s Facebook page to learn more.

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In today’s subscriber-supported information announcement. This shout-out is in celebration of Stewart Johnston's birthday. In celebration, please consider donating to your favorite environmental charity in his honor. I’ll put a list at the end of the newsletter. Here’s to you, Stewart, and hope you have a good day.

On today’s show:

Solar panels are being planned for the long-closed Ivy Landfill

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority is briefed on what to do with land for the never-built Buck Mountain reservoir

One candidate for City Council has failed to make the primary ballot and another’s slot is still pending

The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation make a multimillion commitment to an affordable housing project

And the Local Food Hub moves its drive-through market to new location

Only four of the five candidates in the race for two Democratic nominations to City Council have qualified for the June 8 primary, and another’s slot is still pending.

Yas Washington did not obtain the 125 signatures of registered city voters required to get on the ballot. That means Carl E. Brown, Brian Pinkston and Juandiego Wade are on the ballot, and the registrar’s office is still waiting to finalize Josh Carp’s paperwork. Carp did turn in at least 125 signatures but has additional paperwork that must be received by tomorrow at 5 p.m.

However, a staff member in the Charlottesville registrar’s office told me this morning that Washington can still qualify for the November ballot as an independent should she choose to do so.

In 2009, candidate Andrew Williams failed to qualify for the ballot in the Democratic primary, but later ran as a write-in candidate. Williams did qualify for the general election ballot in 2011 as an independent candidate.

Stay tuned for more information about upcoming campaign forums.

The Charlottesville School Board has voted to designate Jim Henderson as the Acting Superintendent of the city school system. He’ll take over from Rosa Atkins, who retires as of May 31 and is taking a position in the Virginia Department of Education. Henderson worked in Charlottesville Schools for more than 40 years before retiring in 2020. He began as a teacher at Clark Elementary in 1975. (read more)

The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation has made its largest ever grant with $4.25 million going to Piedmont Housing Alliance for their redevelopment of land on U.S. 29. Piedmont Housing is working with the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless and Virginia Supportive Housing to redevelop the Red Carpet Inn site for a total of 140 units that will be guaranteed to be rented at prices for people with extremely low and very low incomes. Eboni Bugg is the director of programs for the CACF.

“This first came on our radar last April when we received a grant application from TJACH and PACEM and the Haven regarding wanting to ensure that there was a non-congregate option for our homeless community members so that they could weather the pandemic without being in congregate shelter,” Bugg said.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors rezoned the land for the project in February. The Red Carpet Inn will continue to be used as a shelter by TJACH in the short-term as the project moves forward. Bugg said the CACF’s investment is made in the spirit of community health. There will be an update on grant at an event on April 15.

Plans are being crafted to install solar panels atop 12 acres of the Ivy Landfill, which has been closed since 1998. The facility is now run by the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority to oversee a remediation program and now contains a Materials Utilization Center where people can discard various items. Dominion Power has been working on the project since 2017, but legislation allowing Dominion and Appalachian Power to proceed with solar energy facilities didn’t become law until last April. Phil McKalips is the director of solid waste.

“We just found out about a month ago that our project has been selected by Dominion for the program,” McKalips said. “We’ve already reached out to neighbors in the area and seem to have gotten quite positive feedback from them.”

Dominion will need up to a year to finalize interconnection agreements and construction could get underway next spring. The facility will be owned by the Community Power Group and not by Dominion, who will purchase the energy from CPG. They will pay the RSWA $800 per acre per year for a 20-year period.

“There is a possibility of later on adding one megawatt, basically 50 percent increase if Dominion seems to think that will be advantageous,” McKalips said.

Community Power Group will be responsible for maintaining the landscape and the panels. Albemarle County will need to grant a special use permit for the project. Under the plans, Dominion will get all of the green energy credits associated with the project.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. What do you know about rock music? Want to put it to the test? Join WTJU virtually on April 16 for their first-ever Trivia Night at 8 p.m. Join a team in the virtual pub and put your screens together to answer rounds of questions with themes that relate to rock, radio, and local lore. There will be merriment! There will be prizes! Trivia Night is just three days before the beginning of the rock marathon, a seven-day extravaganza to help fund the station. Visit wtju.net to learn more!

After the solid waste meeting, the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority met and got a presentation on plans to continue owning and managing hundreds of acres of land in the White Hall district.

“It’s up in the northern part of the county near Earlysville and Free Union,” said Andrea Bowles, the water resources manager for the RWSA .

The property was purchased in the 80’s for the proposed Buck Mountain Reservoir, but that project was abandoned when the presence of the endangered James River spinymussel was detected. That would have made permitting extremely difficult if not impossible.

“There’s a total of 1,314 acres and it cost the Authority $6.95 million,” Bowles said.

Some of the land is currently being used to satisfy the terms of an Army Corps of Engineers permit that allowed for the expansion of the Ragged Mountain Reservoir.

“Back in 2012, we started working on our mitigation plan for the impacts that we had at Ragged Mountain Reservoir and we impacted a lot of streams and we impacted of wetlands so we used the Buck Mountain property as the stream restoration area or the stream mitigation area,” Bowles said.

This meant planting of trees along Buck Mountain Creek and other waterways for a total of about 80,000 linear feet of new riparian buffers.

“We planted over 40,500 trees and we placed 600 of those acres into deed restrictions,” Bowles said.

In 2019, a landowner came forward to ask to buy some of the land back, and the RWSA Board directed staff to come up with a master plan for how the property should be managed.

“Whatever we’re doing up there, we want to address it through our mission and our values and our strategic plan goals,” Terry said. “So environmental stewardship, we would like to have water quality protection, operational optimization. We’d like to be efficient in how we use those properties and sustainable with the use of resources.”

There are 484 acres that are leased for others for agricultural use generating about $1,900 a year in revenue and one recommendation in the plan is to increase the rents to market value. None of the deed restricted lands are leased.

“And the other thing we would like to do is evaluate additional parcels for leases,”

Staff has also reviewed the possibility of selling some of the land and what the development potential might be. They’re recommending demolishing one structure known as the Buck Mountain House and selling off lots, potentially netting the RWSA between $243,000 and $325,000. There’s also the issue of a bridge over a creek on RWSA land that is failing and many have liability issues. Staff is recommending removing the bridge after 2024, which is when the time RWSA will no longer need to use the bridge.

Supervisor Liz Palmer said she needed to hear more voices on that last issue.

“I’m just going to put out there that I think we definitely need to know what the neighbors thinks about this before we do anything and hear from them,” Palmer said.

Palmer also said that other members of the Board of Supervisors have expressed concerns about selling the lots for development.

“Can these be put into conservation easement to remove those development rights so we don’t have clusters of homes?” Palmer asked.

No decisions were made and the plan will come back to the RWSA Board in the future.

The RWSA Board was also presented with a $38.95 million budget for the next fiscal year, split between $20.533 million for operating expenses and $18,418 million in debt service. The public hearing for the budget will be held on May 25. Last year, the RWSA drew about a million from its reserves in order to prevent rate increases. Bill Mawyer is the executive director of the RWSA.

“As we move forward into the next year we have reduced that contribution from our reserve funds,” Mawyer said.

The charges to the Charlottesville Department of Utilities will be increased by 7.6 percent and the charges to the Albemarle County Services Authority will increase by 14.3 percent. The RWSA sells water to the city and the ACSA on a wholesale basis, and those two entities retail rates for individual customers.

The RWSA budget has more than doubled since 2007 due to capital projects to expand capacity and to make upgrades to becoming compliant with Virginia Department of Environmental Quality mandates. According to a cost-share allocation, Albemarle can expect larger increases in rates to cover the cost of increased capacity and redundancy.

For a year now, the Local Food Hub has been running a drive-through market in order to connect local food producers with customers. They’ve done so in the parking lot of the former K-Mart, but have recently moved to a different space. The market now operates at Seminole Square Shopping Center on land owned by the Great Eastern Management Company.

“We’ve realized over the past year that the desire for safe and convenient access to local food is strong and enduring,” said Local Food Hub Executive Director Kristen Suokko in a press release. “As the light at the end of the pandemic tunnel continues to brighten, we remain committed to bridging the gaps between our community and our farmers as effectively as we can.”

The market operates on a preorder-only, drive-through basis. Ordering for the Wednesday market is open Thursday at 3:00pm-Monday at 2:00pm. Ordering for the Friday market is open Monday at 3:00pm-Thursday at noon. Place orders at www.localfoodhub.org/market.

Some environmental organizations you might consider donating to for Stewart Johnston’s birthday:

Blue Ridge Foothills Conservancy

Chesapeake Bay Foundation

James River Association

Nature Conservancy of Virginia

Piedmont Environmental Council

Rivanna Conservation Alliance

Sierra Club of Virginia

Southern Environmental Law Center

Virginia Conservation Network

Virginia Native Plant Society

Virginia Outdoors Foundation

Wild Virginia

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In today’s subscriber-sponsored public service announcement, the Albemarle County Solid Waste Alternatives Committee, or SWAAC, wants you to join the effort to clear up litter from the landscape as part of the Keep Virginia Beautiful initiative. SWAAC wants you to put on some gloves, grab a bag, take a walk, and pick up items that people have discarded. When you’re done, they want you to tell them how much you picked up, and where. Visit keepvirginiabeautiful.org to help SWAAC and other groups across the Commonwealth better address litter in our community.

In today’s show:

Highlights from Governor Ralph Northam’s March 23 press conference

The Blue Ridge Health District explains why they don’t want you to travel to another one for a dose

More information from the University of Virginia Health System

Today’s show focuses solely on the pandemic, and where we are as we continue through the 13th month of this experience. On Tuesday, Governor Ralph Northam announced the easing of some restrictions on human gatherings. (watch on YouTube)

“I’m optimistic about our numbers in Virginia,” Northam said.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reported 1,799 new cases of COVID-19, and the seven-day average for new cases is 1,411. The seven-day average for positive new tests is 5.6 percent, which is where it’s been for the last three weeks.

In Virginia, 14.2 percent of the population if fully vaccinated. Northam and First Lady Pam Northam are among that number, having received the Johnson and Johnson vaccine earlier this month.

“We were vaccinated a week ago Monday and we’re feeling great,” Northam said. “It’s exciting that our country now has three safe and effective vaccines and as we know, more may be coming.”

Northam said the federal government is increasing supply of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine and more doses are on the way. On Tuesday he said mass vaccination centers have entered operations across the state, including one in Danville that we’ll hear about later in the program.

Northam touted their efficiency.

“If you’ve seen one of these mass clinics, you’ve probably been amazed at how well they’re run,” Northam said. “People guiding you where to park, where to check in, where to go next. The clinics I have seen and heard about have been well-oiled machines, and that is all do the hard work of thousands of people determined to get their fellow Virginians vaccinated as quickly as possible.”

Northam said Virginia is on track to open vaccinations to everybody by May 1.

“And I’m confident that we will exceed it,” Northam said. “When our country sets clear goals, we meet and exceed them. In fact, President Biden set a goal of 100 million shots in his first 100 days and our country met that goal in 58 days.”

Northam said the numbers are positive enough to begin to ease restrictions, beginning with the number of people who can gather at events. Beginning on April 1, changes will be made to the Forward Virginia plan.

“Starting on April 1, social gatherings may have up to 50 people indoors and 100 people outdoors,” Northam said.

That includes weddings.

“Entertainment venues will be able to operate at 30 percent of capacity and up to 500 people indoors. Outdoor venues can have up to 30 percent but won’t have a numeric cap,” he said.

Northam used the example of the Richmond Flying Squirrels baseball team, who play in a stadium that can hold up 9,500 people. The new rules would allow attendance of just over 3,000 people. The rules for sporting events are a little different, though.

“The number of spectators allowed for recreational sports will increase to 100 indoors, and to 500 outdoors,” Northam said. “Recreational sporting events indoors and outside will be limited to 30 percent of capacity.”

Northam said other measures are still in place, including the number of people who can gather as well as required face coverings.

Last week, leaders in Northern Virginia sent a letter to Northam asking why they weren’t getting more vaccines given that acceptance rates have not been as high in some areas of the Commonwealth. Dr. Danny Avula, the state’s vaccine coordinator, explained changes that are being made.

“This is certainly something we’ve been monitoring since the beginning of January,” Dr. Avula said. “We’ve primarily started the allocation process based on population and then made some tweaks here and there based on the number of people living in a community who are 65 and over, or with underlying conditions, or the concentration of Black and Latino residents in different communities. So we are now getting to a phase of the vaccination roll-out where we are seeing demand start to wane and I think that is happening more so in rural communities. We’ve seen uptake slow down and those communities are starting to move from 1B to 1C and in response we and we have been for the last couple of weeks kind of shifting allocations to places that have more 1B demand.”

But what about people who do not plan to get the vaccine when their time comes?

“We realize that and I continue to encourage folks that these are safe, they are effective, and that we need as a community, as a society to get to about 70 to 75 percent of individuals receiving the vaccine to get to that herd immunity,” Northam said.

Northam said another challenge will be how to get children vaccinated as they will need to be included in order to reach that goal.

“The clinical trials taking a look at the messenger RNA vaccines, the Pfizer and the Moderna vaccines, have been started in children,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the director of hospital epidemiology taking questions at a press briefing this morning.

“The clinical trials are really going to be looking in addition to this marker of immune response and antibody response, they’re really going to be designed to take a look at safety questions,” Dr. Sifri said.

Yesterday, the Virginia Department of Health confirmed that two COVID variants that originated in California have been identified in the Commonwealth. Dr. Sifri said the best ways to prevent them from spreading is to get vaccinated when the time comes, and to also continue to follow all of the protocols. As I said earlier, the percent positivity has been around 5.5 for the past several weeks.

“There’s a steady level of new COVID cases right now so we’re no longer decreasing in many locations and that’s true here in Virginia as well,” Dr. Sifri said. “I think it is accurate to describe it a race between variants and vaccines. I think the great news is that we have great vaccines and we’re set to push those out rapidly and what we’re waiting for right now is just more supply.”

Now we wait to see if the number of new cases begins dropping again, or whether a “spring surge” happens as large gatherings begin again. Dr. Reid Adams is UVA’s Chief Medical Officer. He said the reduced capacity at those large venues allows for people to be spaced out.

“It doesn’t get away from the fact that people need to continue to social distance, wash their hands, wear their mask, and do all of the things that we’ve been doing for the past year,” Dr. Adams said.

As spring does it thing, the beauty of blossoms cause many area residents to experience allergies, which share some of the same symptoms of COVID-19. Dr. Sifri recommended that people get tested for COVID to be on the safe side.

“I think it is important as you’re starting to have those symptoms to make sure that you know exactly what’s going on,” Dr. Sifri said. “So, if you are having typical allergy symptoms and it is the flowering tree that you’re used to reacting to, maybe it’s a reasonable presumption that is that but it also does not hurt to also just be tested to make sure.”

The Blue Ridge Health District held a press briefing on Thursday to explain why they do not want people who live here to travel to another health district to get vaccinations. But first, Dr. Denise Bonds gave a status update on vaccine availability. Remember that in February the health district was only getting about 3,000 doses a week. (watch the briefing)

“The Health Department received 1,300 first doses of Moderna and 1,100 second doses,” Dr. Bonds said. “Additionally we received 2,340 first doses of Pfizer and we have a little bit of Johnson and Johnson that is available to use for some vaccination this week but it’s not a sustained amount.”

Dr. Bonds said it is likely that increased allocations of vaccine will come in the form of the Johnson and Johnson shot.

Another change is that the UVA Health is once again receiving doses directly from the Virginia Department of Health.

“And UVA at Seminole Square will have 2,510 first doses of Pfizer, 1,170 second doses of Pfizer and 1,110 Moderna second doses,” Dr. Bonds said.

Ryan McKay, the operations director for the District, asked people to register now, regardless of where you are in the queue.

“Why this is important, one we want to understand and know who wants to get vaccinated but this helps determine allocation of vaccine to health districts across Virginia,” McKay said. “And so that data that is pulled from the state database helps inform the actual number of doses we may receive from one week to the next.”

Earlier this week, a social media post prompted a wave of people who live here driving elsewhere as part of a phenomenon known as “vaccine tourism.” Kathryn Goodman is the communications director for the Blue Ridge Health District.

“We’ve heard of a lot of different community members and students driving to Danville to get their first dose of the vaccine, and we’ve also heard from folks who are requesting that they can get their second dose here in Charlottesville,” Goodman said.

However, the statewide system does not work that way.

“Given the limited vaccine supply, we are unable to provide second doses for individuals who are going to these larger vaccination center clinics and that’s because our second doses relies on how many first doses are administered in our health district,” Goodman said. “So unfortunately we’re not able to provide those second doses and want to make sure people are aware of that.”

Goodman said she was aware many have claimed they went because they thought doses were not being used. She said the Virginia Department of Health is working to address allocation issues.

If people continue going outside of the district to get an unscheduled appointment, that could affect the supply that comes to the Blue Ridge Health District.

“If we have a large number of individuals that got their first dose elsewhere but come to us for their second dose, that’s going to reduce the number of first doses that we will have available for that period of time,” Dr. Bonds said.

For more on this specific issue, take a look at a press release sent out on Wednesday.

Near the end of the briefing, Goodman said she understood people’s frustration.

“The important piece behind this is that we everyone to be vaccinated,” Goodman said. “It’s just a matter of when everybody will be vaccinated, not if. If you want a vaccine, we will make sure you get one. It just has to take a little bit of time as it relies on our supply and the vaccine roll-out for vaccinating those who are at the greatest risk for death and disease first.”

And to put that in perspective for today, 70 percent of cases in the Blue Ridge Health District have been in people under the age of 50. Ninety-nine percent of the 200 fatalities have been in people over the age of 50.

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In today’s show:

Developers shed some light on how regulatory hurdles can affect cost of housing

Albemarle’s county executive highlights Albemarle’s building boom

Albemarle’s housing plan is going back to the Planning Commission, but supervisors weighed in first

Charlottesville public housing discusses ending a security contract

A fifth candidate emerges in the raced two Democratic nominations for City Council

Today is the deadline for candidates who want to be on the ballot as a party candidate in the Democratic primary on June 8. Candidates for primaries must have all of their paperwork ready by 5 p.m., including 125 signatures. City resident and software engineer Josh Carp announced his bid on Twitter Tuesday evening.

The other candidates in the race are School Board member Juandiego Wade, Charlottesville native and businessman Carl E. Brown, local campaign veteran Yasmine Washington, and 2019 candidate and UVA project manager Brian Pinkston.

Primaries will also be held in the three Supervisor races in Albemarle. Liz Palmer is not running for a third term in the Samuel Miller District, leaving at least one open seat. County registrar Jake Washburne confirmed in an email that Jim Andrews has filed as a Democrat in that race.

Neither Rio District incumbent Ned Gallaway or Jack Jouett incumbent Diantha McKeel have not yet indicated if they will seek new terms.

This first segment is from the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s meeting on Monday, March 22. (watch the video)

Do you or someone you know need assistance paying for where you live? The waiting list for federal vouchers issued by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority will reopen on March 29 for a brief time, with the window closing on April 2. John Sales is the executive director of CRHA.

“The waitlist is electronic this year and it will be available at portal.cvillerha.com,” Sales said. “That’s on our website. It’s on our Facebook page. And it should be on the news in the next couple of days.”

The CRHA is authorized to issue up to 538 vouchers, which go to individuals to help make up the cost between what they can afford and the open market. Currently, 393 households receive the voucher, and Sales said he is hoping to add between 40 and 50 new ones.

The funding comes from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, but the city of Charlottesville pays $900,000 a year to cover the cost of additional rental assistance. Sales said in an email that 77 households are using that program.

Security contract concerns

Since January, Sentry Force Security has held a contract to patrol CRHA properties. President Tim Sansone addressed the CHRA Board of Commissioners at their meeting at matters from the public and said there has been an increase in illegal activities and that Sentry Force personnel have been coordinating with the Charlottesville Police Department.

“I understand there’s been some dialogue or conversations as far as the scope of our services and the contract that we have with CRHA,” Sansone said. “I think everyone would agree or know that the properties that we’re here to patrol and provide services with are definitely in need of some type of security service or coverage which is what we are providing.”

Sansone said service was reduced in February due to the cost, and he told the CRHA Board that his company would put together a proposal for a lowered price.

The topic came up during a public hearing on the budget for fiscal year 2022. The CRHA fiscal year begins on April 1. Sales said revenue from tenants is expected to be down by $150,000 despite leasing more units. He also said the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is requiring CRHA to set aside $500,000 in reserve in order to one day leave “troubled” status. (draft budget)

Much of the discussion, though, dealt with the security issue.

Sales said the CHRA had signed a $240,000 contract under a line item called “Total Protective Services” but that is now expected to not carry on into the next year. Sales became CRHA director last August.

“Solicitation was already out when I got here,” Sales said. “We moved forward with it. After going through numbers, looking at what we’re projected to lose in revenue and the operating fund not catching up for a year, because it’s a year behind…. We really can’t afford this service.”

Sales said the bill from Sentry Force Security for January was $43,000.

“I don’t know any housing authority that can afford that,” Sales said. “That’s about a half million a year. That would by far be the largest contract we have.”

Sales said there are other ways to address security issues, such as hiring someone to check ids before people enter Crescent Halls, for instance.

At the public comment period, Brandon Collins of the Public Housing Association of Residents said he supported the change.

“The current security company and the previous security company really weren’t offering anything, any kind of improvements to resident safety and the housing authority has been very responsive to resident direction on this matter,” Collins said.

Collins said community-based initiatives such as the recently formed B.U.C.K. Squad would be a better use of resources to address safety.

Sansone spoke again during the public hearing for the budget. He said security officers have logged 147 incidents and 23 of those have been violent crime, drug related, or property damage. He said he understood the budget issues.

“I would hope that we could all agree that security is definitely a need at these properties,” Sansone said. “In January when we are at full staffing level we were patrolling concurrently with [Charlottesville Police Department].”

Sansone said he warned that without security, the number of violent incidents would continue as the weather gets warm. That’s the same message that the head of the B.U.C.K. Squad told Council earlier this month.

Sansone said that could leave the CRHA with liability issues if someone they hire to run the door at Crescent Halls is injured in an incident. The CRHA’s attorney, David Oberg, later disputed that notion and said they’d be covered by worker’s compensation.

Sansone offered a lower rate for Sentry Force’s services albeit with lower service.

“I’d just strongly discourage the Board from considering removing all security presence as a whole, especially with the summer months coming up.

Sales said the new proposal was for $180,000 and he thought that the authority could only afford about $9,000 a month. Sansone continued his pitch.

“It’s not going be the same exact same service level as having what we had done in January but it would be able to provide a deterrent and a presence because if people start seeing that there is no security at all at these properties, then the word is going to get out and you’re going to see a lot more activity happening at these properties, especially with the summer months coming up.”

There were murders at South First Street on November 5 and December 27 of last year, as well as numerous reports of shots fired.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker, who sits on the CHRA Board, acknowledged the summer months could lead to an uptick in violence and she wants to find a solution to prevent future issues.

“It is something that we need to figure out but I think that we need to work with the families that live there with CRHA, with the Safety Committee,” Walker said. “It isn’t something I don’t think we can delay.”

Walker said Council is considering proposals to fund both Peace in the Street and B.U.C.K. Squad.

“But there are also some things that they can’t do that we wouldn’t want them to do just for safety reasons,” Walker said.

The CRHA will vote on the budget at a meeting on March 30.

Kathleen Glenn-Matthews, the operations director for CRHA, gave an update on redevelopment efforts. Groundbreaking for the first phase of South First Street’s redevelopment was held on March 7.

“And we are in the planning process as we really closed on Crescent Halls to go ahead and get a similar event in place there and we hope to have some announcement soon once I talk to the Crescent Halls residents association about times that will for them,” Glenn-Matthews said.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. This subscriber -supported public service announcement is from an anonymous supporter. Do you want to support your public library by picking up a mystery bag of books? The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are resuming their Pop-up Book Sale this Sunday at the Gordon Avenue library. For $5, you can pick up a sealed, pre-selected bag, choosing from mystery, popular fiction, literary fiction, classic literature, biographies, sci-fi / fantasy. The JMRL Pop-Up sale begins this Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Gordon Avenue Library. (learn more on their website)

How much of a role does local policy play in determining the cost of housing? That was one theme of a panel discussion held on March 18, 2021 by the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership. (watch the video)

“There are a lot of factors that go into making something affordable, many of which we just don’t control locally,” said Charlie Armstrong, the vice president of land development for Southern Development, one of the area’s most active property developers.

‌Every‌ ‌structure‌ ‌you‌ ‌see‌ ‌in‌ ‌America‌ ‌is‌ ‌reviewed‌ ‌at‌ ‌multiple‌ ‌levels‌ ‌of‌ ‌government‌ ‌to‌ ‌make‌ ‌sure‌ ‌the‌ ‌edifice‌ ‌conforms‌ ‌to‌ ‌rules.‌ Armstrong said ‌too‌ ‌much‌ land use regulation‌ ‌increases‌ ‌the‌ ‌cost‌ ‌of‌ ‌housing and that localities can play a role through their own policies. ‌

“We‌ ‌as‌ ‌a‌ ‌community‌ ‌really‌ ‌do‌ ‌this‌ ‌to‌ ‌ourselves,”‌ ‌Armstrong‌ ‌said.‌ ‌“We‌ ‌intentionally‌ ‌through‌ ‌our‌ Comprehensive‌ ‌Plans‌ ‌and‌ ‌our‌ ‌zoning‌ ‌ordinances‌ ‌limit‌ ‌the‌ ‌supply‌ ‌of‌ ‌land‌ ‌for‌ ‌new‌ ‌homes.‌ ‌We‌ ‌intentionally‌ ‌as‌ ‌a‌ ‌community‌ ‌limit‌ ‌the‌ ‌density‌ ‌of‌ ‌new‌ ‌homes‌ ‌that‌ ‌is‌ ‌allowed‌ ‌on‌ ‌any‌ ‌one‌ ‌piece‌ ‌of‌ ‌land.”‌ ‌ ‌

Albemarle’s‌ ‌Comprehensive‌ ‌Plan‌ ‌sets‌ ‌aside‌ ‌roughly‌ ‌5‌ ‌percent‌ ‌of‌ ‌the‌ ‌county’s‌ ‌726‌ ‌square‌ ‌miles‌ ‌for‌ ‌residential‌ ‌development.‌ ‌Armstrong‌ ‌said‌ ‌the‌ ‌community’s‌ ‌choice‌ ‌to‌ ‌let‌ ‌the‌ ‌rest‌ ‌of‌ ‌the‌ ‌county‌ ‌ be‌ ‌rural‌ ‌has‌ ‌impacts‌ ‌on‌ ‌the‌ ‌cost‌ ‌of‌ ‌housing.‌ ‌Limited‌ ‌supply‌ ‌drives‌ ‌up‌ ‌the‌ ‌cost‌ ‌because‌ ‌those‌ ‌with‌ ‌more‌ ‌money‌ ‌can‌ ‌offer‌ ‌higher‌ ‌prices.‌ ‌ ‌

For‌ ‌the‌ ‌land‌ ‌that‌ ‌is‌ ‌available,‌ ‌it‌ ‌can‌ ‌be‌ ‌time-consuming‌ ‌and‌ ‌expensive‌ ‌to‌ ‌navigate‌ ‌through‌ ‌the‌ ‌zoning‌ ‌and‌ ‌special‌ ‌use‌ ‌permit‌ ‌process‌ ‌that‌ ‌can‌ ‌unlock‌ ‌higher‌ ‌residential‌ ‌densities.‌ ‌ ‌

Chris‌ ‌Henry‌ ‌of‌ ‌the Stony‌ ‌Point‌ ‌Development Group‌ said‌ ‌housing‌ ‌was‌ ‌more‌ ‌affordable‌ ‌in‌ ‌the‌ ‌past‌ ‌because‌ ‌developers‌ ‌did‌ ‌not‌ ‌have‌ ‌to‌ ‌comply‌ ‌with‌ ‌regulations‌ ‌to‌ ‌reduce‌ ‌stormwater‌ ‌runoff,‌ ‌as‌ ‌well‌ ‌as‌ ‌requirements‌ ‌to‌ ‌build‌ ‌sidewalks‌ ‌and‌ ‌other‌ ‌public‌ ‌infrastructure.‌ ‌ ‌

“Municipalities‌ ‌used‌ ‌to‌ ‌be‌ ‌in‌ ‌the‌ ‌business‌ ‌of‌ ‌even‌ ‌in‌ ‌some‌ ‌cases‌ ‌of‌ ‌building‌ ‌roads,”‌ ‌Henry‌ ‌said. “They‌ ‌would‌ ‌put‌ ‌in‌ ‌stormwater‌ ‌and‌ ‌things‌ ‌like‌ ‌that.‌ ‌A‌ ‌lot‌ ‌of‌ ‌that‌ ‌has‌ ‌been‌ ‌pushed‌ ‌off‌ ‌to‌ ‌the‌ ‌private‌ ‌sector‌ ‌for‌ ‌various‌ ‌reasons,‌ ‌a‌ ‌lot‌ ‌of‌ ‌them‌ ‌are‌ ‌reasonable.‌ ‌But‌ ‌it’s‌ ‌added‌ ‌to‌ ‌the‌ ‌cost‌ ‌of‌ homes.”‌ ‌ ‌

For more on this discussion, I’ve got an article in this week’s C-Ville Weekly that goes into more detail. You can also watch the whole presentation on the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission’s YouTube page.

Let’s go back for a moment to the March 17, 2021 meeting of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. Things are being built in the county. Here’s County Executive Jeffrey Richardson.

“2020 was the greatest volume of building permits in over nine years,” Richardson said. “Just 9.7 percent of building permits were issued in the rural area. Over 90 percent of the building permits were issued in the development area.”

According to the year-end building report for 2020, about a quarter of the units were single family detached, and the rest are a mixture of townhomes, multifamily and other forms of housing.

In all, 1,143 certificates of occupancy were issued in Albemarle in 2020, with a similar ratio between development and rural areas.

Supervisor Ann Mallek said in the mid 2000’s, the ratio was 50:50. She said there is a potential danger in over-development of the growth areas.

“Because of all the work that’s been done for 30 years to have our development areas be places where people want to live and how important it is that we’re so careful about not messing that up, whether it is not addressing the shortcomings we have for infrastructure or making it so crowded that people don’t want to be there,”

Supervisor Diantha McKeel said there are challenges in the development that have to be addressed.

“We have to keep focused on getting the infrastructure built to handle all of these folks,” McKeel said.

Later in the evening, the Board of Supervisors had an update and public hearing on the county’s housing plan which has been under development since July 2019. It builds off of a housing study conducted by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission in March of that year. An updated draft of the Housing Albemarle was made available in the Supervisors’ packet. (March 17 draft)

“The report identified more than 10,000 renters and homeowners who are paying more than the recommended 30 percent of their incomes towards housing costs,” said Stacy Pethia, the county’s housing coordinator. “The proposed policy includes 12 policy objectives and 39 correspondending strategies and action steps.”

These range from increasing the overall supply of housing to promoting mixed-income development in the designated growth areas. The plan also calls for the creation of an affordable housing trust fund.

Pethia did not go into details on March 17.

At the very beginning of her presentation, Pethia said the item would be going back to the Planning Commission after the public hearing. Supervisors had the chance to ask questions before people spoke. Supervisor Liz Palmer drew attention to Objective 8, which calls reductions in regulatory barriers to affordable housing. One strategy would allow accessory external dwelling units in all of the county’s residential zoning districts.

“Maybe I’m reading more into that then I should but does that mean that any place in the whole county can have a dwelling unit, an accessory dwelling unit?” Palmer asked.

“Yes, that is the intent behind that,” Pethia said.

Pethia said an ordinance would be developed first that would set guidelines for such a program.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel also had some concerns about the idea, especially in already established neighborhoods.

“To go back into older neighborhoods, retrofit for something they weren’t built for,” McKeel said. “These accessory units work perfectly in Belvedere. Belvedere was built for them.”

At the public hearing many speakers represented the group IMPACT, which is holding their annual Nehemiah event on March 25 to ask Supervisors to commit to affordable housing. One of them is Vicki Bravo.

“Our interfaith group of 25 congregations representing 15,000 people,” Bravo said. “We congratulate you on your excellent housing policy and we look forward to celebrating its approval. We are pleased that the policy includes the creation of an affordable housing trust fund, the best practice around the country of creating affordable housing.

Following the public hearing, Supervisors had the change to make their comments. Supervisor Ann Mallek said she was concerned the way Objective 1 is phrased would open the door to changes in zoning the community would not support.

“Increase the supply of housing to meet the diverse housing needs of all current and future Albemarle County residents, that’s what it says,” Mallek said. “That is not possible. We need to take out the word ‘all’ and understand that we are going to do our very best to increase the supply to meet the needs of residents but I don’t want to see this used as an excuse to throw everything under the bus because it’s a completely unattainable objective.”

Mallek said many older neighborhoods cannot support additional density because they weren’t built for it.

“The streets are ten feet wide,” Mallek said. “The right of way goes to the edge of the pavement. There is no place for sidewalks or bikes lanes or the extra traffic with doubling the units on that street.”

Supervisor Donna Price said the county would have to come to some new conclusion if it wants to maintain the growth management policy that’s been in place since 1980.

“If we want to maintain our policy of five percent development area and 95 percent rural area, that means we will have to fill in substantial density into the five percent that we’ve got,” Price said. “In order to do that, I believe we have to recognize that the historic suburban neighborhood model of detached single-family homes is insufficient to meet the current and future needs.”

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley said Albemarle is in a dilemma because existing residents of the designated growth area are resisting additional homes.

“And people don’t want the density increased,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “They don’t want the buildings to go higher. So that means eventually do we go out into the rural areas? We have to make a decision. It’s going to be a tough decision.”

LaPisto-Kirtley said she would prefer not to expand the development area but instead build more multifamily units and townhomes.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said he wanted more information about the details of how the trust fund would work, and was confident he would get them as the Plan works its way back through the Planning Commission.

“And we have an opportunity here to have some robust conversations around these specific things because it’s going back to the Planning Commission,” Gallaway said.

The housing plan could go back before the Planning Commission as early as May.

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out, supporter Lonnie Murray wants you to know about a series of seminars on spring and fall landscaping with native plants. Plant Virginia Natives has held two of these already, but the next one is coming up on March 23 with Trista Imrich, owner of Wild Works of Whimsy. This is a good place to start if you’d like to plant natives but don’t know where to begin!

On today’s show:

A quick look at the pandemic metrics for today

The Albemarle Architectural Review Board reviews the Ivy Road corridor

Albemarle Supervisors get an update on planning for the next Comprehensive Plan

Belmont Bridge safety initiatives return while we await information on construction bids

A new name for Albemarle’s charter school

A newcomer enters race for Charlottesville School Board

The current seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases in Virginia is 1,442 as reported by the Department of Health, and the seven-day average for positive PCR tests is 5.6 today, up slightly from 5.4 on Sunday. As of today, 1.14 million Virginians are fully vaccinated.

On Friday, the UVA Health System offered another briefing on its pandemic responses. This time around, Dr. Taison Bell spoke about how the system is working with the Blue Ridge Health District to ensure vaccination distribution is being done in an equitable manner.

“Equitable distribution has been an issue nationwide,” Dr. Bell said. “Every state that reports data on who has received a vaccination has reported a discrepancy. Those who have received the vaccine tend to be white Americans whereas underrepresented minorities who disproportionately over-represent cases and deaths have received disproportionately low access to vaccine.”

Dr. Bell said the district is taking a strategy involving communications to fill information gaps, targeted clinics for smaller communities, and making sure people who don’t have time to hunt for an appointment get one anyway.

“We want to make sure that we are removing geographic barriers and administrative barriers to make sure that we have easy access and actually make getting vaccinated a downhill process rather than an uphill process as it exists at the present,” Dr. Bell said.

Dr. Bell said some remain skeptical about getting vaccinated and he does not like to use the term hesitancy and is there to listen.

“People should have questions and concerns about something that they’re going to inject into their bodies and I think that the one thing to underscore is that our messaging and information around the COVID-19 vaccines just started once they were ready for approval or authorization and so there is a lost time for when we could have closed that information gap,” Dr. Bell said.

An advisory group that’s been considering names for Albemarle County’s charter school is recommending the name Community Lab School. Murray High School and the Community Public Charter School have merged and needed a new name. The charter school’s head teacher also served as chair of the advisory committee.

“We believe Community Lab School combines two of the most popular choices while celebrating a distinguishing strength of our school and helping to explain the purpose and mission of the learning experience we offer to students,” said Stephanie Passman.

Albemarle Schools are also reviewing the name of Virginia L. Murray Elementary School. A survey concluded last Thursday and results should be announced soon.

Three people have now declared their intention to run for three seats on the Charlottesville School Board. Parent Christa Bennett announced on Facebook last week.

“I want for our community to be a just one,” Bennett said. “This includes equity in education and for children to have access to what they need to grow strong and healthy, and prepared for bright futures.”

Bennett has been working on a project to get a playground built at Walker Upper Elementary. Her website highlights efforts to persuade the school system to stop taking away recess time for punishment.

There are currently three incumbents. One of them is Juandiego Wade and he’s running for City Council. Lisa Larson-Torres has indicated she will seek another term, but Leah Puryear has not yet made an announcement. Realtor and former teacher Emily Dooley has also announced her candidacy. For more on Bennett’s candidacy and the race, read an article by Katherine Knott in the Daily Progress.

In the previous installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement, we listened in on the Albemarle Architectural Review Board’s discussion of the Fontaine Avenue entrance corridor. The ARB also discussed another roadway that connects to the University of Virginia on roads that travel through both Albemarle County and the City of Charlottesville.

The ARB reviewed the urban portion of 250 West from I-64 to Old Ivy Road, and touched on the continuation of the roadway into Charlottesville.

Currently under construction on Ivy Road is the 195,000 square foot UVA Musculoskeletal Hospital on the former ground of the now-demolished Children’s Rehabilitation Hospital.

Sentara Martha Jefferson is building a facility to the west of ViVace and WTJU. On the latter, ARB Member Frank Hancock noted its form is more urban that what is currently along the corridor.

“I think it’s going to be interesting to see that redevelopment, that level of redevelopment, if other parcels adjacent to that,” Hancock said. “I know that’s taller and maybe a little bit closer to the corridor which I think is appropriate as we’re moving into the city and of more of the urban area.”

The ARB’s newest member, Chris Henningsen, also said he was interested to see how the corridor is becoming more urban.

“I’m interested to see how the Sentara building looks and gets landscape in its final form, as with the orthapedics center, too,” Henningsen said.

The ARB reviewed the Sentara building but not the orthopedics center because UVA is exempt from formal review by the ARB.

Many buildings have been constructed on Old Ivy Road across the railroad tracks, which serves as a barrier to pedestrian connectivity. ARB member Fred Missel is the director of design and development for the UVA Foundation, which has purchased and consolidated many properties further to the east in Charlottesville for the future Ivy-Emmet section of University Grounds where a new hotel and academic buildings are planned. Missel said the section of Ivy Road in Albemarle County has issues.

“That railroad, and especially the utility lines along that side, it’s just not a great entrance corridor,” Missel said. “With the development of the hotel and conference center, the School of Data Science, and everything on that corner up to Arlingon, that whole area has about 14 acres of land and it’s got capacity for about three-quarters of a million square feet of development long-term.”

Missel said that would mean a lot of vehicular traffic coming through the area, something that will need to be addressed.

“It’s one of the two sort of front doors to the University which is why the Visitor’s Center is located there, unfortunately in the Police Station,” Missel said. “That’s looking to be relocated to the Hotel and Conference Center.”

The city was awarded $12.1 million in funding for a Smart Scale project in the first round to improve the streetscape along Emmet Street. A VDOT dashboard indicates that project is behind schedule.

Speaking of city transportation projects, Charlottesville will once again place traffic barrels on a southbound lane of the Belmont Bridge as part of its Safe Streets initiative. The idea is to give more space for pedestrians and cyclists.

“The safety measures will be in place until the Coronavirus state of emergency is lifted, or until the construction of the replacement bridge commences,” reads a press release.

The city has been planning for the replacement of the Belmont Bridge for over ten years and the project was advertised for construction bids in January. The project has a $31.1 million cost estimate according to VDOT’s most recent Six-Year Improvement Program. Bids for the project closed last Tuesday but the city has not responded yet to a request for information about whether any of them came in under the cost estimate. The current fiscal year contains a $5 million capital payment for the project, and the proposed capital budget for FY22 includes another $2.5 million payment.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors said last week they want a faster review of the county’s Comprehensive Plan and that three years will be too long.

Supervisors last updated the plan six years ago and much has changed since then, according to Planning Manager Rachel Falkenstein.

“Since the 2015 update, we have had significant work on: climate action planning; economic development; and equity, inclusion, and infrastructure investments and we want to better align the plan with those initiatives,” Falkenstein said.

Falkenstein said the Comprehensive Plan also needs to inform a rewrite of the rules of where development can go, and how.

“We’ve identified the need for a zoning ordinance update and doing the comp plan update now to incorporate these initiatives will help set that stage,” Falkenstein said.

In February, Supervisors had pushed back on the three year process staff recommended to update the Comprehensive Plan and asked for a more expedited review. However, Falkenstein said staff still believed in a 36-month process.

“We feel that given the level of engagement and the breadth of topics that are covered in the comp plan, that three years is really a realistic timeline for this work,” Falkenstein said.

A detailed community engagement plan will come back to the Board later this year. A project advisory group would be formed to oversee the process and members would be paid a stipend. Staff has now changed that to have the funding to used to “reduce barriers to participation.” These could include access to language as well as transportation.

Supervisor Ann Mallek said the existing plan is clear to read, and she did not want that to be lost as the current plan is amended.

“The benefit of our comp plan and I think why it won awards and is very well accepted is its readability and the fact that it is not just the last 12 months of something,” Mallek said. “It is a very long term history document about how we got here.”

Supervisor Liz Palmer said she wanted the Planning Commission to weigh in about whether the plan needed to be rewritten, or just updated.

“I am concerned about this idea of a three-year plan being a complete rewrite of this Comprehensive Plan and that’s the part I’m really struggling with,” Palmer said.

Palmer also wanted to know if the zoning ordinance and Comprehensive Plan could be updated at the same time given many conflicts. County Attorney Greg Kamptner said he would prefer to do the comp plan update first.

“The ideal situation would be to have a comp plan and then immediately follow it with a comprehensive rewrite and updating of the zoning ordinance because it is 40 years old,” Kamptner said.

Palmer asked if that would mean the zoning rewrite would not begin for three years. Planning Director Charles Rapp said supervisors will have the chance to weigh in with more direction as the work plan for the Community Development Department comes before them. He said work on the the zoning rewrite could at least begin before the comp plan is finished.

“I think once we get to that framework for the comp plan so we know what it’s going to contain, then we can go ahead and start making progress on the zoning ordinance,” Rapp said.

Charlottesville hired one consultant to produce an affordable housing plan, a Comprehensive Plan, and a new zoning ordinance. The Cville Plans Together initiative just completed the housing plan, which Council endorsed earlier this month. Albemarle Supervisors had a public hearing on their new housing plan last week, but sent it back to the Planning Commission for further work. I’ll have more on that in the next installment.

As for the Albemarle Comprehensive Plan, Supervisor Diantha McKeel also thought three years was too long to wait, and that parts of the zoning needed to be changed sooner.

“The zoning, the code, it is critical to getting it updated,” McKeel said. “To be honest with you it’s really my priority along with specific areas in the comp plan. Economic development. Climate action. I mean, I could go through and name maybe just a couple of others.”

Deputy County Executive Doug Walker said he heard a disconnect between staff and the Board on this issue. He provided some clarifications.

“This is not intended to be a rewrite which was actually done the last time,” Walker said. “It is an update but I acknowledge that to some extent updating and rewriting may seem a lot the same if we’re not very careful about how we distinguish one from the other.”

Falkenstein said staff will come back with a more detailed scope, but still maintained the process will be lengthy. County Executive Jeffrey Richardson agreed.

“The staff is trying to manage this and manage the Board’s expectations,” Richardson said. “Three years sounds like a long time but everywhere I have ever been, a Comprehensive Plan update takes quite some time because of the domino effect of touching all of the various aspects of the plan document.”

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In today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council talks pools, next steps on a controversial West Main statue, and agree to no property tax rate this year while acknowledging one for next year is possible

Albemarle Architectural Review Board takes a look at the Fontaine Avenue and the Ivy Road corridor

At any given City Council meeting, a lot happens. This is a set of highlights from March 15, 2021. Let’s start with an update on one lingering issue.

In February, the city sent out a request for information for entities who might be interested in taking over ownership of the Lewis, Clark and Sacajawea statue. Here’s City Manager Chip Boyles.

“And we do have nine informational responses that we received,” Boyles said. “Staff will take these informational responses, do a review, and come back to Council with a recommendation with how to move forward with the removal of that statue.”

The statue is within the boundary of the first phase of the West Main Streetscape project. Council voted to remove the statue in November 2019 and directed staff last October to pursue that outcome separately from the transportation project. (previous story)

Ridge Street traffic projects

One item on the consent agenda were the recommendations of a task force for how a small pool of federal funding should be spent in the Ridge Street Neighborhood. The group is suggesting that $25,000 in Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) money be spent on traffic calming and another $220,000 be spent on three sidewalk projects. As part of the traffic calming, speed limit signs would be installed on the old section of Ridge Street.

Council gave their approval as part of the consent agenda vote. Before the vote, Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker asked a question.

“How was it determined that there was excessive speeding?” she asked.

City traffic engineer Brennen Duncan responded.

“There have been a few traffic studies, speed studies, that were done on that section over the last five to ten years and all of them showed that there is a speeding issue on old Ridge Street,” Duncan said.

The Reopening of City Pools

Last week, the Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Advisory Board sent a letter requesting a plan to safely reopen facilities and pools. City Manager Chip Boyles gave an update.

“Parks and Recreation has a schedule and a plan for beginning to open up facilities and activities for the summer,” Boyles said. “Baseball fields are already receiving some league play and with two weekends of activity we are reporting 100 percent compliance review for the safety measures by both among the participants, the players and spectators.”

Other facilities will open on a staggered schedule to accommodate the need to hire staff to run them. These include outdoor pools.

“Washington Park is the first to be scheduled with a proposed opening date of May 29,” Boyles said. ”What we can’t begin to open until the state regulations change are the aquatic center at Onesty and the water spray grounds at our parks. Those are because of the phase that we’re in with the state.”

That could change if there is further loosening of the state restrictions.

Mayor Walker said that anyone hired to staff facilities must receive a vaccine and get health benefits given the risks involved.

“And so that should be a top priority just as we are phasing in the operations part of it, the people who are running those operations, we need to make sure that they are safe,” Walker said.

Boyles said he heard that message loud and clear.

At the public comment period, several speakers asked for the pools to open faster. Beth Carta has swum laps in city indoor pools for decades.

“And as a nurse, I’m well-versed in the importance of COVID precautions and airborne precautions,” Carta said. “I also know we need a balance. At this point of the pandemic, it’s very important to have accessible and affordable community health options. People need access to exercise to stay healthy and improve immunity.”

Carta said Governor Ralph Northam has loosened restrictions for indoor pools to open, and those run by the YMCA and ACAC are already in operation. However, those facilities are more expensive than those run by the city parks and rec department.

Walker, who formerly worked at the Smith Aquatic Center, said the pandemic is not over and there are concerns about increased community spread through the UK and South African variants.

“What I’m hearing every speaker fail to understand...is that it takes bodies to run these programs so people in jobs and those people have been fired from their jobs and I don’t think it will be an issue rehiring people because they need their jobs but we need to make sure that safety is a first priority especially for staff,” Walker said.

I took the opportunity to relay the question to officials at the UVA Health System at their briefing on Friday, March 19. Dr. Costi Sifri is the director of hospital epidemiology for the system. He said planning for a gradual opening is okay, as long as the most vulnerable are being vaccinated and as long as mitigation measures like masking are still in place. He said the variants are a wild card.

“Really what we’ll need to do is just monitor and see what’s happening with case rates and what proportion of those cases are due to the variants,” Dr. Sifri said. “That remains a bit unknown right now. Those efforts to understand that are ramping up. I think we’ll learn more in the upcoming weeks.”

I’ll have more from that briefing in the next installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

No property tax rate increase this year, likely one next year

Council also held its first public hearing on City Manager Chip Boyles’ recommended $190.7 million budget for Fiscal Year 22. Before that, Boyles said revenue projections for next year are up slightly.

“This amount is being recommended to increase by $1,260,307 to a total of $191,950,146, still less than a one percent change,” Boyles said.

As of Monday, Boyles did not have a final amount for how much funding the city will receive through the American Rescue Plan, but that the city expected over $10 million and did not yet know what restrictions would be on those. When this information is known, staff will present an amended recommended budget.

There were actually two opportunities for the public to comment on the budget, but first, a public hearing on the tax rate, which is recommended to remain at 95 cents per $100 of assessed value.

Only one person spoke. Jeff Fogel called for a steep increase in the tax rate and increases in tax relief programs for those who can’t afford the higher payments.

“We need this money to provide the services to make this a real, decent community which it isn’t for so much of the population, and you know that!” Fogel said. “I’m not talking about two percent, five percent, ten percent. We’re talking about some substantial amount. You have more people moving down here from the northeast who are paying extraordinary taxes who see this as a gift to them when they’re only paying 95 cents on a dollar.”

Based on current economics, every penny increase on the tax rate would bring in an additional $845,000 in revenue for the city and the current formula allocated 40 percent of new revenues to the school system. That amount also does not include whatever would need to be paid out through the Charlottesville Housing Affordability Program in the form of rebate checks. The proposed budget for FY22 includes $965,000 for that purpose, as well as various tax relief programs.

In his comments, Boyles said there would likely be a need for a tax increase next year. Vice Mayor Sena Magill understood.

“I am expecting that taxes will need to be raised next year and it’s good that we’re already bringing this up now so that it doesn’t take people by surprise next year,” Magill said.

Councilor Michael Payne also addressed the issue.

“Over the next budget cycle as we look at our commitments, there’s no way around the need for revenue increases,” Payne said.

Mayor Walker said before the city increases taxes, Council must determine whether money is being spent efficiently.

“It’s also key for people to trust the process when we say the only alternative is increases,” Walker said.

The public hearing for the final budget will be held on April 5. At this one, for the first public hearing, go and review the video from the Council meeting. After this was recorded, there was a community budget forum on Wednesday. Council will have a budget work session on March 25 at which time the capital budget will be discussed. That’s when we might learn more about the West Main Streetscape.

In today’s public service announcement, we get help from Vice Mayor Sena Magill who at Monday’s Council meeting, told us all about a new essay contest from Alex-Zan.

“The 7th area student contest, ‘focus on helping others!”, Magill said.

Students in kindergarten to 12th grade are asked to enter the “My Help List” contest by writing in 150 words or less why it’s important to help people, and to write down five things they’ve done to assist someone, or could do.

“The contest is an extension of Mr. Alex Zan’s Yes You Matter Initiative,” Magill said.

Winners could get up a $100 cash prize and have their names announced on NBC29. Visit the website of Alex-Zan to learn more.

The next time you walk, bike, or drive along Fontaine Avenue in Albemarle County, think about possible futures. Much of the land is owned by the University of Virginia or its real estate foundation. The road itself is one of Albemarle’s Entrance Corridors, and as such is under design guidelines of the Architectural Review Board.

“The majority of the land is either owned or controlled by the University,” said Fred Missel, director of design and development at the University of Virginia Foundation. “Some land, primarily Foxhaven Farm, Morey Creek, Observatory Hill, are all being held for long-term needs of the University.

The Albemarle Architectural Review Board reviewed the corridor at its meeting on March 15. (watch this meeting on YouTube)

Fontaine Avenue is sign-posted as U.S. 29 Business and runs through the county for a brief stretch before hitting the city line.

The University of Virginia adopted a master plan for the Fontaine Avenue Research Park in September 2018 as a “flexible road map for future development.” This plan ultimately envisions up to 1.4 million gross square feet of building space.

“We developed that over the span of about 25 years,” Missel said. “We started in the mid-90’s and we sold the Fontaine Research Park to the University back in I think it was 2018 so that is now considered Grounds, University Grounds.”

Other undeveloped properties include a 12 acre site to the west of Buckingham Circle which the UVA Foundation purchased from the UVA Physicians Group in 2016. The latter secured a rezoning for the Morey Creek property in July 2011 but never built the proposed office building. Missel described this as a “long-term hold for the University.”

Proffers associated with both the Fontaine Research Park and the Morey Creek involve making the area more pedestrian friendly. The Fontaine property serves as gameday parking for UVA football.

Another property that could have future buildings scrutinized is the 69-acre “Granger tract” which is undeveloped and currently zoned R-1. The land is currently owned by Stribling Holdings LLC.

“Access is a real bear because you do have to go under the railroad tracks, but that would not, I don’t believe any of the Fontaine viewsheds but probably would I-64 and potentially U.S. 29.

Another UVA-owned property in the area is the Piedmont Apartments complex run by University Housing for faculty.

“There has been discussion about whether or not what’s at Piedmont is still the highest and best of the property or if there is some other alternative use that might could be considered longer term and I can tell you that that’s been a question that has been around as long as I’ve been at the Foundation and that’s been 20 years.”

At the city line begins a Smart Scale funded streetscape project for which a public hearing is expected in “early 2021” according to the initiative’s website.

Coordination of land use planning in this area used to the purview of a public body called the Planning and Coordination Council. PACC consisted of officials from Albemarle, Charlottesville and the University of Virginia and meetings were open to the public. However, that ended in late 2019 when both the city and the county agreed to convert the body to one not subject to open meetings rules.

“PACC was formed out of the Three Party Agreement that was established by the UVA, the city and the county back in the 80’s and PACC was dissolved about a year and a half ago,” Missel said.

In its place is the Land Use, Environmental and Planning Committee, which is not open to the public. However, the meeting notes are posted on a public website. Missel is a member of LUEPC in his capacity at the UVA Foundation. And this newsletter is intended to shine as much light as I can on what’s happening.

In tomorrow’s newsletter, a look at the Ivy Road corridor also from the March 15, 2021 ARB meeting.

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On today’s show:

The Blue Ridge Health District will move its vaccination clinic to Fashion Square Mall

Albemarle and Charlottesville both get updates on budgets

Charlottesville Fire Department seeks to reduce risks through neighborhood assessments

Initial site plan filed for parking lot for future Biscuit Run park

Exit 124’s conversion to a “diverging-diamond” is underway

An update on displacement at the Red Carpet Inn

The pandemic has a knack for breathing new life into commercial spaces that have gone dormant if only for a temporary basis. Beginning next week, the Blue Ridge Health District will provide shots at the former J.C. Penney space in Fashion Square Mall. They have been doing so in the parking lot of the former K-Mart. The UVA Health System is providing shots at the former Big Lots.

The Health District continues to go through health care workers eligible under Phase1A. Dr. Denise Bonds is the director.

“There’s a few individuals we still haven’t reached yet, and then of course there are new individuals that have just taken jobs within that area and we will continue to prioritize those individuals,” Bonds said. “We are still working through our 1B essential workers and as I said we’re moving into manufacturing and farm and agriculture. We are vaccinating individuals who are 65 and older and those who are 16 to 64 with high-risk medical conditions.”

Bonds said the district and UVA have administered nearly 100,000 doses. Next week they are expecting 11,650 doses, with 5,800 of those first shots and 2,000 the one-shot Johnson and Johnson version.

The move to the J.C. Penney will allow the district to have up to 30 people administering vaccines at a time. Ryan McKay is the policy director for the Blue Ridge Health District, which has outgrown the tent.

“While that tent has been serving a tremendous purpose and service to the community, it does present some challenges for us we operate,” McKay said. “When we have larger volumes of people, it puts people outside as opposed to inside. It sort of limits the amount of vaccinators we can have and the number of chairs we can provide for observation areas.”

The J.C. Penney space offers 100,000 square feet of room and will begin operations on March 23 starting four days a week.

“Provided that the vaccine allocation increased, we could administer up to 2,000 doses per day out of that location,” McKay said.

Everyone who wants a vaccine is now being asked to go ahead and register with the Commonwealth at vaccinate.virginia.gov. Kathryn Goodman is the communications manager for the Blue Ridge Health District.

‘We want everybody to pre-register right now,” Goodman said. “It doesn’t matter what phase you are in or when you will qualify. We want everyone registered in the state system.”

Today, Governor Ralph Northam announced that schools and universities will be able to hold in-person graduation events later this spring. Events held outdoors will be capped at 30 percent of capacity or 5,000 people, whichever is less. Events held indoors may have up to 500 people or 30 percent capacity, whichever is less. According to a press release sent out today, Virginia school systems will receive $1.9 billion in direct funds from the American Rescue Plan adopted by Congress earlier this month.

Charlottesville City Council met for more than six hours Monday and covered a lot of ground that I won’t fully get to in this newsletter. Council first got an update on the city’s financial forecast. Staff continue to monitor a potential $9 million shortfall in the current fiscal year with decreased meals and lodging taxes. Ryan Davidson is one of Charlottesville’s two senior budget analysts. He said one solution may be to use funding from the American Rescue Plan, but staff have not yet gone through all of the fine print.

“We’re still going through what that means for us and restrictions and where it can be used but we do anticipate using some of this but we still need to figure out how we’re going to get, but we do anticipate using some of this to manage the shortfall,” Davidson said.

Next month’s report will include an updated forecast based on having three quarters of fiscal year 2021 in the books.

The Albemarle County also held a budget work session on Monday. At the beginning, Chief Financial Officer Nelsie Birch suggested dedicating a future work session to how Albemarle’s portion of the ARP funding would be used. That will give her and her staff to get more information.

“I still at this point don’t actually know the amount of money we’re going to be receiving,” Birch said. “It’s somewhere around $21 million.”

More from Albemarle in a moment.

Council also got a report from the fire department on their new approach toward Community Risk Reduction, which is intended to lower service calls through various preventative measures. Joe Powers was hired from Henrico County to be the first deputy chief for community risk reduction.

“We’re one of the few fire departments across the United States that has invested in community risk reduction at an executive level,” Powers said. “From a traditional standpoint, we’ve always heard of fire prevention as a part of the fire department. We’re changing that mindset and taking it from a section of the fire department and making it an organizational process.”

Part of the work involves reviewing neighborhoods, looking for specific threats, and then tailoring targeted messages.

“The entire city doesn’t need a program on cooking fires or pedestrians crossing the street,” Powers said. “Maybe it’s certain intersections or certain neighborhoods.”

A lot of the work has to do with gathering data that can help the department move away from one-size-fits-all approach to community education efforts. Another name for it is neighborhood risk assessment.

“We also need to understand where our structure fires, but more so we need to know where asthma is occurring, allergic reactions, hazardous material calls, and cardiac arrests because all of those risks in areas of the city can be mitigated with our partners and in the fire department,” Powers said.

I’ll have more from the City Council meeting in a future installment.

Albemarle Supervisors went through the county school system’s request as well as capital projects at their work session Monday. Graham Paige is the chair of the Albemarle School Board.

“We are projecting the current revenues of $205.8 million which is an increase of $12 million over the current fiscal year,” Paige said. “The majority of that increase, that $6.9 million, is a general fund transfer from local government which as you know is increasing in response to higher real estate assessments and other local tax revenues that so far have been impacted by COVID-19 less than anticipated.”

Paige said the school board’s request is balanced, but if revenues come in higher than expected, the hope is that income can go to pay for a salary increase. The request includes an increase in the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

One factor in the size of the school budget is the number of pupils. Katrina Callsen is the vice chair of the Albemarle School Board.

“Next school year we are projecting an increase of more than 800 students over current enrollment,” Callsen said. “So moving from the 13,208 to 14,046.”

Albemarle school staff will continue to adjust its budget as more information about state revenues comes in. They’ll adopt their budget in May, after Supervisors have adopted the county’s overall budget.

Supervisor Bea LaPisto Kirtley took the opportunity to ask about summer school. There is a plan to hold a morning session and afternoon session for learning recovery. Superintendent Matt Haas also said the school system is reaching out to community partners to help provide some of the lessons and assistance with logistics.

“We are putting out a request for proposals from our community partners that work with our students and often they have been great partners with the school system for field trips,” Haas said.

That request for proposals carries the title “Summer Programming for Students and closes on April 2.

Supervisors were also briefed on the $56.9 million capital budget for FY22. Several projects were paused in the current budget due to projected decline in revenues related to the pandemic as well as concerns about the uncertainty of the bond market. Albemarle’s chief of budget, Andy Bowman, said the bond market has stabilized, even if the rest of the economy has not yet done so. Interest rates are also lower than they were when the pandemic began, which will save the county money on debt service.

“Working with our financial adviser, we were able to reduce our projected interest rates and that results in a savings of about $400,000,” Bowman said.

Four new requests are proposed to be funded in the FY22 capital budget.

“They are additional funding for economic development public/private partnerships,” Bowman said. “We also have $3 million in additional funding for the transportation leveraging program, another $6.3 million for Mountain View Elementary School expansion and site improvements, and the final project was a trailhead for the Moores Creek trail that will then make a connection to a greater trail network in the future.”

Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District noted that opposition to development projects often draws upon concerns of overcrowded schools.

“There is going to be a coming concern for elementary school seats up 29 north that has to be on discussion at some point,” Gallaway said.

Today, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors appropriated one-time money from reserve funds for two projects. One is for a $1.1 million solid waste “convenience center” to serve southern Albemarle and the other was to have been $3 million to expand broadband projects. However, the Board reduced that to $350,000 for now to see if funding from the ARP can be used for this purpose. (this paragraph was updated after publication)

There’s another $3 million being set aside in a reserve known as the Business Process Optimization intended to build new systems for the Community Development Department. Kristy Shifflet is the county’s project management director.

“In FY21 we’ve begun building a roadmap, really how might we replace a new community development system as well as an enterprise resource planning, or ERP, effort in order to update our business systems for the modern workplace,” Shifflet said. “We understand this is a large undertaking but our technology in these areas are aging and limited.”

The new system could help speed up review of land use applications. (review Albemarle’s recommended FY22 budget)

Albemarle will hold another budget work session on March 18 and will set the tax rate for the current calendar. The current property tax rate is $0.854 per $100 of assessed value, and staff has not recommended an increase.

The eventual opening of a county park at the state-owned Biscuit Run property is one step closer to reality. The initial site plan for the first phase of Biscuit Run park has been filed with the Albemarle Community Development Department. The improvements are for a parking area with 75 spaces as well as an entrance from Route 20. The project has a capital budget of $2 million and is the first of many phases to add amenities to the 1,200 acre park, according to the Winter 2021 report from the Department of Facilities and Environmental Services. Future phases have not yet been programmed in the capital budget.

Another planned infrastructure project is moving forward into a more intensive construction phase. The conversion of Interstate 64’s Exit 124 to a “diverging diamond” increases the amount of vehicles that can travel through the signalized interchange.

“The diverging diamond interchange briefly shifts vehicles to the opposite side of the road, eliminating traditional left turns that must cross over oncoming traffic,” reads a press release. “The new interchange will improve safety by reducing the number of spots where vehicles could collide and can handle more than 600 left-turn movements per hour, twice the capacity of a conventional interchange.”

The speed-limit on U.S. 250 in the area has been reduced to 25 miles per hour. The project is expected to be completed by the fall of 2022 and is one of six projects being constructed by Curtis Contracting. Funding came from the second round of the Smart Scale process from the Virginia Department of Transportation. Curtis Contracting has already completed work at I-64’s Fontaine Avenue interchange and a connector road between Berkmar Drive and Rio Mills Road is nearly finished.

Curtis Contracting will also build roundabouts at both the intersection of U.S. 250 and Route 151 and Profitt Road and Route 20.

And finally today, Albemarle’s communications and public engagement director appeared at today’s Supervisors’ meeting to address concerns related to a recent rezoning applied for by the Piedmont Housing Alliance, Virginia Supportive Housing and the Thomas Jefferson Coalition for the Homeless.

On February 17, Supervisors approved a change for the land where the Red Carpet Inn operates on U.S. 29 for a project that will eventually see between 80 to 140 housing units for people with low incomes. However, news reports have recently surfaced that existing residents of the Red Carpet Inn will be displaced. Emily Kilroy explained that there was a communication error.

“The Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless has shared that as media reports came out about the family that had been living at the Red Carpet Inn on more of a long-term basis, that when they became aware of the communication issue, they reached out to get a list of all the long-term tenants that have been living there,” Kilroy said. “There were ten households that were impacted with the closure of the Red Carpet Inn and they have made contact with all ten of those households. Seven of them have reached back out for support and they are working on an individual basis to find the best solution for their needs to get those individuals rehoused elsewhere in the community.”

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This installment of the newsletter is a little different. I have been slowly moving most of my pandemic coverage to one weekly show, and I wanted to make sure I did one on the one year anniversary of the first episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. With all meetings going online, it was suddenly fairly easy to bring in sound and then cut it up. Four months later, I launched this newsletter and have been slowly building up my ability to bring you information.

Most installments of the podcast double as newsletters, because I tend to write anything out anyway. This time, though, I want to get moving on to processing the next newsletter.

So, this is one I’m going to encourage you to listen to if you want the information. Most of the material has been published elsewhere, but I wanted to bring it all together in a sonic form. What follows in this newsletter is an edited version of my script to try to give you a hint of what you’ll hear.

The first installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report featured sound I could find online, and for first time, I recorded a press conference from the governor, a Facebook live event from Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker, and a remote town hall meeting with Delegate Sally Hudson.

The second installment was published less than 24 hours after the first one, and covered one of the last meetings where Charlottesville City Council met in person.

The third one was produced, followed by another, and another and another. On April 7, I produced the 17th installment, which featured a suggestion from Governor Northam that we begin to wear masks. By the 36th episode on May 28, 2020, that was an order and a component on a gradual loosening of some of the initial restrictions.

In producing the quarantine report, and a radio version that aired on a now-defunct station, my appetite for community journalism reached the point where I decided to strike out on my own, and I launched this newsletter and other platforms yet to be determined.

But the point of this installment is not just to wax nostalgic. The vast majority of this show is from audio from the past week. If you listen, you’ll hear audio from Governor Ralph Northam’s March 9 update on the state of the pandemic. Over 20 percent of all Virginians have had at least one dose of a vaccine, and the one-shot Johnson and Johnson version is in distribution. Let’s hear some of Northam’s reflections. We may not be on the other side yet, but we’ve come a long way in the past year.

For the past few months, the UVA Health System has held a weekly press briefing that has given local reporters a chance to ask questions about the pandemic response. You’ll also hear some of March 12 briefing.

A big change between March 2020 and March 2021 is a new president. Joe Biden addressed the nation on March 11. You’ll hear parts of that, including a bold declaration.

“I’m announcing that I will direct all states, tribes, and territories to make all adults, people 18 and over, eligible to be vaccinated no later than May,” Biden said.

But can Virginia make it? Dr. Danny Avula is the person appointed by Governor Northam to coordinate vaccine distribution in Virginia. He gave his own press briefing on March 12 and sounded a confident tone.

“As we look at the supply and the pace and the demand here in Virginia, we really think that we will easily meet that May 1 marker, and potentially even outpace it for a couple of weeks,” Avula said.

As of today, March 16, 2021, one in five Virginians has received a first dose. Over a million Virginians are fully vaccinated. The current seven-day average for vaccinations is 52,898 a day. Avula said the pace is allowing the Virginia Department of Health to work through the existing eligibility categories.

“We will get through our 1B demand by mid-April, and in some parts of that state that is going to be sooner,” Dr. Avula said. “We really are going to allow different parts of the state much like we did with the 1A to 1B transition, different parts of the state will move to 1C and to 2 at their own pace depending on the unique demographics.”

What about the Blue Ridge Health District? They’re holding a press briefing tomorrow to talk about the issue and I’ll bring that information to you in a further installment of this Charlottesville Community Engagement newsletter.

If you made it this far, another program note. The full audio from the March 10, 2021 Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association candidates forum is posted at InfoCville. (listen)

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In today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out, supporter Lonnie Murray wants you to know about a series of seminars on spring and fall landscaping with native plants. Plant Virginia Natives has held two of these already, but the next one is coming up on March 23 with Trista Imrich, owner of Wild Works of Whimsy. This is a good place to start if you’d like to plant natives but don’t know where to begin!

On today’s show:

Sounds from last week’s groundbreaking of the first new public housing units in a generation

A check in with the update on the Crozet Master Plan

Virginia Republicans pick a new method to nominate candidates for statewide office

City Parks and Rec Board briefed on potential re-openings

Virginia Republicans will choose their candidates for statewide office on May 8 at a convention that will be held at 37 different locations spread out across the Commonwealth. The State Central Committee voted on a motion last night to proceed in this manner, which is known as an “unassembled convention.” Delegates will select the candidate rather than be directly selected by voters.

The previous idea was to hold one convention at Liberty University with participants driving through. There are ten Republican candidates for governor, including State Senator Amanda Chase, who filed an injunction in February to stop the party from holding a convention rather than a primary. The suit was later dismissed.

Democrats will hold a primary on June 8.

The Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Advisory Board met Thursday night, about ten weeks before outdoor pools would be scheduled to open. However, the continuing pandemic and state of emergency could mean delays for this year. In February, the advisory board indicated support for planning for a normal opening. Ned Michie is the chair.

“Staff are in favor of opening those pools on time and safely and are working with City Council who is really going to be the deciding voice, the City Council working with the city manager,” Michie said.

Several people spoke in favor of the pools opening so swim teams can have a full season. Parks and Recreation Director Todd Brown said Council may take up the matter on Monday.

“The City Council is working with the City Manager on the decision of when and what we will open and what activities we will be holding or they will allow us to hold,” Brown said.

The matter is not listed on the Council’s agenda, but Brown said a recommendation might come anyway.

(download March 12 letter from parks board to City Council)

Brown said staff are preparing to get the facilities ready to open, and transition plans are being crafted based on CDC guidelines. If pools do open, Brown said the city will need to be ready to hire people back as lifeguards.

“A couple things that are going on that are planned and some things that we’re hiring for,” Brown said. “The City Market is going to open downtown on April 10 as a drive-through. Throughout the month of April we will be assessing as the guidelines change how and when we can open that up into a walk-up situation as normal. Summer camps at school sites have been approved and we are hiring staff for that. Our summer camps that we hold at rec centers have not been approved.”

The parks board also took action on recommendations for names for new parks.

A 27 acre property across from Azalea Park is slated to be called Azalea Park West

A property on Moores Creek that includes the foundation of the Hartmans Mill is recommended to be called Mill Park.

Davis Field is recommended to be called Unity Field at Northeast Park. The rectangular field is rented out to the Soccer Organization Charlottesville Area.

Heyward Community Forest near the Ragged Mountain Natural Area is recommended to retain that name to honor Jane Heyward

A stretch of land along the John Warner Parkway is recommended to be called Butterfly Greenway

Last Sunday on March 7, ground was broken on the first new public housing units in a generation. The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority is building 62 new units on an athletic field at South First Street as part of the first phase of that facilities’ redevelopment. Audrey Oliver is a former CRHA Commissioner and resident of South First Street.

“For more than 25 years, redevelopment of public housing in the city of Charlottesville has been in conversations and promises to residents for new housing,” Oliver said. “The promises became broken and residents became discouraged because the promised were never delivered.”

In 2010, the city developed a master plan for the development of public housing, and in 2013, a small area plan called the Strategic Investment Area was put together and added to the city’s Comprehensive Plan. But redevelopment itself stalled until after August 12, 2017. The Dave Matthews Band committed $5 million toward public housing and Red Light Management has worked to make the project a reality. Ground breaking can’t occur until all the financial and regulatory hurdles have been cleared.

“Today we’re here to celebrate the groundbreaking of 62 brand new units to be built on this property,” Oliver said. “There will be one, two and three bedroom units.”

Oliver said CRHA aims to build replacement units for all CRHA properties. Charlottesville City Council has committed city funds to assist, including $3 million for South First Street Phase 1 and renovation of Crescent Halls. Council approved a performance agreement for that funding last October, and you can read this long article about what that entails.

“It will not happen overnight but with everyone’s support, we can make it happen,” Oliver said.

Plans for a second phase at South First Street have been led by residents, but the plans are not ready for the CRHA to apply for low-income housing tax credits this year.

Watch the entire event on the city’s streaming video page.

A review of the Crozet Master Plan is slowly making its way through Albemarle County’s planning process and this is a good time to check in. Crozet is one of seven designated growth areas in Albemarle County, and the master plan has been in place since late 2004.

On Wednesday, March 10, the Crozet Community Advisory Committee reviewed the draft land use chapter for the plan which sets the vision for the future of the unincorporated area. Planning Manager Rachel Falkenstein said they are in the third phase of the community process, where the actual chapters are written based on broad recommendations that have been discussed with community members in previous phases.

“To kind of develop that content we’ve had all virtual engagement,” Falkenstein said. “Because of COVID, we’ve been virtual for this phase of work. Several CAC meetings through the summer and fall of 2020. We’ve had the online engagement opportunities, and then just feedback we’ve received through email, comments, discussions with community members and stakeholders.”

There have also been two work sessions with the Planning Commission.

(draft land use recommendations from September 2020)

(draft land use map)

(draft land use chapter)

There are five goals in the draft plan:

Goal 1: Support the continued revitalization of Downtown as the historic, cultural, and commercial heart of Crozet with distinctively urban design and support a mixture of uses in Crozet’s other designated centers of activity.

Goal 2: Provide a variety of housing options that meet the needs of Crozetians at all income levels.

Goal 3: Support existing neighborhoods and the historic context of Crozet through ensuring that new and infill development is compatible in design and scale with existing neighborhood fabric and allowing reuse of historic buildings.

Goal 4: Maintain a distinct rural edge along Crozet’s boundary to provide a visual connection to its cultural heritage as a town nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Goal 5: Leverage and amplify Crozet’s artisan community, culture, history, and entrepreneurial spirit through creative placemaking projects and partnerships.

“I’ll remind you that this is a working draft,” Falkenstein said. “There are some sections that need some work. We have some placeholders in there. We’re still developing graphics and images to support some of the narrative. The land use content itself is still a working draft. We have this meeting. We have public engagement that we’ll put online, and we have a Board meeting coming up. All of that feedback will continue to refine the draft as we go along.”

At this meeting, some CAC members wanted to get right into their critiques of the plan. Those five goals are in support of a new guiding principal .

“Support and strengthen Crozet’s history as a self-sustaining town, while welcoming new and infill development that is compatible in scale and design and provides housing choice for all community members.”

Staff had intended to go through a presentation before taking comments from CAC members, but Doug Bates said he wanted to get his comments out ahead.

“And it’s at that very first guiding principle that I have my most fundamental question,” Bates said. “It says ‘Support and strengthen Crozet’s history as a self-sustaining town, while ensuring new and infill development that is compatible in scale and design… ’ with what? is my question. You can’t have a comparison with nothing.”

“I think the intent was with the small town identity and the scale would be appropriate there, but we can take that feedback and look at revisions to clarify,” Falkenstein said.

“Rachel, that’s great,” Bates rescinded. “I just know that things are in the eye of the beholder and if you don’t make it very specific, then it’s whatever you imagine it’s compatible to is the right answer. I would suggest that you compare it to the neighborhood model.”

The Neighborhood Model is a zoning district in Albemarle that is intended to be used in the designated growth areas where developments are required to conform to 12 principles including pedestrian orientation, human-scale buildings, and redevelopment of existing buildings when possible.

Tom Loach, a CAC member who also served on the Planning Commission from 2008 to 2015 called for the guiding principles to be removed in favor of keeping what is already in place.

“There are already a set of guiding principles that were in the first master plan in 2004 and they were repeated in the second master plan in 2010,” Loach said. “There are seven guiding principles and I think we should stay with the guiding principles that have stayed with use for all of these years.”

Loach also wanted two statements inserted into the plan to retain guidance to limit future growth.

“One statement is a restatement of the original intent of the consultants in the master plan that Crozet wouldn’t build out in about 20 years to a population of 11,200 to 12,000 and that we have reached that mark.” Loach said.

Loach said his second statement would state that the existing infrastructure cannot support existing traffic.

This came before a presentation of recommendations from staff such as “update residential zoning categories to remove barriers to housing affordability where appropriate such as minimum lot size requirements, minimum frontage requirements, and minimum parking standards.”

Falkenstein carried on with her presentation on land use changes.

“The majority of the land use changes, this is to the map itself now, are kind of clean-up related changes to kind of do two things,” Falkenstein said. “To try to bring greater consistency across all of the county’s master plans in terms of our land-use categories and the second is to bring consistency with existing zoning where appropriate to make sure that expectations, you know, we set expectations for what development can happen when existing zoning is there to allow development.”

Falkenstein said growth projections remain similar to the 2010 master plan in part because there are not many vacant parcels of land in Crozet. She said the new land use map doesn’t make too many significant changes. One change, though, is the creation of a “middle density residential” land use category. Other changes relate to downtown Crozet.

“Themes of the feedback we’ve heard concern about neighborhoods around downtown experiencing teardowns, and then also experiencing new construction that would be out of scale with some of those existing neighborhoods,” Falkenstein said. “So we’ve heard a desire for more protection for some of these homes, especially the historic homes and those are existing affordable housing in some of these neighborhoods.”

Falkenstein said staff also had support for new housing types to add a little more density while not being out of scale, such as bungalow courts, duplexes and accessory units.” Staff suggested a downtown overlay district to allow that additional density, but also heard concerns from many.

“Concern about inadequate infrastructure to support new density here and concern there was not enough clarity in it so that there is a cap on the density and the ‘infill’ wasn’t defined,” Falkenstein said.

The new draft chapter recommends further architectural and cultural resources study to further inform how development might look in the future with an eye toward neighborhood preservation. Another recommendation is an acknowledgment that there may not be as much demand for commercial uses in some of downtown.

Doug Bates said existing neighborhoods could not support that additional density.

“Just because there may be more land behind some of these older homes, the roads do not support new growth at the expansion level that’s being described in this document,” Bates said. He said there be no higher density by-right than R-2, or two units per lot.

“And if you want to build something more, you’ve got to ask if we can build something more,” Bates said.

Loach said the draft reflected the words of the staff and not the words of the community. Before the meeting, he circulated a five page list of changes he wanted to see and said he would ask for a motion on his changes. (download Loach’s suggested changes)

“Otherwise what’s going to happen is that we’re going to be here, we’re going to be talking, it’s going back to the staff and it’s going to go forward the way it is,” Loach said.

Loach would have to wait to make his motion, as Falkenstein had not yet finished her presentation, which included details on the “middle density residential” category that is new to the updated plan. The idea is to encourage development of townhomes with accessory apartments.

“We pulled feedback from the community survey kind of two sides of the coin here,” Falkenstein said. “One is that there’s not enough affordable housing or increasing the availability is very or somewhat important to the community, but also limiting growth is important as well so trying to strike that balance was what we were trying to do with this category.”

Falkenstein said the Planning Commission had supported this concept, but Loach objected and said they and staff were overstepping their bounds.

“So, let me get this right,” Loach said. “This is no longer the Crozet Master Plan, this is now the Planning Commission and staff master plan. Because we voted against middle density and here we are back with it again.”

Votes by the Community Advisory Committees, and the Planning Commisison, are not binding.

CAC member Joe Fore said the vote against middle density had been based on an earlier definition that had a higher density. He supported the updates staff had made.

“I very much appreciate Rachel and staff’s tweaking of the middle density category,” Fore said.

“I really like this definition and I think this gets at…I appreciate the form recommendations, the scale recommendations. I do think, Tom, the point of whose plan this is, I do think a lot of this in terms of the form guidance… tiny houses, accessory units, cottages, bungalow courts, that kept coming up at meetings where people were putting stickers on things and saying what they liked and wanted to see more of.”

Fore said he was disappointed that the middle density residential wasn’t shown on many more areas of the map, which would mean those kinds of units won’t be built. Loach interjected.

“Joe, we voted on this,” Loach said. “I understand you like it, but we voted on it. If you want to redo the vote, based on the new information maybe that’s something we should think about.”

Fore tried to respond, but Loach kept talking until Chair Allie Pesch told him to let Fore finish.

“I’m just suggesting Tom that the thing we voted on previously has been changed,” Fore said. “It’s not what it is now. We voted on something that is now different.”

The presentation continued. Next were changes to the section of Crozet were the Old Trail Development is to reflect what’s been built and to better align terminology used in other master plans, such as the Pantops Master Plan. Tori Kanellopoulos is another county planner. +

“With our public feedback online as well we heard support for designating Old Trail as a village center and heard it needs to continue to be a distinct and secondary center of activity compared to downtown and heard the same feedback about why Crozetians visit Old Trail for those gathering, shopping, and recreational uses,” Kanellopoulos said.

The Board of Supervisors will have a work session on the draft land use chapter on April 7. Before then, many Crozet residents want their views heard and they took that opportunity at the CAC meeting.

“I’m Matt Helt, born and raised in Crozet, and live off of St. George Avenue. I’m going to drop about fourteen things.”

Let’s hear the first two.

“One, infrastructure, infrastructure, infrastructures. We’ve talked about it. We’ve beat the dead horse. Sidewalks, bike lanes, parks. It doesn’t matter what zoning you do. We need the infrastructure investments, period. No more ifs, and or buts or excuses from the county, period. Number two, whatever zoning allowed the development of the apartments on Jarmans Gap Road, or the intersection of Jarmans Gap Road and Blue Ridge should be banned from Crozet permanently. Quite frankly it should be demolished. If we’re going to say it’s providing low-income housing, I would love for the county to produce a survey that shows any of the residents who moved into those apartments are former residents of Crozet who needed low-income housing.”

Helt was referring to the Vue, a 126-unit development under the R-6 zoning built by Pinnacle Construction on land that Piedmont Housing Alliance had previously intended to build at a slightly lower density. A historic home was demolished to make way for new buildings, prompting a lot of concern.

Helt also took aim at those who spoke from Old Trail, revealing a divided community.

“Really interesting perspective from the Old Trail Community, I greatly appreciate your sentiment but I don’t know that you recognize the irony in your statements,” the speaker said. “For those of us who grew up here, played in those fields and sixth-grade science class in Slabtown Branch Creek, I’m glad you finally are opposed to more dense zoning. I would have preferred Old Trail not be developed either, but we’re 20 years past that conversation.”

Loach wanted to keep on with the critique of the plan, but Pesch suggested waiting until the public comment period opens. There’s a lot more time to continue these discussions. What do you think? Leave a comment if you can.

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On today’s show:

Albemarle Supervisors hold their first work session on the proposed $466 million budget for FY22

Virginia Festival of the Book kicks off tomorrow

Albemarle expands in-person instruction on Monday, and schools are still looking for input on name of Murray Elementary School

Charlottesville City School returned to in-person learning for kindergarten through 6th grade this week, and next week Albemarle County will move forward to its next phase of in-person learning. Graham Paige is the chair of the Albemarle School Board.

“We will open in stage 4 on March 15,” Paige said. “This move was approved by the Board on February 11 and in this stage, pre-K through third graders will be able to receive four days of school instruction and grades four to 12 will have two days of in-school instruction. We expect approximately 7,600 students will receive in-person instruction with nearly 6,000 other students opting to receive virtual.”

Paige said a survey showed that only 60 percent of respondents said they had suitable Internet access to participate fully in virtual learning. A soft opening took place this week to help new students get to know their learn their new school.

Paige said the future name of Virginia L. Murray Elementary School will soon be decided this week, and it could perhaps remain the same. The school system is reviewing names. Respondents to a recent survey suggested keeping the name.

“While the large majority of survey participants supported retaining the school’s current name, the most popular suggestion for a new name was Ivy Elementary School in reference to the school’s location in the western part of the county,” Paige said.

An online survey continues to be open through March 18. To find out more, visit the school system’s page on renaming.

In other school news, Charlottesville Superintendent Rosa Atkins has announced she will retire effective May 31. We’ll have more from that announcement on a future program.

The Virginia Festival of the Book gets underway tomorrow one year after canceling the last one in the early days of the pandemic. Jane Kulow is the director of the event, which will be held entirely online this year.

“This will be our 27th outing,” Kulow said. “This year’s festival runs two full weeks. Saturday, March 13 to Friday March 26, 2021. It is all virtual, it is all free, and it includes books in all genres and for all ages.”

Unlike in previous years, events will be held one at a time which means someone could theoretically watch every single hour live.

“We believe we’ve found a way to offer some of our best features, and make the festival more accessible than ever,” Kulow said. “We invite you and everyone to explore the schedule and find events to attend.”

Kulow spoke to the Albemarle Board of Supervisors on March 3.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors have begun their detailed review of the recommended $466 million budget for fiscal year 2022. The season has been slightly extended this year with adoption scheduled for May 5 after a series of work sessions. On Wednesday, the Board began with a look at the operating budget and began recommending potential things to add or to cut. Andy Bowman is the chief of budget.

“Fiscal year 22 is really going to be a transitional budget,” Bowman said. “Our economy is stabilizing but it has not stabilized. Our community is adapting as our circumstances change and people are impacted by the pandemic in very different ways.”

On Monday, they’ll talk about the school budget and next Thursday they’ll talk about public safety. At the Thursday meeting, they will also set a maximum tax rate for advertisement if they decide to increase from the current $0.854 per $100 of assessed value. County Executive Jeff Richardson’s recommended budget proposes no increase.

But on Wednesday, Bowman told the supervisors that the transitional budget is intended to prepare for a post-pandemic world.

“So even this is a transitionary budget, we had to reflect in making recommendations on what are those things we can do to build a bridge now to make sure that we are an even more resilient organization and community when we reach the other side of our future?”

This year’s budget is 17 percent higher than the current fiscal year, and Bowman said a lot of that is due to a larger capital improvement plan.

“The board may recall at the state of the Fiscal Year 21 budget, many capital projects have been put on hold and some of those have been restarted and that certainly plays into that as well,” Bowman said.

Since Richardson unveiled his budget in late February, the General Assembly adopted a state budget. Bowman said staff are continuing to review how that might affect Albemarle’s budget, so there may still be adjustments based on new revenues. They’re also reviewing the American Rescue Plan to find out that affect the budget.

“In my mind, I think of this as almost another round of the CARES coronavirus relief funds that were received in the last calendar year,” Bowman said.

The recommended budget does not include any of those federal funds, and budget staff are checking to see what the rules for their usage will be. Virginia is expected to receive $6.8 billion for state and local aid from the ARP, according to the Associated Press.

The county is putting $3 million in one-time funds toward expanding broadband in Albemarle and by creating an Office of Broadband Access. Supervisors directed staff to go in that direction in a joint meeting with the Albemarle Broadband Authority on February 17. Trevor Henry is the assistant county executive.

“We all experienced the tsunami of internet need that occurred over the past year and really we have all been in that mode since a year ago,” Henry said.

Henry said that even households that thought they had good access to broadband taxed their connections when almost every group event went online.

“And so the work that has come since a year ago has only intensified the critical needs and we have a lot of opportunities in front of us now to do some meaningful work,” Henry said. “We have programs at the federal, state and local level.”

Some of the work will be to pay for the “last mile” where clusters of structures are near a fiber line but their owners may not be able to afford to make the connection. Details of the program will come back to the board later this spring. But to make it work, staff will also need to be hired.

“The addition of an operations person, an administrator, will help us set up purchase orders, taking care of all of the billing, taking citizen requests, responding, tracking that data,” Henry said. “Those kinds of metrics, making sure that the action items on all of the various meetings related to broadband get tracked and captured and we’re working to executive them.”

Albemarle will also work on an effort to help people pay for the service once.

Supervisors were all supportive of the recommendations to move forward.

Both Louisa and Nelson have announced plans to move toward universal broadband through public-private partnerships with electric cooperatives. Earlier this month, the Louisa Board of Supervisors announced a $15 million investment. There’s a meeting today facilitated by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission to see how the model being used in Louisa and Nelson can be expanded to cover what’s known as the “middle mile.” Legislation to allow Dominion and Appalachian Power to expand their broadband efforts passed the General Assembly this year and awaits action by Governor Ralph Northam. (HB1923)

The work session also covered public safety. Supervisor Diantha McKeel observed that new legislation requires localities to change the way service calls related to mental health crises are handled.

“I know there’s some discussion about creating a team between so the police don’t have to respond by themselves to many of our mental health calls,” McKeel said. “There’s nothing in the budget Andy right now around that initiative.”

Bowman confirmed that and suggested Police Chief Ron Lantz will be giving an update on that in the near future.

Another new expense in the budget is the hiring of five people to staff the North Garden Volunteer Fire Company during the day with fire and rescue service by the fall of 2022.

“Currently there are no county staff down there, they are entirely volunteer,” Bowman said. “We received a letter from them in the fall requesting supplemental staffing during the weekday daytime.

The budget also includes purchase of an ambulance for the North Garden department. Bowman said that over the past four budgets, the county has added 32 full-time equivalents to fire and rescue. Some of those positions have been supported by grants from the federal government and to increase coverage to meet the needs of a growing population.

A more in-depth discussion of public safety budgetary issues will be held at the March 18 work session. On March 22, they will talk in detail about transit. Charlottesville Area Transit had requested $1.47 million but the draft budget only recommends a million. Albemarle would contribute $6,137 a year for the new Afton Express and $2.18 million for Jaunt.

CAT provided an update on proposed route changes at the February 24 Regional Transit Partnership.

“In fiscal year 21, there are two studies that are taking through the Regional Transit Partnership,” Bowman said. “One of those is a longer-term regional transit vision plan and the other one is funded in 21 looking at some Albemarle specific transit services and we’ll be looking to what comes from that report for FY23 and beyond.”

Supervisors wanted more information on several things, including current response times for North Garden, the status of daytime staffing of the Earlysville Volunteer Fire Company, the and cost of operating the future Biscuit Run county park.

This patron-supported public service announcement is from an anonymous supporter. Do you want to support your public library by picking up a mystery bag of books? The Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are resuming their Pop-up Book Sale this Sunday at the Gordon Avenue library. For $5, you can pick up a sealed, pre-selected bag, choosing from mystery, popular fiction, literary fiction, classic literature, biographies, sci-fi / fantasy. The JMRL Pop-Up sale begins this Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Gordon Avenue Library.

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The four candidates for two seats on the Charlottesville City Council introduce themselves to the Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association

Jaunt issues a statement explaining that the former CEO was asked to resign for improper use of funds for travel, and Brad Sheffield responds

There’s a vacancy on the Charlottesville Planning Commission

The Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce adds four new board members and gets a new chair

An audit of the transit agency Jaunt has found that former CEO Brad Sheffield “purchased numerous expenses for goods, services, and travel which violated internal control policies of the corporation.” The Robinson, Farmer, and Cox (RFC) review of the fiscal year budget also found that the total amount of alledgely misused funds could not be calculated. The agency issued a statement this morning about the irregular transactions.

“As RFC’s audit progressed, and more information came to light, Jaunt’s Board felt that they were no longer comfortable with the business judgment of then-CEO Brad Sheffield,” wrote communications director Jody Saunders. “On December 5, 2020, with the audit findings still months away, the Board made the difficult decision to request Mr. Sheffield’s resignation as CEO.”

Sheffield resigned on December 7, 2020 and Karen Davis took over as interim. Sheffield served one term on the Board of Supervisors representing the Rio District. During that time, he became CEO of Jaunt, which operates fixed-route and on-demand service in the region. The statement said stronger controls have been put in place.

Sheffield denied any wrongdoing and issued his own statement about two hours later according to a tweet from CBS19.

“JAUNT competitively procures funding by providing a range of public and private transportation services, which means the company must be run efficiently to turn a profit,” Sheffield said. “I ran it efficiently and no JAUNT policies were violated.”

Sheffield said all of his travel expenses were in compliance with Jaunt’s policies.

Jaunt changed its official name from JAUNT during a rebranding a few years ago.

There are now four candidates in the race for two Democratic nominations for two seats on the Charlottesville City Council. All of them participated in a candidates forum held last night by the Fry’s Spring Neighborhood Association. The newest candidate, Carl Brown, went first during the opening statements. He’s a native of Charlottesville.

“I’m currently a social entrepreneur in the community,” Brown said. “Part of my platform is my home-grown sense. I have a better sense of this community than most people. My family came here probably eight generations ago.”

Brown said he used to live on Stribling Avenue, a road in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood on which there’s a proposed dense development. More on that in a moment. Next, Yas Washington launched into her platform.

“My vision for Charlottesville is to be able to properly allocate all of our overall operating budget being $190.12 million,” Washington said. “Aside from that, definitely being able to build the city back up as we recover from the hardships of COVID.”

Washington has worked on several political campaigns in the area and said she wanted to work on environmental sustainability, criminal justice reform, and equity for low-income residents.

Juandiego Wade has served four terms on the school board and lives in the Locust Grove neighborhood.

“I have been working with Albemarle County for the past thirty years first as a transportation planner and for the last ten years doing career counseling,” Wade said.

Wade said he demonstrated he can work with neighborhoods in his time as a transportation engineer. He said his priorities include criminal justice reform, affordable and workforce housing, public education, and climate change.

Pinkston ran for the Democratic nomination in the June 2019 primary and placed fourth in a contest where the top three were on the November ballot. He was just 110 votes behind Sena Magill.

“My professional background is in project management,” Pinkston said. “And I always like to say that project managers put people, resources and ideas together to get things done.”

The first question focused on infrastructure needs of the Fry’s Spring neighborhood, namely improvements on Stribling Avenue to make it safer for pedestrians and cyclists following a future development on the western end that could see as many as 170 units. Jason Halbert is the FSNA President and he asked how each candidate would work to ensure that those improvements would be funded and implemented.

“What practical steps do you think you can take on Council if you’re on Council to bring more transparency to the CIP and the capital planning process so that neighborhoods and neighborhood leaders understand and can reflect back to their neighbors where these projects lie as a priority for the city?”

Pinkston went first and said he understood the need for transparency and follow-through.

“As a City Councilor I would be responsive if people came to me and said this has been on the list all this time,” Pinkston said. “The issue that I see with the CIP is that priorities, large priorities come up every couple of years. A few years ago, no one was really talking about affordable housing in the way that we are now and that’s a really important priority and yet these other things that might be considered smaller or just sort of the granular aspects to what makes a city work, you’ve gotta have sidewalks, get lost.”

Wade said he would direct staff to look into creative ways to fund such a project.

“I would see what the project is and see if there are any safety grants out there,” Wade said. “There’s always some type of safety grant. Now with UVA’s new positioning on being a more friendly to the neighborhoods, I would go to UVA, the Equity Center or something, and say ‘hey! This is a $20,000 project, is this something that you can do?”

Wade said he would also look at the CIP itself to see if the most appropriate projects were being funded each year.

Washington said she recognized the importance of better infrastructure.

“I think it’s very important that as development takes place and congestion and everything due to the population and how that is going to traffic, I definitely think it is important to make sure that we are enhancing the quality of walkability,” Washington said.

Brown said he would use his own project management experience to help get things done, including reaching out to a wide variety of stakeholders.

“One of the things that I would like to utilize are those presidents that are on those associations for each neighborhood,” Brown said. “Much like you have issues in your neighborhood, I know there are others.”

Brown said he is familiar with the unsafe conditions on Stribling and he echoed Wade’s call to work with the University of Virginia to see if they could help assist.

“Particularly because they have individuals that are attending the University in that neighborhood as well and see what they would be willing to contribute for the good of the whole,” Brown said.

The next question was about that 11-acre and 170-unit development being pursued by Southern Development that will take a rezoning to Planned Unit Development (PUD). The Planning commission asked the developer to increase residential density and many in the neighborhood are skeptical.

“We just talked about the fact that this road is not safe now and if you add between 200 and 300, between 300 and 400 units on this end of Stribling, and there are others being discussed in the county, because the road goes into the county, you’re talking about a nightmare for this neighborhood,” Halbert said.

Halbert asked how Council should balance the need for more housing with the resulting need for infrastructure.

“Are you for more density and more affordable housing, or should you work with the neighborhood in a way that allows for this?”

Wade said Albemarle and Charlottesville have to work together.

“So what I would recommend is that I would employ staff to go out and maybe use some of the good minds over at the University to seek out solutions that other cities have done,” Wade said.

As a quick reminder outside of this narrative, it’s now been one year since the University of Virginia announced it would build up to 1,500 low-income houses over the next decade on land that it or its real estate foundation owns. (March 10, 2020 press release)

Wade said he would push developers to come up with better solutions.

“I know working with developers for 20 years is that they will do whatever they can to make the quickest buck,” Wade said. “We can convince them that this is Charlottesville and we want something different. These are the things we value as a community.”

Pinkston said he supported the affordable housing plan that was just endorsed by the City Council. To prep for the Fry’s Spring forum, he reached out to a member of the Planning Commission.

“I was talking to Hosea Mitchell today, he’s on the Planning Commission, and I asked him specifically about this site on Stribling and he knows and agrees that there’s not sufficient infrastructure to pull this off,” Pinkston said. “And so I think there’s a realization that the city and/or the developer need to put in the proffers to put that sidewalk and the other improvements that are there.”

Brown said he wanted to know more about what it means for housing to be “affordable.”

“What is a clear definition of affordable?” Brown asked. “That’s what I’ve been asking myself. Because once we start talking about affordable housing, then it goes to low-income housing instantly in the same sentence.”

Brown said the government should not be playing a role in telling developers what they should be building, and that neighborhoods should play a stronger role in deciding what they want to see.

“What I would encourage is again, collaboration,” Brown said. “When we talk about low-income housing, there are houses in this community that we could have investors who invest in that kind of thing, low-income housing, that we haven’t seen before.”

Washington said there is a challenge in achieving density in some places, such as the Fry’s Spring neighborhood.

“Basically, with the R-1 zoning it’s very hard to be able to create density because it’s one unit per lot, but when you go further into that and you start talking about the specific classes as far as R-1B, or whatever the case may be, you then go to 2 to 3 units per lot which is where affordable housing can actually be incorporated,” Washington said.

I’ll post a longer edited version of the audio from the forum sometime within the next 24 hours.

There’s a vacancy on the seven-member Charlottesville Planning Commission. Gary Heaton was appointed to the body in October 2018 soon after moving to the city to become senior pastor of First United Methodist Church. He told his colleagues he’ll be leaving the city shortly for another professional posting.

“I will be reassigned as of July so I think will be exiting my responsibilities on the Planning Commission what did I say, the 15th of April,” Heaton said.

However, his exact last day may be later than that depending on whether the seat can be filled. The vacancy has not yet been posted on the city’s Boards and Commission page. There is also a vacancy on the Board of Zoning Appeals. Learn more about the Planning Commission on the city website.

The Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce has a new chair and four new board members. Guy Browning will serve a one year term to replace another person who took a job outside of the community. Browning is the senior vice president of MacMillan Publisher Services, a global company that operates its U.S. arm from an office in Gordonsville. The other new board members are:

Kara Chandeysson, City Manager for Ting Charlottesville

Keith O’Neil, Chief Operating Officer for UVA Community Credit Union

Ravi Respeto, President & CEO for the United Way of Greater Charlottesville

Charlie Rogers, President/CEO for Innovative Software Solutions (ISS).

Thanks as always for reading! Do take a listen if you have not so far. Subscribe in Apple Music or on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. There are usually more jokes and flowery writing.

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Lots of transportation news from the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission

Charlottesville City Council takes a first crack at next year’s fiscal budget

Brief update on the pandemic

Let’s get a quick update on the pandemic. All metrics continue to trend downward, except for the number of fatalities. The Virginia Department of Health has been slowly catching up with death certificates from the post holiday surge, and 9,849 people are recorded as dying from COVID. And while the number of new cases each day has declined, they are still high. Today there were another 1,246 cases reported.

Today there is a long line once again at the former K-Mart where the Blue Ridge Health District is administering COVID vaccinations presumably the hundreds of people who got first doses on February 17. According to the VDH dashboard, 18 percent of Virginians have received at least one dose. Governor Ralph Northam acknowledged that milestone yesterday.

“We’ve achieved the aggressive goal we set back in January,” Northam said. “Back then as you remember, just a few weeks ago our goal was to get to 25,000 shots a day and we accomplished that. We set a long-term goal that to get everyone vaccinated by this summer would be 50,000.”

The seven-day average is currently 50,877 shots a day

This week the Centers for Disease Control issued new guidance that allows people who have had all of their shots to be able to gather indoors with others who are also protected. (read the guidance)

Still, the pandemic remains with us. On Monday, the Virginia Department of Health announced the South African variant has been found in their central region.

“The B.1.351 variant, which first emerged in South Africa in late 2020, is associated with increased person-to-person transmission of COVID-19,” reads the press release. “At this time, there is no evidence that infections with this variant cause more severe disease.”

I’ll have more from this press conference in a future program.

For many of us, the pandemic has meant working from home. When this time ends, many of us may be looking for a different way to get to and from our workplace. On March 4, the person who runs a service that seeks to get people out of their cars told members of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission about her work. Sara Pennington explained Rideshare.

“We are a program that was established actually in 1980 at Jaunt through the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation to provide carpool and vanpool matching services and support,” Pennington said. “The program later moved to the TJPDC and then in 2009 we expanded our coverage to include the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission so we kind of work in conjunction with our folks across the mountain.”

RideShare also offers a guaranteed ride home program to give people who may have to get home at a different time the occasional option when there are sudden changes of plan.

“That is a great comfort and always what we hear as the first deterrent that keeps folks from taking that alternative transportation,” Pennington said.

RideShare also assists with helping companies with teleworking logistics, and is currently conducting a survey to gauge interest in coworking. Pennington said Rideshare has continued to operate during this last year.

“Even though things this year have been weird with the pandemic there are still some folks who are going into work and who may still need those commute services, so none of that has stopped,” Pennington said. “But we have pivoted a lot of our direction and our resources and information sharing into the field of telework.”

The TJPDC is currently working on several transportation studies, including a small area plan for Zion Crossroads and a look at the U.S. 29 corridor north of Airport Road in Albemarle County to U.S. 33 in Greene County. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a transportation planner.

“The overall purpose of this corridor study is to develop broad transportation recommendations that complement the existing land use designations in the study area,” Hersh-Ballering said.

There are several new developments either under construction or in the planning stages in both Albemarle and Greene.

The TJPDC is also supporting efforts to expand non-motorized infrastructure. Sandy Shackelford is the director of Planning and Transportation.

“One of those is the expansion of the Virginia Capital Trail from Richmond through our region, through the Charlottesville area and even west into Staunton,” Shackelford said.

Shackelford said the current task is to identify an alignment for such a trail.

“It could be right now kind of looking at maybe some of these are on-street connections with a goal in the future to maybe have a set-aside shared-use path kind of facility, but that’s what they’re starting to work towards now

Shackelford said her staff also supports the Regional Transit Partnership, which is at the beginning stages of creating a regional vision for public transportation.

At the end of the TDJPC meeting, Commissioners had the chance to give updates on what’s happening in their community. City Councilor Michael Payne said new city City Manager Chip Boyles is settling in.

“The major thing for us in Charlottesville especially over the next year is really rebuilding our organization and getting it to a better place,” Payne said. “Chip has entered on with a daunting task but perhaps not surprisingly to some of the people here, the work has already started. I’m optimistic that we’re moving into a much more stable place.”

Payne also mentioned that the city is considering a one-cent sales tax to help cover the costs of reconfiguring the schools. That would take approval by voters in a referendum after passage of enabling legislation by the General Assembly.

“And all that revenue would go strictly to school facilities,” Payne said. “What we’ve heard from our representatives is that it will be much more likely to happen and happen quicker if we have a groundswell of many localities saying this would be a useful power for us to have.”

The Louisa County recently banned the practice of people asking others for money within medians. Bob Babyok is the board’s chair.

“On Monday, 1 March, we also approved the panhandling prohibition so no more panhandling in Louisa,” Babyok said.

Jesse Rutherford of the Nelson Board of Supervisors told the TJPDC that there’s a lot of activity happening in that county.

“Here in Nelson we have a lot of opportunity coming as it relates to revitalization of Lovingston and hopefully we’re going to get some good efforts moving forward on some housing development,” Rutherford said.

Nelson County currently has a population of about 15,000 according to the most recent estimates from the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia.

Rutherford also raised an important issue worth considering as the pandemic recedes.

“You know we haven’t had foreclosures in almost a year,” Rutherford said. “Since March there has been a prohibition on any foreclosure that is related to a loan that is insured by the federal government which sets a dangerous precedent potentially this summer when that foreclosure ban is raised.”

Certainly an issue to know more about. The moratorium in Virginia is currently scheduled to end on June 30.

Charlottesville City Council began their review of City Manager Chip Boyles’ recommended fiscal budget for fiscal year 2022. (review the budget)

“We’ll provide a recommended balanced budget of $190,689,839,” Boyles said. “Included in this recommended budget are several identified Council priorities of affordable housing, racial equity, safety and security, workforce development, as well as investment in our employees.”

The budget will be adopted in about five weeks after a series of work sessions, and after that, work will begin on updating the city’s strategic plan as a first concrete step towards creation of a budget for fiscal year 2023. Senior Budget Management Analyst Krisy Hammill detailed some of the Council priorities.

“For racial equity, we are fully funding the deputy city manager of race, equity, diversity, and inclusion, the Home to Hope program, the food equity initiative, the Office of Human Rights, in addition to the city’s minority business activities,” Hammill said.

A request to fully fund the Police Civilian Review Board at $350,000 has been granted. Other requests, however, were not included in the budget. There is no pay raise for employees, for instance. An open issue is whether to fulfil the school system’s full budget request, which does include a pay raise. Hammill offered various scenarios. Watch the video to learn more.

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On today’s show:

A brief update on the pandemic

Charlottesville is seeking feedback on how to prepare for economic recovery

UVa Board of Visitors committee endorses plans for new hotel, conference center, and athletic complex

A challenger emerges in the 57th House of Delegates race

This upcoming Thursday marks the one-year anniversary of the state of emergency declared by Governor Ralph Northam to deal with the COVID pandemic. After a surge related to the winter holidays, Virginia now has a seven-day average of 1,460 new cases reported each day, or around what that metric was the week before Thanksgiving. The seven-day average on February 5 was 3,365.

During a press briefing yesterday, Dr. Costi Sifri of the University of Virginia said community members should still be vigilant.

“We have had a pretty steep and steady decline over the last four to six weeks, but that’s stopped now,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri said one possibility may be the new COVID variants that are out there. He said declines in new case loads are likely not linked to vaccinations. Nearly 2.2 million doses have been administered in Virginia, and over 782,000 are fully vaccinated. The seven-day average for number of doses is at 53,183 a day as of this morning. This week, the Blue Ridge Health District received 2,000 doses of the Johnson and Johnson version of the vaccine, which only requires one shot.

“It’s just going to offer so much more flexibility,” Dr. Sifri said. “It’s the vaccine that hopefully once we have large amounts that we’ll be able to see is easily used in places like doctors’ offices, things that would not be as easily done with a deep-frozen messenger RNA, MRNA vaccine.”

Still, Dr. Sifri said caution is still required to avoid a fourth surge of COVID.

“We don’t have a substantial amount of immunity,” Dr. Sifri said. “We’re not near herd immunity yet but we are making progress and we really do have to continue to practice the things that we know prevent the transmission of COVID.”

Social distancing. Masks. Washing hands. Continuing to watch the numbers.

“The spring, and into the summer looks a little bit different,” Sifri said. “Probably a lot different than it looks right now.”

This past Wednesday, UVA President Jim Ryan announced in an email that the university’s Final Exercises graduation ceremony would not occur as usual. However, the administration is exploring the possibility of smaller events for graduates without guests, or postponing until later this year.

On Monday, Charlottesville City Schools will open up the doors for at least some students to return to class for the first time in a year. Children in kindergarten through 6th grade whose parents have agreed to proceed with in-person instruction. Certain students in 7th grade through 12th grade who have been identified for being at risk have also been invited back. The Charlottesville School Board voted Thursday to offer in-person instruction to students at Buford and Charlottesville High School beginning on April 12. For more information, visit the city schools’ website.

How can the local economy begin to rebound? The Charlottesville Office of Economic Development will hold two facilitated stakeholder meetings later this month to plan for recovery.

“The City Council has indicated that economic recovery of local businesses from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic is a top near-term priority,” reads an email from the office. “OED is now seeking broad participation from City business owners that will help inform a series of immediate action items that the City can pursue to assist with recovery.”

If you own a business in Charlottesville and want to participate on either March 17 or March 18, visit the office’s website.

Delegate Sally Hudson has a challenger in the 57th House race in this year’s General Assembly election. According to the Virginia Public Access Project, Republican Philip Hamilton is running. According to his website, he’s a 33-year-old resident of Charlottesville who graduated from George Mason University with a bachelor of science and from the University of Phoenix with a Master’s in Administration of Justice and Security.

The Buildings and Grounds Committee of the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors met yesterday and approved the schematic design for a new hotel and conference center, as well as an athletics complex. The $130.5 million hotel project will be located near the new School of Data Science within the emerging Ivy Corridor. (meeting packet)

“A mixed-use hospitality, convening, and social destination in this central location will provide a catalyst to achieve these strategic goals set by the President’s Emmet Ivy Task Force,” reads the staff report.

Those goals include supporting the Democracy Initiative, an initiative of the College of Arts and Sciences and other institutions.

The University and its real estate foundation have been purchasing land along Ivy Road for many years to assemble enough space, including the Cavalier Inn. That structure was demolished in the summer of 2018 and the place where it stood will remain undeveloped according to a 2020 site plan.

The hotel will have 215 rooms and 28,000 square feet of space for conferences. It will wrap around the existing parking garage.

The $95 million athletic complex will include a new Football Operations Center and an Olympic Sports Center intended to support more than two dozen varsity sports.

“Given the proximity to Central Grounds, North Grounds, the Ivy Corridor, and various athletic event venues, the Athletics Complex provides a unique opportunity to bring student athletes, other UVA students, coaches, staff, faculty, and the broader community together,” reads that staff report.

The Buildings and Grounds Committee also discussed amendments to the UVA major capital plan including about a $1 billion reduction in projects from the 2020 plan due to various deferrals.

Projects currently under construction include renovations at Alderman Library, a Student and Wellness Center, and the Inn at Darden. Other funded projects in the planning stages include a second upper-class residence hall on Brandon Avenue, the Contemplative Sciences Center, and the renovation of the Physics building.

Construction projects currently on hold include a parking garage to serve an expanded Fontaine Research Center, an academic building for the Batten School, and renovations at Old Cabell Hall.

The Buildings and Grounds Committee also got an update on sustainability highlights at UVA. This includes work toward a project called “Climate Justice Mapping” by the UVA Equity Center and UVA Sustainability.

“The primary goal of the Climate Justice Mapping project is to build platforms for the collaborative identification, collection, and dissemination of information about the disproportionate harm of adverse environmental impacts on communities of color through a series of accessible interactive climate justice maps and graphics,” reads that staff report.

Other community programs include the UVA Sustainable Food Collaborative. Check the whole packet for details.

Thanks for reading! I neglected to say in the podcast today that music in the program is provided thanks to a grant from the Valley Research Center, an institution so secretive, it doesn’t even exist!

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Welcome to a somewhat irregular installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement that brings you a condensed version of a Planning Commission meeting where the full weight of a neighborhood was brought out to oppose a multifamily development next door.

I’m your host Sean Tubbs, and the intent of this episode is to document what happened. We’ll be back to the regular format next time, but when I first started doing podcasts in 2005, I wanted to capture conversations in the public realm. This one seemed important to spend time on.

On March 2, 2021, the Albemarle County Planning Commission was just moments away from recommending denial of a rezoning of nearly 20 acres of land on U.S. 29 to make way for 370 housing units.

The land is currently zoned for single-family residential and the county’s Comprehensive Plan designates future uses could have a residential density of between 6 and 36 units per acre. The proposal from RST development came in just under 20 units per acre.

At the end of the meeting, Attorney Valerie Long asked to defer a vote in order to give RST Development time to make adjustments after the Forest Lakes Community Association mounted a campaign to stop the development.

According to their November 2020 newsletter, a portion of a proposed increase in homeowners association fees for Forest Lakes residents was used to hire a consultant to conduct an “independent, professional review” of the proposal. Many of these materials are available on the FLCA website.

At the same time, Albemarle County is updating its affordable housing policy with a public hearing on the draft plan set for March 17 before the Board of Supervisors. Plans are one thing, but the actual ability for Albemarle to meet its housing goals depends on specific applications being approved.

Before we begin, let me let you know what you’re about to read or hear is an edited portion of the meeting. You can watch the whole thing on the county’s YouTube page. You can also take a look at the staff report on the county’s website. Staff had recommended denial of the project at this time.

What you won’t find in that staff report are new details about provisions and subsidies that would have kept the rental prices below market-rate. The federal definition of “affordable” is that rents would be no more than 30 percent of the occupants household income, based on a metric known as the Area Median Income (AMI).

On the day of the hearing, I asked attorney Valerie Long for more details about the affordability and got them.

“The Owner will commit to: at least 75% of the apartment units will be affordable to those making between 30% and 80% AMI, with an average of 60% AMI, for 30 years.

“The project proposes 254 apartment units. 75% of 254 apartments is 190 units

“In addition, it is our hope that the 108 for-sale townhouse units proposed will be affordable to those making 80% AMI.”

In her email, Long acknowledged staff had not yet received the material.

Now, let’s get to the tape from Tuesday night.

Following a brief staff report from planner Andy Reitelbach, an official with RST Development explained the intent was to provide housing to people with a wide range of incomes.

“The opportunities that we’re creating for ourselves with this wide range does provide for that opportunity with teachers and firefighters and first responders,” said Scott Copeland of RST Development.

Affordability came up several times during the two-hour public hearing, but the tenor of the discussion was set by a nearly 90 minute presentation where different representatives from the Forest Lakes Community took turns reading from a prepared script.

They were led by Scott Elliff, the treasurer of the Forest Lakes Community Association. In all, six out of seven of the FLCA’s Board of Directors would speak.

Elliff has previously led campaigns against interconnectivity with other neighborhoods. In 2016, the neighborhood was successful in preventing a trailhead from being built as part of the Brookhill neighborhood which was approved by the Board of Supervisors that November.

However, the neighborhood was not successful in stopping a road connection that leads north from Brookhill onto Ashwood Boulevard. (April 2015 story) (August 2016 story) (October 2016 story)

Elliff kicked off a long string of comments from Forest Lakes residents who all took turns reading from a slideshow supplied to the county in advance.

“We have a lot of ground to cover because there are so many issues regarding this proposal that we have,” Elliff said. “It’s deficient and unacceptable in numerous different areas and you’re going to see that in great detail.”

At first, the county struggled to display the presentation provided by the FLCA and a brief break was taken to address technical errors. Carolyn Shaffer runs the meetings for the county.

“Can you go ahead and get started on what you are talking about? All of the commissioners have seen…” Shaffer said.

“We’re all going to want to use the visuals that we created specifically for this, of course,“ Ellif said. “Many of our comments relate very specifically to the charts and analysis and examples that we’ve created just specifically for this tonight.”

The visual presentation was highly coordinated and stage managed by Elliff.

“In introducing each person, we have a page with their name on it so you don’t need to use the other name stuff,” Elliff said. “I set that up so you could just roll through this presentation, kind of fully contained.”

“I still have to do the three-minute timer,” Shaffer said.

“Of course, and our people all know that as well,” Elliff said.

Before we go further, let’s review the rules of procedure for the Planning Commission. Especially two lines which are worth noting here.

Each other person speaking on a matter shall be allowed one appearance not to exceed three minutes.

A speaker may not reserve any time for rebuttal or transfer any time to another speaker.

After several minutes of getting the presentation to be visible, the clock started.

Elliff was the first of 27 speakers who were part of the presentation. He was also the 7th and the 14th.

“Our HOA Board presidents will speak and you have a number of volunteer residents who are going to talk about very specific topics and have done a bunch of research,” Elliff said. “We’re going to have charts and analyses and examples and all kinds of things including a couple of areas where we actually contracted our HOA for outside professional support just for this meeting.”

Elliff said the FLCA acknowledges the parcel is in the county’s growth area, but that the current proposal was out of scale. He said the new affordability provisions had no effect on the FLCA’s opposition to the project. He spoke for nearly four minutes before Shaffer cut him off.

“This is going to create just a tremendous amount of traffic potentially between Brookhill and…”

“Because there are so many speakers I have to stop you,” Shaffer said.

“Yes, thank you, so, happy to go on,” Elliff said.

Speaker after speaker explained how they felt this development would hurt their community.

“The 350 additional new housing units at this time I think is simply too much and too soon,” said Mike Turbidy, a member of the FLCA Board of Directors.

“I would be looking at those big, quite frankly ugly buildings,” said Sheila Katz.

Katz read aloud from comments made from those who signed the petition against the development.

“Traffic is going to be backed up actually to my development. I don’t know how I’m going to get out in the morning. This is a poorly designed ugly and excessive development that benefits no one except for a handful of opportunists ignoring what is best for our special community.”

Helen Marie Field also read from other comments from the petition.

“I am very passionate about my opposition to this proposed development,” said Helen Marie Field. “I grew up in Northern Virginia specifically Vienna and I have watched the terrible over development over the years. After graduating from UVA, I stayed in Charlottesville specifically because of its charm and the character of Albemarle County but this is being threatened more and more each year.”

Cat Smith called the current proposal “heavy-handed and ham-fisted.”

“We used a balloon and raised it up to the height of the buildings as the developers have indicated they would be and you can just barely see it there on that slide on fullscreen but it is well above what is an 8-foot wide privacy fence which is directly behind some of the homes in Cricklewood Court,” said Cat Smith.

The next speaker was George Pearsall but he had difficulties being heard, so Scott Elliff was given the chance to take his turn to keep the slide presentation running on track.

“Scott, would you like to take George’s comments, since we can’t hear him?” Shaffer asked.

“Sure, I can do that,” Elliff said. “It’s just two pages.”

“Your time starts now,” Shaffer said.

“He’s the president of the HOA Ashland,” Elliff said. “George’s point primarily is that the scale of this just as Cat mentioned beforehand is overwhelming and huge compared to the one story residential townhouses that are in this area.”

Elena DeLisoe objected to the density and asked that the development include more open space.

“Green space is important for people’s physical and mental wellness,” DeLisoe said. “A less crowded environment results in a better community, reducing the potential for conflicts related to disputes over noise, parking spaces, traffic, snow removal, pets, and other situations created by packing more people into smaller areas.”

One of the consultants hired for the project is also a resident of Forest Lakes.

“FLCA hired us to do a visualization and analysis of the proposed development,” said Vlad Gavrilovic of EPR PC. “We were all also asked to do a professional assessment of the proposed plan and there are some concerns we found from the plan and where it deviated from what I call professional best practices.”

Gavrilovic said EPR PC rewrote the plans and found that a maximum of 200 units were all that would fit on the property.

“We think that’s a much more reasonable yield for the property using professional design standards,” Gavrilovic said.

Forest Lakes resident Alice Keys compared the proposal to the Places29 Master Plan.

“This proposed development may meet the density required in the Comprehensive and Places29 Master Plan, but it does not respect the scale and character of the existing surrounding neighborhood,” Keys said.

Lifelong Albemarle resident Paul Merrell said he was one of the first to move into Forest Lakes back in 1993.

“The proposed development is definitely not similar to this neighborhood or the livability,” Merrell said. “It is instead an example of urban sprawl not in character with the neighborhood that we have now.”

Merrell acknowledged that growth is going to occur. He said there were other locations for affordable housing in Albemarle and Charlottesville.

“It only really benefits the developers’ profit and outcomes from this development,” Merrell said.

Sue Friedman recently concluded ten years on the FLCA Board, and was just appointed to the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee. She raised concerns over equity. The development as proposed requires special exceptions, which are common in the land use application process.

“What is the trade-off in harming an existing development, Forest Lakes, versus giving a developer concessions?” Friedman asked. “What is the expense that we’re willing to have those who are already live here bear for this new development, particularly looking at the traffic and the aesthetics open scale? So in terms of how the county and the planning process addresses equity. Those who are here, we in Forest Lakes, do we deserve to be harmed? Do we deserve to have challenges and expenses to benefit a new development?”

The next scheduled speaker was not available, so Elliff was given another chance to read someone else’s remarks.

“Next we have, it was supposed to be Bob Jones but Scott is going to speak again because Bob was not able to make the meeting,” Shaffer said.

Elliff proceeded to speak about the traffic study the FLCA commissioned from EPR to challenge the traffic study RST had developed. He said the developer’s study did not factor in new development in the Brookhill community under construction to the south.

“We actually asked the developer to run an alternate scenario for us just so we could understand the potential and they frankly declined to do that specifically, so we spent our own good money to contract it,” Elliff said. “Same model, just some different inputs. Next slide please.”

At this point, Elliff is the 14th speaker reading from the same presentation. The 15th consecutive speaker is Jane Keathey, another member of the FLCA Board.

“I feel like this RST development as planned is a poor fit for the space at that intersection,” Keathley said. “There are too many planned units and it will not be able to be adequately accommodated by the local surroundings as we’ve been describing here this evening.”

“Could I have the first slide?” asked Paula Grazzini as she took her turn in the coordinated presentation. She said the Planning Commission needed to take into consideration the additional traffic that will come from the Brookhill development as units are occupied by new residents. Grazzini detailed the EPR traffic study.

“We feel that the majority of people living in those areas are going to choose Archer Avenue and Ashwood Boulevard as their morning rush hour route to reach 29 whether they’re going north or south,” Grazzini said.

Bill McLaughlin, the 18th speaker, is another new member of the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee and sits on the board of directors of the Hollymead Citizens Association. He also said the density of the proposed development raised health concerns.

“My concern is for the health of the people who will be living there in relation to the threat posed by airborne viruses similar to the one causing the current pandemic,” McLaughlin said. “As we are all well aware, the current pandemic has struck most heavily at essential workers who cannot work from home and often work closely with the public. And of course it is just these people who most often live in high-density housing.”

Deborah Bremmer was the 20th speaker named to speak in the powerpoint. We are now 70 minutes into the presentation.

“I’m concerned that if this development is approved that our overcrowded schools will become more overcrowded and our property values will be negatively affected,” Bremmer said.

Speaker 21 was Tamera Hammond, who said approving the development would be against the spirit of the recently adopted Climate Action Plan.

“One of the main themes of the Climate Action Plan is to protect our local natural environment,” Hammond said. “It also states that the plan is as much about the kind of place we want to live in here in Albemarle County as it is about reducing the community’s contributions to greenhouse gas emissions.”

Dick Billings is another member of the FLCA Board and as the 22nd consecutive speaker, he showed a topographic overview of the property.

“This represents first of all the highest ground in the local area so every bit of rainfall that hits this development has to run off to somewhere,” Billings said.

Billings reminded the Planning Commission that the development of the Hollymead Town Center in the 2000’s resulted in stormwater that carried dirt and sediment into Lake Hollymead.

“We don’t want to see that again,” Billings said. “What we would like to see is any plan going forward have a requirement for 100 percent remediation of any damage to the local area.”

Gail Hayes does not live in the development, but her parents do. We’re now at 80 minutes into the presentation.

“You’ll hear me echo some of what Vlad Gavrilovic, Tamera Hammond and Dick Billings said,” Hayes said. “The bottom line up front is that I believe the plan is not acceptable as it has been presented and should not be moved forward until substantial changes have been made.”

The 24th speaker, Todd McGee, is a realtor who also sits on the FLCA Board.

“Unfortunately this project would have a negative impact on the value of the homes that border the site,” McGee said. “The proposed development will have a negative impact on the value of any home that is directly adjacent to the site.”

The 25th speaker was Donna Cameron who along with her husband chose Forest Lakes because of its amenities.

“I’m here to address the intangible and unmeasurable human impact that this proposed development has upon the Forest Lakes residents,” Cameron said. “We knew that the area behind us was zoned residential and would someday be developed but we trusted in the integrity of the 29 Master Plan. We never dreamed that waivers, special exclusions, or expanded stepbacks would create austere, concrete high-rises that would breach our privacy, invade the dark skies, and potentially cause run off flooding.”

The 26th speaker is Paul Moruza, the president of the Hollymead HOA. He said his neighborhood would also be affected by the development.

“We are really all part of one community,” Moruza said. “I would like to represent our Hollymead neighbors to you. We are 468 families and individual residents. We have single-family homes, condos, and townhomes. Hollymead is the older brother of the developments in the Forest Lakes.”

Moruza gave this description of the development.

“It is a very block Soviet-style construction which will be seen from all over,” Moruza said.

The final speaker on the unified presentation was Jimmy Baranik, the current president of the Forest Lakes Community Association.

“For those of you who don’t know, Forest Lakes is the largest homeowners’ association in Albemarle County, 1,500 homes and about 5,000 residents and as Paul mentioned previously, we are one big happy neighborhood.”

Baranik thanked the other speakers who had spoken as well as the hundreds who signed a petition against the development. In all, the total presentation took nearly an hour and a half.

The public hearing was not over. Crystal Passmore is a city resident who wanted to weigh in.

“My comment today is just that I would like people to have homes,” Passmore said. “I want people to have affordable homes. I want people to live in the town where they work. I don’t want people to have to commute from Ruckersville if they work in Charlottesville or if they work in downtown Albemarle. I don’t know anything about viewsheds or intrusive lighting. I just want people to have homes they can afford.”

Passmore said the voices of those who would one day live in the development could not be heard under this arrangement.

“Everyone who has spoken before me has convinced me that this is a lovely place to live,” Passmore said. “I would love it if you guys would allow more people to live here.”

A few more city residents spoke in favor of the project, including Josh Carp. He questioned the notion that the new development would hurt property values.

“I think it’s more important that people have affordable housing then that property values continue to go up,” Carp said. “These houses in the neighborhood are worth half a million dollars plus. If you want to deny affordable housing to maximize property values for people who have that much money, maybe you can come to my kids’ daycare and explain to the teachers why they can’t live in the area.”

Many opponents of the project cited the county’s Comprehensive Plan. City resident Rory Stolzenberg read other portions.

“First, land use objective 5 - promote density within the development area to help create new compact urban places,” Stolzenberg said. “Encourage developers to build at the higher end of the density range on greenfield sites provided that development will be in keeping with design guidelines in the Neighborhood Model. Encourage developers to build within the density range recommended in the master plan on infill sites. Ensure that housing is available to all populations.”

City resident Matt Gillikin called attention to the organized opposition from Forest Lakes residents.

“It’s really remarkable to see how consistently affluent neighborhoods in the county gather their resources together to fight against housing for people who don’t have the resources that they have,” Gillkin said.

After those four spoke, another previous speaker had a second chance to speak, in violation of the Rules of Procedure which Chair Julian Bivins corrected.

“Hello, my name is Jimmy Baranik, I spoke earlier,” Baranik said. “I just want to point out that we are not opposed to underfunding anybody, we’re not opposed to having people who can’t afford wages in our neighborhood. We are opposed to the buildings. That’s what we said. The building environment. We just need to overhaul the plan. I want to make sure everyone is crystal clear on that.”

Jason Inofuentes, a former member of the Pantops Community Advisory Committee, spoke in favor of the project.

“Affordable housing is an imperative that cannot be set aside for the interest of a select few homeowners,” Inofuentes said. “The development would represent an incredible value across 30 years to those who aren’t in the position to buy a well-manicured lawn on a quarter-acre lot.”

That was the end of the public hearing. You can watch the whole thing here.

Deliberation and deferral

After a brief recess, Valerie Long had five minutes to respond according to the Rules of Procedure.

“Obviously we cannot in five minutes rebut all of the comments that were made tonight so first let me say that we have very clear responses and rebuttals to absolutely every single point that was made in opposition,” Long said.

Long sought to address concerns about the traffic input, the visibility of the buildings from existing neighborhoods, and claims of full clear-cutting.

“So the images that you saw from the criticisms of the project are entirely inaccurate,” Long said.

After more explanations, Shaffer informed Long she was over time.

Next, the Planning Commissioners had the chance to discuss a matter.

Commissioner Jennie More went first as she prepared to ask a question.

“I just want to be clear that I want to figure out a way to get to yes,” More said.

More asked another question about the view from the development. She wanted to see a slide that Long had shown during rebuttal.

“I guess there’s a more generous area there than I had imagined and seeing that slide from her helped me understand the possibilities with buffering that could happen there,” More said.

However, the slide was not shown and Long was not offered a chance to respond. During a series of questions from commissioners about the affordability component of the project, staff responded about county policy. At one point, Scott Copeland with RST sought to make a clarifying point.

“Mr. Chairman, can I address the question about the affordability?” Copeland asked.

“No thank you,” Bivins said. “Not right now, thank you very much.”

The planner for the project, Andy Reitelbach, was invited to respond.

“Regarding the new proposal that Ms. Long presented this evening, that hasn’t been submitted to staff yet so I really can’t say on the 75 percent that I believe she mentioned, what those numbers are,” Reitelbach said. “I haven’t seen any plan or anything like that so I don’t know if Ms. Long may be able to expand on that more.”

Long wasn’t given the chance to respond.

The University’s non-voting representative on the Planning Commission, Luis Carrazana, wanted to know more about how stormwater would be treated on the property.

“I don’t remember seeing a [topographical map] in the application, but we did see one from the residents,” Carrazana said.

Reitelbach responded.

“There [are] at least conceptual stormwater management facilities up here in the northeast corner of the site,” Reitelbach said. “I know our county engineer has reviewed at least the conceptual grading and stormwater management and had no objections but stormwater is something that would have to be addressed at the site plan stage and would have to meet all of the state requirements.”

Commissioner Karen Firehock said she had hoped for a more innovative proposal that went further to mitigate stormwater by allowing more open space.

“I am very supportive of the need for affordable housing in our community,” Firehock said. “I am really disappointed at the notion that means we have to sacrifice green space and adequate recreational areas.”

Firehock said she was inclined to recommend denial, but also reminded everyone watching that the Planning Commission’s vote is advisory.

“And the developer would certainly have ample opportunity to amend their application,” Firehock said. “Whether we end up voting for or against it.”

Commissioner Corey Clayborne was concerned about one aspect of infrastructure he thought was lacking in the proposal.

“I was a little concerned I didn’t hear about public transit and this notion to work with the county,” Clayborne said. “If we’re going to have all of these affordable housing units, there’s no public transit there. Do we just leave it alone, or do we just turn a blind eye to it?”

To step out of the meeting for a second, in the current fiscal year, Albemarle County is contributing $87,500 toward creation of a regional transit vision, as well as $53,107 toward a “feasibility study and implementation plan for expanded transit service to population and employment centers within Albemarle County.”

Last week, members of the Regional Transit Partnership were told by TJPDC staffer Jessica Hersh-Ballering that the goal of the study was to inform a second grant application to pay for funding of an actual project.

This information was not conveyed to the Planning Commission at the time.

Commissioner Rick Randolph represented the Scottsville District on the Board of Supervisors from 2016 to 2019. He compared the proposed project to an infamous public housing project in Chicago.

“Twenty years from now, what will this development look like?” Randolph asked. “Will it be like another project like Cabrini Green in Chicago?”

Randolph said the project would supply affordable housing, but fell short on one intangible metric.

“They didn’t satisfy the need of a community to have a soul, and therein lies my concern,” Randolph said. “I can’t find a soul to this project.”

Randolph also said the residents would need to be responsible for covering the cost of maintain certain services and he was skeptical they could do so.

“There needs to be clarity how residents can afford to maintain the roads within this community, plow them when it snows, and to cover the annual cost through their HOA fees for pool and exercise facilities when now 75 percent of the units are going to be affordable housing? Where does the money come from? These are not inexpensive?”

More said she was frustrated that details about the affordability for the units were not made available.

“When you bring us brand new information especially when it’s really important information that is a change of substance the night of the Planning Commission, I think it’s something that’s great to add to the conversation but it leaves staff not able to respond because he hasn’t had that submitted, and it leaves us with questions about something I think is key and important.”

The public hearing last over two hours, with the Forest Lakes Community Association getting almost 90 minutes of consecutive time.

“The level of public comment, which is great, also does tend to wear us down a little bit so then maybe we aren’t asking the great questions we could ask,” More said. “We have staff here that could answer stuff about traffic and these types of things and I think that’s too bad because as I said before I’d like to figure out how to get to yes.”

After More’s comment, Bivins asked Commissioners what they wanted to do. Commissioner Corey Clayborne responded.

“I move to recommend denial of ZMA202000007-RST Residences for the reasons stated in the staff report and the reasons stated within the conversation that we’ve had amongst the Commission,” Clayborne said.

At this point in a regular in-person meeting, the applicant’s representative might stand to request a deferral. A vote by the Planning Commission to recommend denial doesn’t kill a project, but Supervisors often follow the lead of the advisory body.

Let’s hear what happens next.

“Obviously there’s been a lot of comments made,” Long said. “I will reiterate we are prepared to address all of those if asked but if that is not the preference of the Commission tonight, we would be more than happy to take the comments that we’ve received tonight and go back and amend our plans and certainly update the affordable housing, work on the precise location of the transit, and…”

“I thought you were asking about something else, but that’s not what we’re doing here,” Bivins said.

“I’m sorry?” Long said.

“So, you’re asking about you will take whatever we decide and go forward,” Bivins said. “I thought you might be asking for a different kind of situation.”

“No, in fact Mr. Chairman, I think we would like to ask for a deferral at this point so that we can take the comments that we’ve received and see if we can do our best to address those so that we could come back to with you an application that could gain your support and recommendations,” Long said.

After a few minutes of parliamentary procedure, the motion to defer was adopted unanimously.

Commissioners had some parting comments.

“I do think that this development can be fixed in terms of the things that we have recommended,” Firehock said. “I just think that we need a much more quality development with more green space, more attention to fitting in with the character of the neighborhood, public transportation.”

“You’ve heard the thoughts and the cares of the Planning Commission, and I think I can say that each of us wants this to be a successful project but many of us felt that we were not provided with enough information for us to fall directly in the most positive way of supporting the project,” Bivins said.

UPDATE

Shortly after publication, I received this response from Emily Kilroy, the county’s director of communications and public engagement:

The Board of Supervisors has as part of their adopted procedures the following regarding visual/audio presentations: “The speaker may include a visual or audio presentation, provided that the presentation is received by the Clerk at least 48 hours before the Matters from the Public session at which the speaker plans to speak.” You can find this online here: https://www.albemarle.org/government/board-of-supervisors/public-meeting-participation-guide (FAQ for What are the speaking rules for Matters not Listed for Public Hearing?) Prior to the Planning Commission Public Hearing for this application, the Forest Lakes HOA contacted the Planning Division to request to provide a Powerpoint and this was submitted in advance.

The County Attorney’s Office did review the request to provide a list of speakers and a presentation that each speaker would speak to a part of and found it was consistent with practice. For in-person meetings, a speaker could upload a Powerpoint or other visual up at the podium and use that during their 3-minutes. Understanding that every speaker could do that individually, and knowing the transition time that takes when that action is taken individually, a combined presentation was deemed permissible.

Allowing an individual to speak multiple times was a procedural error and has been addressed.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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On today’s show:

A quick COVID update from Dr. Denise Bonds

The Virginia Festival of the Book prepares for a virtual event

Albemarle Schools wants input on alternate names for Virginia L. Murray Elementary School

This year will feature a study and input for a Regional Transit Vision Plan

In today’s COVID news, the director of the Blue Ridge Health District briefed Council last night on the latest in efforts to get vaccinations in as many people’s arms as possible. The district has begun to receive additional supply above the 2,850 doses a week it received in February. That has allowed vaccinations of more types of people to begin.

“We have begun to tackle individuals who work in manufacturing, agriculture and groceries,” said Dr. Denise Bonds. “We have made good inroads into people over the age of 75. We are still vaccinating a large number of people over the age of 65. We have not really been able to start age 16 to 64 with an underlying medical condition, although the vaccine availability is improving significantly and we anticipate being able to open that up shortly.”

Dr. Bonds said work to vaccinate people incarcerated at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail began last week. She also said the district will begin to administer the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, which was just approved last week for emergency use and only requires one shot.

“We have requested 2,000 doses here in the district and we’ll be running what we call large vaccination events,” Bonds said, adding that these will be invitation-only events to help get through the large number of people currently eligible.

The Virginia Department of Health also issued a press release saying the South African strain has been identified in its Northwest Region.

Last night, City Council also adopted a proclamation for the Virginia Festival of the Book, which is holding a virtual ceremony for the second year in a row due to the pandemic. Jane Kulow is the festival’s director.

“We encourage everyone to explore our schedule and find an event that may be of interest,” Kulow said. “We hope that we have found a way to offer some of our best features and make them more accessible than ever.”

The schedule is available at vabook.org and the two week festival begins on March 13. I’ll have more from that City Council meeting in a future update.

Albemarle County Schools are seeking input on ten possible names for Virginia L. Murray Elementary School in Ivy, which is named after a pioneer in Black education in the community. In 2018, the school system adopted a policy to review all buildings named after people. Last year, what had been Cale Elementary on Avon Street Extended became Mountain View Elementary last July.

92 percent of respondents to an online survey posted in January said they would prefer to keep the V.L. Murray name and four people spoke at a February 10 meeting in favor of that outcome and none spoke for another. However, the policy requires the naming committee to submit ten names for the School Board’s consideration, so another survey has been sent around. A final survey asks people to choose three possible suggestions. The committee will hold a final open meeting on this issue on March 24. (survey)

Last month, the Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee discussed potential historic markers to commemorate Black and Women’s history in the county. One of three proposals would recognize Murray.

All localities in the Thomas Jefferson Planning district except Nelson County experienced population growth in the last decade. To reduce the likelihood of traffic congestion, local governments and organizations are seeking ways to improve transit service throughout the community.

Last week, the Regional Transit Partnership held its first meeting of the year. One of the first actions was to allow a group called the Charlottesville Area Alliance to sit on the body as a non-voting member. Jessica Hersh-Ballering is a transportation planner with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

“The Charlottesville Area Alliance was formed in 2016 to lead the advancement of an age-friendly community,” Hersh-Ballering said. “Working with Albemarle and Fluvanna counties and the city of Charlottesville, they successfully applied to be a member of the AARP and World Health Organization’s age-friendly network to bring best practices to our area.”

This year, work will begin to create a vision for regional transit, as well as a second study to determine how to increase bus service in Albemarle County on U.S. 29 North, Pantops and Monticello. The TJPDC has issued a request for proposals for a technical consultant to do work that is partially paid for through grants from the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

Hersh-Ballering said study just got under way and the goal is to wrap it up in ten months in order to qualify for a different funding stream.

“That timeline is really strict because we’re hoping the implementation plan will put a transit provider in the position to apply for a demonstration funding with the next round of funding applications from the DRPT,” Hersh-Ballering said.

(paragraph below was corrected March 3, 2021)

Currently, Albemarle pays Charlottesville Area Transit for fixed-route service. All but one routes currently terminate at the Downtown Transit Center.

Hersh-Ballering said the regional transit vision will recommend where different types of transit should be ranging from express, high-frequency local, low-frequency local, and on-demand.

“The corridor specific service recommendations are intended to be a visual document like a map that uses the initial work product to determine what type of transit service can be best supported on each corridor in the region,” Hersh-Ballering said. “If that sounds really familiar, that’s because that’s very similar to what Richmond did in their vision plan.”

The Richmond plan was endorsed by the Richmond Regional Transportation Planning Organization in April 2017.

The RTP also heard details about potential changes to Charlottesville Area Transit routes. Read a story by Allison Wrabel in the Daily Progress.

Finally today, Charlottesville City Hall will be closed tomorrow to commemorate Liberation and Freedom Day. There are all sorts of events going on this week to celebrate the occasion, which was designated as a city holiday on July 1, 2019. The day marks when Union Major General Phillip Sheridan and his troops arrived in Charlottesville liberating over 14,000 enslaved people. The Jefferson School African American Heritage Center has a whole series of events this week. Visit their website to learn more.

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Two months down, ten more to go. The days are getting longer and soon we’ll pass through the Ides of March and then the equinox on our way to a complete year. The calendar reads March 1, 2021, and this is the first installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement of this 31-day period.

This first installment of the month is supported by the two hundred people who have now made a financial contribution to allow me to keep doing this work each and every day. I’m almost a year into this experiment in independent journalism, and I’m grateful. If you’re interested in helping me make this endeavor sustainable, contact me and I can suggest some options.

On today’s show:

Louisa County announces $15 million investment to bring about universal broadband (watch the announcement)

Charlottesville City Council will be asked to endorse Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan, six week after the Planning Commission took a look

The city’s proposed capital budget allocates a smaller amount for proposed 7th Street Parking Garage

Tonight, Charlottesville City Council will take action on whether to add the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan to the city’s Comprehensive Plan. Council’s public hearing was held on January 12, 2021 during the Planning Commission and they wanted some revisions. City planner Matt Alfele said at that meeting that this plan has been a long time in the making. (read the draft plan)

“I know one of the driving principles of our community is engagement and letting the neighborhood drive the planning process,” Alfele said. “This is very true with the plan in front of you tonight.”

In 2015, the Fifeville Neighborhood Association created a visioning document to position their location to be the next area chosen to receive the master planning treatment. The Thomas Jefferson Planning District was hired to develop the plan, which Alfele said will fit into the overall city planning process in Charlottesville including the Comprehensive Plan.

“The Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan if adopted is a high-level policy document that will help with the completion of these other documents, most notable the zoning rewrite,” Alfele said.

TJPDC planner Nick Morrison explained why Fifeville residents wanted this plan.

“Residents of Fifeville had noted the specter of displacement specifically of long-time residents and the need for additional affordable housing,” Morrison said. “Stresses on the neighborhood from traffic, particularly along the commercial corridor of Cherry Avenue.”

The neighborhood came up with a series of goals they wanted from the plan. Morrison stated one of them.

“To lift up and preserve Fifeville’s legacy of African-American leadership and highlight its unique sense of place as a culturally diverse neighborhood,” Morrison said.

A chart in the plan states that residents do not want to see large apartment buildings such as the ones on West Main Street, but do want to see preservation of existing housing and creation of new subsidized housing.

There are several undeveloped parcels on Cherry Avenue and Roosevelt Brown Boulevard within a mixed-use district. A medium-density residential district runs along 5th Street Extended which would allow some multifamily apartment buildings by-right. A special use permit would be needed for projects between 22 and 43 dwelling units per acre.

Councilor Lloyd Snook noted a tension between the desire of the neighborhood to remain at a low residential density on the one hand, and a push for the city to build more units to increase supply on the other.

“I’m just conscious of the fact that in the next year when we’re going to be having an affordable housing plan, a Comprehensive Plan, and a zoning code, we’re going to have to confront sort of the second order issue here and focusing only on information and opinion on only the first order issue may not help us in the long run in our analysis,” Snook said.

Before recommending approval, commissioners asked for more information on renovations and teardowns that have taken place between 2010 and 2020.

One of the transportation recommendations is already funded. T-3 calls for the widening of a turn lane from Cherry Avenue onto Ridge Street. Charlottesville was awarded a $6.1 million Smart Scale grant for a project called 5th Street SW Corridor Improvements.

Council will also be presented with a $190.7 million operating and capital budget for the fiscal year that begins on July 1. During a press briefing today, City Manager Chip Boyles said preparing a budget during a time of economic uncertainty has been a challenge for staff.

“Known decreased revenues in the current year and unknown revenue and expense projections for fiscal year 2022 make this a difficult task at best,” Boyles said. “Staff has taken a very conservative approach to go into FY22 and is hoping for the best.”

Meals tax and lodging tax revenues have been down sharply since the pandemic with restrictions in place on gathering spaces. Staff expect the trend to continue into the fiscal year. Ryan Davidson is a senior budget management analyst with Charlottesville.

“For lodging and meals, neither of those do we see getting back to 100 percent of pre-COVID collection rates before the end of the next fiscal year,” Davidson said. “Hopefully we’ll be wrong and things will rebound.”

One change made during the development of the capital budget is that there is only one million in funding in the next fiscal year for the proposed 7th Street Parking garage, with $7 million expected to be spent in fiscal year 23.

Krissy Hammill is the other senior budget management analyst. She said the city can still meet its obligations to provide parking for Albemarle County per a 2018 agreement to build a joint General District Court downtown.

“The dollar amount that’s put in here now gives us enough time and gives staff the flexibility to continue doing that research with some funding available,” Hammill said.

The recommended budget also includes no additional city taxpayer funds for the West Main Streetscape and Council is expected to further discuss its future in the coming budget work sessions.

“As part of the staff recommendation, just from an affordability standpoint, we’ve taken out any additional funding for West Main and added the [$50 million] school reconfiguration project,” Hammill said. “Absent some real solid direction from Council, we have not made any changes in the CIP and have not changed our position there in the hope that once we get to these work sessions as part of the budget there will be some decisions made.”

The first budget work session is Thursday at 4 p.m. (meeting info)

This afternoon, Louisa officials pledged to make broadband Internet available to every home and business in the county within the next four years. Christian Goodwin is the county administrator who spoke on a live YouTube feed that he acknowledged could not currently be accessed by all who live in Louisa.

“Today I am pleased to announce that we are unveiling plans to change that here in Louisa County and that we are developing a blueprint that other localities and providers can follow,” Goodwin said.

Louisa will invest $15 million in a partnership with Rappahannock Electric Cooperative, Firefly Fiber Broadband, and Dominion Energy Virginia. Firefly is a subsidiary of the Central Virginia Electric Cooperative. The funding will help cover constructions costs, and end consumers would pay between $50 and $80 a month for service depending on speed.

The first step in the partnership will be an engineering study that will result in a request to the State Corporation Commission for regulatory approval for the service. The goal is to connect half the county by 2023 and full coverage by 2025.

Duane Adams is the vice chair of the Louisa County Board of Supervisors.

“Today more than ever the digital divide between rural and suburban America has been brought to light by the COVID-19 pandemic,” Adams said. “The inability to access reliable high-speed Internet has impacted our citizens in nearly every area of their life, from education to tele-medicine to the ability to conduct business affairs in a secure environment.”

Adams said this would bring about a “generational change” for the county and will also be an economic development tool. Read more in the press release.

Finally today, this week Virginia is set to receive 69,000 doses of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine for COVID. According to a release sent out Saturday night, the Virginia Department of Health will prioritize this third vaccine to mass vaccination clinics across the Commonwealth. Only one dose is required for the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. Today the VDH reports another 1,124 new cases based on abou 13,000 tests processed.

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With the COVID pandemic still affecting our lives, today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out from an anonymous contributor is once again to state clearly:

"We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

If you’d like to help support this program and get a message out there, a $25 monthly contribution through Patreon gets you four such shout-outs. Some restrictions apply. Contact me if you have any questions or have interest. Now, on with the show!

On today’s show:

Another Democrat has entered the race for Charlottesville City Council

A pedestrian is struck on West Main Street during a protest

Virginia State Police explode a suspicious device this morning on the Downtown Mall

An update on vaccines and the pandemic

We’ll begin today with a pandemic update. Statewide trends continue to head down with percent positivity statewide at 7.4 percent today. Numbers in the Blue Ridge Health District have also been declining a week after a sudden surge related to the return of University of Virginia students. Yesterday, UVA eased restrictions on in-person gatherings according to a news release sent out yesterday. Students are now allowed to leave their residences for non-academic or non-dining purposes, and people can meet in groups up to six.

“Out of concern for spreading the virus into the surrounding Charlottesville community, the University will continue to limit community volunteering activity until further notice, with one exception,” the release continues.

That exception is UVA students who volunteer on public safety crews who have also been vaccinated.

The fatality count statewide continues to rise as death certificates continue to be entered into the system used by the Virginia Department of Health to track the disease. Nearly 1,200 deaths have been recorded this week for a statewide total now of 8,382. Most of these deaths actually occured in January. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are now a total of 148 deaths including 57 in Albemarle and 43 in Charlottesville. Over 98 percent of these were people over the age of 50, with 81.1 percent over the age of 70.

In an email update that went out last night, the Blue Ridge Health District announced it will receive the largest shipment of vaccine doses next week. That will allow them to expand vaccinations to people over the age of 65. “BRHD will receive 4,170 first dose vaccines (both Pfizer and Moderna). Nearly half of these will be distributed to UVA Health to assist with vaccinating Phase 1A and 1B individuals at the Seminole Square location and Community Sites. Additionally, 300 doses will go to the Blue Ridge Medical Center in Nelson and 300 doses will go to Walmart Pharmacies in Greene and Louisa for vaccinating individuals 65+.”

This week, the University of Virginia passed a milestone of administering more than 50,000 doses since December 15. They’re also moving all of their vaccination operations to the temporary facility in the Seminole Square Shopping Center which has been informally dubbed by some as “Big Shots.” Dr. Costi Sifri is leading up the Health System’s community health efforts.

“It is challenging to get here into the medical center,” Dr. Sifri said. “There are a lot of traffic and some challenges with that.”

Yesterday, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration panel approved emergency authorization for a vaccine from Johnson and Johnson. The time will soon come when anyone who wants a dose can get one. There is some reluctance among many in the population about the safety of a new type of vaccine. Dr. Sifri said hesitancy among some may be waning.

“The vaccine is showing really important efficacy results as were seen in the clinical trials,” Sifri said. “That’s been demonstrated really around the world where they have been rolled out. But in addition they are very well tolerated. People can have some of these side effects but for the most part they’re reasonable and it is too difficult to manage.”

Dr. Sifri said there are some who are reluctant to receive a vaccine and public health professionals need to continue discussions with those who are hesitant in order to allay their fears.

“Vaccination is going to be our best tool to get over this pandemic,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri said UVA would follow the Blue Ridge Health District’s lead on how to continue to support the response to this community health crisis by providing vaccinations.

Another source of information is a Q&A with Dr. Eric Houpt on vaccinations and how the world around us may be slowly changing. Stay informed.

The University of Virginia Health System will begin to allow visitation at some in-patient units beginning on March 2. For a full list, read the update on their website.

Finally in this segment, a friend of mine on social media yesterday posed the question of whether it was a good idea for people to post pictures of themselves getting a vaccine on social media. To hear that conversation, take a listen to the podcast version of this newsletter.

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A pedestrian was struck yesterday afternoon at rush hour in the intersection of West Main Street and Roosevelt Brown Boulevard. A press release issued by the city of Charlottesville Police Department later in the evening said the person suffered “minor injuries.”

“As vehicles swerved to avoid confrontations, an uninvolved pedestrian was struck by another vehicle as she attempted to cross the street,” reads the release.

Video footage of the incident released on Twitter by Arianna Coghill is more complicated. As the 45 second video begins, a crowd of people are standing within the intersection as part of a Black Lives Matters protest organized by the group BLM757 that had been moving within the city since 230 p.m. The traffic light controlling vehicles traveling on to Roosevelt Brown Boulevard is green but the group is standing directly in the line of traffic.

At four seconds, the light turns yellow. A person holding a blue sign blocks vehicles seeking to northbound travel from Roosevelt Brown Boulevard onto 10th Street NW.

At almost seven seconds, the light is still yellow. A person in a white jacket can be seen waiting to cross Roosevelt Brown heading west toward the University of Virginia. As soon as the light changes, this person begins crossing the road at a jogging pace. A dark gray pick-up truck crosses the perimeter of the intersection despite the traffic signal being red. This vehicle can be heard revving its engines to accelerate.

At ten seconds, the vehicle strikes the person crossing the street and they fall to the ground. The crowd of people move to assist them. The driver stops and the videographer films the rest of the incident. The driver gets out of his vehicle, and others race to the person to help. The video ends.

The first paragraph of the Police Department’s press release mentions the name of the protest organizer and the fourth states that the Commonwealth’s Attorney office will assist in the investigation.

A question is out for more information about whether the driver will be charged.

This morning, another press release from the Charlottesville Police Department announced a suspicious device was found this morning on 4th Street SE near the Downtown Mall Crossing. The Virginia State Police were called in and the device was detonated.

“CPD’s forensic investigators are processing the scene and have collected relevant evidence, which will be sent to the Virginia Division of Forensic Science for analysis,” reads the release.

(Note - I did not link to the tweet pending identification of the person who took it. I want to make sure they get credit and that I have permission to use it. I can provide the link upon email and will update this newsletter once I have permission)

There are now three Democrats seeking two nominations for two seats on the Charlottesville City Council. Charlottesville Tomorrow reports that Albemarle High School graduate Yasmine Washington is running and Charlotte Rene Woods has a profile on her published Friday. Washington joins school board member Juandiego Wade and 2019 candidate Brian Pinkston in the race. Keep track of campaign finance on the Virginia Public Access Project.

There’s an open seat in a House of Delegates district in the Fredericksburg area. Delegate Mark Cole will not seek reelection to a seat he has held since 2002 according to the Virginia Public Access Project. On his website, Cole announced this would be his last term. For more on this story, read an article in the Fauquier Times.

Thank you for reading. Please drop me a line if you have any questions.

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In today’s Patreon fueled shout-out: The Local Energy Alliance Program, your local energy nonprofit, wants to help you lower your energy bills, make your home more comfortable, and save energy. Schedule your Home Energy Check-Up to get started - now only $45 for City of Charlottesville and Albemarle County residents. You’ll receive energy-saving products and expert advice customized to your needs. Sign up today!

On today’s show:

Albemarle seeking feedback into Rio Road corridor study

Albemarle Board of Supervisors are presented with $466 million budget for FY22

Governor Northam announces some easings of COVID restrictions on events

As the pandemic in Virginia nears the one-year anniversary, Governor Ralph Northam announced yesterday the next steps on lifting restrictions now that certain milestones are being hit such as vaccination targets.

“We’ve administered almost 1.7 million doses overall,” Northam said. “More than 1.1 million Virginians have received the first dose. That’s about 13.5 percent of the population.”

Daily vaccination numbers are down due to supply chain issues related to winter weather. Today the seven-day average is 32,569 a day, short of the goal of 50,000 a day. Northam expressed confidence that would change soon.

“Last week, President Biden’s administration announced a bump in vaccine allocations from states,” Northam said. “They also increased the number of vaccine doses going to pharmacies in the federal pharmacy partnership. That means more pharmacies are coming online this week to start giving shots through that federal partnership.”

That will bring vaccines to pharmacies at Walgreens, Wal-Mart, Giant, Food City, and independent stores. Details are to come, but Northam said the efforts will work with local health districts to coordinate off-site locations.

“Off-site mask clinics will allow Wal-Mart to vaccinate a few hundred people a day and it will allow them to choose different locations each week,” Northam said. “All of these pharmacies will prioritize those 65 and over and all vaccinations are by appointment only so again, please don’t just show up but go onto our website or make the phone call.”

Another factor leading to the decision to ease restrictions is the pending approval of the Johnson & Johnson version of the vaccine. Another that the vaccination call center is now in operation and the goal is to have them help get people to appointments at pharmacies. Before going into details, Northam reminded Virginia why the state of emergency led to social distancing and more.

“Last year to slow the spread of the virus we put limits on how many people could be together at various events or in certain places of business,” Northam said. “And it worked. As our COVID cases and hospitalizations went down, we slowly raised those limits through phased reopenings. But as the cold weather and holidays approached, cases started getting higher then ever before. So we took the sensible step and reintroduced some of those mitigation measures.”

Now, cases numbers are going down while vaccination numbers are going up. Northam said that means it is time to slowly begin to loosen up on those restrictions. The following measures go into place on March 1:

Alcohol sales at restaurants can now continue until midnight (was 10 p.m)

Curfew between midnight and 5 a.m. is lifted

Outdoor gatherings can increase to 25 people, up from the current 10

Outdoor entertainment venues can increase attendance from 250 people to 30 percent of capacity with a cap of 1,000 people

Overnight summer camps can begins operation on May 1

“If the trends continue as they are, cases down and vaccinations up, I would expect that by April we could be able to continue the 30 percent measure but remove the 1,000 person cap for outdoor venues,” Northam said. (read more in the press release)

Today the seven-day average for new cases dropped to 1,869 but today’s count increased to 2,036. The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 75 cases, with 37 from Albemarle and 21 from Charlottesville. The fatality count continues to rise as a backlog of death certificate data is entered into the system. There have now been 133 deaths in the Blue Ridge Health District among the 7,963 reported by the Virginia Department of Health.

Yesterday the Virginia House of Delegates approved a bill to require localities to provide in-person education as a default by this fall. Republicans had sought to add an emergency clause to SB1303 immediately require in-person instruction rather than wait until July. Here’s Delegate John Avoli (R-Staunton).

“We cannot afford to punt this issue another four months down the road, rendering the remained of this school year and the entirety of March, April, May and June unaffected by this crucial legislation.” Avoli said. “Please Madame Speaker, let us open the schoolhouse doors through the efforts of Senator Dunnavunt and Delegate Van Valkenburg.”

However, Delegate Marcus Simon (D-Fairfax) said he shared the concerns about getting students back to school but noted that the bill did not have the votes to pass the Senate with an emergency clause, which would take a four-fifths vote.

“This is a serious bill right now with Delegate Van Valkenberger’s amendments on it, it’s a serious policy bill about moving things forward and making things happen,” Simon said. “If we voted for an emergency clause and put an emergency clause on this bill, it would undoubtedly fail.”

Those amendments added provisions allowing students to opt out and to allow schools to shut down if there is an outbreak. The vote to reject the amendment was 51 to 47, but the bill later passed the House of Delegates 88 to 9. The Virginia Senate approved the House amendments today on a 36 to 3 vote.

Albemarle County Executive Jeffrey Richardson unveiled a $466 million recommended operating budget for the Board of Supervisors to review over the several weeks. (review the recommended FY22 budget)

“This year’s budget theme pulls forward the budget theme year from fiscal year 21 which was ‘Respond, Recover and Recalibrate’,” Richardson said.

That budget was altered on the fly as the economy was shut down to in order to slow the spread of COVID-19. Positions were frozen and both operating and capital expenditures were cut back while the financial picture became more clear. Now, Richardson has presented a budget that allows for the county to move forward with lessons learned during the pandemic.

“This year we’ve been added to that theme the word resilient because this recommended budget is intended to make certain strategic investments to transform our organization as the community around us transforms,” Richardson said.

One of those investments is the creation of an Office of Broadband Access, intended to move Albemarle towards universal internet coverage.

“The office will have two recommended [full-time equivalents] that will report through the County Executive’s work to support the work of expanding access in urban and rural communities,” Richardson said. “Two very different approaches and needs. The full force of this organization will support this office which will work to tackle broadband using the equity lens.”

The budget does not anticipate an increase in the property tax rate, which will remain at $0.854 cents per $100 of assessed value. Residential assessments are up by 2.8 percent though commercial assessments are down 5.5 percent.

Richardson’s budget includes a move toward a $15 an hour minimum wage for county employees as well as a two percent “market adjustment.”

Here are some highlights from the budget:

An expansion of Mountain View Elementary will proceed

Five new firefighters will be hired to support daytime service at North Garden Volunteer Fire Company, plus a new training position and a new ambulance

$3 million in funding for “Business Process Optimization” program to update land use permitting process and other government systems

$600,000 in funding for affordable housing, to be determined (in FY21)

$600,000 in funding to implement Climate Action Plan, to be determined (in FY21)

$25 million to fund the already-approved renovation of Albemarle courts in downtown Charlottesville

Two additional positions in social services for “family preservation”

Budget is based on creation of a local tax on cigarettes that would go in effect Jan 1, 2022

Near the end of his presentation, Richardson sounded an optimistic tone.

“Board, we believe that during the course of FY22, our economy will continue to stabilize,” Richardson said. “We’ll know a lot more about our economy, our customer service expectations and what the public needs and expects, and the way we work.”

Supervisors did not have many specific questions during the presentation, but Samuel Miller District representative Liz Palmer said she supported the investments in public safety at North Garden.

“The North Garden Volunteer Fire Department is a wonderful building that’s been kept up by the community for many years,” Palmer said. “It is a prime location for an ambulance because there are so many accidents on 29 South down there.”

The first public hearing will be held virtually on March 3 at 6 p.m. Work sessions begin on March 10 and continue throughout the month. Stay tuned to the Week Ahead newsletter to learn when.

Tonight, the Places29-Rio Community Advisory Committee will get a briefing on the Rio Road Corridor Study, a project underway in that is in part a response to opponents of recent rezoning proposals on Rio Road East. They argued Albemarle County needed to address congestion on the street before approving any more residential units. The firm Line + Grade was hired last year to conduct the work following their work on a similar study of Avon Street Extended.

The Albemarle Planning Commission got a look at the study's scope at their meeting on February 16. (project website)

"The scope of the study is from the Rio-29 Small Area Plan area at the west to the intersection of the John Warner Parkway," said David Benish, one of the county's planning managers. "This study will also be taking into account traffic from existing and potential development in those approaching segments to this corridor."

The study's scope will evaluate the roadway and develop future projects to improve safety and create new infrastructure.

"It also will provide solutions to enhance the mobility and access for all users and all common travel methods," Benish said.

Benish said this will be first time that Albemarle's Office of Equity and Inclusion will use their new equity impact assessment process.

"OEI's initial demographic analysis of the area reveals a corridor that has a very diverse population regarding race, age, income, homeownership status and transportation needs," Benish said.

A questionnaire for the project is currently live and there will be a pair of kickoff meetings on March 11 and March 12. Benish also told the Planning Commission that the Virginia Department of Transportation has recently recommended funding for a roundabout at the intersection of Rio Road East and the John Warner Parkway.

Thanks for reading! To help support this program, please consider a contribution through Patreon which goes to the general research for the program as well as other projects I’m working on. Drop me a line if you have questions about how you can help!

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On today’s show:

CRHA gets an update on two upcoming construction projects

Batesville residents have the chance to ask questions about a 60-acre solar project

Virginia General Assembly is considering legislation to require schools return to in-person education

Let’s begin with a quick look at COVID numbers today.The local surge continues while the statewide recedes. The Virginia Department of Health reports 1,907 new cases today, which is just one number off the statewide 7-day average of 1,908. 102 of those new cases are in the Blue Ridge District with 80 from Albemarle and ten from Albemarle. The University of Virginia is now reporting 853 active cases on its COVID tracker.

We need to talk a little about deaths. After over a week without any fatalities, thirteen new cases have been reported in Blue Ridge Health District for the past four days. That doesn’t mean the individuals died yesterday, as the Virginia Department of Health recommends looking at fatalities on the day they occured. Statewide the death count had been going up sharply as a backlog of death certificate data is entered. The total is 7,807 in Virginia as of today.

One alarming metric change today is a sudden increase of cases of Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children from 18 on Monday to 25 yesterday to 27 today. Read coverage on that topic in the Henrico Citizen.

Charlottesville is moving forward with a plan to return students to classrooms on March 8. Albemarle County goes from Stage 3 to Stage 4 on March 15. A bill that would require school systems to make in-person instruction the default form of education has passed a Virginia House of Delegates panel. SB1303 was approved by the 17-3 by the House Education Committee on Monday. Here’s the sponsor, Senator Siobhan Dunnavunt (R-12).

“It requires each School Board to offer in-person education for the minimal number of hours required annually to each person in K-12 schools [and] to follow the mitigation guidelines of the CDC to do that in a safe way,” Dunnavant said. Schools would be directed to work with local health departments to ensure anyone who contracts a case would be quarantined.

Dunnavunt said opening schools will help some people get back to work.

“We are seeing that working mothers have the highest unemployment rate and after all of our efforts in equality in employment, we have had a huge setback with untold jeopardy for moms going forward because the infrastructure of school is a necessary component of the stability of the family,” Dunnavunt said.

The bill under consideration is a substituted amended to allow some students to continue to attend school virtually.

“Folks are able to learn virtually if they have medical reasons they feel are important or if their community is just a bit more wary of going back,” said Delegate Schuyler VanValkenburg (D-72).

The legislation would go into effect July 1. An emergency clause requiring schools to open immediately was removed before it passed the Senate. For a snapshot of what divisions are doing what at the moment, consult the Virginia Department of Education map.

While we’re on the topic of legislation, a bill to create a passenger rail authority for the New River Valley has passed the full General Assembly. This year’s recommended Smart Scale projects include $50 million to expand passenger rail to Christiansburg. More on that in Amy Freidenberger’s story in the Roanoke Times.

Finally in brief COVID news, the Center at Belvedere has announced it will reopen its doors on March 15. The community space off of Rio Road closed their doors in late January amid a surge in cases. An email from Center executive director Peter Thompson said vigilance will still be required.

“Not everyone has received a vaccination, and uncertainty surrounding coronavirus variants remains,” Thompson wrote. “To safeguard against complacency, we are adding a few new protocols to ensure the safest possible environment in which to enjoy our many programs.”

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners held their final meeting before groundbreaking will take place for the first new public housing units to be built in a generation.

Jay Kessler has been working as the project manager on behalf of the CRHA in a position known as “owner’s representative.” Riverbend Development is the private partner under an LLC called the Affordable Housing Group.

“And in this case, the owner is different than my normal clients because it really is AHG, it’s CRHA, and it’s PHAR,” Kessler said. “Owners have a significant role to play in the success of their design and construction projects. I bring a 35-year construction background.”

Kessler said he had no prior experience working on projects that trigger regulations from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Kessler said actual work at South First Street began on February 8.

“Right now they are working on getting erosion and sediment control set up, getting security fencing up, getting signs and banners up so people know what’s going on if they drive by on if they are not familiar with it,” Kessler said.

The first building pad will be ready in April, followed by significant construction activities. The work is expected to be complete in June 2022.

Kessler said the Crescent Halls renovations are not as close to construction and negotiations are still underway for a contract price with GMH Construction. He said he hoped the project could close by the first week of March with construction beginning in mid-April and concluding toward the the end of 2022.

“We had hoped to be there at the end of last week but didn’t quite get to where we have a final contract in place,” Kessler said. “Their plan is to start on the re-roofing of the building once the 8th floor is vacant so that we don’t have too much noise for residents living there.”

Kessler said the construction schedule depended on enough residents volunteering to be temporarily relocated to other units within the building and that CRHA had enough verbal commitments to proceed.

“There will be challenges with it being occupied during the renovations but that’s had a lot of discussion, a lot of planning,” Kessler said.

The cost of both projects have increased due to a scarcity of building materials, which has resulted in an increase in costs.

“That’s definitely an issue on South First Street, but I know our contractor Breeden Construction factored in the cost risk into their contract so if the market changes, they are at that risk, not us, not the owner,” Kessler said.

The occasion was noted by Joy Johnson of the Public Housing Association of Residents, who recently won the Dolbeare Lifetime Service Award from the National Low-Income Housing Coalition for her work in laying the groundwork for affordable housing reform in the city.

“The work that PHAR and myself has done, and to see those 63 units getting ready to go up and to see Crescent Halls getting ready…. ...to be able to see that to me I am just very thankful,” Johnson said.

The CRHA will have a work session on the agency’s capital budget on Thursday. It’s been postponed twice due to recent inclement weather.

Last night, a community meeting was held for a special use permit for a 60-acre utility-scale solar facility near Batesville. Sun Tribe Solar is applying for the 8-megawatt project on behalf of the Central Virginia Electric Cooperative, which purchased the property last year. Supervisors updated the zoning code to allow such facilities with a special use permit.

Bobby Jocz is a permitting lead with Sun Tribe Solar.

“Once the life of this facility is complete, the site will be restored to its original condition,” Jocz said.

Neighbors had the opportunity to ask questions about the project. Paul Miller is a resident of Craigs Store Road, where the site would be located.

“I’m in general in favor of solar development, but I’m not so sure about this particular location when I look at opportunities for development on top of buildings in urban areas,” Miller said.

Miller asked if there could be opportunities for sheep to be able to graze on the property. Miller and others also expressed concern about outdoor lighting at the facility given concerns about preserving the dark sky.

Mark Tueting also lives on Craigs Store Road and he is concerned on the visual impacts for the years before vegetated landscaping grows in. He also had a question about whether this would be a “substantial detriment”

“I’m excited solar and they’ve been really good to work with and they’ve talked about letting my son keep running his sheep there, but I have to worry about property values, too,” Tueting said. “I think most of us who live in the area said we wanted to live in a rural area. We know we probably wouldn’t have bought here if there was a power plant next door.”

Bill Fritz with Albemarle’s Community Development Department said there is a high bar to stop a project based on the claims for “substantial detriment.”

“Substantial detriment that planners use is that the impact is such a severe impact that it denies the right to use another property,” Fritz said. “For example, if I have a use that generates a massive amount of odor, and I am next to a restaurant, I have effectively made it so that restaurant cannot operate. That would be a substantial detriment. The mere fact it can be seen would not be a substantial detriment.”

However, Fritz said there are three other factors staff will review while it conducts its review.

“It may not be a substantial detriment but it might be inconsistent with the character of the area,” Fritz said. The project will next go to the Planning Commission for a recommendation followed by the Board of Supervisors.

Watch the whole video of the community meeting on YouTube.

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What is 10 times 15? What about 1,200 divided by eight? 75 plus 75? The answer is 150, which is also the correct response to how many times now has there been an episode of Charlottesville Community Engagement. It is February 22, 2021 and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs. Thank you for reading, and please let me know what you think.

On today’s show:

Events could return to the Charlottesville Pavilion this summer if the pandemic recedes

Charlottesville City Council will wait to make final decisions on proposed capital improvement program projects, keeping West Main Streetscape project alive

City Council hires local law firm to represent its interest in upcoming legal hearing on recreational uses at the Ragged Mountain Natural Area

To begin today’s show, some news that came in as we got closer to production. Charlottesville’s Commonwealth Attorney has opted to not begin a criminal investigation into whether Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker’s use of a city-issued credit card to purchase gift cards for people who attended various meetings. In a letter to City Manager Chip Boyles, Joe Platania wrote that an investigation will not happen until after the city updates a policy that governs use of the cards. Read more about the story on NBC29, which first reported the letter. Council will discuss the policy at a future work session. (read the letter)

The prospect of the West Main Streetscape being implemented is still alive as City Council still wants more information about how the project could be salvaged. The project was split into four phases in order to secure funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation, but staff has recommended not fully funding the project.

Council has not made several final decisions about the proposed $160 million Capital Improvement Program for the next fiscal year and the four years that come after it. That amount also includes $8 million for a 300-space parking deck as well as a $50 million placeholder for reconfiguration of the city’s middle schools.

“There certainly is a lot of unknowns when we think about going into the future of the CIP especially when we think about schools and not knowing the scope of what they’re going to be [doing],” said City Councilor Heather Hill. “And also thinking about the parking deck situation and what options we may have.”

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he felt the city was at a point where it should proceed with West Main Street in a fashion similar to Council voting to proceed with the pedestrianization of East Main Street in 1974.

“The more I have thought about it, the more I have thought the future of the city is going to be along the axis between downtown and the University and we ought to be spending our time, our energy, and our resources on that area,” Snook said.

Snook said he was less inclined to support the parking garage.

Mayor Walker said budget staff have been clear that the city is running into its debt capacity and the city should proceed cautiously.

“I just don’t know how we are rating West Main Street and still thinking that is a must and that it must continue at this time when we’re talking about things like housing and schools,” Walker said.

Snook said he has been persuaded by arguments that at least $3 million in maintenance improvements are needed on West Main Street.

Councilor Hill said believed the city has made an investment in West Main and should see the project through.

“The biggest thing is just the other dollars coming from other sources that are not the city, and there’s not a lot of projects where we find those opportunities,” Hill said.

Those external sources include $5 million from the University of Virginia and the potential $10.8 million in VDOT Smart Scale funds for Phase 3 of the West Main Streetscape. Phases 1 and 2 require a local match in order for the city to draw down Smart Scale Funds and revenue-sharing funds already approved.

“I’m really struggling with just closing the door on this,” Hill said.

The draft CIP contains a placeholder of $50 million in FY24 for the school reconfiguration.

Walker said would prefer to keep some of the debt capacity available for future needs.

“If we okay West Main at this point, we are limiting schools to an amount because we are boxing ourselves in,” Walker said. “And then everything else that comes up as a result of this pandemic and how long we’re in it, then we are also restricting ourselves there.”

Councilor Michael Payne said he supported the vision of the West Main project, but could not support prioritizing that over schools or affordable housing. He said he would support the city paying for the bare minimum and losing some of the Smart Scale funding due to the debt capacity issue.

“We’re in the same situation where we could eliminate our city funding of West Main Street, and the parking garage, and we still even then wouldn’t be that close to getting our CIP budget on a sustainable level,” Payne said. He also said he would like to continue conversations with the School Board about the reconfiguration project due the large amount of money required to pay for the capital costs.

A firm is working with the school board to further refine the cost estimates for school reconfiguration. There was also interest in getting more information about various scenarios for West Main, including incorporating some of the results of a recent value engineering study. Councilor Snook had this idea.

“One of my thoughts is that we have a brand new city manager, and let’s let him put his creative thoughts to work and see if he’s got some ideas for us,” Snook said.

City Manager Chip Boyles said he would have a conversation with VDOT about when Phase 1 and Phase 2 need to get underway to stay within the six-year deadline required of Smart Scale. Jack Dawson, the city engineer, said the right of way phase is expected to begin this July to keep the project on VDOT’s schedule.

“There is some urgency about what direction we think we may need to go in, sooner or later, for sure,” Dawson said.

Vice Mayor Sena Magill said she would support reducing the scope of the project.

“What can we do with just the revenue-sharing match?” Magill asked. “There’s a lot extra that is on top of what we need for our revenue-sharing match.”

Council agreed to wait on a final decision on West Main until they have more information on options. David Brown is the city’s public works director.

“We do have some time to where we can look and evaluate to make a determination,” Brown said. “For the project, we can evaluate and make an assessment, rescope the project that still meets the requirements of the funding sources so we still have that opportunity.”

Boyles said he would prepare options for Council to consider.

“We can get enough information to come back to you with some concepts and maybe even some recommendations and staff can continue to keep working forward,” Boyles said. “It won’t be that much wasted effort based on whatever your decision is in later March or April.”

The FY22 operating and capital budget will be presented to Council on March 1. The first public hearing is scheduled for March 15. Budget adoption will be roughly a month later.

Council had also discussed the future of capital funding for a 300-space parking structure, but took no action on whether $8 million in funding should be included for the project. The topic also came up at a meeting earlier on February 16 of the Charlottesville Parking Advisory Panel that featured an update on the city's Parking Action Plan. Rick Siebert was hired as the city's first parking manager in the fall of 2016 to implement a plan.

"This was originally a five-year plan that expired in 2020 and we've been talking about how we might change some of the objectives for the next five years," Siebert said.

This plan was intended to "optimize existing resources," "enhance access alternatives", and "maintain and grow supply." The plan called for a pilot program for parking meters on streets close to the Downtown Mall, but the project did not last for the initial six-month testing period.

There wasn’t a lot of back and forth at this meeting about the plan, or what a future plan might look like.

Kirby Hutto, general manager of the Charlottesville Pavilion and parking panel member, said tourism is a major part of economic development for downtown.

“I can tell you that the majority of our patrons are not residents of Charlottesville,” Hutto said. “They’re coming in from the outlying counties and sometimes coming in from a hundred miles away. They’re going to drive. I’m sorry. There is nothing that is going to put them on public transportation but if we want their revenue, if we want those tax dollars, we have to be able to accommodate them.”

Siebert said parking levels are beginning to rebound and are at about fifty percent of pre-COVID levels. The majority are people with monthly passes, but about a fifth are hourly parkers.

“Events were major drivers in our transient revenue and the lack of events has been felt,” Siebert said.

The Charlottesville Pavilion canceled its entire season last year, and planning is underway to at least think about scheduling something in the near future as community health targets are met. The idea would be to open up gradually with a percentage of total capacity.

“We’re starting to see glimmers of light,” Hutto said. “There’s a group of venue managers from around the state including a lot of the big boys like Kings Dominion, Richmond Raceway, and Hampton Coliseum, JPJ, that have put together what I think is a really well-thought out reopening plan that is tied to milestones that you can actually track and see. You know, vaccination percentage of the general public. New infections reported. Those two numbers. As the first one climbs and the second one declines, they’ve got a proposal and my understanding this in front of the Governor’s task force right now.

Hutto said that might mean events at the Pavilion as early as June, but agents with nationally touring acts are not planning until returning to tours until the fall.

“No one is asking for dates in June and July,” Hutto said. “Everyone is asking for dates in September and October.”

In a conversation I had with Siebert today, he said a draft of the Parking Action Plan will be ready by the end of the week for future discussion by the panel and other stakeholders slated for after that time.

Also at their meeting on February 16, Council was briefed on a plan to remedy the city’s noncompliance with a mandate from the Department of Housing and Urban Development to spend previously funding on a timely basis. Erin Atak is the city’s grants coordinator.

“City staff had identified an immediate program for funding to solve the city’s timeliness concerns by May 2,” Atak said. “The city has unexpended 2019 [Community Development Block Grant] entitlement funds totaling $244,950.82 from the delayed Belmont /Franklin sidewalk activity.”

That project came about when Belmont was the city’s Priority Neighborhood but has not moved forward due to COVID as well as difficulty securing space for the project.

“Right now we’re having a lot of issues achieving right of way,” Atak said. “We have reached out ot the Belmont-Carlton Neighborhood Association and the Belmont CDBG Task Force with help on this and they are pretty motivated to help.”

Atak has recommended that the money instead be used for COVID-relief programs and the sidewalk project would be financed by the federal government again in the future. A previously approved rental relief program for public housing residents will now get the additional funds in the short-term.

This item will be included on the consent agenda for the March 1 Council meeting.

Finally today, at the end of Council’s meeting on February 16, Councilor Heather Hill read from a motion to hire outside legal counsel to represent the city in an upcoming trial.

“I move to authorize the acting city attorney to authorize the law firm of Zunka, Milnor, and Carter to represent the city in connection with the courts hearing of all the pending motions scheduled for March 1, 2021 in the litigation with Albemarle County over recreational uses at Ragged Mountain Reservoir,” Hill said.

For background, after the expansion of the Ragged Mountain Reservoir, the city’s parks and recreation assumed management of the trails from the Ivy Creek Foundation and moved forward with a plan to allow to bike trails. Albemarle County officials objected and cited a provision in the county’s ordinance that allowed them to block that use. The matter resulted in a lawsuit that will go to trial after previous attempts at mediation failed.

(2/28/2021) - Some follow up reporting discovered that there had been a hearing date scheduled for March 8, not March 1. That hearing has since been delayed. For more information on this lawsuit, visit this link on cvillepedia.

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We’re now at a point in this murky pandemic where one thing is clear - uncertainty about the future is a commonly held concern. This week, Albemarle and Charlottesville both reported one-day records as a second local surge hit due in part to the arrival of UVA students from across the country to begin in-person instruction. On this Saturday, February 20 edition of the Charlottesville Community Engagement Newcast and Newsletter, we hear the response from the University of Virginia as a Town Hall held Friday afternoon.

We’ll also check in with officials at UVA Health and hear a statement from the Blue Ridge Health District related to long lines this past Wednesday at the vaccination clinic at the former K-Mart. The idea of this newsletter is intended to make things a little less murky as you make your decisions about your life in the days, weeks, and months to come.

Before we begin today, a quick look at the numbers from the Virginia Department of Health. Statewide, new cases in the Commonwealth are dropping and the seven-day average is now at 2,055 a day. That average was 3,035 last Saturday and 6,149 on January 20. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is now at 8.2 percent. Down from 13.5 percent a month ago.

But locally, the Blue Ridge Health District has experienced its highest-ever number of new cases this week with 936 since Sunday. The majority of those cases were in Albemarle and Charlottesville. The city had 80 new cases on Wednesday, 99 cases on Thursday, 107 on Friday before going back down to 60 today. That matches the the one-day high for all of 2020 on September 18, which was the last time UVA students returned to in-person instruction.

Before we get to the Town Hall, a few more facts to keep in mind. There have been 117 fatalities in the Blue Ridge Health District, and no new deaths have been reported since February 11. Two-thirds of the 12,668 cases in the district have been contracted by people under the age of 50, yet only two of the 117 fatalities are from people below that that age, and those two individuals were in their forties. More than three quarter of those deaths have been from people over the age of 70.

The University recognized the concern in the Charlottesville community and held a town hall Friday. Jim Ryan is the UVA president. (watch the town hall)

“On Tuesday, we enacted temporary restrictions designed to slow the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19,” Ryan said. “Our hope is to lift these restrictions by the end of next week but that will depend on what we see over the next several days.”

These include a ban on in-person gatherings and encouraging students both on and off campus to stay at home. In-person instruction remains open, as do research activities. The restrictions were intended to stave off potential holiday-related gatherings.

“It was Mardi Gras, the next day was a day off from classes, and we thought students would be getting together that night,” Ryan said. “This was not a decision we made lightly and it was a decision informed by the unanimous advice of our medical doctors.”

The town hall was intended to respond to allegations that the spike was increased by fraternal organization who held in-person recruitment activities this year. That didn’t happen in the fall, when those activities were not permitted. Ryan said the increase was not related to these activities.

“The positive cases so far have been distributed across the entire student population and include students living both on-Grounds and off-Grounds, undergraduate and graduate students, and students affiliated with a large number of groups,” Ryan said.

Ryan said research into the cases did not single out one of those groups, but contact tracing appears to indicate a general trend of people not adhering to the rules.

“This doesn’t mean that all students who contracted the virus were being intentional scofflaws flouting the restrictions,” Ryan said. “Instead the picture is a lot more complicated with some students who were undoubtedly ignoring health and safety protocols and others who made innocent and understandable mistakes or simply let their guards down which many of us if we’re honest, myself included, have done over the course of the last year.”

Ryan said fraternity and sorority rush contributed to the cases, but were not the entire cause of the spike.

“We should be aware of and reject a single simplistic narrative where there’s one villain or one villainous group to blame,” Ryan said. “The fact is that there are multiple causes across a range of groups and individuals. Some were willful and others far more innocent.”

Ryan said the UVA administration did not have the ability to ban the recruitment events without imposing a total ban on all organizations from having any meetings. During his interlude, he said the University did not want to become a totalitarian state.

“This was another situation where we are trying sincerely to strike the right balance between freedom and trust on the one hand, and complete control on the other,” Ryan said. “If we got that balance wrong, I’m sorry, and please lay the blame at my feet as I’m ultimately responsible.”

Ryan implored students and faculty to obey the rules to avoid continued restrictions to avoid community spread.

Now, how can we track that going forward? Since last August, UVA has had a COVID dashboard with cases that has results from all of the various testing methods under way. When this is reported every weekday at 4 p.m. it gives a first look at transmission rates related to the UVA. These cases later show up on the Virginia Department of Health dashboard, which is updated daily.

Dr. Mitch Rossner is the chair of the UVA Department of Medicine.

“The COVID-tracker has probably the most up to date data that you’ll see,” Rossner said. “Some of the other data that’s reported in other venues may lag up to several days behind that.”

Another item tracked on the UVA COVID dashboard is the number of available rooms for quarantine and isolation. Also, hospitalizations.

“Thankfully the number of new hospitalizations in the last couple of weeks has also come down,” Rossner said. “Also, thankfully we have not seen any students developing serious illnesses or requiring hospitalization.”

Dr. Rossner said the presence of the COVID variants will present new challenges and will likely infect those who do not follow protocols.

“It’s a good wake-up call for all of us,” Dr. Rossner. “Have you edged closer to six feet? Had that mask slipped below your nose? Really it points out that despite pandemic fatigue, it’s really not the time to be slacking off on these public health measures.”

The current restrictions will remain in place through February 26 and will be re-evaluated next week.

The first question at the town hall was about enforcement. Dean of Students Allen Grove said UVA officials did issue sanctions on some individuals last year.

“For well over 50 years, the Board of Visitors at the University has delegated the authority to discipline students for violation of the standards of conduct to students through the University Judiciary Committee,” Groves said. “Our office investigates reports and complaints and then files with the University Judiciary Committee and they have a hearing and sanction. The violation must be shown beyond a reasonable doubt for a sanction to be imposed. We do have in our office the authority to interim suspend a student for an egregious violation and we did impose a number of those in the fall.”

The website for the student-run UJC states that the body heard 9 cases involving 43 violations of COVID policy, but Groves said those numbers are now out of date as official hearings were not held until January.

“We have brought cases for COVID violations against a number of individual students and also student organizations including five of our fraternities,” Groves said.

A major concern is that these student cases will lead to transmission to the broader Charlottesville community. Infectious disease expert Dr. Costi Sifri has been leading up UVA’s interaction with the Blue Ridge Health District to explain how they will know if that occurs.

“We work closely with contact tracers to understand what the interactions are between students and with the community at large and to have those understandings,” Sifri said. “There are parts of the UVA community that have overlap with the rest of the community and as part of that contact tracing effort we are here to work to make sure that we have effective mitigation strategies in place. And of course it’s really important to have active lines of communication between the Department of HEalth and with the contact tracers and those of us who have this public health role for the university.”

Dr. Taison Bell is a critical care specialist at UVA who was named by Business Insider magazine last year as one of its 30 Leaders Under 40 Changing Healthcare. He said the COVID crisis has had the potential to improve community health for many in the area.

“Being a good partner to the community means that we are using the community leaders that have been doing a lot of the work that’s been taking place before COVID-19 and really using them to really reach their community,” Dr. Bell said. “And in particular, changing the model of medicine where we actually go into communities is really the name of the game when it comes to COVID-19 when it comes to public health messaging and making sure people have the resources they need and ultimately getting the vaccine rolled out.”

To close out this segment, let’s hear President Ryan ask one of the questions.

“Mitch, I think this one is for you,” Ryan said. “Why do we have faith that we’ll not get a resurgence of cases the moment restrictions are lifted.”

“Well, part of the basis of restrictions is really to flatten the curve, but after we flatten the curve, the key thing is really going to be for all of us to maintain that vigilance, those public health measures going forward,” Dr. Rossner said. “That’s going to be the critical thing. This is not a short-term ‘wear your mask for the end of the week and then when the case numbers look better we can go back to business as usual.’ This is really a wake-up call for us that we have to to really adhere to these health measures on a continuous basis. If we do that we can be successful, but flattening the curve this next week or so is really to get those case numbers down and get us back into a position where we can be successful.”

In the meantime, vaccinations continue, despite logistical issues like the one experience this week at the Blue Ridge Health District.

“We’ve provided over 40,000 vaccine doses since the onset of our vaccine efforts and at this point I think around 25 percent or more of all citizens in Charlottesville have been vaccinated with at least one dose and it’s around 15 percent or higher in Albemarle,” Dr. Sifri said. “We are trying to be the lever-arm for the health district to roll out the vaccine for our region.”

(this is the point of the written newsletter where I remind you this is also a podcast)

In almost a year of pandemic coverage, one thing I’ve been struck by is the sheer amount of research that takes place in the UVA Health System. One item that struck my eye this week was the release of a paper that found that only two percent of Virginians had COVID-19 antibodies in their blood as of mid-August. That could mean that “herd immunity” is a long way off. Dr. Eric Houpt is the chief of UVA Health’s Division of Infection Diseases and International Health.

“It was a broad survey of about 5,000 people in Virginia to see how many have been exposed to COVID-19,” Dr. Houpt said. “If you do some mathematical calculations you can project where we are today and that would project that we’re at about 15 to 20 percent that have been exposed to COVID-19 in Virginia.”

Dr. Houpt said the virus will have a harder time spreading when 60 to 80 percent of the population have antibodies.

Blood samples were taken from people from five locations across Virginia who were visiting the doctor for routine reasons and not for COVID.

“About two out of three of the positive individuals that had antibodies had been exposed to COVID-19 [but] had never had any symptoms at all,” Dr. Houpt said. “That’s in keeping with other findings. Some studies find 40 percent, some 50 percent asymptomatic.”

Dr. Houpt said the results mean it is likely that most Virginians are still susceptible to the virus, and public health measures such as mask wearing in public should be the norm for the foreseeable future. He also said this means people should get the vaccine as soon as they are able.

“We still have a long way to go,” Dr. Houpt said. “The best way to get there for sure is through vaccination.”

The study will be repeated in the summer. For more on the work, read the press release on the UVA health site.

The antibody study came up at the weekly COVID briefing by UVA Health, which was held Friday morning. Dr. Sifri participated on that call as well.

“There remains many people who are susceptible to infection and I think [the study] really emphasizes the importance of the vaccination program

One concern is that the U.K. and South African variants may provide challenges to the vaccines. Dr. Sifri recommends people get the vaccines anyway.

“It’s really important to keep in mind that the Johnson and Johnson vaccine and others that have been looked at in South Africa appear to protect against severe disease, hospitalizations, and deaths,” Dr. Sifri said. “So while it may be less effective it also appears that these vaccines do offer protection against the most important outcomes for COVID protection.”

Governor Northam has asked all school divisions across Virginia to plan for at least some return to in-person instruction in the near future. Charlottesville plans a four-day return to school on March 8 for pre-K through 6th students whose families have requested in-person instruction, as well as middle and high school students identified as needing face-to-face support. Albemarle County is currently at Stage 3 learning and will move to Stage 4 learning on March 15, which means four-days a week for pre-K through 3rd grade and two-days a week for 4th through 12th grade.

Some families have expressed concern that the latest spike in cases might put those plans in jeopardy.

“What we’ve learned over this past year and it’s really been highlighted lately by the CDC is that in-classroom instruction can occur in a safe manner, safe for the students and safe for the teachers,” Dr. Sifri said. “It has to be done thoughtfully and appropriately with attention to social distancing, mask wearing, hand hygiene, and the air handling systems and those HVAC types of issues in schools. If there is close attention to those, schools can reopen.”

Dr. Sifri said in Virginia, vaccination of K-12 teachers is a priority, which he said would provide an extra layer of protection, but that the community health protocols should still be used.

“The advice and recommendations have not changed,” Dr. Sifri said. “If you’ve been vaccinated, still we should continue to wear masks for several important reasons. The first is that while the vaccines are very effective for the widely circulating strains, 95 percent protective. 95 percent isn’t quite 100 percent. It’s close and outstanding, but not 100 percent.”

Dr. Sifri said the second reason is that it’s theoretically possible that someone vaccinated can still be a carrier.

“The third I think important reason is to understand that not everybody knows, we don’t know who does or who does not have a COVID vaccine in our community so if you’re not wearing a mask in a place where people are not aware that you have been vaccinated, that could lead to significant concerns to other people that you are perhaps endangering their health and safety.”

Dr. Sifri said the day may come soon when this advice changes as more is known about vaccine performance.

“That’s of course at a time when I think we have a lot more people vaccinated but I think we can look forward to that day so at least for now I think we need to continue to wear a mask,” he said.

Finally today, the Blue Ridge Health District put out a statement on its Facebook page on Thursday explaining what happened on Wednesday at its vaccination clinic. The full details are available on the Facebook page, but some highlights are worth clipping out.

“The clinic was intended for 400 hundred individuals ages 65+ that live in Albemarle County, certain essential workers, and those who were on Saturday’s waitlist for a vaccine clinic for communities of color,” reads the statement.

That Saturday clinic had to be postponed due to inclement weather.

Participants for the Wednesday clinic were selected from the surveys BRHD have issued and sent a link to the new registration system created by the Virginia Department of Health known as PrepMod.

“The PrepMod link for scheduling appointments was widely shared throughout the community, despite our request not to share the link,” the statement continued. “Thus, there was an overwhelming number of people not invited to the clinic who scheduled an appointment, leading to a limited amount of appointments for those who were actually invited.”

Despite long lines and having to turn some people away, the BRHD administered nearly four times more doses than expected in a 14-hour period.

“We are proud to have vaccinated 1,500 people yesterday with zero doses going to waste,” the statement reads. “Of the 1,500, 210 represent individuals who are now fully vaccinated.”

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Many happy landings today as we wait to find out if another rover will successfully land on Mars after another “seven minutes of terror.” It’s Thursday, February 18, 2021 and the following is another installment of “several minutes of information” or as I’ve called it for nearly 150 times now, the Charlottesville Community Engagement Newscast and Newsletter.Support for today’s show comes not from a Patreon-fueled shout-out, but instead from a donation from the Valley Research Center. Experts there have concocted the following introduction for my consideration. I want you to let me know if you think it works?

On today’s show:

Albemarle County Planning Commission takes action on a form-based code the intersection of Rio Road and U.S. 29

The Albemarle County Economic Development Authority gets an update on assessments, the economy, and more

More homes coming to Greene County

Small business group wants to help beverage producers with marketing

Eleven months into the pandemic, and Albemarle and Charlottesville have set one-day records today for new COVID cases. There are 99 reported in Charlottesville and 135 reported in Albemarle. Yesterday, the UVA COVID-tracker listed 229 new cases, and it is likely some of those cases are reflected in today’s health district numbers.

Yesterday, the UVA Health System announced their intent to make a full purchase of the Novant Health UVa Health System, which includes hospitals in Culpeper, Haymarket and Prince William. UVA will buy out Novant’s 40 percent share. The three facilities have a total of 260 inpatient beds, which would bring the UVA Health Systems’ total to over a thousand. The move is included within the University of Virginia’s overall strategic plan for 2030. The deal is expected to close by July 1.

The Albemarle County Economic Development Authority has entered into a job creation agreement with Afton Scientific for that company’s expansion.

Afton Scientific manufactures pharmaceuticals that are sterile and digestible and has around 60 employees. Their products include therapies for cystic fibrosis, immune diseases, and breast cancer. Tom Thorp, the firm’s CEO, told the EDA about a probiotic for infants that Afton Scientific is working on.

“That will get rolled out nationwide, and it’s very exciting,” Thorp said. “A lot of major companies are going to be backing that and we’ll be making that at our third facility. What we do is we take the ingredients and we mix it up and we sterilize it and put in these vials and cap and crimp it and give it back to the customer.”

The company is in the midst of a $500,000 expansion that will add 20 new jobs with an average wage of $48,500. Afton Scientific recently received a Virginia Jobs Investment Program grant that will provide the company with a bonus of $750 per job. Albemarle is adding an additional $10,000, or $500 per job, with that funding coming through the EDA. The members voted unanimously to approve the deal with one member abstaining due to a conflict of interest.

Next, the EDA got an update on the county’s real estate assessments for 2021. Commercial properties declined an average of 5.5 percent in Albemarle, according to assessor Peter Lynch.

“Hotels were kind of the properties that were affected the worse in their valuation because of the pandemic with shopping centers only slightly behind them,” Lynch said. “We have found that so far medical office and office buildings are adversely affected but really the long term effect on that is still to be seen.”

After Lynch’s presentation, county economist Steve Allshouse gave a look at the county’s economic future, though he cautioned forecasts are difficult in this time period.

“Everything is being driven by the pandemic and typically when economists do forecasting they like to look at historical data,” Allshouse said. “Well, the problem is we don’t have a lot of historical data dealing with the economy in pandemics and in fact you have to go back to 1918 to the Spanish Flu pandemic to find any data that might be instructive.”

Allshouse said the local economy has bright spots, including a relatively low unemployment rate as well as data that shows the total number of jobs in the county appears to have increased after an initial loss of ten percent of jobs in the early days of the pandemic.

“What I’m thinking currently, for the quarter that ended in December, is that we most likely gained back about 40 percent, maybe a little more,” Allshouse said.

Allshouse said the recovery will likely be slow especially as the path forward with the pandemic remains unclear. Part of this relates to consumer confidence in the economy but part of it relates to uncertainty in many households.

“There are still people hurting in this recession and its aftermath so when I talk about consumer confidence going up, I just want people to be aware that I’m aware that not everybody is feeling confident,” Allshouse said.

Allshouse said the savings rates are up on aggregate, but this does not capture the experience of all Americans.

“A lot of people are saving and also their property values to get back to Peter’s point locally have gone up and also with recent increases in the last several quarters in the U.S. equities market, a lot of people’s net worth has gone up,” Allshouse said. “But again I have to heavily caveat these statements by saying not everyone own’s stocks, not everyone has a 401K savings plan, not everybody owns a house, so again, there are large swaths of the population that have not seen their household net worth go up.”

Another factor to consider is the migration of people to this community from elsewhere who bring their jobs with them during a time of remote work.

You can watch the full meeting on the county’s YouTube channel.

A statewide business group wants to help area beverage producers get their drinks to more customers. The Virginia Small Business Development Center is working with Cureate Courses to offer a free six-week program intended to "speed up the growth of existing food and beverage producers in Central Virginia." The program is open to companies in both the Shenandoah Valley and Central Virginia who are seeking to grow. Applications are being taken through March 8. (apply)

J.T. Newberry with the county’s economic development office encouraged businesses to apply.

“Agribusiness and food production is one of the county’s targeted industries,” Newberry said.

On Tuesday, the Albemarle Planning Commission held a public hearing on a new zoning overlay district created by staff for the area around the intersection of U.S. 29 and Rio Road. The idea is to encourage the redevelopment of single-story shopping centers into a more urban form. The form-based code would be optional and would allow for more square feet in a structure. Rachel Falkenstein is a planning manager with the county.

“The application process for development under form-based code would look pretty similar to a by-right development process that we have today with a couple of small tweaks,” Falkenstein said. “The first is that we are requiring a pre-application meeting for applications under the form based code where we could discuss topics with the applicant such as the location of streets and civic spaces and any unique site characteristics.”

Some Commissioners wanted the code to have more incentives in place to encourage property owners to actually take advantage of it.

“Without those incentives being identified and clarified, what motivation is there for the private sector given that the form-based code is optional?” asked Commissioner Rick Randolph, who served on the Board of Supervisors from 2016 to 2019.

Commissioner Karen Firehock also encouraged staff to work on creating incentives. She also thought the code should not require or prioritize that roofs be pitched.

“We don’t want everything to look the same and the main point I want to make is that flat roofs allow us to have green roofs,” Firehock said. “There are many green roofs that are designed with benches and gardens and even places to have a picnic lunch.”

Commissioner Jennie More represents the White Hall District which includes Crozet. She said there could be an opportunity for this area to absorb more residential population through redevelopment.

“I guess I’m just putting this out there as you move through this process is, are we asking enough from this area that is so much different from downtown Crozet?” More asked.

That could mean higher buildings, which have been opposed by some nearby residents in the plan’s development. Commissioner Tim Keller would support taller buildings.

“I understand the heights were lowered because of community involvement earlier on, but I do think that this is a place with the combination of its proximity to the University of Virginia and the city center and its location where it is in an area that is seeing such major redevelopment that incentives that would allow higher structures and maybe that’s part of the answer,” Keller said.

Commission Chair Julian Bivens said he thought the project would be more prone to failure if the county cannot make sizable investments in the infrastructure needed for an urban area.

“If our Supervisors really want that intersection to take off, then we’re going to have to figure out a way to sort of come in there and put some things in place and perhaps become serious partners with some of the landowners,” Bivens said.

The Commission voted to unanimously to recommend approval of the form-based code and it will go next to the Board of Supervisors.

In the next installment of the show, we’ll have a quick report on the Rio Road Corridor study that will soon be underway. There’s a lot going on in this community.

Finally today, the Greene County Board of Supervisors last week approved a zoning amendment that allows Southern Development’s construction of two new neighborhoods to move forward. A previous board in 2012 rezoned land just north of the Albemarle County border for the Creekside and the Village of Preddy Creek. If fully built out, the two areas would bring about 1,000 new homes. The original rezoning required a connector road to be built prior to construction, but the amendment acknowledged that the Virginia Department of Transportation is now building the road. Read Terry Beigie’s story in the Greene County Record for the details.

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On today’s program:

Officials with the Blue Ridge Health District lay out details for new statewide registration process

Charlottesville still projecting a shortfall in the current year’s budget

University of Virginia bans in-person gatherings

Today’s newscast is being completed while there are reports of long lines at the mass vaccination clinic at the Blue Ridge Health District. In a few minutes, we’ll hear from people from officials with the district, but I’ve been sent photos of long lines and reports of people who have been waiting for hours. More on that as I can get questions answered.

Update: The Blue Ridge Health District sent out this statement around the time of publication.

The first shot administered in the Blue Ridge Health District was given two months ago to Dr. Ebony Hilton and since then there has been progress despite a limited supply of vaccines. Ryan McKay is the policy director at BRHD and he spoke at a press conference on February 16.

“In our district, over 58,000 doses have been administered,” McKay said. “This includes vaccine that has been administered certainly by us at the Blue Ridge Health District. It also includes any other providers that are providing access to the vaccines so that would include Sentara Martha Jefferson and the University of Virginia Health System.”

Recent snow and ice lead to cancellations of vaccinations and with more ice on the way, they’re preparing for more disruption. Today’s long lines are not related to this, at least according to what McKay said yesterday.

“We had to reschedule appointments over the weekend related to weather-related issues which is also creating some of the scheduling issues that we’ve faced,” McKay said. “One thing we want to report now is that in anticipation of snow and what could be significant ice Thursday into Friday, we’re going to reschedule appointments on Thursday so anyone who has an appointment scheduled for Thursday will be rescheduled for Saturday and those who have appointments on Friday will be rescheduled for Monday.”

Speaking yesterday, Blue Ridge Health District officials acknowledged concerns about what has been perceived to be an inequitable distribution of the vaccine. Rebecca Schmidt is the district’s director of partnerships and strategic initiatives. She said the goal now is to ensure everyone has access to doses as more supply continues to flow into the district.

“We know that this system overall was not set up to be equitable,” Schmidt said. “But now we have a little more of an opportunity to plan for what an equitable policy might look like in our district. And I will say that we are not alone in this. Nationally, in communities across our country, everyone is really grappling with this really inherent challenge when you have limited supply of a vaccine how do you get it out to communities across our district who have very different needs?”

Schmidt said that will lead to the creation of more ways for people to get vaccinated.

“There shouldn’t just be one avenue or one way that you get access to vaccine,” Schmidt said. “There are likely going to be lots of different ways. We know that one size does not fit all.”

At today’s Board of Supervisor’s meeting, Liz Palmer mentioned vaccinations will be given at Yancey Community School this weekend in Esmont. Those slots are full, but it is an example of the kind of different event that will be held as the pandemic continues.

New system online

A new statewide registration system for vaccinations went online yesterday morning, and this includes a phone number people can call in either English and Spanish, with access to translators for other languages. Kathryn Goodman is the communications manager for the Blue Ridge Health District.

“As many of you know, our health district here has had multiple surveys going out for individuals who are 65 plus, those in Phase 1A and Phase 1B, 16 to 64 with high-risk medical conditions, etc,” Goodman said. “All of those surveys have now been transferred to the new statewide system. So the state system is intended for us to have a streamlined database so we can pull information for anyone in our community who needs to be vaccinated.”

I have questions out today to find out what went wrong today. Thank you to those who sent in photos.

As planning for mass vaccination continues, the pandemic continues to do what it does. There is a sudden spike today in the number of cases in the Blue Ridge Health District. District-wide there are another 173 cases reported today, with 80 reported from Charlottesville and 68 in Albemarle. These are the highest one-day number for both localities in for sometime, and quite possibly related to the return of the University of Virginia to in-person instruction on February 1.

The University of Virginia has banned all in-person gatherings through at least February 26. The UVA COVID tracker reported 121 new cases on Monday, which is the largest one-day total since the dashboard was launched last August. For more information, read coverage in the Cavalier Daily. Earlier in the month, that newspaper also reported that fraternities and sororities were preparing for in-person gatherings. I highly recommend reading the Cavalier Daily when you can.

Charlottesville City Council took action to bring its COVID-19 ordinance back into compliance with Governor Ralph Northam’s current state of emergency, which allows up to 25 spectators at sports gatherings. The city’s ordinance caps that at 10, whereas Albemarle County follows Virginia rules with the higher number of fans allowed. Councilor Lloyd Snook brought up the topic.

“We have three Little Leagues that are active,” Snook said. “They draw from both the city and the county. The confusion right now is that under at least some interpretations and the interpretation they’ve been using, although they are allowed to practice in the city, they are not allowed to play their games in the city.”

Council had the choice to either amend the city’s ordinance to bring the city’s definition of sporting events into line with Virginia’s or repeal the ordinance. Council chose the former on a 4-1 vote with Mayor Nikuyah Walker objecting out of concerns related to the potential for parks and recreation employees to be placed in harm’s way.

Charlottesville City Council received several reports yesterday afternoon, beginning with an update on the city’s financial forecast. Senior Budget Analyst Ryan Davidson said nothing much has changed since the last one in January. (forecast)

“We’re still looking at projecting our revenues to come in approximately $9.9 million lower than the FY21 adopted budget amount,” Davidson said.

For a sense of scale, that’s about five percent lower than expected. That’s largely due to a dramatic reduction in meals tax and transient lodging tax.

A possible solution to close the gap is to use the $6.7 million reserve Council agreed to set aside in the FY21 budget. In a normal year, that money would have gone to pay for certain items in the capital improvement program.

“It’s going to be and going to require an ongoing effort by everyone involved to manage the shortfall and we just need to continue to keep these figures in front of us as we’re continuing to make the decisions as we go through the fiscal year.”

Budgets in future fiscal years are influenced by decisions made now, such as capital projects. I’ll have more on that in a moment, but for now, there was also a bit of news about filling a vacancy on the Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board. Here’s Councilor Michael Payne.

“Unfortunately we have not been able to schedule interviews by tonight’s meeting but the Council has decided we will schedule those interviews for this week and hold a special meeting this week in order to make that final appointment,” Payne said.

There was also a long conversation about the credit card policy which I’ve clipped out for a future story that I hope to be able to get to later this week. There’s a chance I may just knit long soundbites into a podcast so people can hear the discussion in Councilor’s own words. This is issue is perhaps not as simple as you think, as at the heart of this conversation is one about community engagement. More on that later.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville’s Planning Commission was briefed last week on the affordable housing plan under development

There will be one new member of the Albemarle Supervisors next January

Albemarle’s greenhouse gas emissions inventory nearing completion

Charlottesville hands out $1 million in rental relief

Another banner year for conservation easements in the Northern Piedmont region

There will be at least one new person on the Albemarle Board of Supervisors when they convene for the first time in 2022. Supervisor Liz Palmer told members of the Albemarle County Democratic Party on Friday she will step down as the Samuel Miller District when her second term ends in December. Palmer was elected in 2013 when she defeated Republican Duane Snow, and defeated Republican John Lowry in 2017. No candidates have yet filed paperwork to run in the district, which covers southwest Albemarle County.

Both the Jack Jouett District and Rio District are also up for election this year. Neither Diantha McKeel or Ned Gallaway have announced their intentions. McKeel is in the final year of her second term and Gallaway is finishing his first.

Affordable housing in Charlottesville

This afternoon, Charlottesville City Council will get an update on the creation of an affordable housing plan that is at the heart of the ongoing Comprehensive Plan review. Last week, the Planning Commission was presented with a revised plan from officials with Rhodeside & Harwell and subcontractor HR&A Advisors. (revised plan)

“We had the draft plan that was available for public input,” said Sarah Kirk with HR&A. “We conducted a lot of engagement around that.”

Kirk said many changes were made to the language of the plan to make sure the words line up with its intent of bridging the “sizable affordable housing gap” while also addressing “historical patterns of segregation [that] persist throughout the City.”

“There were some places where the intent of the language that was being used or the intent of the recommendations weren’t really clear,” Kirk said. “So what we’ve really done is we’ve clarified language to make sure that we’re being explicit about what the recommendation is and how it will be implemented by the city.”

They’ve also added more information about tools to expand homeownership in the city.

“In addition we’ve added some additional detail about how the plan conserves vulnerable populations as well as address energy costs as part of housing affordability,” Kirk said.

The consultants also added more details on the recommendation for the city to invest $10 million a year in affordable housing.

“Really it’s $7 million of direct subsidy, most of it would be going through either the [Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund] or other allocations,” Kirk said. “$2 million of that is for tax relief which the city has already allocated. The city does needs to be spending funds on administration of these various housing programs and so we wanted to capture that here.”

Kirk said the document more clearly acknowledges existing projects already funded, including investments in redevelopment of city’s public housing sites and the redevelopment by Piedmont Housing Alliance of Friendship Court. There’s also a new section on how all of these ideas would be implemented. You can watch her presentation on the city’s Boxcast channel.

Council gets the report at 4 p.m. and will discuss the matter further at their meeting on March 1. The Cville Plans Together Initiative will meet with the Planning Commission again on February 23 with a discussion of a draft future land use map. Hosea Mitchell is chair of the Planning Commission.

“This is going to be a pretty critical meeting because this is where things fell apart before,” Mitchell said. “I’m hoping that you guys can get us over this huge speed bump.”

Also tonight, Council will be asked to give direction on the West Main Streetscape, a question that has been posed to them at multiple meetings over the years. For more on Council’s meeting tonight, check out the most recent installment of the Week Ahead newsletter. (the link)

Just before today’s newsletter was about to be produced, the City of Charlottesville sent out a press release announcing that the city’s Office of Economic Development disbursed $1 million in rent relief between last July and this January. The source of the money was the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund. A total of 353 households received funding with an average of $3,701 per household. (press release)

Climate action

Albemarle County is moving forward with the next phase of a Climate Action Plan. The Board of Supervisors adopted the plan last October. Greg Harper of the county’s Facilities and Environmental Services Department updated the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee.

“The Board did not want us to develop a paper document and put it on the shelf as they say,” Harper said. “They want a climate program and I think this was just the beginning of what is going to be a long-term, long-time program.”

Addressing climate change is one of Board’s strategic goals, which means programs to implement the plan’s objective to hit certain emissions reductions goals are likely to be funded.

“We’re supposed to have community emissions reduced by 45 percent [by 2030] and then by 2050 we should be achieving net zero emissions,” Harper said. “That means for all the emissions emits, carbon emissions and other greenhouse gases, we’re supposed to sequester or absorb an equal amount of emissions so that the net is zero. That’s basically what that means.”

Harper said the climate action plan is a set of strategies and actions that can be taken across multiple sectors to reduce the overall.

“There are 11 goals in the five sector categories,” Harper said. “Those broad goals are supported by 31 strategies and those 31 strategies are supported by 135 separate actions in the plan.”

Harper said the county is now moving into Phase 2 which includes an update of a greenhouse gas emissions inventory. Such work has not been done in over a decade.

“And it’s nearly complete, so I would be on the lookout in the next couple of months for 2018 greenhouse gas inventory for Albemarle County,” Harper said. “And it’s 2018 because we can’t do 2020 because we won’t have the data for 2020 for a couple of years unfortunately.”

Harper said the Climate Action Plan is intended to build on other county documents, including the Comprehensive Plan. For the full presentation, watch this portion of the Places29-Hydraulic meeting on the Albemarle County YouTube page.

A nonprofit group is celebrating another banner year for land conservation. The Piedmont Environmental Council has announced the placement of 5,287 acres of land in its nine-county region in 2020. That includes easements held by PEC as well as the Virginia Outdoors Foundation, local and state governments, and other land trusts.

“Every acre of protected land is land that helps prevent water pollution, preserve natural flood controls, promote groundwater recharge, and support local agriculture and carbon sequestration,” said Chris Miller, president of The Piedmont Environmental Council in a press release.

This year’s totals includes acquisition by the Albemarle County Easement Authority of 1,150 acres of land near Morven Farm. In all, over 2,000 acres in Albemarle added conservation easements last year. You can download more info from here to learn more about what happened in each of their counties.

Disclaimer: PEC is one of the sponsors of Town Crier Productions and I worked for them for a two-year period before launching this business to support my return to journalism. They have no editorial input in this or any other newsletter and I welcome their support.

Speaking of the Virginia Outdoors Foundation. They have awarded the Town of Scottsville an $80,000 preservation grant to help purchase 14.2 acres of wetlands for a future park. The goal is eventually to add walking trails in the area to expand the network in West Downtown. The VOF awarded the Nelson County Parks and Recreation Department $60,000 to create the first public access boat launch on the Rockfish River. For a full list of localities and organizations that will receive an award, visit the VOF’s website.

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Perhaps we sing about the weather outside being frightful at the wrong holiday, but this winter certainly has transformed the greater Charlottesville area into a bit of a wonderland. Fitting for Valentine’s Day! Charlottesville Community Engagement is here for February 14, 2021 to bring you another installment on the pandemic.

Today’s program is a gift from me to you for Valentine’s Day. I’ve dedicated my life to doing this work in order to help this community understand itself a little better, and I’m grateful to the universe for allowing me to be here at this time. My message here today is simply a hope today that this message finds you well. If not, then it’s a wish for a better tomorrow.

On today’s show:

Two variants of COVID-19 are now in Virginia

More on the vaccination roll-out including a concern CVS is not distributing through an equity lens

Lessons learned at UVA Health during the pandemic

Another newsletter, another set of pandemic numbers. All long-term indicators of community spread continue to trend downward at the state level. The seven-day average of positive PCR tests is now at 9.6 percent, down from 15.5 percent a month ago. Today the seven-day average for new cases dropped below 3,000 a day for the first time in over two months. However, one trend is for an increased number of cases in Charlottesville, with an average of 34 a day, with other indicators increasing.

But there is now evidence that new strains of COVID are here, throwing another uncertainty into the situation.

On Friday, the Virginia Department of Health announced that a person in eastern Virginia contracted what is known as the U.K. variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. They also identified the first case of what is known as the South African variant.

“A preliminary report from experts in the United Kingdom indicates that this variant causes more severe illness than other variants, but more studies are needed to confirm this finding,” reads the press release that went out Friday afternoon.

With the pandemic now at the 11 month mark, what does this mean for the pathway forward?

Dr. Danny Avula talked about the variants on a press call Friday afternoon held in his capacity as the vaccine coordinator for the Virginia Department of Health.

“We’re certainly paying close attention to the variant situation and I think the entire country and the entire world are in similar boats in the way that we approach this,” Dr. Avula said. “We don’t know what’s to come. We know right now that we in Virginia we’ve got evidence of both the B.1.1.7 and the B.1.3.5.1, the U.K. and the South African variants. We also know that these have presented a really significant issue in other countries.”

Avula said he spoke with colleagues from Israel last week who told him that the U.K. variant is now the dominant strain.

“Within two months of identifying the B.1.1.7 variant, it became their dominant strain and they were reporting last week anywhere from 70 to 80 percent of their new infections were the U.K. strain,” Avula said. “Our modelers down at the CDC say it will be the dominant strain here in the United States by the end of March.”

Dr. Avula said the vaccines still appear to be effective against the U.K. strain but more data is necessary to determine its efficacy against the South African strain. In the meantime, he encourages people to continue to be vigilant.

“I think what it does mean for Virginia is that we have to double down on all the core mitigation strategies like the masking and the distancing,” Dr. Avula said.

Dr. Avula said that means improving the vaccination system. We’ll hear more from him on that later.

Let’s now check in with the University of Virginia Health System. They also held a press briefing on Friday. Dr. Costi Sifri is an infectious disease expert.

“Variants are in the United States, they’re in Virginia,” Dr. Sifri said. “We don’t know exactly how many because we have not done a lot of genomic sequencing to understand how many there are and where they are located.”

Dr. Sifri said that will likely change over time and the public should be prepared.

“We would anticipate that we will see them in increasing amounts and as we know the CDC has predicted that is what we can anticipate seeing in the upcoming months,” Dr. Sifri said. “What we understand however from what’s occurred in Europe is that COVID precautions so what we really need to do is double down and be committed to continuing the things we know prevent the transmission of COVID.”

That means washing hands, keeping distance, and continuing to wear a mask.

Also on the briefing call was Kyle Enfield is the director of the Special Pathogens Unit at the University of Virginia Health System. He’s been on the frontline of the fight against the virus since the pandemic began.

“A lot has happened in the time that we’ve had COVID patients at UVA,” Enfield said. “We admitted our first patient on March 23, 2020. We have learned a lot about how to care for these patients at UVA.”

Part of that has come from clinical trials to get treatments and part is the experience that comes with dealing with patients dealing with a novel virus over months. Dr. Enfield shared one lesson learned.

“We don’t rush to intubate patients as early,” Enfield said. “What we have found is that there is a group of patients that while they require very high levels of oxygen, or what we call high-flow oxygen, many of them will do very well without intubation and the benefit to the patient is that by not being put on a breathing machine they are able to be more interactive with us as a team, more interactive with their environment. They don’t require the sedative medications that can lead to a complication called delirium in the ICU.”

Another lesson is the use of remdesivir in patients who aren’t seriously ill as well as use of certain steroids.

In the early days of the pandemic, one of the concerns was whether there were enough ventilators to go round. Dr. Enfield said the state helped manage an inventory.

“We actually have a good strategic surplus in the state of Virginia that allows us to move ventilators from hospital to hospital and we haven’t really had to touch that at all,” Enfield said.

Now the state is working to manage a limited number of vaccines from the federal government, while also dealing with the federal program that allocates other doses to pharmacy chain CVS.

Dr. Sifri said the University of Virginia Health system has remained busy assisting the Blue Ridge Health District with vaccinations.

“Our biggest challenge is that we’re constrained by the supply of vaccine,” Dr. Sifri said.

As of this morning, more than one million Virginians have received at least one dose of a vaccine according to the Virginia Department of Health dashboard. The seven-day average is now at 35,873 a day. The target set by Governor Ralph Northam is 50,000 a day.

Dr. Avula said the number of doses will increase, but the pathway isn’t entirely clear.

“The rest of it really depends on how the production goes with Moderna and Pfizer, and then the timeline for the introduction of Johnson & Johnson, and Astra-Zeneca, and then the potential for Novovax down the road,” Avula said. “Johnson & Johnson has submitted their application for authorization. That decision is due to be made on February 26 and so our hope is that in the first week of March that brings new vaccine into the supply line and the Moderna and Pfizer production will just continuously increase over the course of the next couple of months.”

Next week, the VDH will roll out a centralized system for people to register vaccinations. Dr. Avula acknowledged that the opening up of Phase1B overwhelmed local health departments across Virginia.

“What we have done in response to that is create this more centralized process and it allows us to have consistency to follow the guidelines that we’re crafting at the state level, but there still has to be local flexibility, right?”

Dr. Avula said different areas of Virginia may have different needs. For instance, efforts are afoot on the Eastern shore to vaccinate workers in poultry factories.

To confuse matters more, Fairfax County will be opting out of the statewide registration system. Dr. Avula spoke with officials there on Friday.

“I think the county worked really hard to build their own registration process and for reasons you’d have to ask them about, they weren’t ready to make that transition,” Dr. Avula said. “We absolutely encouraged it. The Fairfax County Health Department is not under the jurisdiction of the state. They are one the ones that are independent and integrated into their local government.”

So far, many people have been able to get appointments outside of local health districts through vaccinations at CVS pharmacies, for which doses are being allotted through a different system. Dr. Avula said he has an issue with their process for favoring those with means.

“It does not allow equitable access, right?” Dr. Avula said. “It does not take into consideration people who don’t have Internet access, or who don’t have the ability to wake up at 5 a.m. and try to sign up…. It favors those those can be mobile, right? So you have people in parts of Northern Virginia who are willing to drive to Abingdon to get an appointment. We need to figure something out there.”

Avula gave details about how the VDH system will look when it is formally announced later this week. It’s not just an Internet portal and the goal is to expand access.

“What will be coming next week is a central call center with 750 call takers,” Avula said. “They will be in English and in Spanish. They will also have access to a third-party translation service in a hundred different languages.”

The announcement is expected later this week.

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This edition of the show is supported by the many people who have been generous with a paid subscription to Substack or a monthly contribution to Patreon to help me keep the lights on while I bring you this information each week. This venture would not be possible without your support, and I’m grateful to bring context to the community in this manner. If you’ve not been able to do so so far, that’s okay. Just make sure you share it with someone else. And now…

On today’s show:

Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Advisory Board updates on facility reopening, Emerald Ash Borer impacts, and City Market plans

The Places29-North Advisory Committee briefed on draft housing plan, future construction

Albemarle County signs agreement with Piedmont Housing Alliance to use federal vouchers to help subsidize 76 apartment units at redeveloped Southwood

Both of our segments today touch upon the pandemic in some way, so we should go ahead and get the numbers out of the way. All this week, the number of new COVID cases has been in the 3000’s range, with 3,191 reported today. The seven-day percentage for positive results is now at 10 percent, down from 16.4 percent a month ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, the number of cases in Charlottesville is once again beginning to increase similar to early September when students began to arrive at the University of Virginia for in-person instruction. There are 42 cases today, and the seven-day average is now 25.

The COVID tracker at the University of Virginia now lists 222 active cases with 201 of these students. That figure will be updated one more time this afternoon before the weekend begins.

The Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Advisory Board had not met for 11 months before their first virtual meeting of the year last night. Since then, Council took an action that changed the group’s relationship to city government.

"We appear to have been demoted," said Ned Michie, who was appointed as chair at the beginning of the meeting. “We’re now an advisory committee to staff rather than a City Council appointed advisory board.”

The group covered a lot of ground and got a lot of information from staff about what the department has been up to since the pandemic shut down government operations. Vic Garber is the deputy director of Parks and Recreation.

“All parks are still open which includes open space, our basketball courts, tennis courts, playgrounds, trails and our shelters,” Garber said. “We still don’t take reservations at our shelters.”

However, restrooms at outdoor parks are all closed, except at the skate park and the golf courses due to the volumes of people. Also closed are the city’s indoor recreational centers and indoor pools. With spring not too far away, many are wondering what the schedule will be to open.

“We do still follow CDC guidelines, Virginia Department of Health Guidelines, and local ordinances in everything that we do,” Garber said. “The pools are still closed because we do not have permission to open those pools yet from City Council.”

Garber said park attendance has increased, and recreation programs pivoted to online. But other usual parks and rec offerings are still on hold.

“Athletics is still at a standstill,” Garber said. “Youth basketball was canceled. Normally we have about 500 youth participating.”

Garber said he expected representatives from Little League baseball to ask Council to allow them to prepare for them to play ball in the spring. Governor Northam has amended the state of emergency to allow this to occur and for games to be played with up to 25 spectators.

“Presently the City is still in phase two,” Garber said. “If you remember, [Albemarle] County went to phase three. We stayed in phase two in late July.”

That caps gatherings to no more than ten people.

“So, in a nutshell, we can practice, we can scrimmage, but we cannot have competition,” Garber said.

The pandemic is not the only natural disaster going on in our midst. The emerald ash borer is devastating ash trees in Virginia, and the parks department has been removing affected specimens.

The city’s Tree Commission is requesting Council spend at least $50,000 to try to treat trees and fight the spread. Parks director Todd Brown said that may just delay the inevitable.

“You can count on basically all the ash trees are going to die,” Brown said. “It’s a question of when. We are treating some of them and a small portion of money is going towards treatment. I’m working with the Tree Commission of which trees those are going to be and the arborist.”

Brown said it is now a matter of triage and that people will notice this spring when the leaves come back. He said this will become a pressing issue. Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell asked an important question.

“What exactly is emerald ash borer? Is that an insect?” Mitchell asked.

“It’s a little bug that gets in the bark and cuts off the blood flow effectively to the tree,” said parks planner Chris Gensic.

But back to pools. The city is continuing to rebuild the Heating, Ventilating and Air Conditioning system at Smith Aquatic and Fitness Center, a facility that opened in 2010 and has been plagued with issues.

“We’re a little bit ahead of schedule so it looks like we may have a May completion and hopefully in the future, we’re projecting it might possibly be open some time in June if we’re given approval to do so,” Garber said.

Garber said the indoor pool at Crow Recreation Center has been revamped and is ready to open, but requires Council approval to open. That applies to all facilities, and Brown said the department is getting ready.

“At this point, we don’t know what opening will look like,” Garber said. “But we are preparing to open all facilities.”

Even though they are no longer specifically charged with advising Council, the board discussed how they could encourage Council to begin to open up facilities. They opted to work on a letter in advance of Council’s discussion next Tuesday about the city’s COVID ordinance.

This morning I had the opportunity to ask officials at UVA Health what they think about the potential for opening. Dr. Costi Sifri is an infection diseases expert at the UVA hospital. He urged caution.

“We have the prospect of a vaccine that is highly effective against the strain, the predominant strains in the United States,” Dr. Sifri said. “We have hope but we also have the challenge that maybe these new variants. I think those two things need to be considered and balanced.”

We’ll hear more from Dr. Sifri in the next installment of this program.

Also on the agenda at Council Tuesday is an update on the City Market

“We are requesting to keep the market in its current leased location area which everyone knows is at 100 Water Street to maintain the market continuity for vendors and the customers,” Garber said. “If Council approves the sublease next week, City Market will return starting April the 3rd though we do not know the format whether its going to be a drive-through, or a pick-up only, in-person shopping or whatever,” Garber said.

More on the City Council agenda and the rest of what’s coming up in local government will be made available in the next installment of the Week Ahead newsletter, sponsored by the Piedmont Environmental Council.

You’re reading Charlottesville Community Engagement. With the COVID pandemic still raging, today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out from an anonymous contributor is once again to state clearly:

"We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

Before we begin the next segment, a quick notification to you that a public comment period for Albemarle’s draft housing plan ends on Monday. Take a look at the county’s website to read the plan and to fill out a questionnaire. (draft plan website)

The first objective is to increase the housing supply to meet the needs of an Albemarle population projected by the Weldon Cooper Center to be 138,485 by the year 2040, up from a current estimate of 109,722. (read Feb. 9 edition for an update on population)

“To accommodate this growth, the County will need to add approximately 11,750 new units to our housing stock over the next 20 years,” reads the plan. “The majority of this need—8,134 units or 69% of the required new housing – is projected to be met with units already in the residential development pipeline. This means the county must support the development of an additional 3,616 units to fully accommodate projected household growth through 2040.”

Members of the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee had the chance to ask questions last night. Bill McLaughlin sent a long list of comments and questions to staff about the plan.

“A lot of them were coming from the concern about the health of the people that are going to be living in these developments in terms of how much density are we going to trade for low-income housing and I’m wondering if we get too much density, do we have a housing areas, housing developments that aren’t really good for anyone to live in,” McLaughlin said.

McLaughlin questioned the county’s policy of restricting development to designated growth areas.

“And that total is 35 square miles, and I don’t know how much of that 35 square miles is left,” McLaughlin said.

The reason the county has community advisory committees is to shepherd the various master plans. The idea in general has been to encourage density. Here’s what the introduction of the county’s Comprehensive Plan says:

“A large part of planning for the future has been the County’s commitment to its Growth Management Policy,” reads the introduction to the plan. “The Growth Management Policy directs development into specific, identified areas for vibrant growth while conserving the remainder of the County for rural uses, such as agriculture, forestry, and resource protection.”

The Comprehensive Plan was last adopted in June 2015. Furthermore, objective 4 of the Development Areas chapter calls for the efficient use of land “to prevent premature expansion” of those areas and objective 5 calls for density to “create new compact urban areas.”

As reported in the February 6 edition of this newsletter, Albemarle is just beginning a review of the plan. Here’s Rivanna District Supervisor

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley weighed in.

“We have two choices in Albemarle County,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “Either we make full use of our developable area which probably means eventually going higher in density or higher in buildings. Maybe multi-story apartment buildings closer to the center of downtown. You don’t want to build them out in the middle of nowhere. You want to build them where people can go shopping, where people can go to the grocery store nearby. Or you go into the rural areas and if we crack that nut and go into the rural areas, which may happen eventually, if that happens, we lose Albemarle in my opinion.”

There are multiple apartment complexes and new development under construction or under planning consideration in the Places29-North area.

RST Residences seeks a rezoning for redevelopment of the Ridgewood Mobile Home Park along U.S. 29. The community meeting was held last July. The rezoning is for 244 apartment units and 108 townhome units.“That’s a total of 370 units,” Accardi said. “Fifty percent of these units are proposed to be designated as affordable.”The Planning Commission will take up the rezoning request on March 2.

The Forest Lakes Community Association is organizing opposition to the request. Over 400 people have signed a petition calling for Supervisors to deny the request. Scott Elliff is on the association’s board of directors.

“We’ve done a lot of research and analysis on it,” Elliff said. “It’s troubling to us in a lot of different ways and we’ll certainly be very active at the Planning Commission meeting.”

Currently under construction is the Brookhill development, which was approved by the Board of Supervisors in November 2016 and the new community is being built in phases.

“This project is approved for a maximum of 1,550 dwelling units as well as 130,000 square feet of non-residential space,” Accardi said.

Another development under construction is North Pointe, which was approved by the Board of Supervisors in 2006. The land remained undeveloped for many years but infrastructure for the property has been constructed in the past couple of years.

“The project is approved to develop a maximum of 893 units as well as commercial and office space,” Accardi said. “None of the blocks have been approved to be built so far.”

That refers to approval of site plans, which is a ministerial function that requires approval by staff if the developer meets all of the conditions in the rezoning.

There are still remaining units available allowed in Hollymead Town Center under a 2003 rezoning that have not yet been built.

Other pending re-zonings:

An amendment to the Hollymead Town Center original rezoning to increase maximum amount of non-residential space by 25,000 square feet in order to build a new 40,000 square foot building. Next step would be to scheduled a Board of Supervisors public hearing.

The Albemarle Planning Commission has recommended approval of a special use permit request from Rappahannock Electric Cooperative to increase the height of existing poles for power lines. The item has not yet been scheduled for a hearing before the Board of Supervisors

Request to amend previous rezoning at Willow Glenn on the east side of Dickerson Road to convert all housing units to multifamily units rather than the mix called for in the rezoning. This would increase the number of dwelling units to 324. A community meeting will be held at the Places29-North meeting in March.

Albemarle County has entered into an agreement with Piedmont Housing Alliance to use some of the county’s allotment of federal housing vouchers for the first phase of the redevelopment of Southwood Mobile Home Park. Habitat for Humanity was able to secure a rezoning for this first phase, which would see new construction along Old Lynchburg Road on land that is currently wooded. (details)

Now Piedmont Housing Alliance will develop the actual new homes and will seek Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) to make the project more feasible. This agreement could help the application’s chances with the Virginia Housing Development Authority, an entity that now goes by the name Virginia Housing.

The application for Southwood Apartments A would be for 76 affordable rental units with 58 of those being two-bedrooms. According to correspondence from Virginia Housing to Albemarle County, these would be in two three-story buildings.

Applications for LIHTC credit are due in March. Other applications are expected to come from Virginia Supportive Housing for redevelopment of the Red Carpet Inn in a collaboration with Piedmont Housing. Piedmont Housing is also submitting an application for the second phase of Friendship Court.

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Charlottesville Planning Commission makes recommendations to trim city’s capital budget

Charlottesville seeks information on entities who want to take the Lewis, Clark and Sacajawea Statue

Another candidate enters the race for Charlottesville City Council

You may have noticed I’ve not been reporting the COVID numbers each installment of this newsletter. There’s been so much to get to, and I often report the numbers on Twitter. Every now and then I think it’s important to take stock and track where we are in this ongoing pandemic.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,203 cases of COVID, and another 34 deaths. The total number of fatalities since last March is now 6,932. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is now 10.1 percent. That number was 11.3 percent a week ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 107 cases today, with 30 of those from Albemarle and 47 from Charlottesville. The death count in the district is now 116 people since the pandemic began. The University of Virginia returned to in-person instruction on February 1, and their COVID tracker now lists 178 active cases with 161 of them being students. The dashboard has been updated recently.

As of today, 1,156,117 vaccine doses have been administered and almost one of ten Virginians has received at least one shot. The seven-day average for doses given each day is at 33,520, still below Governor Northam’s goal of 50,000 a day.

The Charlottesville Planning Commission has weighed in on cuts and other amendments they would like to see made to the city’s proposed capital improvement program. Hosea Mitchell is the chair of the body.

“There are at least four hot potatoes,” Mitchell said.

One of these hot potatoes is an additional $8 million in funding in FY22 for a parking structure on land purchased by the city in January 2017 at 9th and Market Street to support the joint courts complex with Albemarle County. Others are $50 million as a placeholder for middle school reconfiguration and the of previously-approved millions in city funding for the West Main Street. All told, the draft five-year plan totals $160 million, or about double what the CIP was ten years ago. (draft CIP)

“What is outlined in the documents we’ve got is not sustainable,” Mitchell said. “The budget cannot be achieved without significant revenue enhancements. Tax and fee increases.”

There have been many words written about the West Main Streetscape, a project whose cost estimate has increased to as much as $52 million to build out the full scope of a design put together by Rhodeside & Harwell. Staff has recommended not proceeding with funding for two of the phases for which Council has already authorized the sale of municipal bonds. Krissy Hammill is a senior budget management analyst with the city.

“West Main Street, there was $4 million that was removed,” Hammill said. “The $18 million that was previously approved in prior CIP’s remains intact and would be available.”

To pay for this draft CIP, Hammill said the tax rate would need to be annually increased by two cents for five years beginning next year. If Council proceeds with this version, they would be using up all of the city’s debt capacity for years to come.

“That would mean that future Councils or Commissions would also be limited in what could be recommended or added to future CIP budgets,” Hammill said.

After a public hearing, Commissioners began their discussion. Many questions had to do with the status of state funding for the West Main Streetscape, a project that was broken into multiple phases in order to secure funding. Phase 1 has a cost estimate of $16.7 million, of which $3.275 million comes from VDOT’s transportation revenue sharing program. Jeanette Janiczek is the manager of the city’s Urban Construction Initiative.

“When the city submits a grant application, we have to identify what we’re going to do with the funds,” Janiczek. “With revenue-sharing it’s a little bit more open ended. That would be on phase 1 only. There are no Smart Scale funds on it.”

Smart Scale is a process where VDOT funds projects based on how they would accomplish different criteria such as public safety. The city received just over $2 million in Smart Scale funding for Phase 2, as well as another $2 million in revenue-sharing. The rest of the $11.15 million would come from the sale of municipal bonds, which ultimately would be paid by city taxpayers.

VDOT staff have recommended the city receive $10.8 million for the third phase of Smart Scale, which is a standalone project that would not require a city match. Much of the city funding would cover the cost of undergrounding overhead utility lines, which VDOT will not cover.

Another big ticket item in recent CIPs has been funding for affordable housing. Previous Councils have approved line items for specific projects as well as general contributions to the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund. One of these calls for $13.5 million in funding for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority to redevelop various sites. That includes $1.5 million for fiscal year 2022. Commissioner Liz Russell asked why that figure is lower for next year, but increases to $3 million in future years. The city’s redevelopment manager, Brenda Kelley, explained.

“The housing authority, CRHA, is not planning on making a [Low Income Housing Tax Credit] application this coming March,” Kelley said. “I don’t know if they have any proposals for March 2022 yet.”

The CRHA has received tax credits for the redevelopment of Crescent Halls as well as the first phase of South First Street. Construction of the latter is expected to break ground later this month. Kelley said the specifics of how city funding would be used for future projects has not been worked out, but including the overall figures in the CIP tells the CRHA of the city’s commitment.

“South First Street Phase 2 will probably start construction about this time next year and right now there aren’t any proposed projects in the future planned, but they are looking at all of their other sites,” Kelley said. “There’s just nothing definite on board right now.”

Russell and Mitchell both said they would like to see some way to salvage the West Main Streetscape. Mitchell suggested reducing the amount for the parking garage, and using that to help cover some of the costs for West Main. So did Commissioner Gary Heaton who said he would support paying to place the utility lines underground.

“I think [there is] not a lot to be gained by just completely wiping off improvements that need to be made that have residual benefits to the community long into the future,” Heaton said. “If you’re spending that kind of money and you’re doing that kind of renovation work, you underground while you’ve torn up the street.”

Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg asked his colleagues if they had read through the value engineering study which reviewed the Rhodeside & Harwell design to find cost savings.

“It is appalling,” Stolzenberg said. “You’ve got half a million dollars in there for rocks. Literally just a boulder that is sliced into pieces for decorative purposes. You’ve got half a million dollars for custom concrete benches that look incredibly comfortable where you could have bought regular benches for like $20,000. I think with the streetscape project, we really have to get back to what’s important.”

Stolzenberg agreed with a decision to close the slip lane that allows vehicles to turn right from eastbound West Main to southbound Ridge Street but said the city did not need to invest in a pocket park at that location at this time.

Commissioner Lyle Solla-Yates also weighed in.

“I’d like to see increases in funding for the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund, increased funding for tree planting, and providing more funding for essential parts of West Main for best use, matching funds for health, safety, and cost and risk prevention,” Solla-Yates said.

Solla-Yates suggested delaying funding for more small area plans, implementation of the Strategic Investment Area, and delaying spending on the parking garage for at least one more year. He also suggested deferring $6 million on the General District court anticipated for next year until at least FY23.

An agreement between Albemarle and Charlottesville for the courts complex includes a section on how the county “shall” begin construction of the parking garage by May 1, 2022 and deliver 90 spaces for use by the county by November 30, 2023. If they do not, then the city must either provide 100 spaces in the Market Street Parking garage to the county or sell back a share of land on East Market Street. (correction has been made to this paragraph post publication. See comments)

After the commission’s discussion, Vice Mayor Sena Magill asked a question.

“I keep hearing everyone talking about how we [might] move forward with the garage but it just being the absolutely least necessary and I just think that needs to have some definition for what is considered to be the least necessary,” Magill said.

City economic development director Chris Engel said he did not have a good question but the total $10 million figure was derived from a preliminary study of a 300 space garage with 10,000 square feet of commercial space.

Mitchell said he would support spending an amount to satisfy the terms of the agreement to provide 100 spaces.

“I do think that there are creative ways to meet out commitment without spending [$10] million bucks,” Mitchell said.

Stolzenberg said he envisioned a one or two story building with parking on the bottom with enough structural support to eventually build housing units on top. He also suggested asking the county if they would consider amending the agreement to delay the project.

After a discussion, Mitchell suggested a recommendation to make a motion to make amendments. The motion they voted upon calls for:

Prioritize local West Main Street funding to match state funding for transportation for health and safety while not spending money on aesthetics

Delay funding for small area plans until the Cville Plans Together initiative is completed

Delay further funding on SIA improvements until the Cville Plans Together initiative is completed

Delay some funding for garage, courts complex, and $1 million for East High Signalization

Reduce overall funding for the garage and study ways to otherwise fulfil commitment to Albemarle County

Delay $150,000 in additional funding for economic development strategic initiatives

Increase funding for the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund from the $800,000 a year proposed

Increase funding for tree planting and pursue donation program for this purpose

Increase funding for sidewalks

The commission voted unanimously to approve the motion. Their recommendations are purely advisory. Council will be presented with a budget later this month. On Monday, they will further discuss what to do with the West Main Streetscape.

Speaking of West Main Street, the city is requesting information from entities and organizations that might be interested in removing the Lewis, Clark and Sacajawea statue at the intersection with Ridge Street and McIntire Street.

“The assumption by the City of Charlottesville is that any prospective recipient would be responsible for the safe removal and relocation of the statue, including all of the associated planning and logistical work required,” reads a press release. “The recipient would also bear all of the associated financial costs related to this work. In return for this service, the City of Charlottesville would transfer full ownership of the statue to the recipient at no cost to the recipient.”

Council directed staff to proceed with plans to remove the statue at a work session in November 2019. Responses to this request for information are due by March 12.

There are now two challengers seeking two Democratic nominations for Charlottesville City Council. Brian Pinkston is a facilities manager at the University of Virginia who previously ran in 2019 but failed to secure the nomination.

City School Board member Juandiego Wade announced his candidacy in January. City Councilor Heather Hill has not announced whether she will seek a second term, which would require getting one of the two nominations in the June primary.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker announced last year that she would seek another term. As an independent, Walker only has to qualify for the ballot by submitting the correct number of signatures to the city’s registrar.

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On today’s show:

The population of the Charlottesville area has grown by over ten percent in the past ten years

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission says goodbye to Chip Boyles

Charlottesville City Council discusses the capital improvement budget

In six days, Chip Boyles will officially become Charlottesville’s City Manager. Last Thursday, the Board of Commissioners of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission said goodbye to Boyles in his capacity as their executive director. He has been there since April 2014. Greene County Supervisor Dale Herring is Chair of the TJPDC Board and he read from a proclamation.

“Whereas the influence and reputation of the TJPDC and the quality of programs and services during Chip’s tenure has been greatly enhanced by the vision, skills, and passion he brought to TJPDC’s mission, therefore be it resolved that the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission expresses enduring gratitude and appreciation for the generous and faithful service provided to the TJPDC and this region by Chip Boyles.”

Commissioner Keith Smith of Fluvanna County said Boyles took over at a time when the TJPDC had opted to not renew the contract of a previous director.

“We were in a bad way and just to do a 180, it was purely upon his skill, his leadership, and that funny accent of his, people apparently trust him,” Smith said. “Who knew?”

Charlottesville City Councilor Michael Payne said he appreciated the comments from other TJPDC Commissioners.

“I’m just incredibly excited to work with Chip going forward and I think there are really bright days ahead for the region as a whole,” Payne said.

Nelson County Supervisor Jesse Rutherford praised Boyles’ optimism but also made a threat in jest.

“Michael and you all, I’m just saying,” Rutherford said. “My threat out there of saying that if this doesn’t go well, we will ban all fruit products and beverages from going into Charlottesville from Nelson County. That’s a serious one and whoever the reporter is in here, write that down!”

Rutherford also sounded a more positive tone.

“We look forward to the success of Charlottesville,” Rutherford said. “That is not only important to Nelson County but the region. I can’t say this enough, but we have sent you our best, alright?”

One of TJPDC’s achievements with Boyles in charge is the creation of the Regional Transit Partnership, a gathering of various agencies that has spent the last few years laying out the foundation for a more integrated system. Recently the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation (DRPT) awarded TJPDC a grant to help build more of the framework.

“This award is $175,000 for the development of a regional plan as recommended by the Regional Transit Partnership,” Jacobs said. “There is a match for this of $175,000 to be provided both by Albemarle County and the city of Charlottesville over two fiscal years.”

This plan will involve coordination between Charlottesville Area Transit, the University Transit Service, JAUNT and Albemarle County. The DRPT also awarded a $106,500 grant to TJPDC to study expansion of transit in Albemarle. The county will have to pay half of that as a match.

“This study is to develop the financial feasibility of new transit services in three different areas,” Jacobs said. “Route 29 north, Monticello, and Pantops.”

The TJPDC also coordinates regional priorities for Community Development Block Grants. Applications to the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development from non-urban localities are due on March 26.

“As of the end of January, we’ve already been notified of one project in Louisa County for a planning and infrastructure grant for affordable housing,” Jacobs said. “We know of a Nelson County potential grant for downtown revitalization of Lovingston. We have Albemarle County acquisition and redevelopment for an affordable housing project. And Scottsville has a redevelopment project going on.”

The Virginia DHCD is now directly administering a rent and mortgage relief program to assist households during the pandemic, but the TJPDC was in charge of the program in the second half of calendar year 2020.

“We were awarded a total grant of $1.8 million dollars for the region [and] $1.624 million of that went directly to pay for rent and mortgage relief for qualifying families,” Jacobs said. “That was 570 families in this region who were served with an average of $2,000 rent per household.”

The state program is not covering additional mortgage payments at this time, but are still accepting applications for rent relief. Visit their website if you or someone you know needs assistance.

Locally, the TJPDC has launched an online portal called Porch Light that allows people to find affordable housing opportunities.

“If you know people who have rental properties, direct them to our website and they can go directly to the site,” Boyles said. “We need landlords to list their properties. It’s free. It’s easy.”

Nelson County Supervisor Rutherford said the COVID pandemic has brought a real sense of urgency about housing.

“We’re going to be doing some hard soul-searching in Nelson County and what it is we can do to get some economies of scale and some more dense housing,” Rutherford said.

Rutherford said he is aware that some newcomers to the area are choosing Nelson due to the provision of more broadband Internet. He said he has a tenant who works in Crystal City and commutes twice a week.

“We’re going to see some major culture changes in our workforce and in how we operate on a business level,” Rutherford said.

(watch the whole TJPDC meeting here)

Population estimates published

The Weldon Cooper Center at the University of Virginia has released its annual population estimates for localities across the Commonwealth. Albemarle County has grown by 11.7 percent since the 2010 Census, with an estimated population of 110,545 as of July 1, 2020. The population of the City of Charlottesville increased by 13.8 percent to a population of 49,477.

There are also increases in most other localities in the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. Fluvanna County jumped 5.9 percent to 27,202. Greene County is estimated to be at 20,323, or an increase of 10.4 percent. Louisa County increased by 11.6 percent to a population of 37,011 people. Only Nelson County is estimated to have declined over the past ten years, losing just over a hundred people to 14,904 people.

When added all together, the planning district as a whole increased 10.5 percent to a total population of 259,432. Other planning districts that experienced that level of growth include Northern Virginia with 13.5 percent growth, the Rappahannock-Rapidan with 8.7 percent, the Richmond Regional at 10.6 percent, the Crater District at 7.7 percent and the George Washington Regional Commission at 14.9 percent.

The U.S. Census Bureau, however, organizes localities into Metropolitan Statistical Areas. The Charlottesville MSA is similar to the Planning District, with the exception that Louisa County is replaced with Buckingham County. When viewed that way, the MSA grew by 10.4 percent. Buckingham County remained flat in the Weldon Cooper estimate with an increase of just 16 people.

The U.S. Census results are expected to be posted later in the year, later than the usual release date of April 1.

Charlottesville Council discusses capital budget at Feb. 3 work session

Later on today, the Charlottesville Planning Commission will meet with the Charlottesville Planning Commission to discuss the Capital Improvement Program (CIP) for the next fiscal year which begins on July 1, 2021. Last week, Council discussed the proposed $160 million CIP for the next five years. When they adopt a budget in April, Council will only approve actual funding for FY22 but looking ahead to the full five-year period helps give budget planners perspective about what capacity the city has incur more debt to cover capital projects.

“If you look at sort of a ten year history, you will see that in 2012 our CIP was at $80 million,” said Krissy Hammill, a senior budget analyst with the city. “It ebbed and flowed until about 2017 but we still hovered around the $80 million mark. Since 2018, the CIP from 2017 to now, this draft, our five-year CIP has basically doubled.”

Hammill said Council increased the amounts for affordable housing from $8 million in the 2012 five-year plan to $38 million in the current draft. Additional spending was allocated for education and transportation.

“Of those three priority areas, we’ve essentially added $94 million of funding to a plan, of course the big chunk being the $50 million for the school reconfiguration,” Hammill said. “But I think it shows that in some respects with regard to the CIP plan, we’ve put the money where our priorities were, but we’ve also done that without taking anything away.”

A $6 million city contribution for a joint General District Court with Albemarle is in the plan as is $10 million for a parking garage at 9th and Market Street to support the expanded courts complex.

The draft CIP contemplates issuing $121 million in bonds over the next five years to fund some of the projects, including about $74 million in projects already authorized by previous Councils. Hammil said that will come close to maxing out the city’s debt capacity for the foreseeable future. It will also cost the city more.

“If we get to a point where we’re issuing $185 million or $195 million worth of debt, the debt service doubles,” Hammill said. “So you’re going to go from a debt service payment of roughly $11 million of $22 million.”

That will likely require a tax increase to cover that additional payment, or the equivalent reduction in spending. There is currently no tax increase anticipated for the next year, but Hammil said they would need to plan for one soon should they decide to proceed with the full capital improvement plan.

Council made no major decisions at the work session last week but did offer glimpses of their thoughts in a discussion.

Councilor Payne said he would support deferring or canceling the $10 million for the parking garage and working to find another solution to guarantee parking for the courts complex.

“I think we really need to at least initiate conversations on are there ways to meet that courts agreement outside of a new parking garage of that size and cost,” Payne said. “Not abandon that agreement. Meet it. Honor it. Honor our relationships and commitments with the county but see what we can do reduce that cost there.”

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he was also willing to rethink the garage.

“I’ve been a real passionate defender of this parking garage but as someone who uses the parking garage that we have now, I’m looking around and seeing we don’t have a demand for parking right now,” Snook said. “Admittedly things are slow because of COVID, but we don’t know when that will end.”

Payne said the city also needs to have a conversation about the full cost of middle school reconfiguration. Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she and Councilor Heather Hill sit on a committee with two school board members who are working on the issue while a cost estimate is developed.

Walker said whatever the conversation, the focus must be on equity. She also said the city’s spending on housing must be tracked. The city is currently without a housing coordinator.

“I don’t know where we are on replacing [John] Sales’ position,” Walker said. “I think it was Jeff Levien last time he was before us said there was still a vacant unit sitting in [Six Hundred West Main] because he could not find anyone to rent it.”

Walker said she is also concerned about the future of the city’s investment in Piedmont Housing Alliance’s redevelopment of Friendship Court.

“We make decisions based on relationships and not based on what people would do,” Walker said. “We are taking taxpayer money and investing those dollars and we should have some strings attached.”

Staff has recommended not proceeding with additional funding for the West Main Streetscape, which has a roughly $52 million cost estimate to implement a design plan that cost $2.85 million in city funds to create. One Councilor was ready to de-prioritize local funds being use to move forward.

“I do see the value and vision,” Payne said. “I just can’t justify it as being a bigger priority than these other things,” Payne said.

The West Main project was split into four phases in order to secure funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation. Local funding is required for Phase 1 and Phase 2, but a third phase is being recommended for nearly $10.9 million in funding in the next Smart Scale round. I asked the Virginia Department of Transportation plan what would happen if Council decides to cancel the first two phases. Phase 3 covers the area between the Drewary Brown Bridge and Roosevelt Brown Boulevard.

“The Phase 3 application would not be automatically removed,” said VDOT spokesman Lou Hatter. “It is a standalone project. From the process perspective the City would need to pass a resolution requesting that its Phase 3 application be withdrawn from consideration for funding.”

Hatter said if the city does drop Phase 3, the funding would go to the next highest scoring project in Smart Scale, which is a roundabout at the intersection of Route 522 and Route 20 in Orange.

Councilor Snook said he did not want to make a decision at the work session, and consensus was reached to do so at Council’s upcoming meeting next Monday.

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It’s Super Bowl Sunday, and a day many might usually gather to celebrate on this unofficial national holiday. But the pandemic is still keeping this from being a normal time, and this installment of the Charlottesville Community Engagement newscast and newsletter is intended to catch us up on where we are eleven months since the first positive case was recorded in Virginia.

Today’s installment comes with support from Jim Duncan, associate broker and partner at Nest Realty, who represents buyers and sellers in the Charlottesville area, and writes the long-running realcentralva.com and realcrozetva.com blogs. For context on this market,

As it is Super Bowl Sunday, and there’s a bit of snow on the ground still, let’s get right to the information. Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 2,949 cases for a total of 529,125 to date. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is now at 10.4 percent. That’s down from 12.7 percent two weeks ago.

The Blue Ridge Health District is at a total of 11,290 cases since last March, with another 71 reported today.

Governor Ralph Northam held another press conference on Friday to give an update on the pandemic, including a directive that public schools in Virginia must have a plan in place to provide in-person education for the most vulnerable students by March 15.

But first, Northam reviewed the year to date.

"January was a hard month for COVID cases," Northam said. "We saw a record number of cases, hospitalizations, and sadly, deaths."

There were 155,195 cases reported by the Virginia Department of Health in January, and 1,383 deaths.

Governor Northam said the numbers are trending downward. The seven day average for new daily cases is now at 3,478, down from 4,619 on January 31. After five days of new daily cases in the 2000 to 3000 range, the numbers have begun to increase again. Northam urged caution.

"While these are all positive trends, we can not let down our guard," Northam said. "The virus as you have heard is mutating and changing. The variant from the United Kingdom is here."

On Friday, the VDH announced the South African variant is also present in Virginia.

"These variants make it even more urgent to get as many people vaccinated as we can as quickly and as equitably as possible," Northam said. "So now is not the time to relax."

Northam said VDH has been managing the inventory of available vaccine doses, and that the average number per day is approaching the goal of 50,000 a day. Today, the seven-day average is 37,103. Remember, Northam's comment here is now a couple of days old as this newsletter goes out.

"We're pushing vaccines out as fast as possible," Northam said. "We've administered 86 percent of our first doses, and 67 percent of our total doses. That puts us 12th among other states, and over nine percent of our population has received the first dose of vaccine. That's ninth among states."

On Saturday, Virginia passed the milestone of a million doses administered. That's almost double the number of positive cases since March 7, 2020. But Northam again urged caution and reminded Virginians there is still a finite number of vaccines available.

“Everyone is feeling impatient,“ Northam said. “It’s hard to know that you are eligible for a vaccine but no doses are available yet. But that’s the situation we’re in across the country. Demand is much larger than our supply.”

Northam said Virginia is still ramping up the infrastructure and 700 new call center employees are being trained to help people pre-register and get information. A phone number will be released as soon as it is available as well as a new online portal. Northam said people who have already registered through their health district are already in the system.

Another new source of vaccines will soon be delivered to pharmacies.

“This week the Biden administration announced the next phase of the federal pharmacy partnership,” Northam said. “In Virginia, CVS will be the first pharmacy in this roll-out because it has the most locations of any pharmacy in Virginia. We have worked with CVS to start with their stores that are in reach of people who are more vulnerable. Those aged 65 and up, those who are of low-income, and those from disadvantaged communities.”

This will begin later this week at 65 locations across the Commonwealth. The doses to be distributed will be separate from the supply Virginia is already receiving.

“We’re still working with CVS and CDC on how registration for how those vaccinations will work, so please stay tuned, and be assured this is only the first phase of the roll-out of the federal pharmacy partnership,” Northam said.

Northam next turned to the issue of public education. He said schools around the country closed in the early days of the pandemic eleven months ago.

“As school divisions began developing plans for the current school year, our guidance was that we want students and we wanted our teachers and staff to be safe,” Northam said. “But we encouraged in-person instruction for the students who needed it the most.”

Northam said data suggests that schools that have opened to some form of in-person instruction have not seen the same community spread as other congregate settings.

“That tells us that it’s time to find a path forward to in-person learning,” Northam said. “In the past eleven months, our children have been champions. They have made sacrifices. They’ve endured a lot of change and uncertainty.”

Northam is a pediatrician, and he said his colleagues have been telling him about mental health issues and substance abuse. There’s also been a decline in academic performance.

“Last month we issued guidance to our school divisions for how to plan a safe return to in-person learning,” Northam said. “We didn’t say ‘throw open the doors, five days a week starting tomorrow.’ We said ‘here are the steps that you need to take. You can start with the students that most need that in-person instruction.’ But we also said this needs to happen and today I’m saying it needs to start by March 15.”

Northam stopped short of calling that a mandate. He also said school systems need to offer in-person summer school options to get students caught up.

“We have prioritized vaccinating our teachers,” Northam said. “We have given school divisions the funding that they need for safety measures. In-person learning won’t look the same for every school division and it won’t look the same as school did a year ago before this pandemic began. But we need to make a start. We can do this and we must do this.”

To illustrate the issue, Northam introduced Teacher of the Year Anthony Swann of Rocky Mount Elementary School in Franklin County, who he also appointed to the state Board of Education.

“Although some students are all virtual, they still don’t have true accountability measures in place to ensure that they are learning,” Swann said. “For instance, when my district was following a hybrid learning style, I found that when a lot of my students were home on virtual days they would not do the work.”

Swann said in-person days have been spent playing catch-up rather than moving forward with the curriculum. He said moving back to in-person instruction will help with students’ social lives as well. Last week, Franklin County Public Schools moved back to four-days a week for pre-K through 7th district with health measures in place.

“On the very first day with all of my students back, one of my students walked in the room and his words were ‘oh my God, I get to see my friends!” Swann exclaimed.

Northam said the directive to get systems back to in-person does not require every student to return to school on March 15.

“Not everybody is going to be ready to run through the front door and say ‘we’re back to school as normal’”, Northam said. “There will be individuals that don’t feel comfortable. There will be families. I have a family, a lot of families that I have taken care of that may have individuals at home, maybe a parent or a grandparent, that has health care issues. They may not have had the opportunity to get vaccinated yet so those families are not going to feel comfortable sending their children to school. I get that. But I’m just hopeful that if we give factual information, in time people will realize that this is safe and it’s really in the best interest of our children.”

Watch the full press conference for more information.

Just as Northam’s press conference was beginning, officials at UVA Health held their own briefing. Chief Executive Officer Wendy Horton said the health system is now able to administer a thousand doses a day at the two sites from which it is offering doses.

“So this week we have a combination of both of our sites, here on Ground where we are doing principally second doses and then also on select days our community site at Seminole Square,” Horton said.

UVA Health is collaborating with the Blue Ridge Health District on the effort, including the K-Mart site.

In-person instruction resumed at the University of Virginia last Monday. Dr. Costi Sifri said UVA is applying the same mitigation strategy as during the fall semester.

“Testing has been ramped up so now everybody, all students, not only those that are in dorms but also those that are in off-Grounds or in other housing will be tested on a weekly basis,” Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri is an expert in infectious diseases and he said he sees no threat from in-person instruction as long as people wear masks and keep their distance. He was also asked if the new COVID variants pose any additional risk to community spread at this time, especially as more school systems return.

“We’ve heard some preliminary information that it may be more transmissible or be higher in school age children and younger people,” Dr. Sifri said. “However, that’s also coupled with the fact that there is some shifting epidemiology in terms of where transmission would be seen in general in the U.K.”

Dr. Sifri said the situation will continue to be monitored.

Too much to read? Remember, each and everyone of these installment is also a podcast!

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On today’s show:

Albemarle Board of Supervisors push back on three-year process to update the Comprehensive Plan

Albemarle Architectural Review Board weighs in on cell tower, Rio Hill Shopping Center

A quick check in with the Albemarle Broadband Authority

In today’s shout-out from me, the Bridge Performing Arts Initiative has opened their exhibit Face to Face - Portraits of Our Vibrant City. Artists were matched with community members to serve as subjects. It turns out, I’m one of them! Due to COVID, the gallery is closed, but members of the public are encouraged to visit the windows at the Bridge to take a view! I worked with artists Tesceline Tabilas on mine, and I’m quite pleased with the way her work turned out. Go see it!

The next installment will be a recap of various COVID projects. Today’s show focuses exclusively on Albemarle County, though my apologies to the Planning Commission for not covering their meeting. There’s a full list of Daily Progress stories written by Allison Wrabel at the end of this report.

The Board of Supervisors had a packed agenda on Wednesday. In our main segment today, they weighed in on a proposal from staff for a three-year review of the county’s Comprehensive Plan.

Virginia’s code requires the Planning Commission in each locality to create and maintain such a plan to guide future development.

“In the preparation of a comprehensive plan, the commission shall make careful and comprehensive surveys and studies of the existing conditions and trends of growth, and of the probable future requirements of its territory and inhabitants,” reads 15.2-2223.

Albemarle’s Comprehensive Plan guides all decisions made in the county, and a major plank is a growth management policy. Charles Rapp became planning director in 2019, but he knows the history. The county’s first Comprehensive Plan dates back to 1971.

“At that time there was a population of just under 40,000 people here in the county,” Rapp said.

Nine years later, the county’s Comprehensive Plan had been updated to call for a growth management policy to limit suburban sprawl. The Board of Supervisors adopted a downzoning in 1980 that established the designated growth areas we know today. The last update was approved in 2015 after a long period of review.

“That update along with the numerous updates over the past 15 years have added a wealth of information throughout our Comprehensive Plan and that has resulted in a document that is over 400 pages long,” Rapp said.

Rapp said the county continues to experience growth, and the pandemic did not slow down the number of building permits and land use applications. Forecasts show the trend will continue.

“The current population is estimated at just below 110,000 here in Albemarle County which is bringing new challenges,” Rapp said. “There have been recent discussion with the Board and with some of our community groups and other boards and commissions focused on transportation infrastructure, affordable housing, development density and form as our development areas take on more urban character, protection of natural resources, scenic viewsheds, and the rural areas.”

Rapp said the upcoming Comprehensive Plan update will give community members and elected officials the chance to review all of these issues. He said there’s also an opportunity to add focus on two new priorities that have emerged in the past few years.

“There’s been an organizational core value of equity and inclusion and diversity which we feel should really be folded into all aspects of this Comprehensive Plan,” Rapp said. “Another item that we’d like to see is to strengthen the synergy between the comp plan’s policies and the goals of the Climate Action Plan so they really align together.”

Rapp said staff is recommending an approach that would “deconstruct” the existing plan and try to root inconsistencies. The idea is to hire a temporary project coordinator to work on a three-year, five phase process to update the plan. The first would be pre-planning, but planning manager Rachel Falkenstein said community engagement would begin in the second. (conceptual scope)

“The second phase we are calling Big Questions and Community Goals, and here is where we would begin the broad engagement process on developing a community vision,” Falkenstein said.

The third phase would deal with land use topics in order to set expectations for community development. The fourth would include development of new policy recommendations, and the fifth would be adoption of the plan. The conceptual framework said this would take place in the first quarter of 2024. A new committee would be created to oversee the project and members of this Project Advisory Group would be paid stipends. The county would hire artists to try to find new ways of conducting community engagement.

Not mentioned by staff, but this year, three seats are up on the Board of Supervisors, and the other three are up for election in 2023. Before then, current supervisors get to approve the pathway forward.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel is in the final year of her second term representing the Jack Jouett District and she expressed a concern.

“Three years is taking me back a little bit,” McKeel said. “That is a long time. I understand there is a lot of work and we don’t want to rush it but three years seems like a long time to get this update done.”

The last Comprehensive Plan took four years to update. (story from June 2015)

For comparison, the city of Charlottesville is entering the fifth year of its Comprehensive Plan process. (cvilleplanstogether)

But back to Albemarle. The first plan in 1971 envisioned a lot more urban development than currently planned. Supervisor Ann Mallek has been active in civic affairs there since the mid 1980’s and was active with the Earlysville Area Residents’ League.

“Back in the 90’s, 80s, Earlysville’s crossroads was a village and thankfully during the early 90’s the leaders of our little organization at the urging of the residents said, well go down to the Board of Supervisors and ask them when we’re going to get out sewers and our sidewalks to go along with all of the townhouses that we were supposed to have right here in the middle of Earlysville,” Mallek said. “And the Board at the time said you’re not getting any, so the response was, take away our village, and they did. That’s not going to happen now I’m sure because all of the services have expanded out much much further than they used to be.”

This will be the first Comprehensive Plan update for Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District. She said Albemarle’s population has grown by 175 percent since 1971.

“This simply exemplifies the complexities of what we are dealing with as an urbanized county that many of our other nearby communities don’t face and really demonstrates the necessity of a review of our Comprehensive Plan,” Price said.

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District was elected in 2019 along with Price. She said she thought the plan revision should be conducted through the Community Advisory Committees rather than create a new committee.

“I will be honest with you, I’ve got a problem with offering some stipends to people,” LaPisto Kirtley said. “I didn’t see how much it would be per person.”

LaPisto-Kirtley said she would support a chapter-by-chapter review of the existing documents rather than appear to start from scratch. Supervisor Liz Palmer’s first year on the Board of Supervisors in 2014 was spent during such a review.

“A lot of people communicate through the Board,” Palmer said. “They elect us. They listen to us. And development and land use planning is what they’re asking us about half the time. I would want to make sure the Board is quite involved in this and doesn’t come in at the end when you guys have gotten this document all together and it’s dumped on our lap.”

At the end of the discussion, Rapp said he would try to come back with a way to speed up the timeline. A new proposal will come back to the Board of Supervisors at a later date.

Earlier in the meeting, the Board of Supervisors agreed to pursue several avenues to convert several roadways to classifications that would allow them to be under the purview of the Architectural Review Board. Three years ago staff noticed that several of the county’s 21 Entrance Corridors were not actually compliant with state guidelines.

One of the disqualified Entrance Corridors is Avon Street, which lost its status. Staff has recommended asking the Virginia Department of Transportation to classify the roadway as an arterial, but that has triggered concern from members of the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee. Supervisor Donna Price read from a letter they sent.

“We know that a corridor study is supposed to be taking place on Avon Street Extended and have some serious concerns as to the impact that obtaining arterial status may have specifically with regards to things like speed limits,” Price said. “We have Mountain View Elementary School up there and Biscuit Run Park at the southern end of Avon Street Extended.”

Transportation Planner Kevin McDermott said the corridor study is already completed. He also said that arterial roadways can continue to have speed limits of 35 miles per hour, but they would review the application to see if any changes would need to be made. (March 2020 study)

“VDOT will not have any issue with us installing pedestrian facilities like are recommended in that corridor plan if it were an arterial,” McDermott said. “They’re not going to make that distinction.”

McDermott said the arterial status would not interfere with a crosswalk at Mountain View Elementary School. Supervisor Liz Palmer said the 5th and Avon CAC also wants to make sure that Old Lynchburg Road near Southwood can be an Entrance Corridor so that new development can be reviewed by the ARB.

Albemarle's Architectural Review Board met on Monday, and its members had no issue with the appearance of a 94-foot cell tower Verizon wants to build in Greenwood off of I-64. The ARB has jurisdiction because this site is within an Entrance Corridor.

Albemarle's current wireless policy does not ban such towers, but requires them to blend into the scenery. ARB member Fred Missell said the process has worked well.

"Of all of the projects that we do in the county, I think the way the visibilility of these monopoles has been handled has been top-notch compared to other counties," Missel said.

The ARB's review was limited in purview to the I-64 entrance corridor. The tower will also need a special use permit from the Board of Supervisors. ARB member Frank Hancock said he understood opposition from neighbors but supported the application.

"To me this is entirely appropriate, I don't really have any issues with it," Hancock said.

Relatively new ARB member Christian Henningsen agreed but with a caveat.

"I had no concerns about the appearance from 64," Henningsen said. "I think the adjacent landowners have a different perspective and the appearance may be a lot of different from that perspective but that's kind of out of our purview."

The ARB voted 5-0 to approve a certificate of appropriateness for the tower.

Next, they reviewed a plan to renovate the 31-acre Rio Hill Shopping Center, which is owned by a company associated with the Connecticut State Retirement system. Josh Kagan is with Hart Advisors and is the owner's representative.

"Retail has changed and COVID has accelerated that change and I think as a result retail is ever more binary and there are going to be winners and losers," Kagan said.

The Rio Hill Shopping Center was built in 1989, and Kagan said this redesign is intended to make it relevant in a shifting retail landscape.

"I want you guys to understand what our vision is," Kagan said. "This is not a short-term sort of fix. This is to create and transform the public experience of this real estate."

This year, the T.J. Maxx will move to a bigger space where Dick's Sporting Goods had been, and a Sierra Trading Post store will open. Those are the first steps as part of a larger redevelopment that will continue. The existing canopies will be removed according to David Timmerman of BRW Architects.

"What we're looking for is a site that brings people, that attracts people, that makes people walk from one end of the site to the other," Timmerman said.

One corner of the site will be demolished in a future phase of redevelopment to make way for new construction. Frank Hancock said he appreciated that some of the empty retail spaces would be filled.

"You see those giant voids, those big empty retails spaces, so having that reoccupied is definitely a positive on the corridor," Hancock said.

Kagan said Sierra Trading Post and T.J. Maxx are hoping to move to their new location in the fall.

Later in the day on Monday, the Albemarle Broadband Authority met at 5 p.m. at a rescheduled meeting. The county will pursue funding for several projects in 2021 through both the Virginia Telecommunications Initiative and the federal Rural Digital Opportunity Fund. Mike Culp is the Information Technology Director at the county.

“The likelihood of one or both being awarded is still high, but we just have to go through a process to make sure we do all that we can to make our next big deadline which is February 8,” Culp said.

The authority went into closed session at the end of the meeting to discuss some of the details in the VATI application.

There are nine specific goals called for in Albemarle’s strategic plan, and one of them is to expand broadband. Culp said the Board of Supervisors will be briefed on February 17 on an initiative to expand internet to all residences in Albemarle. That follows an announcement last year that Nelson County is planning to achieve that goal in 2024. The ABBA board will meet with the supervisors at that meeting on February 17.

I mentioned I’d have a list of Daily Progress coverage from the week. All of these are by reporter Allison Wrabel.

Broadband authority expands wireless to 3,000 homes, February 2, 2021

County planners voice support for development fee increases, February 2, 2021

County looks to re-designate eight roads, February 3, 2021

Supervisors wary of long comp plan review process, February 3, 2021

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council is poised make a go or no go decision on the West Main Streetscape project

City agrees to transfer land at the Amtrak station

A quick COVID update

Many statewide metrics measuring COVID-19 in Virginia are trending downwards, but are still higher than at most points of 2020. Today the Virginia Department of Health reports 2,959 new cases and the seven-day average is 3,541. On January 3, the number reported had been 5,010.

In this community, the University of Virginia resumed in-person instruction this week and the first day of the spring semester was held on Monday. One thing different this year is that fraternities and sororities are now able to gather in-person as long as they follow state and local guidelines to stop the spread of COVID. Sierra Martin has a story about this today in the Cavalier Daily. Yesterday, Maryann Xue reported that many people associated with the University of Virginia were able to sign up for vaccine appointments at UVA Health that they were not eligible to receive.

The Virginia Department of Health reports today that 1.38 million vaccine doses have been administered in the Commonwealth. The average is now up to 39,658 a day. Compare that to a total of 513,339 cases of COVID since the pandemic began.

This morning, the VDH also reported the transmission of another COVID variant in northwest Virginia.

“The B.1.1.7 variant, which first emerged in the United Kingdom in late 2020, is associated with increased person-to-person transmission of COVID-19,” reads the press release.

The release goes on to say this information stressed the need to keep wearing a mask and following social distancing guidelines, even if you have received the vaccine.

At a budget work session later today, City Council is expected to take a final decision on the fate of the West Main Streetscape. This event begins at 3:30 p.m.

Staff has recommended not putting additional dollars into the second phase, which would call into question the future of state funding awarded to that portion of the project, which has a multimillion dollar cost estimate for all four phases.

On Monday, Council discussed a study intended to cut the costs of the project which has been under development since 2013. Unlike Albemarle County, city staff plans and manages the city’s road construction projects. Jeanette Janiczek is manager of the city’s Urban Construction Initiative. (read the study)

“The idea is not to rescope the project,” Janiczek said. “The idea is with a value engineering process is to have an independent firm review the work that’s been done and see ways we can improve the project while still maintaining the benefits that we were envisioning.”

The city has secured millions in funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation for the project, which was originally envisioned to add bike lanes, new sidewalks, and new street trees for a roadway that had been anticipated to have several hundred more residents as new construction was built. The project was broken into four phases in order to help secure funding. Two have received funding and both require a local match.

Last month, VDOT staff recommended over $10 million for Phase Three of the project, which includes the area where hundreds of apartment units have been built at the Standard, the Flats at West Village, and the Lark on West Main. These have all been built and occupied since the West Main Study got underway in 2013.

Janiczek said staff recommended approval of ten recommendations in the value engineering study from RK&K to reduce cost. One of them is not to move forward with planting trees in a proprietary product called a Silva Cell that would also retain stormwater.

“We don’t have any Silva Cells anywhere in the city,” Janiczek said. “So this is a new product. It’s proprietary. It’s kind of expensive because it does so many wonderful things. It can complicate utility relocation because these are plastic tubes that are sorted on a plastic platform and are separating the sidewalk, or the pavers in this instance.”

All of these intricacies are called for by the West Main Streetscape design put together by the firm Rhodeside & Harwell. As of last year, they’ve been paid $2.85 million by the city so far to create construction documents created as part of the process. A previous City Council approved the schematics in May 2017. No members of that Council are still in office. (May 2017 story)

City Councilor Michael Payne said he appreciated how the Silva Cells could help the city achieve some of its climate action goals. He also said that the value engineering study did not really do enough to bring down costs of a project that has had an estimate as high as $49 million. That prompted a long conversation about whether the project should just be killed.

“We’re really just going to need to be honest about, we’re not going to be able to fundamentally change the impact of this project with value engineering, and if we cut blanket amounts from the CIP for this project, we’re probably going to sacrifice the actual vision and intent that guided creating this, which was to create a very different kind of pedestrian-oriented corridor that’s almost an extension of the Downtown Mall,” Payne said.

Payne said he thought housing and school reconfiguration were more important to spend capital improvement dollars on.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker wanted clarity Monday about whether Council even wanted to move forward with West Main to avoid having that dominate the budget conversation later on today.

“Is this something that we can place on the shelf and be okay with that?” Walker asked.

Councilor Heather Hill said she still wanted to know what improvements need to happen on West Main just to keep it maintained.

“I still believe that this corridor is vitally important and its not working for pedestrian and bicyclists, so just getting staff’s perspective on what an alternative would be,” Hill said.

VDOT funding for Phase 1 and Phase 2 both require the city to match funds and the city’s portion would come from bonds that Council has theoretically authorized but that have not yet been sold. Councilor Lloyd Snook asked if the city could save money by never selling bonds for that purpose.

“And so, in theory, we could reclaim $16 million minus the $3 million to do the bare minimum, we could reclaim say $13 million by saying ‘sorry, we’re not doing phase 1 or phase 2, we’re just going to do the bare minimum?’”

“Correct,” Janiczek said.

Snook said he wanted two more days to review before saying whether he would approve ending the project.

One question I have out to the Virginia Department of Transportation on whether the $10 million recommended for Smart Scale funding for Phase 4 has to be spent on the Rhodeside & Harwell design, or if a new public process could be opened up to decide how to use that funding to address the same purpose and need. This round of funding requires no local match, but it is possible the project would not have scored as high under an alternate design.

The city currently has several other streetscape projects in development that were funded by Smart Scale. None of them had a preconceived plan in place when they were awarded the funding. If the Commonwealth Transportation Board approves the funding in June, the actual money will not be distributed to the localities for several years.

No funding has been designated for the project’s fourth phase, which spans between Jefferson Park Avenue and Roosevelt Brown Boulevard.

Last November, the University of Virginia reaffirmed their commitment to spend $5 million on West Main Street.

"The University remains committed to its funding pledge for the West Main Streetscape project,” wrote UVA spokesman Brian Coy. “Per discussions with the City, our intent is to focus on safety and security improvements towards the western end of Main Street, supporting both students and the broader community.”

Regardless of whether the West Main Streetscape project moves forward, the city has been awarded funding for other projects nearby.

Additionally, VDOT is recommending $5 million in funding for multimodal improvements to Ridge Street, which is immediately adjacent to Phase 1 of the project. In the third Smart Scale round, the city was awarded $6.1 million in funding for a project at the intersection of Ridge Street, Elliot Avenue and Cherry Avenue.

The preparation for all of these Smart Scale projects have been overseen by Chip Boyles in his capacity as the executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. He becomes City Manager on February 15.

Earlier in the meeting, Council agreed to convey city-owned property back to developer Allan Cadgene operating under his Union Station Partners LLC. Chris Engel is the city’s economic development director. (staff report)

“This item in summary deals with a loose end from a development agreement that was entered into between Union Station Partners and the city of Charlottesville back in the late 1990’s,” Engel said.

At that time, the Downtown Transit Station had not yet been built, and there was a possibility it might be located at the Amtrak station on West Main. The city entered into a development agreement to secure a federal grant which required a match from the city.

“In lieu of providing cash, the parties agreed to transfer a parcel of land so that that could serve as a local match,” Engel said.

The 0.8 acre property has continued to be used as a parking lot ever since. The grant did result in an upgrade of the train station but a second phase did not materialize. No one spoke at the public hearing required by city code.

It should also be noted that the fourth round of Smart Scale also recommends $50 million in funds to increase passenger rail services through Charlottesville to expand frequency to Roanoke and points west.

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On today’s show:

A COVID update from the Blue Ridge Health District

Council denies special use permit for 11 units in Belmont

Local real estate group releases report for 4th quarter of 2021

The Virginia Festival of the Book goes virtual for 2021

With the COVID pandemic still raging, today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out from an anonymous contributor is once again to state clearly:

"We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

A second mass vaccination site at Seminole Square Shopping Center is now in place to be used by the University of Virginia and the Blue Ridge Health District to administer doses, though the supply is still limited. Ryan McKay is the policy director for the health district.

“Right now we are receiving 2,850 doses each week,” McKay said. “That’s for the entire district. That’s for everyone.”

McKay said more than half of Virginia’s population is eligible for Phase1B and health districts are still working to ensure everyone in Phase 1A is vaccinated.

“You can imagine the number of people it’s going to take to get through 1B and the amount of time it’s going to take given our current allotment,” McKay said. “It’s going to be a matter of months before we can provide that widespread access to all of those individuals in that particular group.”

Over 40,000 have filled out the survey that the Blue Ridge Health District has used to begin to tackle the logistics. That also means creating a third space for municipal employees.

“We’ve partnered with the city and Albemarle County to have them open and operate a site at Charlottesville High School where they are providing access to Phase 1A city employees, so this would be people in health and human services, social services, and then Phase 1B educators,” McKay said.

The Biden administration has stated they are working to increase supply, and more information will come out over the next few weeks.

“There are other vaccines on the horizon but we don’t know how readily available they will be,” McKay said. “Some of those vaccines, such as the Johnson & Johnson, is actually a one-dose vaccine but the efficacy on that vaccine is less. I think it’s at about 65 percent. So as more vaccines become available we’ll obviously have to educate our communities about those vaccines and the benefits and comparisons to the ones that are currently out there.”

There are now more people vaccinated in Virginia than the total number of cases since last March. McKay said there was a surge following the holidays, but that has begun to wane.

“Over the last couple of weeks we have seen a downward trend both in the percent positive from test results, and we’ve also seen a downward trend in the total number of cases and case incidence per 100,000,” McKay said. “So we believe at this point after three weeks or so of a downward trend, that we’ve worked our way beyond the surge but also recognize that there is always that potential for increased cases and transmission in the community.”

Charlottesville City Council has denied a special use permit for additional density at a site in Belmont that would have added 11 units at 1000 Monticello Road.

Brian Haluska is a city planner.

“1000 Monticello Road already has a development on it, so that project as its currently developed has more units than what the zoning would allow,” Haluska said. “The project was built in the 70’s and was rezoned in 2003.”

That rezoning was part of a comprehensive rezoning across the city. This portion of Belmont was put in the Neighborhood Commercial Corridor category, which is why there are so many restaurants clustered nearby.

Several members of the Charlottesville Low-Income Housing Coalition asked Council to deny the permit.

Laura Goldblatt is a member of the Board of Commissioners for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority and a Belmont resident.

“It doesn’t meet the affordability that we need,” Goldblatt said. “One of the things that we need to demand of developers is affordable housing. The only way we’re going to start to see a lack of displacement and that we’re going to see Charlottesville be more inclusive and welcoming is if developers really have their feet held to the fire and have to do it.”

Many expressed anger that the owner, Piedmont Realty Holdings III LLC, raised rents in the current building after purchasing the property in February 2019 for $2.75 million. Haluska said staff could not take that into consideration.

“Past actions of an applicant are not something we take into account and you can kind of get into trouble with that when you do that,” Haluska said.

He also said the number of units proposed in the new structure do not trigger provisions in the city code that require a portion of them to be sold or rented to people whose incomes are less than 80 percent of the area median (AMI). (link to code)

“Altogether this project does not have enough square footage within all of its buildings including the new building to make it over that line,” Haluska said.

The applicant had volunteered to make five units comply with the city’s affordable dwelling unit policy anyway, at roughly 65 percent of the AMI. However, Council did not trust the guarantee. Here’s Councilor Lloyd Snook.

“To me the issue is, are we as a city better off if we have 11 units, five of which are affordable at this roughly 65 percent of AMI,” Snook said.

Councilor Michael Payne was among the three Councilors who voted to deny.

“Just because an SUP is in front of us doesn’t mean we have to approve it,” Payne said. “It’s our policy decision and we can evaluate all SUPs on the merits and make a policy decision there. Given the adverse neighborhood impacts, the fact that it doesn’t conform with our Comprehensive Plan, the existing zoning there, and under our current ordinance for the criteria for standards for issuance I think there is a strong case to be made that there are adverse neighborhood impacts on the surrounding neighborhood.”

Payne made a motion to recommend denial and it carried 3-2. Mayor Nikuyah Walker and Vice Mayor Sena Magill voted to deny and Snook and Councilor Heather Hill voted to approve.

A rewrite of the city’s affordable housing policy is underway. The public comment period for the draft has closed, but the document is available for review. The Planning Commission will discuss the draft at their meeting on February 9. (draft affordable housing plan)

The Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors has released its home sales report for the final quarter of calendar year 2020. In summary, mortgage rates are at a historic low which may be fueling recent activity in the market. (download the report)

“Sales are surging in the CAAR area housing market,” reads the executive summary of the report. “There were 1,278 sales in the 4th quarter, a 23 percent jump from last year.”

There has also been an increase in the median sales price, which was $348,050 in the region during the period, or a 13 percent rise over the previous year. There are also fewer homes on the market, which is likely contributing to the increase in sales prices.

The report covers the same jurisdictions in the Thomas Jefferson Area Planning District. They are Charlottesville, Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson.

For the second year in a row, the Virginia Festival of the Book will not be held in person this March. However, the festival will proceed virtually from March 13 through March 26 on both Zoom and Facebook Live. More than forty events will be held with authors and all of it is free to the viewing audience. But if you can’t wait until then, there are many recorded events available on-demand at vabook.org. There are also several events coming up this month as part of their Shelf Life program. The festival has been running since 1995 and is a service of Virginia Humanities.

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On today’s show:

Albemarle local government and school employees may get a $1,000 bonus

The MPO Policy Board is briefed on several transportation projects

Charlottesville’s public housing board held an emergency meeting today

And Albemarle County begins taking public comment on a new housing policy

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and the Albemarle School Board met last Thursday to begin the public side of the budget cycle. In Virginia, school boards do not have the power to raise their own money, so legislative bodies have to factor in school needs when setting a tax rate.

“We’re here to kind of kick off and get started with the things that roll right into our budget season which is right upon us,” said Albemarle Supervisor Ned Gallaway.

“We are pleased to be with the supervisors as we start out with this budget season,” said Graham Paige, the chair of the Albemarle School Board.

Recently, Albemarle unpaused several capital projects that were delayed due to the uncertainty involving the pandemic’s effect on the local economy. These include an addition at Crozet Elementary School. But, the main topic for Thursday’s meeting is a major factor that Albemarle’s budget staff need to consider as they tally up projected expenditures. Matt Haas is the Superintendent of Albemarle Public Schools.

“I’m really grateful for this opportunity to be here with the Albemarle County School Board, the Board of Supervisors and our staff to have a conversation with what I think we all might consider is a high priority, compensation for our employees,” Haas said.

Haas said this previous year has been very difficult for schools around the world as normal was turned upside down. There’s a lot of work that goes into providing the services associated with public schools.

“Since then our employees, our teachers, our nurses, teaching assistants, building services staff, principals, bus drivers, aides, our child nutrition staff, and our leadership team have come together [and] treated every day as an opportunity to learn and improve, both virus mitigation and safety, providing for student and family needs in terms of meals and essentials and amazingly, high-quality teaching and learning, whether it is provided online or out at the school,” Haas said.

This year, school employees did not get a raise due to the county’s decision to play it safe fiscally. A projected increase to a minimum wage of $15 an hour was also shelved. Still, Haas sounded optimistic.

“As you know, it’s a new year, “ Haas said. “Although some of the events we have witnessed since January 1 might make it seem like we’re still experiencing 2020, we’re now actually in 2021 and due to the smart moves of our local government and school finance staff, we are in better position than I thought we might have been right now.”

But, are conditions favorable enough to increase compensation? On January 20, the Board of Supervisors were told that overall tax assessments in Albemarle were up 1.4 percent, which could bring in additional revenue depending on the property tax rate. Andy Bowman in the county’s budget office sounded a realistic tone.

“T his will be the slowest growth in our reassessments since the Great Recession and that will be especially impactful in the revenue picture next year,” Bowman said. “As the Boards may know, a little more than half of the county’s operating revenue comes from real estate taxes.”

Bowman said the budget office sees the economy as uncertain and unstable at this time.

“We are seeing that the county revenues are stabilizing but we have not stabilized,” Bowman said. “And as the pandemic continues, we are not through that, either.”

However, Bowman said budget staff have identified a source of revenue to provide for a one-time funding for several ways to shore up the county, including employee compensation using the term “stablizing the county’s workforce”.

The budgets are still being prepared and will be presented in mid to late February.

A third of the school’s budget comes from the state, and the rest comes from local taxes. That means the school’s budget depends on what is proposed in Virginia’s budget. Maya Kumazawa is the budget and planning director for Albemarle Schools. She said the system will receive more money than expected in the current fiscal year.

“There are a few things listed in FY21 that add up to approximately $5 million that we are anticipated to receive in the current year above what we have adopted, so this would fall under one-time funding as Mr. Bowman described,” Kumazawa said. “In addition for next year, the Governor’s proposed budget includes a two-percent one-time bonus for SOQ funded positions which is likely to turn into a raise pending more information about revenue forecasts.”

The elected officials were told that other major employers have already made the jump to $15 an hour. Dana Robb is with Albemarle’s human resources department.

“We are still seeing trends of some local employers moving towards [$15 an hour] or have, such as the city of Charlottesville, University of Virginia, and Sentara Martha Jefferson,” Robb said.

The Commonwealth of Virginia is also increasing its minimum wage to $15 gradually through 2026.

So, what’s the one-time proposal? Lorna Gerome is Albemarle’s human resources director and she said the county was proposing…

“To provide a lump-sum payment of $1,000 for all regular full-time employees and some portion of that for part-time,” Gerome said. “This would come out of existing year-end fund balance and we would be able to do it this spring.”

For local government, that would use a maximum of $850,000 of the county’s surplus. For the school government, that would be a maximum of a $2.7 million drawdown of their fund balance of $8.6 million.

The idea of the one-time payment had general support from both elected bodies. Here’s Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District.

“I think this $1,000 lump sum payment is a way of saying ‘we see you, we recognize you, this is what we can do for now and we appreciate all you have done for us in making sure that local government runs for all of the people of Albemarle,” LaPisto-Kirtley said.

Others, however, were concerned that the county has not been able to increase salaries. Dave Oberg represents the White Hall District.

“From my perspective, I appreciate the thought of hey, look, we’re going to give a bonus,” Oberg said. “I get that. But the problem is that I think there’s a danger that assuages our guilt. We didn’t give you the raise that we thought we would give you, but we’re giving you a bonus. And I just think that’s a problem.”

Last week, the regional body that takes votes on transportation projects met for the first time in 2021.

One item on the agenda was a public hearing on a cost increase for the Belmont Bridge replacement. That project has been in the planning stages for over ten years and set to get under construction this year. The cost estimate for the project is $31.1 million, or about six million higher than the most recent estimate included within the Metropolitan Planning Organization’s transportation improvement program.

Charlottesville’s capital budget for the current fiscal year includes $5 million toward the project, and the draft capital improvement program includes $2.5 million. No one spoke at the public hearing.

State and federal funding for the Belmont Bridge predate the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process. Results of the fourth round were recently released. VDOT engineer Chuck Proctor told the MPO Policy Board that the area was successful in getting many projects recommended.

“In the MPO area there were 15 total projects, 13 of them were funded,” Proctor said. “The only ones that weren’t funded were the Hillsdale Drive South extension and the Fray’s Mill intersection on 29.”

That last project is in the scope of an MPO study that will soon get underway to look at U.S. 29 between Airport Road in Albemarle County and the intersection with U.S. 33 in Greene County.

“The purpose of this corridor study is to develop broad transportation recommendations that complement the existing land use designations in the study area,” said transportation planner Jessica Hersh-Ballering. “This will not just be personal motor vehicles. This will be transit, bicycle, and pedestrian transportation.

On January 20, the Greene Planning Commission recommended approval of a zoning amendment that will allow construction to begin on 1,180 new homes off Preddy Creek Road. (Read Terry Beigie’s story in the Greene County Record to learn more)

There’s also the possibility that Greene County could be added to the jurisdictional boundaries of the MPO. Sandy Shackelford is the director of planning and transportation at the MPO.

“We’re also going to be recommending that we use a consultant to do an MPO strategic plan, specifically as we start looking at the possibility of changing the MPO boundaries,” Shackleford said. “We think this is a really good opportunity to review and define who it is that we’re serving. Who is our client? Is that the elected officials? Is it members of the public at large? Is that our local government bodies and staff? We really want to spend some time thinking about who it is that we are doing this work for.”

MPO members were interested in a recommendation from staff to find ways to raise additional revenue for transportation projects through public-private partnerships. City Councilor and MPO Chair Michael Payne said he would welcome work from staff on how transportation programs can be altered to help address climate change.

“Connecting our climate action plan project to our capital projects and transportation projects, [and] think about how they interact with induced demand and emissions from transportation,” Payne said.

Toward the end of the meeting, the MPO was briefed on a pair of grants intended to expand transit in the region. One is a $350,000 grant to create a regional vision for transit, and the other is a $106,215 feasibility study for expanded transit in Albemarle.

“The $350,000 for the vision plan is intended to go beyond any work that the Regional Transit Partnership has already done,” said Hersh-Ballering. “Like what Richmond did, we’re trying to come up with a really clear plan for what kind of investment all of our transit agencies are going to make in the future. It will not get down to the details of route planning or determine how many vehicles to buy.”

Finally, this was the last MPO meeting run by Chip Boyles, who will become City Manager on February 15. Christina Jacobs will serve as interim director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission while a search is conducted by Boyles’ replacement.

Albemarle County has released a draft housing policy that seeks to increase the number of units by thousands.

“By fostering a variety of housing types that are affordable to individuals and families with diverse incomes, Albemarle County seeks to ensure a thriving, sustainable community for all, today and well into the future,” reads a description of the plan on the online questionnaire for Housing Albemarle.

The plan is based on forecasts that show Albemarle growing to a population of over 138,000 people by 2040. The Housing Albemarle draft suggests 11,750 more units are needed by then, and the document is intended to suggest ways to get there. That could include increased density in development areas, creation of permanently affordable housing on county-owned land, and designation of Housing Rehabilitation Zones. (Weldon Cooper projections)

The questionnaire will be open through February 15. The Board of Supervisors will have a public hearing on Housing Albemarle on March 17.

Finally today, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority held an emergency meeting to discuss the employment contract of executive director John Sales. Sales joined the agency last August after a brief stint as the city’s coordinator. At the end of a closed session, CRHA Commissioner Lisa Green read a motion.

“I move that the Board direct the Chair with the assistance of counsel to communicate directly with the executive director regarding proposed changes to his employment agreement,” Green said. Personnel matters are one reason government bodies can close meetings to the public. There was no other information about what the contract change might include, but Brandon Collins of the Public Housing Association of Residents had this to say.

“PHAR on the whole thinks that Mr. Sales is doing a fabulous job,” Collins said. “We’re really glad he’s here and we hope that’s reflected in whatever it is you all are talking about today.”

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On today’s show:

A quick look at another new hotel proposed for Pantops

Albemarle seeking to install five historic markers this year

Coverage of the January 27, 2021 briefing by Governor Ralph Northam

Faced with mounting criticism over Virginia’s rate of vaccination, Governor Ralph Northam took to the podium this afternoon to address what his administration plans to do to speed up delivery of doses.

“First of all I want all of you to know that I understand your frustration,” Northam said. “I know you’re out of patience and I am as well.”

The first doses of the Pfizer vaccine became available in the United States in mid-December, followed soon after by the Moderna vaccine.

“We told you then that the first shots would go to the people who are most vulnerable,” Northam said. “Health care workers and people living in long-term care. We estimated that would be about 500,000 people. Today about a month later, more than 520,000 shots have been given in our Commonwealth.

Northam said that means more people have been vaccinated than diagnosed with COVID in the past year. Today that number hit 488,553 according to data from the Virginia Department of Health.

The federal government is the entity that contracted with pharmaceutical companies to manufacture the vaccines. Northam said the national government has been distributing doses to states. The presidential transition has been a factor leading to public confusion.

“Fifteen days ago, the outgoing federal Secretary of Health told states to open up eligibility to everyone 65 and over,” Northam said. “[They said] ‘we’ll send more doses. If you don’t expand eligibility, we’ll reduce your supply.’ Then two days later, states learned that there were no more doses. That made a confusing situation even more confusing across the entire country.”

Northam said he has been in touch with the Biden administration including a call yesterday with all of the nation’s governors.

“I also heard something that I have not heard since the pandemic began and that is a commitment at the national level to work together, find solutions, and get this moving so we can all get back to our lives,” Northam said.

Earlier in the day, the White House COVID Response team held a briefing on their efforts. Andy Slavitt is Acting Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

“We’ve been hitting our target of an average of 1 million vaccinations per day, necessary to meet the president’s early commitment to administer 100 million shots in 100 days,” Slavitt said.

But back to Virginia.

Northam said all states will immediately receive a 16 percent increase in supply. He also reported on a briefing from General Gustave Perna, the person in charge of Operation Warp Speed.

“We asked how can we be confident that we will receive these additional doses in the weeks ahead,” Northam said. “He told us that after more than a month of working, the drug manufacturers have hit a stable, regular sustainable cadence of production and that is good news.”

The national goal is now to have vaccinations available to everyone who wants one by the end of the summer. Today, the VDH reported the seven-day average for vaccinations is 26,010. That’s halfway to the goal of 50,000 a day.

Northam invited representatives of CVS and Walgreens, the two companies that are working with the federal government to vaccinate people who live and work in long term care facilities. James Satterfield is a regional healthcare director at Walgreens.

“We’ve completed 92 skilled nursing facilities and are in the process of pulling forward and completing our assisted living facilities as well,” Satterfield said. “Currently we’ve given over 18,500 shots to the most vulnerable in those long term care facilities and look forward to completing those doses.

Dick Dakessian is a vice president at CVS Health.

“As far as where we’re at today for CVS, our first round of COVID vaccination doses, we’ve gone to 195 skilled nursing facilities that we were dedicated to vaccinating and have completed those,” Dakessian said. “Right now we’re about halfway through those as well and plan to complete those, the second doses, by February 8. Today we have had 43,000 doses administered within skilled nursing facilities.”

Northam said he is ordering hospitals to not hold on to any additional vaccine and to get doses in arms as soon as possible.

“We’re also working with hospitals and local health districts to make sure they are not holding on to too much supply of second doses, especially if they won’t need it for several weeks,” Northam said. “By shifting inventory around, we’re going to be able to increase the number of shots this week by about 20 percent. That’s about 40,000 more shots by this Sunday on top of the 175,000 that were already planned.”

Dr. Mike McDermott is the CEO of Mary Washington Health Care in the Fredericksburg area, as well as the past president of the Virginia Hospital and Health Care Association.

“Overall, Virginia hospitals have administered more than 318,000 vaccine doses since mid-December,” McDermott said. “To give you an example of how fast vaccination capacity is scaling within our hospitals, Virginia hospitals have increased vaccinations by 35 percent in the last week.”

McDermott said Operation Warp Speed was able to get vaccines manufactured, but he said there was not enough logistical work to get what he said was the “last twelve inches” of getting shots in arms. He also said the previous federal administration was not transparent in their operations.

Vaccine supplies are still expected to be limited for some time. Northam said the Virginia Department of Health would issue more guidance about who is eligible.

“Here is how to allocate your supply,” Northam said. “Half of available doses should go for people age 65 and older,” Northam said. “The other half should be used for frontline essential workers and people who are at increased risk for severe illness as the CDC identifies.”

Northam also unveiled an updated VDH dashboard for vaccines that has more details on where doses are going. This dashboard also has more demographic information to ensure that doses are being distributed equitably. Many initial shots were recorded without identifying the race of the recipient.

“On Monday, Health Commissioner Dr. Norm Oliver wrote to every clinician in Virginian and told them to collect this information, it matters for transparency,” Northam said. He added he will endorse legislation in the General Assembly to require this information.

Right now, signing up for vaccines is handled by individual health districts. Northam said that system has been fragmented, so he has directed the Virginia Department of Health to create a statewide system.

“That is not ready today but I expect it to be ready soon,” Northam said. “I know this has been a source of great frustration for a lot of Virginians. I hear you and we’re getting this fixed.”

Northam has also amended Executive Order 72 continuing COVID-19 restrictions until at least February 28.

Before we move on to the rest of the show, let’s hear more from Andy Slavitt.

“Now as you heard from the president this week, he is pushing us to view 1 million a day as the floor, not the ceiling,” Slavitt said. “To that end, we are releasing more supply, activating [the Federal Emergency Management Agency] and deploying many more personnel. In fact, just this week, FEMA announced they had obligated $1 billion to support state vaccination sites.”

Slavett said there are two limiting factors to distributing hundreds of millions of vaccines. First is getting the supply, and the second is to distribute them quickly and efficiently.

“We are taking action to increase supply and increase capacity but even so it will be months before everyone who wants a vaccine will be able to get one,” Slavett said.

Until then, perhaps its best to follow the advice of our long-running Patreon supporter who wants to say:

"We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

Last week, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors was presented with the annual report of the county’s Office of Equity and Inclusion (OEI). One of the activities reported is a partnership with the Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee to install more highway markers. Liz Russell is a member of the committee.

“The challenge and sort of task presented by the Board of Supervisors and administered under OEI under the Community Remembrance project is to have five markers installed and we’d like to have them by the end of this year, five markers to better reflect the stories of women and people of color in the county,” Russell said.

Two markers are close to being installed. One is for the Albemarle Training School and one is for Virginia L. Murray, the first Black woman to be supervise education in the county. The Albemarle Training School was the precursor to Jackson P. Burley High School. The committee needs to select three more topics for markers.

Later that evening, the Pantops Community Advisory Committee learned more about a proposal to build a four-story hotel next to the Rivanna Ridge Shopping Center. Andy Reitelbach is the lead reviewer for the 125-room Pantops Overlook Hotel, which requires an amendment to the existing zoning.

“Sometimes the zoning that designates what can be developed by-right and the future land uses identified in the master plan do not always line up,” Reitelbach said. “That is way a rezoning may have to come in.”

In this case, the zoning states this land should be for office use and that a tree conservation area should be on the property. The Pantops Master Plan calls for most of the land to be community mixed-use and a small portion part of it be parks and recreation. Access would be right-in, right-out onto U.S. 250. One CAC member asked what the business viability would be for another hotel.

“In this immediate area we have going up very soon if not already finished and operating, a Holiday Inn Express, a Hilton Garden Inn, a Comfort Inn and on the plans a Hampton Inn,” said Sara Robinson. “What justification did the owners that we needed another hotel?”

Doug Ellis is with WS4 LLC, the company that owns the property.

“We see Albemarle County as a great market for a well-developed and designed hotel that meets a different need than those what you listed off but we’re very aware that they are in the general area as well and hope to develop a product that is very different from those,” Ellis said.

The new hotel would be all suites and would offer extended stays. The same company owns an adjacent parcel under the company Happy Boxes Pantops LLC. Ellis said there are no plans to develop that land. There is no date yet for public hearings at the Planning Commission or the Board of Supervisors.

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On today’s show:

A COVID update packed with important information

News from Charlottesville’s public housing authority board including a new vacancy

A group continues to seek ways to increase glass recycling from local wineries

We begin today with COVID-19. The Virginia Department of Health reports another 4,707 new cases today, and another 93 fatalities. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests has dropped to 12.5 percent, down from 13.6 percent a week ago. There are another 71 cases in the Blue Ridge Health District and another death in Fluvanna County. That’s now 106 people in the district who have passed on from COVID-related complications.

The continued surge as well as a shortage of vaccines has led the Center at Belvedere to close its doors through at least March 1, though programming will continue online. The nonprofit group that offers community space closed in the early days of the pandemic, but reopened. Peter Thompson is the executive director.

“Conditions are quite different from what they were last June when we resumed on-site programs,” Thompson wrote in a message posted to the Center’s website. “Due to the increase in Covid-19 infection rates locally, the emergence of highly contagious new variants, and the complexities of vaccine distribution, we have determined that the best way for us to support community health is to temporarily move all of our programs online.”

Yesterday the Virginia Department of Health reported the presence in Northern Virginia of a more infectious strain of COVID that was first discovered in the United Kingdom. In a press release, health officials said they will continue to monitor the situation.

“While scientists are working to better understand its impact on vaccine efficacy, early data suggests currently authorized vaccines are effective against the new variant,” the release continues.

Also yesterday, Albemarle’s communications director Emily Kilroy briefed the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee on the vaccine roll-out.

Albemarle County has increased the presence of COVID-related information on its website following concerns from some that not enough was being done to get shots in people’s arms. Kilroy urged patience while the vaccine supply is replenished.

“We like try to to remind folks that we are still much in the middle of the pandemic and even once folks start getting vaccinated, and are getting vaccinated, that still does not change your day to day,” Kilroy said. “You’re still wearing a mask. You’re still keeping distance. You’re still safest at home.”

As for vaccines, the seven-day average for vaccines administered per day is now at 24,790, up from 21,823 yesterday. In the past 24 hours, the VDH reports 39,109 doses administered. Keep in mind there has been a data backlog at times, but the number of vaccines administered per day has been increasing. The goal set by Governor Ralph Northam is 50,000 a day.

In other COVID news, the Federal Transit Administration has awarded nearly a quarter of a million dollars to the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation (DRPT) to help transit providers recover even before the pandemic is over. The DRPT will create a toolkit called “Adapting to a New Normal” that will offer advice on how to increase safety and reduce contacts. (release)

Update from CRHA meeting

There’s a new vacancy on the Board of Commissioners for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. Michael Osteen has resigned in the midst of his second term. CRHA Chair Betsy Roettger read from a resolution last night.

“And whereas his tenure on the CRHA Board, Mr. Osteen has worked diligently to represent the needs of CRHA residents and brought his expertise in design, building, and property management,” Roettger said. “And whereas Mr. Osteen’s commitment to a resident-centric approach to the management of CRHA demonstrates the fundamental values of true-asset based community leadership…”

Osteen also served on the Planning Commission from 2006 to 2014. City Council will need to appoint a vacancy.

A frequent speaker at CRHA meetings noted that last night’s meeting is perhaps the last before groundbreaking takes place for the first new public housing units. Brandon Collins is on the staff at the Public Housing Association of Residents (PHAR) and wanted to note the occasion. He said many residents became frustrated in the early 2010’s after nothing happened following adoption of a master plan for public housing in the summer of 2010.

“We all kind of got over that hump,” Collins said. “PHAR made an important realization which was that redevelopment was needed but it needed to be on residents term and PHAR needed to say yes to something, so we set out and we did the work for about a year putting together what we called the positive vision for redevelopment.”

Collins said the vision calls for reparations for past wrongs by providing for resident self-determination.

“And that’s something to work towards and it’s something that this housing authority has been bold in accepting the idea that the only way to make this work is through resident-led redevelopment,” Collins said.

The CRHA Board got an update on redevelopment last night. Renovation of Crescent Halls and creation of new units at South First Street are the two plans that are moving forward. Kathleen Glenn-Matthews is director of operations at CRHA.

“After a really long day, we finally have closed on South First Street and we’re really excited that we’re going to be able to have a community meeting this Sunday,” Glenn-Matthews said.

There’s no date set yet for ground-breaking at the first phase South First Street, but she said it may happen toward the end of the month once there is equipment on site. A virtual ceremony will be held due to COVID.

Glenn-Matthews said that redevelopment is moving forward despite a recent staff vacancy. Dave Norris has left his position as CRHA Redevelopment Director. There’s an application for the position on the CRHA website. In an email to me this morning, Norris confirmed his departure and said he continued working to help get the agency closer to ground-breaking. He also said he has been focusing time recently on the Sister City partnership between Charlottesville and Winneba, Ghana.

You can learn more about the status of redevelopment in an update Glenn-Matthews posted. The CRHA has not closed the financing deal for the Crescent Halls project.

The waiting list for the CRHA’s Mainstream Voucher Program will open back up on January 29, according to a blog post on their website.

Group seeks information from beverage producers on glass recycling

An ad hoc group of environmental professionals working on a way to reduce the amount of glass that winds up in landfills resumed the conversation earlier this month. The work is an outcome of Albemarle County’s Solid Waste Advisory Committee and Better World Betty. They have been asking area wineries and breweries to tell them how much glass they discard in an online survey that is open through February 1.

“There’s just a lot of glass to be had and we’re excited about the survey results that we’ve received,” said Teri Kent, the founder of Better World Betty.

The idea is to collect the information with an eye towards hiring a hauler who could collect glass from beverage providers and aggregate the material at a processing facility run by the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority. For this to work, the glass must be separated in the waste stream to avoid contamination.

A co-founder of Valley Road Vineyards in Afton said he supported the idea.

“I am instinctively drawn to anything that will do something than what we’re doing with glass now which is just putting it in the landfill,” said Stan Joynes. “But I do have this question at the outset which is what is the end of this material?”

Philip McKalips is the solid waste manager at the RSWA. He said for many years, the agency collected glass and was able to find places for it to go but has recently formalized an arrangement.

“More recently we wanted to have more of a structured program, something that we could rely on functionally, and we set up an arrangement with Strategic Materials where they actually a hire a trucking company, they come on a regular process, out to our closed landfill, where we stockpile our recycled glass that comes in from our collection centers,” McKalips said.

From there, the glass goes to a facility in Wilson, North Carolina, where the materials are sorted.

“And then they either use it internally or sell it to other users,” McKalips said.

The goal of the current initiative is to collect enough glass so it can be used as material to make new containers. Localities in Northern Virginia have created a program where purple bins are used to collect glass, returning to a time when materials were separated by those who purchased the product. Scott DeFife is with the Glass Packaging Institute.

“All of the glass that’s going into the bins in the Northern Virginia communities of Arlington, Alexandria and Fairfax is now making its way down to Wilson and getting turned around into glass container plants,” DeFife said.

DeFife said much of what ends up in mixed recycling bins winds up in a landfill.

“Getting enough clean, you know, a critical mass of good quality glass can get that glass back into the supply chain,” DeFife said. He added that there is a market for a glass manufacturer somewhere in Virginia which would reduce travel time.

“But the economics of processing are very chicken and egg,” DeFife said. “Nobody is going to build a $10 million to $15 million glass processing plant if there’s no glass to go to it.”

So work continues to organize the waste stream. The group wants as many beverage producers as possible to fill out the survey. Jesse Warren is with UVA Sustainability.

“What we’re thinking is some kind of weekly hauling route where a provider will provide something like a 64x96 gallon cart that you all will then fill up with glass,” Warren said.

Special thanks to the Valley Road Research Center for their musical contributions, funded by an anonymous donor.

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Today’s show doubles as an episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. With the COVID pandemic still raging, today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out from an anonymous contributor is once again to state clearly:

"We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

At a briefing on January 22, 2021, the executive director of the Blue Ridge Health District had a clear message for people in the greater Charlottesville area.

“There is a vaccination shortage and I just need everyone to understand that,” said Dr. Denise Bonds.

Bonds appeared at one of three press briefings held Friday to explain the current situation. In this edition of the newsletter, we’ll also hear from Dr. Costi Sifri from the University of Virginia Health System and Dr. Danny Avula, Richmond’s health director who is also serving as the state’s vaccine coordinator.

“Right now in Virginia we’re getting about 105,000 new doses per week and clearly there is much more demand than that,” Avula said. “Why is that and how do we address it?”

The post holiday surge appears to be receding slightly, with several indicators trending downward over the past several days. Today’s count of 3,792 new cases reported by the Virginia Department of Health is the second lowest-one day count of the year, and the seven-day average for new cases has been trending downwards and is now at 4,735.

Virginia has now surpassed five million PCR tests administered and the seven-day average for positive test results is now at 12.7 percent. That number has been declining since January 10 when it hit a high of 16.8 percent.

There have now been a total of 10,132 cases in the Blue Ridge Health District with a 7-day average of 82 new cases a day. The holiday surge has been felt more dramatically in surrounding counties. Nearly two-thirds of the 573 cases in Nelson County have been reported since January 1 and more than half of Louisa’s cases have been in 2021. In comparison, the city of Charlottesville has only had twenty-percent of its 2,639 cases reported this year.

Throughout the pandemic, a lot of planning has been based on an epidemiological model created by the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute. Their model depicts several scenarios which could unfold under various conditions. The latest one considers new forms of COVID that are believed to be circulating across the world. The “new variants” scenario assumes a 40 percent increase in transmission rate and a potentially dramatic increase in new cases.

“In this scenario, new weekly cases peak at almost 75,000,” reads the report. “However, peaks are sustained, with 65,000 or more cases expected for 10 weeks, from late February to late April. By comparison, Virginia had about 50,000 new cases during the entire month of November.”

For comparison, there’s been 33,142 cases this week, compared to 40,449 the week before.

Take a look at the report if you want to look further, but do know the last two sentences under “model-results” remind everyone this scenario is not inevitable.

“Do your part to stop the spread,” reads the ‘model results section.’ ”Continue to practice good prevention and get vaccinated when eligible.”

However, there is an issue with supply. It has been two weeks since the Blue Ridge Health District announced the opening of Phase1B, and some in the community have expressed frustration with the roll-out. Cynthia Neff is an Albemarle resident who spoke to the Board of Supervisors on January 20.

“As this vaccine roll-out has began having one problem after another, I’ve started to talking to a lot of people to try to better understand,” Neff said. “Certainly we can do this better, quicker, faster, more effectively. And I’m not sure that I’m seeing that in spite of a lot of people working really hard.”

To clear up some of the confusion, the Blue Ridge Health District held a press briefing on Friday. Here’s Dr. Denise Bonds, the agency’s director.

“We recently opened up vaccination to Phase 1B,” Bonds said. “This was a request by the federal government and an encouragement by our state government to really begin to offer vaccines to those who were at highest risk at having of having an adverse outcome if they were impacted, and that would be people over the age of 75, and to a large degree those over the age of 65 or younger with comorbidities.”

Based on an email sent out on January 7, the Health District had originally anticipated opening up that phase in early spring, but they complied with the request and announced on January 15 they would proceed on January 18 at the mass vaccination site built at the former K-Mart building on U.S. 29 and Hydraulic Road. An arrangement was worked out with the University of Virginia to supply people who could administer doses.

However, Dr. Bonds said she learned of a major problem on January 20.

“There is a vaccination shortage and I just need everybody to understand that,” Bonds said. “There are five million Virginians that are currently eligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Virginia gets each week 105,000 doses for the whole state. As you can see, there is considerable demand and not much supply.”

For the Blue Ridge Health District, that means a weekly distribution of 2,950 first doses for the next four weeks. Dr. Bonds said she learned on Wednesday that would be the new supply from the Virginia Department of Health as they contend with a shortage.

“Prior to that we ordered what we needed for the next week but the state quickly realized they were getting twice to three times as many as orders as we actually got vaccines, so they switched to a per capita distribution system,” Dr. Bonds said.

For the next four weeks at least, the Blue Ridge Health District will need to figure out how to prioritize the limited amount of doses. Ryan McKay is the director of policy for the health district.

“The 2,950 dose fall significantly short of what we know we can dispense in any given week,” McKay said. “What that means is that we have to plan a little bit more accordingly in terms of how we distribute vaccines to localities but also how we apply that distribution to the guidelines that are provided by VDH and how we use an equitable lens to make sure that we’re reaching all of the hardest hit individuals in the district.”

As of Friday afternoon, the Blue Ridge Health District had administered 1,500 first doses, and were scheduling appointments for 4,200 people using resources shared by the UVA Health System. Dr. Bonds repeated again that there are limited doses.

“Please be patient,” Dr. Bonds said. “We are trying to make sure that we offer to anyone over the age of 75 a vaccine, but it’s going to take us some time to get through the entire list.”

Dr. Bonds said anyone who currently has an existing appointment with the Blue Ridge Health District for a first shot will get their initial dose.

“Individuals who need a second dose will also get a vaccine,” Bonds said. “That 2,950 represents first doses only. Second doses are distributed in a second separate distribution system and we will contact individuals on a week by week basis to make sure those people who need a second dose are given an appointment so they don’t have to compete in the general IT system.”

As new supply comes in, the health district will be able to make more appointments. Dr. Bonds recommended people who qualify under Phase 1B to fill out the survey but continued to urge patience.

“I want to set very clear expectations,” Dr. Bonds said. “At our current rate of receiving vaccines it will take months to vaccinate all of the individuals that qualify under Phase1B.”

Dr. Bonds said capacity would be expanded by the authorization of new vaccines. They’re also switching to a new computer system to make the scheduling process more efficient, as there have been reported difficulties. In the meantime, Dr. Bonds repeated the most effective tools to stop or slow the spread of COVID.

“We need everyone to continue those great mitigation strategies that we have all become so good at,” Dr. Bonds said. “Please continue to wear your mask. Please continue to maintain physical distancing. Wash your hands frequently and properly. And please limit your social gatherings, particularly with other households. We know this has been a huge source of infection, particularly recently.”

UVA Health System’s role

Since Monday, the University of Virginia Health System has been helping to bolster capacity in the Blue Ridge Health District’s efforts. They’ll begin their second week tomorrow.

“We have plenty of capacity in terms of our ability to provide shots,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the health system’s director of hospital epidemiology. “We’re willing to do whatever Blue Ridge Health District wants us to do to meet the needs of our community.”

The University of Virginia Health System has been vaccinating its personnel. As of Friday, the University of Virginia had received 25,075 first doses of vaccine.

“Of those, we have provided a total of 17,321 total doses and we have scheduled 22,693 first doses, or have provided those vaccines,” Dr. Sifri said.

However, those numbers may be much lower over the next few week as supply chains struggle to keep up with demand. Dr. Sifri said the work has been done to set up the system for when more doses are available.

“I think this is becoming a clear realization around the country that vaccine supplies are going to be limited,” Dr. Sifri said. “I think that we understood that from the launch of this vaccine program. Some of the initial efforts for the first couple of weeks as we got vaccines were to figure out that last mile. How to figure out how to get a vaccine into a person’s arm and make it a vaccination. That work is now done within our health system and I think that’s true around the rest of our health district, around the state and the country. Now that we have capacity to distribute vaccine and get it into people’s arms, we’re starting to see that the supply is limited.”

Dr. Sifri said he did not know how much vaccine would be distributed to the UVA Health System. He said they have the capacity to deliver 1,000 doses a day but the limiting factor will be vaccine supply.

“Our hope is and our anticipation is that vaccine production efforts are ramped up in the next month and perhaps the prospect of having new vaccines come to approval within the next month or so, we’ll be able to ramp up further delivery to everybody,” Dr. Sifri said.

Dr. Sifri encouraged people in Phase1B to sign up through the Blue Ridge Health District through its online portal to register. He also said people should be prepared for changes as more information is known.

“Keep attentive to how the situation may change,” Dr. Sifri said. “Maybe there’s going to be other avenues to receive vaccine, perhaps through pharmacies, perhaps through your primary care physician. Those structures aren’t in place yet because of the limitations of the vaccine and because of some of the challenges of the current vaccine that we have available.”

Dr. Sifri stressed it is crucial that people who have been vaccinated continue to wear a mask, continue to follow social distancing protocols. The vaccines are all approved under an emergency declaration.

“We don’t have a lot of information yet as to whether being vaccinated reduces the ability to carry the virus,” Dr. Sifri said. “There is some information from the clinical trials that suggests it does reduce the amount of virus that people carry and that some people may no longer carry the vaccine in addition to being protected from the vaccine but I think it’s still to early to tell.”

The word from Virginia’s vaccine coordinator

Virginia has 35 health districts, and Dr. Danny Avula runs both the Richmond and Henrico County departments. Now he is also playing the role of vaccine coordinator for the entire Commonwealth. He began his press briefing Friday with a statement and a question.

“Right now in Virginia we’re getting about 105,000 new doses per week and clearly there is much more demand than that,” Avula said. “Why is that and how do we address it?”

Health districts across the Commonwealth have moved quickly to create vaccination sites and to train people to administer the dose. However, there isn’t enough vaccine yet to go around.

“Clearly to get to our goals of herd immunity and get up to 70 to 80 percent of the population vaccinated, we are going to need that kind of infrastructure,” Avula said. “But right now when we’re only getting about 105,000 new doses a week, that infrastructure will sit idly until our supply increases.”

On Sunday, January 24, the Virginia Department of Health reported that the seven-day average for vaccinations is now at 21,007 a day. The dashboard reported 474,979 doses administered, which is less than half of the 1,055,975 doses Virginia has received.

Dr. Avula said the reason for some of that gap is that CVS and Walgreens are slowly rolling out their distribution of the vaccine into long-term care facilities.

“There is a large number of doses, probably around 100,000 at this point, that have been distributed into Virginia but have not been administered yet,” Avula said. “The CVS and Walgreens are working those various nursing homes and assisted living facilities as quickly as they can. We have been on the phone with their state leadership multiple times this week and they are accelerating their pace.”

But back to the allocations for health districts across the Commonwealth which are much smaller than had been anticipated. Dr. Avula said Phase1B covers a very large portion of the population.

“The challenge of this is when you’re only getting a couple of thousand new doses a week to be distributing between hospitals, health systems, health departments, providers, and pharmacies, how do you do that in a way that comes even close to meeting demand?” Avuld asked. “The answer is, you don’t, you can’t. And understandably that has led to a great deal of confusion and frustration on the part of our public.”

We can expect to hear more questions in the weeks and months to come, and these health briefings are expected to continue.

Defense Production Act

Before we go today, one piece of federal information. One of President Joe Biden’s first actions in office was to sign an executive order that invokes the Defense Production Act which could help speed up vaccines.

“The Federal Government must act urgently and effectively to combat the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. To that end, this order directs immediate actions to secure supplies necessary for responding to the pandemic, so that those supplies are available, and remain available, to the Federal Government and State, local, Tribal, and territorial authorities, as well as to America’s health care workers, health systems, and patients. These supplies are vital to the Nation’s ability to reopen its schools and economy as soon and safely as possible.”

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On this edition:

Albemarle Supervisors get an update on assessments and economic indicators

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority holds its first work session of the year

More information about Smart Scale projects

And the Virginia Department of Transportation briefs officials on a program to create more habitat for monarch butterflies

The shape of Albemarle County’s budget for fiscal year became a little more clear with the announcement that property values are up at an average of 1.4 percent according to assessor Peter Lynch.

“Out of all of the properties in Albemarle County, we review twenty percent each year so we try to cover over a five-year period all of the properties to make sure our data is up to date,” Lynch said.

Part of the work of the Office of the Assessor is to validate properties that qualify for tax breaks due to agricultural use. Some properties convert to different uses, and when they do, the owners have to pay what they would have been charged under the new use for the past five years in what is known as a roll-back tax. This year, the assessor’s office was more productive in this area than in usual times.

“We worked 135 roll-backs for more than $975,00 in rollback, in tax dollars,” Lynch said. “In an average year, we would do 38 rollbacks so this is a huge improvement over that.”

The pandemic affected the overall assessment for 2021.

“The properties that were affected the most by the economic impacts of the COVID situation that we’re going through were hotels and shopping centers,” Lynch said. “And it’s reflected in their values. Those properties were in excess of twenty percent decreases on average for that property class.”

Lynch said hotels in Albemarle usually have an occupancy rate of 60 to 70 percent, but that number has been in the 20 to 30 percent range for much of the pandemic. He said office properties were also affected, but not to the same extent. For more details on this topic including a further breakdown in the numbers, go read Allison Wrabel’s story in the Daily Progress.

After the assessment discussion, Supervisors got an update on the county’s financial outlook. Steve Allshouse is with the county’s Department of Community Development.

“Economic forecasting in this era is very difficult mainly because last time we had a pandemic in the United States was in 1918 but at that time economic data was not being kept very carefully or was not in existence so economists today are being challenged by doing forecasting without really having a good historical context to look at,’ Allshouse said.

However, the forecast for Fiscal Year 22 is built off recent data, such as those assessment numbers we just heard about. Allshouse predicted a “bumpy” road ahead.

“The reason I say bumpy is that you’ll see lots of good news mixed with lots of bad news and that’s typical when we’re looking at recoveries so please expect that if you hear something negative in the media about the economy locally, you’re likely to hear things that are positive.”

Overall, the unemployment rate in Albemarle was 3.6% in November 2019. In April 2020, that jumped to 9 percent.

In Albemarle, in the past year there has been a 44 percent decline in the number of people employed in the food service and hospitality industry, or about 1,950 jobs lost. The arts, entertainment and recreation industry lost 962 jobs, and retail lost 712 jobs. Some sectors actually gained positions over the study period.

“Between the two period, spring of 2019 and spring of 2020, what we saw in construction was an increase of about 4 percent, or 98 jobs,” Allshouse said. “And also in the finance and insurance sector we saw a modest increase of about 1.2 percent or a total of about 12 jobs.”

Allshouse estimated that about 40 percent of the jobs initially lost have returned as the shutdown lifted, and he projects that at least 60 percent will come back by the end of this calendar year.

“That’s not a full recovery by the end of the first half of the next fiscal year but I do believe that we will see eventually the total number of jobs come back to where they were pre-pandemic but that’s going to take a while,” Allshouse said. “This is going to be a very slow process in my estimation.”

If the pandemic recedes, the tourism industry is one area that could come back quickly. However, adaptations to social distancing may have long-term effects on business travel.

“My concern is that some of what takes place in the motel and hotel industry reflects activity that is dependent on business travel and I think that is going to take a longer time to come back mainly because I think businesses have gotten used to having remote meetings,” Allshouse said.

County Executive Jeff Richardson will present a budget later sometime toward the end of February. It will be the first budget prepared under Nelsie Birch, who became Albemarle’s chief financial officer.

“We’re taking that information that Mr. Lynch, the county assessor, has provided, and Mr. Allshouse, and building that into our framework for what you all will be undertaking for the next few months,” Birch said.

This being budget season, the Board of Commissioners for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority are also getting ready for the next fiscal year. Their budget is being prepared with assistance from consultant Hayley Fetrow of HSF Consulting. Fetrow briefed the CHRA Board at a work session on Wednesday. (watch the work session)

“The goal of today is to provide you with an overview of the budgeting process,” Fetrow said. “And this year, interestingly, we have some new revenue lines that we’re getting additional levels of funding that we can talk a little bit about.”

In addition to being a consultant, Fetrow is the director of a public housing authority in Medway, Massachusetts. Her firm specializes in helping financially troubled housing authorities.

“We usually come in, help them reorganize, restructure, and really put best practices in place and the goal for us is provide a sustainable model for housing authorities going forward,”Fetrow said. “I think at Charlottesville we’ve had a varying opportunity to kind of help out in the finance department and it’s been exciting to have new staff come on in the last year with Mr. Sales.”

Mr. Sales is John Sales, who became the new executive director at CRHA last August. He had previously served as the city’s housing coordinator. One outcome of better recordkeeping has been the receipt of federal CARES funding to help tenants catch up rent due to lost wages, among other things.

One new line item in the budget will be a column that lists revenue from Charlottesville and other sources for redevelopment efforts.

“We can start to put these things down in writing and be clear about where we anticipate getting support from the city and other sources and how we anticipate spending them,” Fetrow said.

Commissioners were taken through a full look at the details of the budget, and new systems that are being put in place to better manage the accounts. This is one way the agency might one day move on from troubled status.

“Charlottesville is really going to evolve in the next year or two with respect to budgeting and operations and how you manage this,” Fetrow said.

A next step is to present the budget information to the public in community meetings. The draft budget should be available for review next week. Here’s John Sales.

“Our first meeting is going to be on February 10,” sales said. One is at 4 p.m. and one is at 6 p.m. And then we have the Board work session which will be on the CFP budget on February 11 at p.m. And then we’re hoping to get Board approval on March 9.”

The Smart Scale funding process has recommended nine out of ten transportation projects in Albemarle County submitted in the latest round. The Commonwealth Transportation Board will consider the projects this spring and will take a final vote in June.

“The total amount of Smart Scale funds that would come to Albemarle from these projects is just over $60 million,” said Albemarle transportation planner Kevin McDermott sent in an email to the Board of Supervisors.

Smart Scale is a process where projects submitted by localities and planning districts are ranked according to how they provide a series of desired outcomes. VDOT staff matches higher-ranked projects with funding sources. However, funding for the projects will not come for a few years, allowing time for the projects to be designed.

“The projects are not just a benefit for private vehicular transportation but also represent a park and ride lot with potential to be served by regional transit, two projects that are solely bicycle and pedestrian improvements, and the inclusion of a bicycle and pedestrian element within every project recommended for funding.

Another high-scoring project is $50 million to increase passenger rail along the Interstate 81 and U.S. 29 corridors.

Here are the projects recommended for funding:

$5.73 million in funding for a $24 million project to make improvements around the intersection of U.S. 29 and Hydraulic Road. The rest of the funding is leftover from projects completed on U.S. 29 over the past few years.

$3.94 million for a $5.9 million for Route 250 East Corridor Improvements

$5.2 million for a $7.26 million for improvements at intersection of Old Lynchburg Road and 5th Street Extended

$8.7 million for the total cost of improvements to address safety concerns on Ridge Street

$8.126 million for a $10.126 million roundabout at intersection of John Warner Parkway and East Rio Road

$10.874 million for the total cost of Phase 3 of the West Main Streetscape between 8th Street NW to Roosevelt Brown Boulevard

$7.743 million for the total cost of intersection improvements at Preston Avenue and Grady Avenue

$3.38 million for the total cost of a park and ride lot at Exit 107 on Interstate 64

$3.524 million for the total cost of a shared-use path on U.S. 29 from Carrsbrook to Seminole Lane

$9.841 million for a project to build a trailhead and trails near 5th Street Station

$12.374 million for improvements at the U.S. 29 and Fontaine Avenue interchange

$9.2 million for a roundabout in Fluvanna County at Troy Road and Route 250

$7.762 million for a roundabout at Route 231 and High Street in Gordonsville

$20.465 million for the second phase of multimodal improvements on Emmet Street

One project in Charlottesville that did not get recommended for funding is a $34.3 million project to extend Hillsdale Drive south to a new interchange at the U.S. 250 bypass. A project to remove a traffic light at U.S. 29 and Fray’s Mill Road also did not make the cut. Two intersection projects in Louisa County also did not get recommended, as well as a roundabout at Route 53 and Turkeysag Trail in Fluvanna.

The Virginia Department of Transportation is participating in a program that seeks to help provide a safer journey for winged creatures that majestically migrate across the Commonwealth. Angel Deem is the director of VDOT’s environmental division and she spoke before the Commonwealth Transportation Board on January 19.

“So I’m happy to present to the Board today an overview of what’s termed the Monarch Butterfly Candidate Conversation Agreement with Assurances,” Deem said. “That’s a long title and its shortened up to CCAA.”

CCAA is a program of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that works with other government agencies to conserve land for at-risk species, such as the Monarch butterfly. Deem said the goal is to conserve millions of acres of land across the nation that are currently being used by state highway agencies and land used to produce energy. Another specific goal is to plant milkweed on 2.3 million acres.

Last December, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services updated the endangered species list, and the Monarch is listed as “warranted but precluded.” Deem explains.

“What they mean by precluded is that there are other priority listings ahead of this one so they are essentially going to put it on hold if you will and continue to monitor its progress,” Deem said.

Progress would be made if existing habitats aren’t threatened to be converted to some other uses. The use of pesticides and mowing of state right of way are other threats.

“Those things are impacting the available foraging and breeding habitat for the Monarch,” Deem said.

Under the CCAA, VDOT would agree to taking several conservation measures.

“We would do some specific seeding and planting and brush removal to encourage suitable habitat for the Monarch,” Deem said. “We would also participate in what’s called conservation mowing, allowing food sources to be available to develop for the Monarch as well as breeding sites.”

VDOT entered into the agreement last November and the goal in the first year will be to apply the measures to 1,567 acres. Deem said VDOT has already achieved that goal and is now making progress towards the five year goal of doubling that amount. For more information on the program, watch the entire presentation on YouTube. (view the slides)

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It’s my mother’s birthday, and I wish her a fantastic day and am sad I will not be able to visit her today. So this January 20, 2021 installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement is dedicated as a grateful appreciation for all she’s done for me over the years. None of this would be possible without her love and support over the years, and I am truly grateful. Happy birthday, mom!

On today’s show:

Charlottesville City Council gets a budget update

Charlottesville Council hears from the Tree Commission about the unmet planting needs

The Commonwealth Transportation Board hears about COVID-related traffic trends

The fallout from the economic shutdown related to the COVID-19 pandemic means that Charlottesville is facing a tougher financial future than would have been expected. Last night, the City Council got an update on the city’s financial picture. Ryan Davidson is a senior budget analyst with the city. (read the report)

“There’s been a marked decline in many of our revenues and our new revenue projections are approximately $5 million than what we had previously presented to City Council,” Davidson said.

Specifically, meals tax collections are $2 million lower than had been forecast in September, and transient lodging tax collections are $1.86 million lower. But not all sources of revenue are in the red.

“Licenses and permits,” Davidson said. “This is one bit of good news! We are seeing continued strong performance in our building and plumbing and our other permits. We’re expecting almost a half million increase.”

Davidson said in the worst case scenario with revenues that continue to decline, the city could end up with a $13.2 million shortfall by the end of the year. To manage that shortfall, budget staff are using the cash reserve that Council agreed to put aside when it approved the budget for the current fiscal year. That money would have gone to various items in the capital improvement program. Davidson said the city may also need to use surpluses from both FY19 and FY20.

“That can be up to $4.1 million that we could bring in as the potential revenue source to help fill that gap,” Davidson said. He added that the city is trying to avoid laying off any employees, but it will take a full effort by Council and staff to continue to get through the year.

Davidson reminded the Council there are still just over five months left in the fiscal year, and projections can change over time as conditions fluctuate.

“Let’s try to manage to the worst case scenario, then if things are better than that, then we will be prepared for that,” Davidson said. “And if they’re better than that, we have leverage and we will have resources that we have not yet had to use.”

Council also got a briefing from the Charlottesville Tree Commission on their annual report. Brian Menard is the group’s chair. (read the report)

“This past December marked ten years since Council established the commission with the charge to ‘protect and improve the urban forest in pursuit of a better quality of life for city residents and environmental and aesthetic benefits,” Menard said.

Menard said both planting more trees and preserving ones that exist are critical to maintain an urban forest, and that the benefits of doing so are many.

“These include public health, energy conservation, environmental sustainability, water and air quality, stormwater management, and environmental and social justice,” Menard said.

Menard said the percentage of Charlottesville’s 10.4 square miles covered by trees is dropping, and an aerial study will be conducted later this year to confirm initial analysis that the city has lost 460 acres of tree canopy since 2004 due to development and to the city not meeting its goals.

“The goal of planting two hundred trees a year has not been met in each of the last four years,” Menard said. “Planting has not kept pace with removals. They average about 129 trees a year, which is 65 percent of the planting goal.”

Menard said many new developments are not planting what they should, which leads to more urban heat and less shade.

“To be clear, the Commission understands and supports the need for more housing especially the critical need for affordable housing, but it believes that there must be a balance that recognizes another critical need which is to preserve and expand our green infrastructure,” Menard said.

Menard noted that neighborhoods with lower tree canopies are the ones with lower-incomes.

“Simply put, less shade equals higher levels of heat, negative health outcomes, and higher energy costs,” Menard said. “Neighborhoods with tree canopy below 40 percent are effectively unhealthy neighborhoods.”

Menard said members of the Tree Commission want to make sure the update of the zoning code and Comprehensive Plan reflects the need for more trees. They also would like funding restored for tree planting. That line item was eliminated in the current fiscal year and put in a reserve to deal with potential revenue shortfalls that turned out to have materialized.

Take a look at the report to learn more. I’ll have more from the City Council meeting in a future newsletter. (FY20 annual report)

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 4,515 new cases of COVID-19 and the seven-day average is currently 6,149 a day. The percent positivity declined another tenth of a percentage point today to 13.5 percent. There are another 63 deaths reported today in Virginia, but none are in the Blue Ridge Health District, where a new death has not been reported since January 11.

The district reports 94 new cases today, including 14 in Louisa County, which has seen nearly half of its total caseload of 1,313 reported in 2021. The Louisa Board of Supervisors had been intended to get a briefing from the Blue Ridge Health District, but an appearance by director Denise Bonds was postponed. BRHD officials are slated to give an update to the Albemarle Board of Supervisors at their meeting tonight. There are 33 new cases reported in Albemarle today for a total of 2,808 cases during the pandemic.

The VDH’s dashboard on vaccines now shows a seven-day rolling average of 18,740 doses being administered a day. A disclaimer on the site states that it make take up to 72 hours for administered doses to be recorded into the system.

The various government-mandated closures to slow the spread of COVID during the pandemic initially lead to lower traffic volumes on Virginia’s highways. Yesterday the Commonwealth Transportation Board got an update on traffic volume when measured by trucks-only and all-vehicles. Mena Lockwood is with VDOT’s Traffic Engineering Division.

“Both are trending below normal, decreasing from about 90 percent typical down to about 84 percent of typical at the end of the month,” Lockwood said.

In mid-April, traffic volumes were down as much as 60 percent of the normal. VDOT measures traffic volume at 512 locations throughout the Commonwealth. To watch the presentation, click this link. (Lockwood’s presentation)

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors has a long meeting beginning at 1 p.m.

In the evening session, there is a public hearing to officially move forward with already approved capital projects that were paused at the beginning of the pandemic.

“In a typical year, this happens in June when the Board appropriates funds for the new budget year,” said Albemarle County spokeswoman Emily Kilroy. “This did not occur in June 2020 as Finance & Budget staff waited to understand the impact of the pandemic on local revenues.”

Projects include $260,000 for the county’s Greenways/Blueways program, $330,000 to address drainage infrastructure in older county neighborhoods, and $20.4 million for an addition to Crozet Elementary School as well as other improvements. (staff report)

To learn more about what’s happening at the Board of Supervisors, take a look at this week’s Week Ahead newsletter.

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On today’s show:

Several transportation projects are recommended for funding including a third phase of the West Main Streetscape

A local business group gets funding to create a new networking platform

Intrastate public transportation has been canceled due to security concerns related to the inauguration

Need a little extra space to stow your stuff away? Support for today's installment comes from Storage Sense in Charlottesville, now accepting tenants to fill the brand-new 658 interior temperature-controlled storage units at its location on Pantops Corner Way. Now offering contact-free storage rentals, tenants can handle everything from renting to bill-paying online from the comfort of their own homes. Visit www.storagesense.com or call (434) 658-1003 to pick a place to keep your valuable safe and secure.

Today’s count of new COVID cases in Virginia is the lowest in two weeks with 4,526 reported this morning. Three out of ten of Virginia’s total of 451,076 cases have been reported in 2021. The seven-day average of positive PCR tests is now at 13.6 percent, down from 16.5 percent on January 5, when the case count was 4,377.

In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 55 cases reported today, the same as on January 5. Nearly 29 percent of the district’s 9,731 cases to date have been reported this year. Forty-three percent of Nelson County’s 523 cases are from 2021 compared to 16 percent of Charlottesville’s cases.

Meanwhile, the latest epidemiological model put together by the Biocomplexity Institute at the University of Virginia forecasts that cases in Virginia could peak at 50,000 a week by mid-February, but the number could be higher than that if people abandon safety protocols.

“A slow vaccine rollout, accompanied by pandemic fatigue, could see new cases increasing into April,” reads on the key takeaways in the report dated January 15.

That figure of 50,000 a week by mid February is part of the Best Past Control Scenario which assumes steady increases in vaccination as well as continued adherence to masking and distancing protocols. However, the latest report also has a Fatigued Control Scenario which shows cases peaking at 75,000 a week in late March if vaccination roll-out stalls and pandemic fatigue continues.

Today, the Virginia Department of Health reports they now have a seven-day moving average of 17,464 vaccinations a day. The goal is to get to 50,000 as soon as possible. (view the dashboard)

A data-driven application process has recommended funding for several major projects in the area, including $24.6 million for improvements at the intersection of U.S. 29 and Hydraulic Road. This also includes nearly $8 million for the third phase of the West Main Streetscape in Charlottesville. Both are recommended for funding under the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process, which ranks projects according to a series of metrics including congestion relief, public safety, and economic development.

Albemarle and Charlottesville are both within VDOT’s Culpeper District.

“Culpeper gets a total of 20 projects recommended for funding for a total of $166.9 million dollars,” said Chad Tucker with the Office of Intermodal Planning and Investment.

Smart Scale was put in place after nearly $230 million was spent on several projects to address congestion on U.S. 29 including construction of Berkmar Drive Extended and a grade-separated intersection at 29 and Rio Road. Smart Scale is now in its fourth round and nothing is final until the Commonwealth Transportation Board takes a vote in June. Under the recommended scenario, the Hydraulic project received the highest score in the Culpeper District.

“That will really augment the investments that have been done at Rio in helping to keep traffic moving efficiently and safely along the U.S. 29 corridor in the Charlottesville,” Tucker said.

Projects recommended for funding in Albemarle include $11 million in Route 250 East Corridor Improvements, $8.5 million for safety improvements at the intersection of Old Lynchburg Road and 5th Street Extended, a roundabout at the intersection of the John Warner Parkway and East Rio Road, and a $7.5 million for a roundabout and other safety improvements at the intersection of Route 20 and Route 53.

Projects recommended for funding in Charlottesville include $5 million for a project to increase safety on Ridge Street, $6.1 million for improvements at the intersection of Preston Avenue and Grady Avenue, a second phase of multimodal improvements on Emmet Street, in addition to phase 3 of the streetscape.

Council has been waiting for the results of Smart Scale before making a long-term decision about the future of the West Main Streetscape, which was broken into multiple phases in 2017 after a previous Smart Scale application to cover the whole cost did not qualify for funding in the second round. A portion of the project was covered in the third Smart Scale round.

A roundabout at Troy Road and Route 250 in Fluvanna County has also been recommended for funding.

“I think Culpeper did a very good job of having targeted improvements that are addressing safety in congestion hotspots throughout the district,” Tucker said.

More on this as the weeks and months continue. For a more complete picture, be on the look-out for a story from Allison Wrabel in the Daily Progress.

Tomorrow’s inauguration of Joe Biden as the 46th president has led to security crackdowns throughout the capital region. That includes the shutting down of several transportation routes. Jennifer Mitchell is the director of the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

“On Friday, we did make the decision to suspend our state-supported Amtrak routes for tomorrow and [Thursday],” Mitchell said. “So starting from 6 a.m. tomorrow to 6 a.m. Thursday which is also consistent with some of the other highway closures.”

Mitchell said the state has also suspended the state-funded intrastate bus routes that enter into the District of Columbia. This includes the Valley Flyer, the Piedmont Express and the Capital Connection. Those services will resume as normal on Friday.

The Charlottesville Business Innovation Council has been awarded by a GO Virginia grant of $76,500 to develop a “digital connection platform” to help businesses expand their networks.

“The cloud-based platform and mobile app will be a robust and dynamic centralized platform that provides the connections, tools, resources and information necessary to guide, bolster and support the Region's entrepreneurial ecosystem at all levels during the pandemic and beyond,” reads a press release. “Potential users of the connector platform will be individuals, businesses, startups, investors, innovators, non-profits, and economic development professionals.”

GO Virginia is a program of the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development intended to boost economic opportunities across the Commonwealth. Albemarle and Charlottesville are within Region 9 along with Culpeper, Fauquier, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, Madison, Nelson, Orange and Rappahanoock counties. The Central Virginia Partnership for Economic Development will help oversee roll-out of the Connector Platform which is expected to occur later this year.

Tonight at 7:30 p.m., the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society holds it annual meeting and the guest of honor is Edward Ayers on the topic All History Is Local. Ayers if a former dean of the University of Virginia College of Arts and Sciences and President Emeritus at the University of Richmond. He’s now the executive director of New American History. Here’s a blurb from their website:

“History is the turbulent, unpredictable, and deeply human record of everything that happened before this moment,” reads the about page. “Through interactive maps, video, audio, an algorithmic engine of journalism, and tools for educators, we hope to make visible what was previously invisible about our shared American story.”

You can participate in the program on Zoom or watch it on Facebook Live.

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The pandemic has been altering our lives for ten months now, and this weekend marks the ten month anniversary of the first episode of what would be the creation of Charlottesville Community Engagement.

As this installment is devoted entirely to the vaccine, it hereby doubles as the 52nd installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

In today’s show:

On Monday, the University of Virginia Health System will begin helping the Blue Ridge Health District administer vaccines

Virginia’s vaccine coordinator provides update on getting to 50,000 doses a day

D.C. Deputy Mayor Wayne Turnage addresses Black reluctance to vaccinations

Today’s program comes to you with support from Jim Duncan, an associate broker and partner at Nest Realty, who represents buyers and sellers in the Charlottesville area, and writes the long-running realcentralva.com and realcrozetva.com blogs. He’s one of many who wants to support community news.

Let’s start with today’s numbers. Today, Virginia sets another one-day record with 9,914 cases, nearly 3,200 higher than reported the day before.

Over a quarter of Virginia’s total of 439,305 cases have been reported in 2021, an indicator of how much community transmission is happening now, compared to the early days of the pandemic. There is not a corresponding increase yet in the number of deaths, and the total count stands at 5,729 today.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there has not been January 11, and the death toll stands at 99.

There are another 143 cases reported in the district today. Over a quarter of the 9,558 cases to date have been reported in the past 17 days.

Over 40 percent of Louisa County’s 1,269 cases to date are reported in 2021. In comparison, only 16.2 percent of Charlottesville’s 2,560 cases are from this year. The bottom line is that cases are rising fast, and health officials stress the need to continue to follow safety protocols.

These numbers are going to change fast. Now let’s move now to a different set of metrics. Vaccines.

In the first week of the year, Dr. Danny Avula was appointed by Governor Ralph Northam to coordinate the roll-out of the vaccine by the local, state and federal governments. He briefed the press on Saturday.

“As of today, we have administered a total of 295,202 doses and that is out of a total number of vaccines distributed to Virginia of 943,400,” Avula said.

We’ll hear more from Avula and the state of Virginia later. Let’s first turn to the greater Charlottesville area.

As of Friday morning, nearly 10,000 people associated with the University of Virginia Health System have received their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. About a tenth of that number have received a second dose.

Beginning next week, the University of Virginia Health system will send additional resources to the vaccination clinic being run by the Blue Ridge Health District. This is part of the roll-out of Phase1B in the Health District, which is a division of the Virginia Department of Health.

“We will be taking any unused vaccines that we have left over taking care of our own folks and then go over to the K-Mart tent sent up that has been set up by the Health District to help them with vaccinating folks in that group 1b,” said Eric Swensen, a spokesman of the UVA Health System.

Here’s Dr. Costi Sifri, the health system’s director of hospital epidemiology.

“We have doses we think in excess of what we’re going to need to vaccinate our employees,” Dr. Sifri said. “Where that number is i don’t know but it’s probably in the thousands, several thousands.”

But it’s just not doses of vaccine. UVA will begin to supplement personnel required to handle administering the shots in the modular structure.

“I believe on Monday we are sending over vaccinators from UVA Health to support the efforts of the Health District,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, the health system’s director of hospital epidemiology. “We’re going to be sending up to ten. It sounds like initially we’ll be sending four or five as we learn this process but we anticipate within a week we’ll be sending up to ten on a daily basis to help support their efforts.”

Dr. Sifri said UVA Health continues to vaccinate its employees and healthcare workers under Phase1A, and logistics are being planned for Phase1C. That phase may include non-medical faculty, staff and students but the exact determination has not yet been made. That all comes from guidelines provided by the federal Centers for Disease Control, and filtered through the Virginia Disaster Medical Advisory Committee. Dr. Sifri said the various phases may change as more vaccine doses become available.

“We certainly have heard and I think we can all anticipate seeing that there will be more rapid movement to collapsing these tier groups so that we can more rapidly vaccinate everybody within our community and this is true nationwide,” Dr. Sifri said. “I think this will be an evolving plan.”

For the next few weeks, though, Dr. Sifri said initial efforts will focus on those at highest risk in the community. Wendy Horton, CEO of the UVA Health System, said that they will work at the direction of the Health District.

“You know, VDH is really providing the guidance and we are helping with the vaccinations per their guidance,” Horton said. “The bottom line is that next week we anticipate that we will be moving toward community vaccination. We are partnering with VDH and our goal is to really support the vaccination efforts to try to get into the community and try to vaccinate as many people as we can under the guidance of VDH.”

The vaccine roll-out may still take time. Dr. Sifri said people should continue to follow the guidelines that have been in place for ten months now to slow the spread.

“We’re seeing the highest rates that we’ve seen in our community since this has started so it really is incumbent upon us to continue to practice those measures which keep us safe and keep our loved ones safe, and that is to wear masks when you’re not at home, to maintain social distancing, to avoid inside areas that are close with a lot of people, and of course, as always to continue hand-washing,” Dr. Sifri said.

To find out where you are right now in the vaccination schedule, Dr. Sifri recommended signing up with the Virginia Department of Health. (survey)

On Thursday, January 14, 2021, Governor Ralph Northam held another press conference where he gave up an update on vaccinations across Virginia. Over the course of the pandemic, Northam has critiqued the federal government for its lack of action. That is changing as the presidential transition approaches. (watch the video)

“In recent days, we’ve seen a new attitude among our federal partners,” Northam said. “We have been able to work much more closely with them.”

On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services sent out new guidance to states telling them to expand vaccinations to people 65 and over and for those under 64 at risk. Virginia will comply, depending on supplies.

“Communication between the federal, state, and local authorities is key,” Northam said. “This means about half of Virginia is now eligible to receive the vaccine. That’s a major logistical effort and it is not going to happen overnight. Everyone will need to be patient. It’s going to happen as fast as it can be done.”

At the beginning of the year, Northam set a goal of 50,000 vaccinations a day. He appointed the director of the Richmond Health District to coordinate efforts between the multiple layers of government. Here’s Dr. Danny Avula speaking on Thursday.

“What we recognize is that if we’re going to get to 50,000 doses a day, which is what we need to do if we’re going to get herd immunity in the Commonwealth, we really do need to get to an infrastructure that can handle 50,000 doses a day, that we’re going to need to do more,” Dr. Danny Avula said.

The K-Mart site is an example of one of these sites, and the goal is to get them all functioning six to seven days a week across the Commonwealth.

“Our goal is to get this staffed by the National Guard and by contracted vaccinators who will be able to provide this service in large scale,” Dr. Avula said.

Two days later, Dr. Avula gave an update on where things are. The roll-out has been critiqued by several as being too slow. As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health website reported 316,812 total doses administered, and an average of 15,384 a day. That’s still short of the target.

“We have been steadily increasing the number of doses a day,” Avula said. “If you look on the website, and you look at that seven-day average, it has gone from a few thousand a day to over 14,000 a day.”

Dr. Avula said over 20,000 doses were administered a day from Wednesday to Friday. He said one issue has been that there has been a gap between actual shots in arms and them being entered into reporting systems. Today’s dashboard reports a total of 316,812 doses administered and 943,400 doses distributed.

“So, there’s a gap there and I think that has led a lot of people to ask questions,” Dr. Avula said. “What is going on? Are doses sitting on shelves? How are we not getting doses to the people who need it.”

So far, most of the doses distributed have gone to the people who work for health systems. That will begin to change as more Health Districts move into Phase 1B.

Think back to what Northam said earlier about how the federal Health and Human Services Department authorized people over the age of 65 to be vaccinated? There’s a problem and the federal communications may have been broken down.

“They also intimated that there would be a large release of second dose reserve,” Dr. Avula said. “Remember, this vaccine is a two-dose vaccine and the way the federal government had been allocating that is that they’d been sending out first doses and holding back second doses and then delivering those second doses as they came ready to deliver those second doses. And so we were hearing consistent messaging from the federal government that all of those doses were going to be released. As a Commonwealth we decided to follow the federal government’s lead to add those 65 and up and those with underlying conditions to our Phase 1b. Over the last couple days we have heard very different messaging and we’re not exactly sure what to do with that but the sense is that may not actually be the case and our allocations may not actually be increasing is what we’re hearing and is certainly is disconcerting and disheartening given that we made the first step to expand our 1B under the assumption we’d be receiving more vaccine.”

Nonetheless, Dr. Avula said Virginia continues to receive 100,000 doses or so each week.

“The state is not holding back any of the that vaccine,” Avula said. “It is all being sent out to providers.”

Dr. Avula said it will take time to get through all Virginia residents, and to ramp up to the target of 50,000 doses a day.

One of the identified issues with getting the vaccine distributed widely is hesitance in the Black community. Wayne Turnage served as chief of staff for former Governor Tim Kaine and is now Deputy Mayor for the D.C. Health and Human Services agency. He said we’re in serious times.

“Two hundred and thirty thousand new infections per day, more than 4,400 deaths per day, [a number] growing by nearly fifty percent every two weeks,” Turnage said. “All offer further indication that we are in the worst pandemic in more than a hundred years.”

Turnage said mass vaccinations are the best way to get back to something close to normal life. He volunteered in one of the vaccine trials, but learned afterward his experimental dosage was a placebo. Turnage has since received his first actual shot.

“Epidemiologists explain that this virus will continue to propagate until it can no longer find fuel among the population,” Turnage said. “We further understand that to build a fortress to prevent this continuing spread, roughly 60 to 70 percent of the 330 million people in this country must be vaccinated, effectively creating through mass inoculation the much discussed herd immunity. Yet in jurisdictions all over the country, large numbers of African-Americans have expressed a stubborn resistance to the government’s expectations that U.S. citizens agree to be vaccinated in hopes of controlling this devastating spread of COVID-19. Our reluctance is understandable for it is borne of a justifiable mistrust of medical experiments that were once implemented in the Black community using methods that violated the most basic research ethics for conducting experimental trials.”

Turnage pointed to his experience going through the vaccine trials as an example of his personal confidence in the process. He said the safety records during the vaccine creation process is safe and that the two brands authorized have been proven to be effective. Turnage made several points, and the first was about the design of the vaccine.

“One of the routinely expressed fears of the Black community is that the vaccine will actually expose them to the virus and make them sick,” Turnage said. “However, these vaccines are not similar to the most traditional viruses and vaccines, which often consisted of the actual virus itself. For example, the polio virus was made of the live virus prior to 2000, and since then it has been made from a deadened or attenuated form of the live virus. Likewise, vaccines for measles, the flu, rubella and the chicken pox, are made from a live, or weakened virus. Though extremely rare, in such cases there is always the possibility that an attenuated virus can turn pathogenic and cause the disease both in the person who was vaccinated and their close contacts. But the current vaccines to fight COVID in this country are built from a new and smartly innovative technology based on a single molecule that has the ability to communicate with your body’s protein-making machinery. Making protein is a normal biological function of your body. Based on the instructions that your body receives from this single molecule, your body is forced to make spike proteins that have the exact appearance of the virus and thus your immune system is tricked into developing antibodies to fight COVID should you ever be exposed.”

Turnage said that means there is no chance of contracting COVID from the shot.

“The takeaway is that once you get vaccinated, you have less than a five percent chance of contracting COVID,” Turnage said. “And if you get infected despite having the vaccine, there appears to be next to a zero chance that you will become deathly ill.”

What’s next in the pandemic? Make sure you are signed up for the Charlottesville Community Engagement newsletter to make sure you’re up to date. It’s not just about the pandemic, but about the greater Charlottesville community as we work through the challenges that we face. Thank you for reading and listening, and please send on to a friend.

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Yesterday marked the 6th month anniversary of this program, which I launched to help explain various things that happen in and around Charlottesville. That’s hours of podcasts and thousands and thousands of words about this community, and many of them belong to the various people in local government, and the citizens that participate. I thank you for reading and listening, and I want to acknowledge the many people who have provided financial support. At the end of this post, you can find out how you can join them. For now, though, it’s more important to get to the information.

Planned for today’s show:

Charlottesville hires regional administrator Chip Boyles to serve as City Manager

Charlottesville Planning Commission begins its work in 2021

Albemarle County Schools transitioning to all virtual learning

After a tense start to 2021 that included over a dozen hours spent in closed emergency session, Charlottesville City Council has named a city manager. City Councilor Michael Payne read from a prepared statement.

“We would like to announce that Mr. Chip Boyles has agreed to join the organization as City Manager,” Payne said. “After carefully balancing the needs of the city at this current time, we are offering Mr. Boyles the City Manager position with the goal of stabilizing the organization and rebuilding the leadership team within City Hall.”

Boyles came to the area in the spring of 2014 when he was hired to be executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District, a regional agency that provides government services to the city as well as five surrounding counties.

“I look forward to working with all of the city staff and I especially look forward to working with all of the Charlottesville community,” Boyles said. “I know that there are a number of citizens that were looking for a different direction as a City Manager but I’m trusting the City Council and your commitment to the city to lead all of Charlottesville to a much brighter future. I hope that over time I will build the support of all the community for all of us to work together to work toward a more unified community and Charlottesville.”

Boyles will not be known as an interim city manager, though Payne said Council will reopen a search for city manager sometime next year with the goal of getting public input. If successful, Boyles would be able to participate in that process.

The joint statement also acknowledges recent dysfunction and said solutions won’t happen overnight.

“Over the past several months, city government has experienced significant turnover, uncertainty, and instability,” Payne said. “This has occurred at a time when our community is facing historic challenges created by a global pandemic, economic instability, and the need to address long-standing inequities within our community.”

During his tenure, Boyles has helped promote regional cooperation in public transit, affordable housing, and many of the various issues that face our overall community. The TJPDC has overseen the creation of the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan, created the Ruckersville Area Plan in Greene County, and is currently planning on a similar study for Zion Crossroads.

Boyles received a Master’s in Public Administration from Clemson University and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of South Carolina. He served for five years as city manager in Taneytown, a small town in western Maryland. In 2000 he became assistant city administrator of the city of Clemson in South Carolina, a position that gave him eight years working in a community in a university town not unlike Charlottesville. Other positions include urban development director in the city parish of Baton Rouge, Louisiana and a vice president at the East Baton Rouge Redevelopment Administration.

In April 2014, Boyles succeeded previous TJPDC executive director Stephen Williams. William’s contract was not renewed following fall-out from allegations of financial mismanagement related to a federal grant.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she supported Boyles serving in the new position. She’s worked with him from her position as a board member of the Regional Transit Partnership and the TJPDC Board.

“My thoughts here was that we had wanted someone who is neutral,” Walker said. “Chip has been here in the community for a number of years but he hasn’t been in the organization and it will provide us an opportunity to just look at any issues that were brought up through a neutral lens and I thought that was very important.”

Interim City Manager John Blair will leave the city to take a job as city attorney in Staunton. Councilor Heather Hill thanked him for his service.

“Mr. Blair’s departure is a great loss for the organization and the community that we serve,” Hill said. “I would be remiss to not acknowledge the sacrifices that he and his family have made for this organization during his tenure and most notable in his time as acting City Manager.”

Blair took over as interim in September after Dr. Tarron Richardson resigned that month after a brief tenure that lasted little over a year. Councilor Lloyd Snook also thanked Blair for serving as interim manager.

“As Charlottesville goes, so goes our region as well, so it will not be a complete change but just more of a difference in a way to focus on the the city of Charlottesville but keeping the region in mind as well,” Boyles said.

A longer version of this story will be forthcoming in a special edition of this program for premium subscribers. They’ll get to see it first, and then it will be made public.

Albemarle County reports 48 new cases of COVID today and one of the two core indicators used by the Centers for Disease Control to gauge transmission risk is at the highest level. The total number of cases per 100,000 people over the past 14 days is at 557.4 and the percent positive rate over 14 days is at 8.5 percent.

The higher case counts have led Superintendent Matthew Haas to order county schools to go back to all-virtual instruction beginning Tuesday, January 19. He sent this email to family and staff.

“While schools remain among the safest places in our community in helping to prevent the spread of the virus, given what is occurring around us, now is not the time to be recommending that we continue with or increase the thousands of students now receiving their instruction face-to-face,” Haas wrote in an email addressed to families and staff.

Haas writes that all-virtual will continue through at least February 1. That’s the date for which the school system had been planning to move more students into face-to-face instruction. The day is significant because it marks the beginning of a new grading period. Haas said he will change his planning targets.

“The uncertain and highly volatile nature of this illness requires us to be instantly flexible and proactive in our decision-making,” Haas said. “I no longer will be making recommendations tied to marking periods. I will continue to rely upon the health data in our county, the advice of our health department, and the views of our parents and employees to determine when a change in our instructional plans should be recommended to our School Board.

An announcement about whether they will return to the current tier of stage 3 will be made on January 27. That will occur on the school system’s Stages of Returning webpage.

Albemarle’s case count of 48 is included within the 5,294 new COVID cases reported by the Virginia Department of Health today. The seven-day average of positive PCR tests has declined slightly to 15.5 percent. There are another 74 deaths reported, bringing the total to 5,626 in the past ten months.

Albemarle is within the Blue Ridge Health District, which reports 112 cases today. That also includes 20 cases in Charlottesville, 19 in Louisa, 11 in Nelson, nine in Fluvanna and five in Greene.

The tradition of long meetings that Charlottesville City Government is famous for has continued into the new year. The Planning Commission met for four hours Tuesday. Commissioner Gary Heaton said at the beginning of the meeting that he welcomed the work ahead.

“I did want to say to everybody how encouraging it is to show up to a civic meeting at a time where there is a lot of conversation about what government is,” Heaton said. “And here it is right on the computer screen. Thank you everybody for your participation.”

The commission also got an update on the status of a new format for another regional planning body that consists of Charlottesville, Albemarle and the University of Virginia. What was a public body called the Planning and Coordination Council is now something different. Bill Palmer is with the Office of the Architect at the University of Virginia, and sits on the city Planning Commission as a non-voting member.

“What used to be the PACC-Tech or PACC and has now been reiterated as LUEPC,” Palmer said. “Don’t make me say what that acronym is because I don’t remember exactly.”

I don’t blame Palmer, because the Land Use, Environmental and Planning Committee doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. Still, it will provide the same function as what it has replaced.

“That’s kind of the coordination committee for the city, county and University of Virginia to talk about planning issues,” Palmer said.

The group meets for the first time this year on Friday. That event is not subject to open meeting rules because it consists of staff. Currently there is no agenda available online.

Another city committee charged with thinking about planning is the PLACE Design Task Force, upon which City Planning Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg sits. City Council voted last year to stop having PLACE report directly to Council.

“At this point the general idea is to reform as a general sort of think tank or bodies of experts that the city can draw from in order to create ad hoc task forces for any problem it wants to solve,” Stolzenberg said. “Things like lighting plans, or whatever.”

One idea would be for the group to address specific problems in the city. Stolzenberg had one suggestion.

“Since Council is debating the future of the West Main Streetscape which is a very expensive budget item, and we don’t have lots of room in the budget, one thing that we’re trying to brainstorm is kind of tactical urbanist improvements that we could make to the street at very low cost in order to make it a safer better experience in the near term without spending $50 million dollars.”

One possibility for community engagement may come in the form of informal walking tours to gather input, but of course, only when it’s safe to gather again.

Commissioners also got a brief update on the Cville Plans Together initiative, which seeks to update the Comprehensive Plan, create an affordable housing strategy, and update the zoning code. Jennifer Koch is the project manager with the consultant, Rhodeside & Harwell. There will be a work session on January 26 to discuss something known as the Future Land Use map, which signals to developers and property owners desired levels of density and intensity.

“We’re convening several times as a consultant team this week to determine that we have the right program… for that meeting so we can have a really productive and effective discussion,” Koch said. “We will let you know as soon as possible this week if we need to delay that a little bit but right now I am looking forward to speaking with you more about land use on the 26th.”

After that, the Commission got into the Cherry Avenue Small Area Plan, a document created by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. I’ll have a story on that for paid subscribers first later on in the week.

They also recommended approval of a special use permit to add additional density at 1000 Monticello Avenue, a project that drew opposition from many in the neighborhood as well as from housing advocates. For more on that, read Nolan Stout’s account in the Daily Progress.

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With the COVID pandemic still raging, today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out from an anonymous contributor is once again to state clearly:

"We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

On today’s show:

Scottsville Town Council responds to racist propaganda distributed over the weekend

The Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee gets an update on Albemarle’s new housing policy

Developer of Rivanna Village project in eastern Albemarle gives a status report

University of Virginia Health System to halt hospital visitation

Louisa County schools to switch to virtual learning for two weeks

Louisa County public schools will transition Thursday to virtual instruction for a limited period of time due to staffing. A Virginia Department of Education map listing the status of school systems in the Commonwealth shows Louisa as being “all hybrid.”

Let’s hear from their superintendent. (watch the video)

“Hello team LCPS, this is your superintendent, Doug Straley, and I hope you’re having a fantastic day,” said Superintendent Doug Straley. “Today I am announcing that LCPS will transition to a fully-remote learning model beginning on Thursday, January 14 and we will remain in this model through Friday, January 29.”

Today, Louisa reported another 18 cases and the two core indicators used by the Centers for Disease Control indicate the county is at highest risk of community transition. The 14-day average for positive tests is 15.1% and the total number of cases per 100,000 over the past four days is 785.8. But the closure is not due to the rising number of cases.

“We have a large number of staff members right now who are quarantined due to being close contacts to COVID-19 positive individuals who are not connected to LCPS,” Straley said. “Because of the high amount of staff who are quarantined we do not have enough substitutes or staff to adequately fill vacancies, provide instruction, and maintain our health and safety strategies.”

Louisa’s 18 cases are part of the 4,561 reported by the Virginia Department of Health this morning. The percent positive rate dropped to 16.4 percent, but today’s numbers are based on 19,287 tests. That amount is lower than most days and reflects a trend of a lower amount of data points experienced after weekends.

The total amount reported in the Blue Ridge Health District is 59, the lowest number in the district since last Tuesday. Since then, the average daily count is 149.

The University of Virginia Health System announced today will stop admitting visitors except in limited circumstances beginning January 13.

“This applies to UVA inpatient units, Emergency Department, outpatient clinics and outpatient procedural areas,” reads a release sent out this morning. “These changes are being made to help protect the health of our patients and team members as COVID-19 cases have increased in the Charlottesville area and throughout Virginia.

For more information, visit the UVA Health System website.

The Scottsville Town Council met last night for their first meeting of the year with a work session and the topic of public safety came up in a several ways. First, town Police Chief Jeff Vohlwinkel updated the Council on compliance with a presidential executive order issued last summer in the wake of the protests that rocked the nation after George Floyd was killed on May 25 after being held to the ground for nine and a half minutes by a police officer’s knee.

“So it’s a presidential executive order related to community policing and safety that requires us to show that we have a use of force policy that complies with the federal and state laws as it relates to use of excessive force and that we have a duty to intervene within the policy as well as barring choke holds,” Vohlwinel said.

Vohlwinkel said the police department’s accreditation would be in jeopardy and it could not receive federal funds without having made the policy change. He also told Council he has been in touch with federal and local authorities regarding the distribution of racist fliers in and around Scottsville.

“I’ve been in touch with the FBI and the Commonwealth’s Attorney and our adjoining agencies to converse with them as to what they have seen or heard related to this matter and I’ve reached out the Virginia Fusion Center as it related to receiving intelligence from them,” Vohlwinkel said.

The Virginia Fusion Center is a counterterrorism agency.

Later in the meeting, the Council discussed a draft of a proposed Mayoral Declaration of the Ideals of the Scottsville Community. Councilor Laura Mellusi read it in the absence of Mayor Ron Smith. (read the statement on the town’s Facebook page)

“We are Scottsville’s community and local government,” Mellusi read. “ We are a small town like thousands of others in our United States but we all have responsibilities to action when our country is threatened.”

The statement went on to say the community does not condone “political violence and intimidation, bigotry and political corruption.”

Councilor Ed Payne said he supported the statement but took issue with the phrase.

“The one word that troubles me is the term political violence,” Payne said. “Now that’s timely because there has been recent political violence but as we all lived through 2020, we saw there were other forms of violence that may in some opinion have been political or may not have. Social, maybe. If this is to go out to the public I would like to see the word political struck from this because violence is violence.”

Councilor Dan Gritsko agreed with Payne and said he appreciated what Mayor Smith was trying to do especially in light of the racist propaganda distributed over the weekend.

“I applaud his effort to be proactive to remind our citizens and to remind those around us who might want to stir up trouble that we don’t want there and we are trying to create a community that is inclusive, that honors people of enormously different backgrounds,” Gritsko said.

Jim Bowling serves as the attorney for the Town of Scottsville. After the discussion on the Mayoral declaration, he updated Council on the weekend’s incident.

“I can stress enough that I’d be surprised if this was done totally by outsiders and I think you’re going to fine some regional or local people involved and it’s important that the town’s citizens take on the responsibility to help their other citizens in trying to find whoever is responsible for this,” Bowling said.

Council discussed a potential reward for more information, but Councilor Dan Gritsko said he was concerned about overreaction.

“I’m not overly worried about who did it, we’ll find out who did it one way or the other,” Gritsko said. “We should be thick-skinned enough as a people to be able to deal with somebody’s poor reasoning or poor thinking in the light of freedom of speech as a country.”

Gritzko said he regularly takes students to the National Holocaust Museum in D.C. and the truth is that the Nazis murdered millions of people. But Bowling pointed out that the fliers were intended to intimidate.

‘The point here though is that this is criminal behavior and its domestic terrorism and anything else is to kick it under the table,” Bowling said.

Will it happen again? Mellusi told anyone watching to notify the authorities if they are intimidated.

“If you received information you’re not comfortable with, or if you’re feeling threatened in anyway, to please contact our chief of police and to share that information with him,” Mellusi said. “If you don’t live in the town but you’re in the county of Albemarle, county of Buckingham, county of Nelson, county of Fluvanna to reach out to those police.”

The Scottsville Town Council will meet again next week.

The Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee also met last night for its first meeting of the year. They got an update from the Robertson Development Group on forthcoming construction at Rivanna Village, a mixed-use development that can have up to 400 residential units and 60,000 square feet of commercial space. Here is the firm’s Tim Culpeper.

“We have been actively developing what we call Phase 2 of Rivanna Village for probably the last five or fix months,” said the firm’s Tim Culpeper. “You have probably noticed over the past 60 to 90 days our development activity has slowed down considerably. We have all of our various plans approved on the county level. We are waiting on one approval from [the Virginia Department of Transportation] for the approval of several spans across of streams in Phase 2.”

Culpeper said the first 40 lots in phase 2 will be delivered to builders about 90 days after the VDOT approval. Phase 1 continues under development and all of the lots have been sold to builders. There are 107 units in this phase, consisting of a mix of villas, townhomes, and single family units. The exact number of units in Phase 2 is not yet known because they are still figuring out the lot sizes, but Culpeper said it will be in the range of 180 to 200 units.

“We are not going to come close to 400 units I don’t think,” Culpeper said. “The reasons for that are we have opted to deliver more traditional single-family detached lots in the community and fewer of the townhomes. Obviously the more townhomes we do, the more density we will be able to achieve because those are much more narrow units.”

Culpeper said an easement has been obtained for a second entrance onto U.S. 250 and the work could be completed in the middle of the year.

“The other major improvement from the public’s perspective is we are developing a significant park and rec improvement there in Rivanna Village which is round numbers of an 18 to 19 acre park with a dog park and walking trails and there are some playing fields and other parks and rec improvements there,” Culpeper said.

There are no tenants lined up for the commercial space, which Culpeper chalks up to the pandemic as well as the plans submitted for the rezoned property relegating non-residential uses to areas that are perhaps not viable. His company purchased the property in November 2016 after it a rezoned had been approved.

“The orientation of the commercial space on the master plan that we inherited is not traditional commercial space,” Culpeper said. “It doesn’t have any visibility on a major thoroughfare. It doesn’t have any real retail exposure. So that has presented some challenges in the type of user that we can attract to that location.”

Culpeper said there has been interest from childcare and healthcare companies, but no leases have been signed yet.

After that discussion, Albemarle Housing Coordinator Stacy Pethia gave an update on the Housing Albemarle, a project to update the county’s affordable housing plan.

“The county has had an affordable housing policy that was adopted in 2004 and that’s what the county has been working on since then,” Pethia said. “It was readopted with some minor updates in 2015 with the Comprehensive Plan update. Then in April of 2019, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission released a regional housing assessment and that really highlighted what the affordable housing and market rate housing needs will be today. So where we have a gap in housing provision and it projected what that gap will be heading out until 2040.”

The report found that Albemarle needs 11,750 additional units by 2040 to meet population projections, and that includes new legislative approval for about 3,616 units. The public comment period will begin sometime in the coming weeks or by the middle of February. (draft plan)

Albemarle limits dense growth to only around five percent of its total land mass. One member of the committee had this observation.

“Since Albemarle County has only really five or six growth areas, five or six growth areas cannot absorb that many homes no matter what you and it certainly would influence the quality of living as well,” said Dottie Martin.

Martin asked Supervisor Donna Price if the county would consider adding more growth areas. Price said she was not.

“It’s my understanding right now that the Board is not open to expand the development areas,” Price said. “My belief is we need to complete development within our development areas before we look to expand.”

You can watch the rest of the discussion on the Albemarle County YouTube channel.

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On today’s program:

The pandemic continues as Virginia’s total case count exceeds 400,000

A Charlottesville School Board seeks one of two Democratic nominations for City Council

The University of Virginia prepares for many events to celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.

The race for two seats on the Charlottesville City Council began today with the first candidate to announce a run.

“My name is Juandiego Wade and it is my honor to announce my candidacy for Charlottesville City Council,” Wade said. Wade has been a member of the School Board since 2006, the first year there were elections for those positions. He’s won re-election three times since.

“I know the greatness that Charlottesville possesses, the greatness of its citizens, its staff, its organizations,” Wade said. He’s been an Albemarle County employee for thirty years and has served as the co-chair of the Community Working Group put together by University of Virginia President Jim Ryan.

“I believe to have demonstrated leadership and knowledge of local government which will allow me to hit the ground running,” Wade said.

So far, Wade is the only challenger to announce, though Mayor Nikuyah Walker announced last February she would seek a separate term. However, Walker is an independent whereas Wade is seeking one of two Democratic nominations in the June 8 primary.

After the announcement, Wade took questions from reporters. The first from Nolan Stout of the Daily Progress asked what issues Wade wanted to discuss during the campaign.

“My platform, my areas would be criminal justice reform, I’d like to see how that could reimagined and I think that we can do that if we work together as a community,” Wade said. “Affordable and workforce housing, public education, and the economy and I feel like with those areas I’m experienced in particular with education, and the economy as a career counselor working with the local shops and business owners for the last ten years in my current capacity with the county.”

Wade’s discussion with reporters was happening at the same time City Council continued to meet in closed session to discuss hiring a new city manager. A search firm is no longer working on behalf of the city to identify applicants. Wade didn’t want to directly address what Council should do, but did say that as a School Board member, he has worked closely with Superintendent Rosa Atkins, who has been in her position since July 2006.

“When you get a good leader, you have to support them and that’s something that I’m used to and that I understand,” Wade said. “Not that you don’t challenge your leaders with questions and ideas from time to time, but it has to be a team mentality.”

From that perspective, Wade said he understood what Council is experiencing.

“Governing, leading under the best of circumstances is a really difficult job and we’re not in a perfect situation now,” Wade said. “I can imagine the leaders, the current leaders of Charlottesville, they have some difficult decisions to make.”

He said his time as an elected official in Charlottesville has prepared him to make choices when the time comes.

“Over the years, on the School Board for the last 16 years, we have made some really difficult decisions and it got pretty heated and we got pretty short with each other but that’s part of it,” Wade said. “We get into this field to make those difficult decisions and that’s why we were elected to do that.”

Aside from calls to closed session, Council has not had a meeting yet this year and skipped one scheduled for January 4. They will meet tomorrow as part of a joint meeting with the Planning Commission. They had been originally been scheduled to discuss the Capital Improvement Program for next Fiscal Year, but that has been postponed to February.

One big ticket item for consideration by the current or a future Council is whether to move forward with at least $50 million to reconfigure schools for 5th through 8th grade. This next comment comes from Wade the School Board member who has to vote on a budget request to send to Council.

“We will need to look at the budget just like in every year,” Wade said. “We have a great relationship with the city government working with public works and the City Manager’s office to move forward because they know just like we do that when we have great schools and modern schools that that is a plus for the city. That that is going to draw businesses and residents in and so I know that they want to do it.”

So far, Wade is the only announced challenger. He said he would wait to see who else seeks the Democratic nomination.

“Until we get two nominees, I just want to talk about my vision and listen and I think that I can do that I will hopefully be one of the seats come next November that will be able to serve the city,” Wade said.

Bekah Saxon, the co-chair of the Charlottesville Democratic Committee, said the current plan is for local Democrats to select nominees in the June 8 primary.

“We are excited to see how the candidates emerge and are committed to making sure voters are able to learn about the entire slate of candidates in the Democratic primary in the months leading up to the primary,” Saxon said in a message to me this morning.

Local election campaigns are often community events where people gather together. For at least the first part of this race, things will be a little different. I asked Juandiego Wade to talk about how the pandemic will affect the race.

“You know, Charlottesville is all about relationships and some of those things that that a candidate can really do well on is having those meet and greets in people’s neighbors’ living rooms and kitchens and things like that,” Wade said. “I don’t think that may be possible this time around but what I do imagine is that maybe meeting as the weather warms up in someone’s backyard, or a big area where people can spread out and we can talk. But certainly Zoom will be part of that for this campaign. If there are public forums people want to come to, that it just may have to be socially distanced when people meet.”

Some other information on the candidate. Wade is a native of Richmond, graduated from Norfolk State University in 1988 and the University of Virginia in 1990. In 2019, the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce honored him with the Paul Goodloe McIntire Award. According to his campaign website, he has been married to Claudette Grant since 1993 and then have one daughter who attends James Madison University.

The seven-day average for new COVID cases reported each day by the Virginia Department of Health is now at 5,121, with 4,530 reported today. The cumulative total for cases since March has now climbed over 400,000 and there have been nearly 5,400 deaths. The percent positivity is 16.7 percent. The seven-day average for new cases per 100,000 population is 60.1 today. That metric is known as the incidence rate and it has been rising steadily since November.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, the seven-day average for new daily cases is 149, with 126 reported today. There has not been a new fatality reported in a week and the total count remains at 97.

Next Monday is Martin Luther King Jr. Day and several in the community are marking the occasion with panels, lectures, and a community read. Last week, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted a proclamation marking the county’s appreciation of the slain leader.

“I think too many Americans when they think of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and they think of Martin Luther King they think of that as a Black holiday,” said Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District. “Dr. King did nothing but profess and proclaim and protest equal rights for everyone. Martin Luther King Jr. Day is a holiday for all Americans because what he preached and what he lived and died for was that all of us would be able to achieve and enjoy the benefits of living in this country.”

Meghan Faulkner is the chief of staff in the Division for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at UVA. She has coordinated UVA’s Celebration of MLK for the past 11 years. Like so many things, this year’s series is a little different.

“We have about 15 events which will all be virtual and open to the public of course free of charge,” Faulkner said. “They begin on January 14 and they will run through the end of the month.”

A full list can be found here. The overall theme for the series is Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community? That’s based on a 1967 book written by Dr. King.

“We are doing a community read of the book and we’ve been distributing copies, free copies, 500 copies, throughout the community at various spots,” Faulkner said. A panel discussion will be held on January 25.

“We’ll also have best-selling author Austin Channing Brown on January 20 to give a virtual talk on her book I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness,” Faulkner said. “And Dr. Virgil Wood, an Albemarle native, who will discuss his book In Love We Still Trust: Lessons We Learned from Martin Luther King Jr. and Sr. That will be on January 25 and he will share his experience attending Hillsboro School in Crozet, Virginia and the Albemarle Training Center in Charlottesville so that should be a very interesting talk.”

Faulkner said a new activity this year will be financial investments in several non-profits. These include African American Teaching Fellows, City of Promise, Legal Aid Justice Center, Loaves and Fishes, and the Piedmont Housing Alliance.

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On today’s show:

Charlottesville School Board debates school return in long discussion

University of Virginia Health System briefs the media on vaccine

Albemarle Board of Supervisors look ahead to 2021

Today marks the third day in a row where the Virginia Department of Health has reported over 5,000 new cases of COVID, with a figure of 5,238 cases. The percent positivity has decreased slightly to 16.7. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 185 cases, the third day in a row that there have been more 150 cases. Today that’s 80 cases in Albemarle, 34 in Charlottesville, 19 from both Fluvanna and Greene, 21 from Louisa and 12 from Nelson.

The University of Virginia Health System gave an update this afternoon on COVID in the community. Dr. Costi Sifri is the system’s director of hospital epidemiology.

“We are seeing increasing rates of cases in the community that is impacting admissions,” Dr. Sifri said. “This is a statewide phenomenon.”

We’ll have more from that briefing in a moment.

The Charlottesville School Board voted 4-3 last night to direct staff to plan for a return to face-to-face education on March 8, though a final decision would still depend on whether the current COVID surge has abated. They were shown metrics from Dr. Beth Baptist, the director’s school system.

“Right now everything is in an upward trend,” Baptist said. “It is better for Charlottesville and Albemarle, our numbers are less. But we have to remember that Charlottesville is not an island. We have people coming in and out every day and there’s so much movement.”

Dr. Baptist noted that teachers and staff will be eligible for vaccines in Phase 1B and surveys will go out soon to determine how many doses will be needed. The earliest they can be administered will be at least early spring, according to a release sent out yesterday by the Blue Ridge Health District. Logistics are being worked out now.

“We will certainly work with staff that based on the time of their appointments to have coverage if needed to go get the shots,” Baptist said. “We’ll encourage them to get the shots. We are not going to make anybody take the shot but if someone doesn’t take the shot and we have an outbreak or some problem within the school system we may have to have them not be in the building.”

In December, the board gave staff direction to proceed with a limited opening on for face-to-face instruction for pre-K through elementary school beginning on January 19. Last night, Superintendent Rosa Atkins recommended pushing back the start date to February 22. (materials)

“During that time we would hope to see the community transmission rate be decreasing, start to decrease at a significant decline,” Atkins said. “We also hope during that time to get more information about the vaccinations.”

Atkins said the final decision would be made at the School Board meeting in February. School Board member Jennifer McKeever disagreed with the recommendation.

“I think that February 22 is far too soon,” McKeever said.

School Board Member Lashundra Bryson Morsberger called for a halt to planning for now due to the winter.

“Everyone is in just a world of anxiety every time we have these meetings and the dates are very arbitrary at this point,” Bryson Morsberger said. “”We’re in the middle of a surge and I think we just need to have a pause all the dates. The date to go back in February, we’re in the surge. I just think we need to let it settle for a while, let the new administration come in. Let the teachers get the vaccine and the people who are coming into contact with students get the vaccine.”

School Board Member Sherry Kraft said she wasn’t ready yet to give up on in-person learning for some part of the third quarter of the year, which begins on February 1. She had a positive feeling after watching Governor Ralph Northam talk about Phase 1B on Wednesday.

“I think the vaccines are such a game changer and we’re not exactly sure about the timing of that,” Kraft said. “I felt like there was a really good chance that the process was going to move faster.”

(A Virginia Department of Health press release went out at 4:36 p.m. today with more information on Phase1B, stating it would begin in some health districts beginning this Monday. See below for more.)

School Board Member Juandiego Wade said he supported the February 22 date as well as the idea of some students going back to school as soon as possible.

“The virtual is just not working with a lot of our students and we’re doing what we can and I don’t like what we’re doing as far as setting a date and saying we’ll look at it and make a decision but I don’t see any other option,” Wade said.

School Board James Bryant also supported planning for the February 22 date.

“It could very well be February, it could very well not be based on the metrics,” Bryant said.

School Board Member Leah Puryear was on the same page.

“A little bit over four weeks from now, we will meet again and if the metrics have changed, the 22nd I think was the date given may still be able to work, but if we’re in the 15 percent range it won’t work,” Puryear said.

However, McKeever said the February 22 date was arbitrary and was causing anxiety in the community.

“February 22 is when the projection, the governor’s projection is to be the peak of this surge,” McKeeker said. “I don’t know why we’re going to continue to have our staff live in anxiety about when we’re going back to school.”

Superintendent Atkins said she was growing increasingly concerned about the welfare of students who are falling behind.

“Virtual is working for some students but there are also students that virtual is not working for, especially when you get to our high school,” Atkins said. “We have students that we are going to lose in our high schools because they are not engaged right now.”

Atkins said having no specific date to plan for would be very difficult for planning purposes. Eventually, a motion was made to move the planning date to March 8. After a long discussion, they took a vote. Bryant, Wade, Kraft and Puryear voted yes. The others voted no.

Speaking of vaccines, that was a major topic at this afternoon’s briefing with UVA Health officials. We just heard how teachers are within Phase1B, which has not yet happened. Dr. Reid Adams is UVA Health’s chief medical officer. He said Phase 1A has been underway for a few weeks with a focus on the most vulnerable population and health-care providers.

“Who are doing health care work and working in medical systems and then of course residents of long-term care facilities, and the latter part is being done through contracts with pharmacies,” Reid said. “We have vaccinated about 7,500 of our employees to date and this week we’re starting to start to provide our initial bolus of team members’ second dose of vaccine.”

Reid said UVA has been getting more shipments of vaccine and has ramped up capacity. He said the Blue Ridge Health District is coordinating doses for other health care workers.

“There is a well-publicized effort to provide vaccines for healthcare workers who are not part of health care systems or hospitals in our are that is occurring on Hydraulic Road,” Sifri said. “As we work through health care providers we will start to see that vaccination of first responders, like fire, police, people who because of their work are not able to socially isolate and that likely will be occurring in those community forums and UVA Health is working now to support those efforts.”

Dr. Sifri said UVA has moved fast to increase its internal capacity.

“When we received the first vaccines which I believe were on December 15, we had a capacity to provide vaccines to about 175 or our employees on a daily basis,” Dr. Sifri said. “That’s now increased to over 900, nearly 1,000 people a day.”

However, the actual numbers may vary. Dr. Sifri said he thought community vaccination efforts will have similar increases as they gain more experience.

“Governor Northam’s announcement this week sort of gave that charge and he talked about some of the efforts that they are entertaining and working towards as this vaccine moves forward including looking at the National Guard as part of that effort,” Dr. Sifri said.

In the next installment of this program, we’ll hear from Dr. Fauci, who spoke Friday to a group of faith leaders about the vaccine.

As this newsletter was about to be sent out, the Virginia Department of Health announced that some localities would begin Phase1B on Monday. Yesterday, a release from the Blue Ridge Health District had put the timetable to “early spring.”

Here’s a large section from today’s release.

“While many localities remain focused on 1a vaccinations, 11 health districts will begin gradually adding vaccination opportunities for the following groups: frontline essential workers, people age 75 and older, and people living in correctional facilities, homeless shelters or migrant labor camps. Overlap of vaccination of groups is needed to ensure people are vaccinated as quickly and efficiently as possible.”

The advance districts do not include anything in the Blue Ridge Health District. The VDH release states that all health districts should begin Phase1B by the end of January.

“It will take several weeks to months to vaccinate Virginians who fall into Phase 1b,” the release continues. “The ability to schedule appointments will depend on the supply of vaccine available.” (VDH Phase1B guidelines)

Just as a violent insurrection against the U.S. Capitol was fanned by the sitting U.S. president on Wednesday afternoon, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors met for its first meeting of the year and appointed Ned Gallaway to a third year as Chair. Unlike Charlottesville, the Board appoints its presiding officer every year.

Each Supervisor gave thoughts about what they hope 2021 will be like. Supervisor Diantha McKeel represents the Jack Jouett District and her second term is up at the beginning of the year. She made these comments before the moment of silence.

“We now have 8 million people who have moved into poverty,” McKeel said. “We have 90 million people who have no health insurance. One in six adults are going hungry. One in four children are going hungry and in the United States right now we’re losing someone to COVID every 30 seconds.

Supervisor Ann Mallek represents the White Hall District and she gave these remarks which supports Albemarle government action to respond to the pandemic.

“While we have many more obstacles in our future from COVID-19 I am confident that we will avoid chaos, provide services and earn the confidence of our citizens,” Mallek said. “I know there is a long to-do list already and our work plan is overflowing but there are high-priority program issues I hope we will all think about and give attention to in 2021.”

These include completion of the county’s Housing Albemarle plan, finding ways to pay for infrastructure to support urban growth, and connecting the Climate Action Plan with action steps including the county’s own procurement policy.

“If we take a cradle to cradle approach and get thorough documentation, not information from sales people, we will make much better decisions,” Mallek said.

Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District is in the second year of her first term. She said the pandemic will continue to lead to hardships for Albemarle residents. Price listed three priorities.

“The first one is expanding broadband and that includes revising our cell tower policies in order to ensure that we can expand availability and access,” Price said. “On top of everything we have to look at equity and I’ve said before, equity must be prospective not retrospective. And every decision the county makes must be made with a view towards equity.”

Price’s third priority is to find a way to find locations in the county where “convenience centers” can be built to allow residents to drop off solid waste for disposal or recycling.

“As I travel to neighboring counties I see that virtually all of them have no fee convenience centers,” Price said. “We have no convenience centers in Albemarle County.”

Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley is in her second year of her first term representing the Rivanna District. She said education is a priority as the pandemic continues.

“We need to do something with our schools,” LaPisto-Kirtley said. “I’m hoping that the school district will figure out a way to make up for lost time for our children. That’s the basis of our democracy. We need to have an outstanding educational system for everybody.”

Supervisor Liz Palmer is in the final year of her second term in the Samuel Miller District. The pandemic is a focus.

“And I hope that we can continue to do the great job that we have been doing in masking and social distancing in spite of the spike that is going on now,” Palmer said.

Gallaway is in the final year of his first term representing the Rio District. He thanked the Board clerk and her staff for their work in helping government meetings continue during the pandemic.

“I know that work is going to continue and we don’t really know when that’s going to end but I know that the Board members are confident that we will continue to be able to provide services,” Gallaway said.

We’ll have more from the Albemarle meeting in a future installment of the show.

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Today’s shout-out is to the people who have been supporting this work, either through a monthly Patreon contribution for general research, converting to a paid subscription for this newsletter, or contacting me about sponsorship possibilities. The work I’m doing is important for the communities around Charlottesville as we continue to wrestle with many issues. Government is us, and my aim is to convey that complexity as frequently as I can. Please consider what you can do to help me keep the lights on.

It’s January 7, 2021 and I’m Sean Tubbs, the host of the Charlottesville Community Engagement Newscast and newsletter. On today’s show:

Governor Ralph Northam pledges to speed up vaccine distribution

Charlottesville City Police Council holds press conference to address recent violent crime

Charlottesville City Council meets but takes no action

This morning the Virginia Department of Health reported another 5,379 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth, and the percent positivity increased slightly to 16.8 percent. Today’s one-day total is just a handful shy of the one-day-record set before.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 159 cases reported today. That’s 70 from Albemarle, 36 from Charlottesville, 15 from Fluvanna, ten from Greene, 15 from Louisa and 13 from Nelson. There are no new deaths reported today in the district.

As the world watched hundreds of angry people break into the U.S. Capitol yesterday, Governor Ralph Northam held his first COVID briefing of 2021 and stated something that is backed up by the data. (watch the video)

“The virus is worse now than it has ever been,” Northam said. “Case numbers are about four times higher than they were last spring. We had the highest case number every day and we can expect it to go higher.”

Northam said the epidemiological model put out by the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute demonstrates that, but the public version hasn’t been updated since Christmas Day. The governor said it will be a long winter with more threats lurking.

“We also need to be clear that new strains of the virus are out there,” Northam said. ”They’re much more contagious than what we’ve seen so far. They’re out in the world and though we’ve not seen it yet in Virginia, it will surely make its way here if not already so.”

It’s now been over three weeks since Dr. Ebony Hilton became the first person vaccinated in the University of Virginia Health System, and medical personnel across the Commonwealth are receiving their second dose this week. Many have critiqued the Virginia Department of Health for not distributing shots fast enough, but Northam explained some of the logistical challenges.

“It involves highly complex advanced manufacturing,” Northam said. “It requires moving supplies around the world and storing much of it as super cold, sub-zero temperatures. This is complex stuff.”

Northam went on to do some math. There are 8.5 million Virginians, and with the vaccines currently approved, most will need two doses. The roll-out will take months.

“Right now, Virginia is receiving about 110,000 doses a week,” Northam said. “Our first step is to use up all of that supply, to completely wipe out that supply because we know the supply will be replenished.”

Northam set a goal of administering 25,000 shots a day.

“And hitting it will depend on manufacturing ramping up and supplies being distributed to states over time,” Northam said. “We don’t have everything we need. No state does because it’s being manufactured literally in real time. That’s consistent with the short-term goal that President-Elect Biden has laid out for our country.”

Northam urged patience, and likened the current situation to what was experienced in the early days of the pandemic when Virginia did not have the infrastructure to process tests for COVID.

“Back then we were testing about 5,000 individuals a day,” Northam said. “We said we need to double it. We set a goal of testing 10,000 people a day. And we all celebrated when we hit it, and then we kept hitting it over and over again. Today we routinely test double that, or triple that, or even more.”

In other words, the infrastructure is being built to add another tool in the fight against COVID. Until then, Northam said doses should not be wasted. This next soundbite is directed at health care providers who have not been able to use all of their allotment.

“So I want you to empty those freezers and get shots in arms,” Northam said. “When you have vials, give out shots until they are gone. No one wants to see any supplies sitting unused.

Northam said this did not mean that just anyone should get a shot, but that health districts across Virginia should continue to expand efforts to make sure anyone eligible under Phase1A gets vaccinated.

The next step in the vaccine roll-out is Phase1B, which will expand distribution to more essential workers who are outside of the healthcare industry. According to a release sent out this morning, Phase 1B will begin in early spring with public safety workers at the top of a prioritization list.

“People who work in jobs that keep our society functioning,” Northam said. “People who are at higher risk of exposure to COVID-19. And people who can not work remotely.”

One of the biggest ongoing crises is the effect on public education. The past ten months have caused a disruption of instruction.

Later on tonight, the Charlottesville School Board will get an update from Superintendent Rosa Atkins on current metrics about the pandemic. According to information on the VDH website, “childcare/K12 teachers/staff” are listed as the third category under Phase1B prioritization.

“They’re high on the list of essential workers because teachers are critical to getting schools back open and that’s critical to people getting back to work and literally getting back to normal,” Northam said. “Opening schools doesn’t depend on vaccinating teachers but that will sure make it a lot easier.”

Further down the list are grocery store workers, food processing workers, those who work with hazardous materials, and those who help others get around.

“This group includes bus drivers, and transit workers, the people who run the systems that help other people run the systems that help people get to work,” Northam said.

Dr. Danny Avula, the director of Richmond and Henrico’s health departments will be put in charge of the state’s vaccination roll-out.

“My hope in this short-term assignment is to come alongside [Health Commissioner Norm Oliver] and this amazing team that is driving this work at VDH to help build some more of those bridges between the work that is happening locally and the work that is happening centrally and really get after vaccinating Virginia,” Dr. Avula said.

I’ll continue to cover this as more developments take place.

This morning, Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney held a press conference to update the public on a series of violent crimes in the city and to state that the Police Department needs the community’s assistance to fix the problem.

“More than a month ago we stood before you to discuss the unprecedented levels of violence in this community,” Brackney said. “Unfortunately the trend has continued into the New Year. We understand the drivers of systemic violence. We study them. We explore the root causes of community violence to include poverty, exclusion from education or living wage opportunities. We understand institutional supremacy and racism and its effects. Charlottesville does not need another commission, does not need another task force or forum to understand or address violence here.”

Chief Brackney said Charlottesville is rich with resources, but that many community voices need to come together to solve problems.

“I’m calling on all individuals, all organizations, who have called for change since 2017 to get involved,” Brackney said. “I’m calling on community advocates, influences, organizers, to go beyond Twitter or Instagram, Facebook, your news interviews, podcasts or social mediums to leverage your collective resources. What are you willing to contribute to solve the problem?”

Brackney said the community needs tutors, mentors, and people to spend time in communities affected. She said many in Charlottesville are suffering from trauma.

“I have witnessed this community coalesce around issues it cares about,” Brackney said. “Social justice. Police reform. Historical and institutional racism and supremacy. Community violence is an institutional legacy and our children are their inheritors.”

But before that, let’s get back to recent incidents. The top three news alerts on the Charlottesville Police Department are for:

The arrests of three Georgia men for a shooting this week that put a Fluvanna resident in the hospital

The December 27 murder of a man at the South First Street public housing complex

The December 24 arrest of a Porstmouth man for a December 17 rape on Madison Avenue

Major Jim Mooney, the assistant chief of police, was on hand at the press conference to give some statistics for 2020.

“Charlottesville Police Department responded to 195 calls for shots fired so just under 200,” Lt. said. “A hundred and twenty-two of those were confirmed shots fired cases meaning we found evidence of gunfire, shell casings. And in numerous cases there were victims associated with that.”

There were four homicides in 2020 and three of those were solved. Mooney said 2021 is not getting off to a good start.

“Multiple shots fired calls with a number of cases, some cases 20 plus casings,” Lt. said. “We have people that are shooting wildly and in our cases on Tuesday we had two incidents where apartment buildings were hit and not just one apartment, multiple apartments. In one of those apartments a woman lay in her bed and the bullet traveled through the mattress. Another woman was struck in the forehead.”

Brackney said a long-term approach is needed and that the department needs resources.

“It means addressing all of the underlying systemic ills that are going on, and this cannot be laid solely as a burden at the Police Department’s feet and that again is almost how the questions are always formed, is what is our response,” Brackney said. “I can’t do this by myself and neither can this department.”

The press conference comes a day after the City Council held two emergency closed sessions to discuss next steps in the search for an City Manager. The second meeting concluded after about three hours with no action. The closed meeting call also invoked state code that allowed discussion of a Councilor’s performance.

The Council’s emergency session will resume tomorrow at 1 p.m.

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On today’s show:

Another one-day record for COVID-19 cases in Virginia and the Blue Ridge Health District

The Virginia State Crime Commission votes 9-2 to recommend eliminating mandatory minimum sentences

An update from Charlottesville Tree Commission

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation gives a D+ to the estuary’s water qualityx

Virginia has set another one-day record for COVID-19 cases reported by the Virginia Department of Health, with 5,387 today. The seven-day average for positive tests has increased to 16.7 percent. That number was 10.6 percent on December 6, when the impacts of the Thanksgiving holiday began to show up in the data.

The post-Christmas surge is reflected in the Blue Ridge Health District which also sets a new record with 193 cases today. That’s 64 cases in Albemarle, 46 in Charlottesville, 26 in Fluvanna, 16 in Greene, 37 in Louisa, and 4 in Nelson. There are no deaths reported today.

Today, the Blue Ridge Health District will begin administering vaccines at the new location set up at the former KMart at the intersection of Hydraulic Road and U.S. 29.

“We anticipate 8,000+ people in Phase 1A and will be vaccinating hundreds this week and expanding clinics next week to keep increasing capacity for vaccinating as many people as possible,” said Kathryn Goodman, communications manager in the district. “At our greatest capacity in the Kmart location, we will have 18 nurses vaccinating people in 10 minute appointments from 9am-4:30pm multiple times per week.”

Goodman said that guidelines for Phase 1B and Phase 1C will be released later this week. Governor Ralph Northam will address Virginia at 2 p.m today.

Democrats have held on to two seats in the General Assembly in special elections held yesterday. In the 2nd District race to replace Jennifer Carroll Foy, Democrat Candi King defeated Republican Heather Mitchell 4,386 votes to 4,123 votes, or 51.4 percent to 48.4 percent. In the 90th District, Democrat Angelia Williams Graves won by a more comfortable margin against Republican Sylvia Marie Bryant. Graves got 63.5 percent of the vote to Bryant’s 36.4 percent. That race was to replace Joe Lindsey, who resigned to become a judge.

At recording time, Charlottesville City Council is holding an emergency meeting in closed session. The meeting comes a day after news broke that the firm Ralph Andersen and Associates has stopped work on a search for a new city manager. Let’s hear the call to that meeting from Councilor Heather Hill.

The official call cites the discussion states it will be for “‘discussion or consideration of one or more prospective candidates for City Council,” “discussion of a public contract involving the expenditure of public funds,” “discussion or consideration of the performance of one or more city councilors,” and consultation with legal council about one or all of the above.

But that meeting will not be Charlottesville’s first meeting of 2021. That honor goes to the Tree Commission which met yesterday to discuss several items and get updates. One of them was an update on the PLACE Design Task Force, a group created by a previous City Council in March 2012 to advise Council on urban design issues. That body has been pondering its existence, and here’s Mark Rylander, who serves on both PLACE and the Tree Commission.

“The last few meetings have consisted of strategizing among ourselves how to best be useful,” Rylander said. “PLACE was originally charged with reporting to Council and now is sort of under the [Neighborhood Development Services] umbrella which means that without sort of more assertive planning by PLACE itself, as a group it will sort of morph into an advisory body that chases after whatever NDS wants them to look at.”

In November, Parag Agrawal accepted an offer to be the new director of Neighborhood Development Services, but he decided instead to take a similar job in Prince William County, according to the Daily Progress.

This year, Council will need to decide what to do with the West Main Streetscape, a project conceived of in 2012 at the request of PLACE members at the time to replace an earlier conceptual design for a street that had been anticipated to see several large buildings constructed. Now, the project has a cost estimate of tens of millions at a time when the city is coming close to its debt capacity.

“It’s becoming apparent that maybe the city can’t afford everything that was planned for the West Main Street project, and it’s a sensitive topic because a lot of work has gone into it, but that’s potentially what PLACE will be working on,” Rylander said.

The Tree Commission also discussed their annual report, which will unveil the percentage of the city’s land mass covered by trees, a term known as the “tree canopy.” Higher levels of tree canopy can reduce heat in urban communities and the Tree Commission is working to educate the public on this point, especially as the city works on a climate action plan.

“This Commission really sees its mission as having fully evolved, not beyond its charge, but that we are looking things beyond aesthetics and beauty and even just tree types, that we really are undertaking larger issues,” said Brian Menard, the commission’s chair.

Menard noted that the Tree Commission celebrated its 10th anniversary, and that the Commission is poised to be part of the conversations on social justice and climate change. The report will be presented to the Council at their meeting on January 19.

A 13-member body that makes recommendations on public safety policy has voted 9-2 to advise the state government to remove laws that require judges to incarcerate people for a minimum period of time. Before their vote, the Virginia State Crime Commission was briefed on the topic and learned that there are 224 distinct offenses that require mandatory minimum sentences, 162 of which are felonies and 62 are misdemeanors. (agenda)

The idea had the support of Fairfax’s Deputy Public Defender, Andy Elders. He gave several reasons why he thought all mandatory minimum sentences in Virginia should be abolished.

“The first is that the threat of mandatory minimum sentences distorts our legal process,” Elders said. “Jury trials in Virginia are now extraordinarily rare and in 2019 as we discussed during the special session last year, only 1.3 percent of criminal convictions come from jury trials. One of the reasons for that is because a prosecutor can threaten a five or ten year mandatory minimum in some cases or even life, while simultaneously offering a shorter sentence as part of a plea agreement. The effect on the accused is overwhelming.”

Elders said there is no evidence that mandatory minimums have reduced crime. However Delegate Les Adams (R-16), said that data is inconclusive and he voted against a motion for the commission to recommend elimination of mandatory minimums for all 224 offense until there was more study.

“To give it sort of the imprimatur of the Commission, I don’t know if that’s appropriate,” Adams said. “I don’t see how elimination of the mandatory minimum sentence would be something that would gain widespread support by our colleagues in the House and Senate.”

The other vote against the motion was from Norfolk Police Chief Larry Boone, who was opposed to dropping mandatory minimums for assaults on law enforcement officers.

“In our current environment that we’ve gone through in the last six months or so, though I have not done the research, I would suspect that assault on law enforcement has probably gone up,” Boone said.

The next step is for bills to be filed in the General Assembly to turn the recommended changes into law. The General Assembly session convenes on January 13.

A non-profit organization that monitors the ecological health of the Chesapeake Bay has released its annual report and has given another D+ grade. Will Baker is the president of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.

“The Chesapeake Bay system is still dangerously out of balance but there is hope for improvement as pollution levels decline and the dead zone retreats,” Baker said. The dead zone refers to an area where there is no oxygen and thus no aquatic of plant life.

Six states and the District of Columbia are under a deadline to significantly reduce pollution and improve water quality by 2025 in a process known as the TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load). In Virginia, that requires all localities to significantly reduce levels of nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment that enter waterways. Locally, that includes investments such as $48 million to upgrade the Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant, a project completed in 2012.

“The current D+ is a sober reminder that the road ahead remains steep and the clock is ticking,” Baker said. He said Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia and D.C. have all made advances, but Pennsylvania and New York are not on track to meet their goals. (full report)

Albemarle continues to address the issue and will soon kick off the second phase of an initiative to improve stream health with community meetings on January 21 and January 22. Learn more about the county’s efforts here.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at 1 p.m. and the Fluvanna Board of Supervisors meets at 4 p.m. Details on both can be found in the Week Ahead newsletter that went out on Sunday.

One small correction. I had reported that Charlottesville City Council would have a joint work session with the Charlottesville Planning

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On today’s show:

City Council suspends search for a new city manager

Three Georgia men have been arrested in connection with a shooting yesterday

Albemarle’s design review panel briefed on restoration of several “entrance corridors”

Details on two “community reads” currently being assisted by the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 4,377 cases of COVID-19 today, and reports another 59 deaths. The percent positivity rating has risen to 16.2 percent, up from 12.2 percent a week ago. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 55 cases and one more death, bringing the total COVID-related fatalities in the district to 97 since March.

Yesterday the Blue Ridge Health District posted a video that showed the inside of the temporary structure that has been erected in the former KMart parking lot. The structure will be the location of mass vaccinations beginning tomorrow. Blue Ridge Health District spokeswoman Kathryn Goodman said in an email this morning Emergency Medical Services personnel, Region 10 residential facility staff and dialysis center staff will be the first to receive doses as part of Phase1A of the vaccine roll-out. Meanwhile, many health care workers at the University of Virginia and Sentara Martha Jefferson hospitals have received their second doses.

Charlottesville Police have arrested three men from Columbus, Georgia and charged them with several felonies related to a shooting on Emmet Street yesterday. According to a release, a 21-year-old resident of Fluvanna County was shot and is in stable condition at the University of Virginia Hospital. The suspects were apprehended by the Albemarle County Police Department and being held in the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail pending a bond hearing.

Charlottesville City Council has suspended its search for a new city manager to replace Dr. Tarron Richardson, who resigned last September.

"Council has decided to pause working with a search firm for the City Manager recruitment and is evaluating next steps to stabilize the organization over the next 12-24 months,” reads a statement from Council sent to the Daily Progress yesterday by Councilor Heather Hill. “We anticipate providing additional information to the public in advance of our next regular meeting on January 19th."

In a Facebook post, City Councilor Lloyd Snook said the city had interviewed five search firms in October and selected Ralph Andersen and Associates in part because one of that company’s officials had made a statement that “it is going to take a special kind of person to want to come to Charlottesville at the moment.”

That official was Robert Burg, the company’s vice president. According to Snook, Burg had a virtual meeting with city staff on December 4. A story in the Daily Progress today based on a Freedom of Information Act request from Tanesha Hudson quotes an email from Police Chief RaShall Brackney in which she described Burg as “unprofessional.”

In his post, Snook said that Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker had disagreed with the hiring of Ralph Andersen and Associates. He quoted a December 10 email from Walker in which she said she would not meet one-on-one with Burg, but only as an entire Council. In the email, she said she did not think the firm was interested in hearing her point of view.

“I explained to you all in the summer that I believed that it would be extremely challenging to select a city manager with this current council and that I had hoped that things would have worked out with the previous city manager,” Walker said in that email.

Walker’s first four-year term is up later this year, as is the first four-year term of Councilor Heather Hill. In 2017, Walker was the first independent candidate elected to Council since 1948, and she announced last February she would seek another term.

In his Facebook post, Snook said Burg told that he had never seen this level of dysfunction before and that it would be difficult to hire a manager at this time.

“In my opinion, we will not be able to hire a permanent City Manager until after the next election, in November, 2021, and we should not try,” Snook wrote.

Council has now had four managers since the contract of Maurice Jones was not renewed in 2018. Deputy City Manager Mike Murphy served as interim until May 2019, when Richardson took over. City attorney John Blair is serving as interim manager. Council also recently suspended its strategic plan process. They are next scheduled to meet on January 12 in a joint meeting with the Planning Commission. That meeting will be on the Capital Improvement Program.

So far, no candidates for Council have filed paperwork, according to an email received this morning from City Registrar Melissa Morton.

Albemarle County might soon pursue scenic and historic designations for roadways that until recently have been under the jurisdiction of the Architectural Review Board. The ARB reviews projects within what are known as Entrance Corridors, but several roads such as Route 6 do not qualify because the Virginia Department of Transportation does not classify them as “arterial” roadways. Margaret Maliszewski is an Albemarle County Planning Manager.

“For four of the non-arterial streets, we are recommending that they be upgraded to arterial status,” Maliszewski said. “They include the full length of Avon Street Extended, Barracks Road from the city limits to Georgetown Road, Thomas Jefferson Parkway or Route 53 for the full length, and Richmond Road from Route 22 to the County.”

Maliszewski said staff is also recommending restoring a county-level scenic or historic designation for several other streets such as the rest of Barracks Road, Route 6 and Route 22. Other roads could become Scenic By-Ways, a designation granted by the Commonwealth Transportation Board. The Board of Supervisors will be presented with the information at their meeting on February 3.

“If the Board wants us to start to consider the county scenic highway and the historic designation that is a multi-step process that would have public hearings and we’re not ready to jump into that yet. Really what we’re asking for in February is whether they want us to start pursuing it.”

ARB Member Frank Stoner said he wasn’t sure that all of the entrance corridor designations needed to be restored.

“Some of these corridors don’t really have any commercial development on them and I just wonder whether it’s worth the effort to pursue this designation,” Stoner said. “I don’t exactly know what’s involved once you get into VDOT.”

Stoner said he was most concerned about restoring ARB’s jurisdiction over Avon Street Extended, which he said was not a major arterial.

“And it’s a road that already has a fairly industrial character and so I worry that there aren’t many places anymore in the county where you can actually build something akin to a warehouse or a purely functional structure and Avon already serves that purpose,” Stoner said.

The year is still relatively new and there’s still time to pick up the habit of reading a book. If you’d like to read along with several hundred other area residents, the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library has the book for you as part of their Same Page program.

“So this year for 2021 our Same Page pick is Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson,” said Abby Cox, a reference librarian with JMRL. “This is the same book we picked for last year but Same Page takes place during March so as you can imagine, most of our book groups did not get to meet last year to discuss the book and we weren’t able to bring her in person because of the pandemic.”

Cox said Brown Girl Dreaming is a memoir in poetry of Woodson’s childhood in South Carolina and New York in the late 60’s. And this year’s programs will also be virtual due to the continuing nature of the pandemic. JMRL has adapted.

“We have pivoted a lot of our programming to virtual programming so we’ve been having book groups meet through Zoom where people can also call into participate so that’s really how this is going to look for our Same Page programming,” Cox said.

Woodson will be on one of the sessions on March 17 at 7 p.m. as part of the Virginia Festival of the Book, which will be entirely virtual this year.

The “community read” is under the Same Page program, which is funded by the Friends of the Library group in partnership with the Virginia Festival of the Book. It used to be called the Big Read and was paid for through a grant from the National Endowment of the Arts.

The University of Virginia’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion are also doing a “community read” in commemoration of Martin Luther King Jr. Their book for 2021 is Dr. King’s 1967 work Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community. A panel discussion for that will be held on January 25 at 6 p.m. (details)

“One of the things that is so great about a Community Read is it gives people to have conversations with neighbors or members of the community that they may not otherwise be in dialogue with,” Cox said.

Copies of both Brown Girl Dreaming and Where Do We Go From Here are available to be checked out from JMRL branches.

Are you going to read it? If so, let me know. Let’s have some dialog!

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville Tree Commission meets at 5 p.m. They’ll discuss their annual report to Council and hear a report from the city’s arborist. (agenda)

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On today’s show:

COVID numbers in Virginia are in post-holiday surge

Delegate Lee Carter seeks Democratic nomination for Governor

City Parks and Recreation begins bird walking course this week

Since the last newsletter on Thursday, the Virginia Department of Health has reported 20,454 new cases of COVID. To put that in perspective, it took six weeks in the early pandemic for Virginia to hit that amount. The seven-day average for new daily cases is 4,480 and the seven-day average for positive test results has gone from 13.2 percent on December 31 to 15.8 percent today.

Today the VDH reports another 3,771 cases, based on about 18,000 tests processed yesterday. The current seven-day average for daily tests is 30686 a day.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there have been 350 additional cases and four more deaths. So far, 96 people have died in the district since the pandemic began.

Another Democrat has entered the race for that party’s nomination. Delegate Lee Carter (D-50) made his announcement on New Year’s Day.

“It’s no secret that Virginia is divided, but it’s not divided between red and blue, and it’s not divided between big cities and small towns,” Carter said. “Virginia is divided between the haves and the have nots.”

Carter joins a field of announced candidates that includes former Delegate Jennifer Carroll Foy, Senator Jennifer McClellan, and former governor Terry McAuliffe. In an ad announcing his campaign, Carter leaned into his message of Democratic socialism.

“For everyone with a stack of bills on the kitchen table waiting to get paid, I’m running for Governor so the rest of us can finally get what we need,” Carter said over top an audio bed of him at a recent rally. “So we can get what we deserve.”

One way to keep track of the election is through the Virginia Public Access Project. The Democrats will select a nominee in a primary on June 8. Republicans will choose their nominee in an unassembled convention. Delegate Kirk Cox and Senator Amanda Chase have announced their candidacies.

There is one declared independent in the race, Princess Blanding. She’s the sister of Marcus-David Peters, a man shot by Richmond police in May 2019.

Tomorrow will see two special elections for vacant seats in the House of Delegates. One is for District 2, from which Carroll-Foy resigned to run for Governor. The other is House District 90, from which Joe Lindsey resigned in November to become a judge in Norfolk.

There will need to be another special election at some point this year to the fill the vacancy left by the death on New Year’s Day of Senator Ben Chafin (R-38). He died of COVID-related complications.

We’re about to hit the ten month mark of the pandemic, and there’s no sign of when recreational centers operated by the city of Charlottesville will reopen. But the Parks and Recreation Department is doing what so many have done to adapt. They’ve pivoted to offer new kinds of activities. Lucy Hartley is a program specialist with the department who at 9:30 this Wednesday morning will lead the first of our four bird walks.

“The first one is going to be at our city park Riverview which is right along the Rivanna River so we can pick up some great blue herons and maybe some other waterbirds,” Hartley said. “The next one on January 20 at Darden Towe Park. February 3 at Ivy Creek and February 17 at McIntire Park.”

Each one will likely include different birds, as there are microhabitats all across the area. The walk this Wednesday at Riverview passes through many types of terrain.

“Some of the walk will be in a meadow habitat so we’ll see some of the sparrows and finches and birds like that that like to eat the seeds,” Hartley said. “We’ll be close to the water so we might see some of the ducks and grebes and other water birds. The blue heron of course. And it’s winter so there are certain species that are only here in the winter time so the juncos and the white-throated sparrows, sapsucker woodpeckers and there are certain things you can only see this time of year.”

Hartley said it is easier to see birds because trees have lost their leaves. And before they come back, this is a good time to start a new hobby. She said they began the program in order to offer something new.

“When we’re planning programs we’re looking at trends out there and we’ve all read about the surge in interest in people biking, kayaking and all those outdoor activities,” Harley said. “But when people were home in March, and it was a little quieter because there wasn’t as much traffic and people were definitely hearing birds and noticing things about birds that they might not have been tuned into before, so there is a growing interest in birding and we wanted to try to capitalize on that and give people the tools they need to learn the bird sounds and resources and how to identify them and get some basic.”

Each walk is $6 for city residents and $8 for every one else. Register online. There are eight slots available. And if you decide to go, let me know.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Architectural Review Board meets at 1 p.m. for a virtual meeting with design review of an auto repair facility on Ivy Road and a new WaWa at U.S. 29 and Proffit Road. There will also be a discussion of how to bring several county-designated Entrance Corridors into state compliance, as well as an overview of the architectural standards on U.S. 250 West. (meeting info)

At 5 p.m. the Louisa County Board of Supervisors meets in person. One of the items on their agenda is a discussion of panhandling in the county. (agenda packet)

Before you go, a quick mention that doing this work is now my sole source of revenue. I had been working a part-time job, but left this weekend in order to focus on bringing you this information under my business, Town Crier Productions. I’m still putting that together, but if you’d like to support the work, here are some ways to do so:

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Today is the 120th episode of a program I’ve been producing since July 13, and builds on the dozens of episodes of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. It’s all brought to you by the many people who have made a financial contribution this year to support the daily information I put together for the general public.

I sincerely appreciate it, and every new Substack subscriber or Patreon supporter helps me feel like I’ve made the right choice this year. I will continue into 2021 and beyond, and you all have my sincere thanks for making that an option. And to those who haven’t paid? That’s okay! Just make sure you send the work along to others so we can grow the audience together.

On today’s show:

Virginia posts another one-day record for COVID cases

The Blue Ridge Health District builds a big tent for vaccinations

The Virginia Department of Health gives a briefing on vaccines

Albemarle County government provides its own year in review

In the podcast, a quick sound collage of bloopers and weird sounds

The final day of the year brings the highest case one-day count yet in Virginia with 5,239 new cases reported by the Commonwealth’s Department of Health. There have been another 48 deaths bringing the total now to 5,032 in Virginia since March. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is now 13.2 percent, the highest that figure has been.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 125 new cases today, the second-highest one-day total. That figure includes 52 from Albemarle, 21 from Charlottesville, 19 from Louisa, 15 from Fluvanna, 13 from Greene, and five from Nelson.

In a moment, we’ll hear from Ryan McKay from the Blue Ridge Health District on plans to expand the number of vaccinations administered locally. But first, members of the press had the opportunity yesterday to ask detailed questions of the person heading up Virginia’s COVID vaccination efforts. Christie Gray is the director of the immunization division at the Virginia Department of Health.

“As of this morning, December 30, Virginia had received approximately 285,000 vaccine doses from two manufacturers and has administered 54,295 doses to people in the Commonwealth,” Gray said.

However, Gray said Virginia had expected to have 370,000 doses by the end of the year, today, but failed to meet that goal. Still, doses were distributed.

“Eighteen Virginia hospitals received the initial shipment of the Pfizer vaccine the week of December 18 and is dispersing those shipments of 72,125 doses to our frontline health care workers,” Gray said. “Virginia also received approximately 140,000 doses of Moderna vaccine the week of December 23 and both the previously approved Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are being distributed to 96 sites geographically dispersed throughout the Commonwealth.”

Gray said Operation Warp Speed has estimated Virginia will get about 100,000 doses total from of both vaccines each week for the month of January. So far, the federal public-private partnership has failed to meet expectations.

“The actual amount of the vaccine received in Virginia is a moving target and is dependent on when and how quickly vaccination doses are manufactured,” Gray said.

Currently we are in Phase 1A, where vaccines are to be reserved by front-line health care workers and residents of long-term care facilities. This week, some employees of the Blue Ridge Health District received the shot. Across Virginia, the first long-term care residents are to have received the vaccine on-site through the partnership with CVS and Walgreens.

Gray pointed people in the direction of the new VDH vaccination dashboard, but said the numbers posted would lag behind the actual numbers.

The next decision point is to determine who exactly in Phase 1B and 1C will be in line to receive the vaccine.

“Virginia is awaiting recommendations by the Virginia Unified Command and the Virginia Disaster Medical Advisory Committee to make final recommendations on priority groups 1B and 1C,” Gray said. That could happen by the end of this week.

During the question and answer period, reporters wanted to know why there were delays in getting the vaccine distributed. Gray acknowledged the process has been slow.

“Dealing with new systems and operations at this scale it is expected to be slower at the beginning but we are expecting to increase our efficiency over time and I would like to say that 47,000 doses in two weeks is not a small number and we are proud of our Virginia providers for accomplishing that,” Gray said.

Locally, vaccinations will be administered in the parking lot of the former KMart at the intersection of U.S. 29 and Hydraulic Road. Ryan McKay is the director of policy for the Blue Ridge Health District.

“On Monday, we begin providing access to Phase1A so it’s really non-hospital affiliated health care providers and we’re really working on that access for EMS providers, for individuals who work in dialysis centers and through Region 10 where their staff are working in residential facilities”, McKay said.

This will begin the mass vaccination campaign that the Blue Ridge Health District will run. They’re doing so with assistance from Red Light Management and the Bama Works Fund of the Dave Matthews Band. Skyline Tent will build a temporary structure under which the vaccines will be administered for several months in a large, roomy space that will allow for physical distancing.

“We established this relationship really quickly,” McKay said. “I think we met with them on site a week ago yesterday and we talked out a few different options and based on what they were able to provide this modular structure that we put up over the course of the next few days. And then we’ll open it up next week and that really allows us to maximize our staff capacity and really get people in and out as efficiently, safely, and effectively as possible. One of the rate-limiting factors in all of this is that people have to wait 15 to 20 minutes after they get vaccinated to assure they’re not going to have a severe adverse reaction like anaphylactic shock.”

Such incidents have so far been rare. McKay said there will be neighborhood level clinics as well as more and more vaccines doses are provided.

It’s the last day of 2020, and Albemarle County has released a 15 minute video that reflects on what local government has been up to this year. (watch the video)

“Hi, I’m Jeff Richardson and I’m the county executive for Albemarle County government,” Richardson said. The video was to have been shown to the Board of Supervisors at their final meeting of the year, but an ice storm that day ended the meeting early.

“A lot of the work that has taken place over this very challenging year specifically related to COVID, the pandemic, and the response responsibilities that our government has faced over the past year.”

The video also mentions what many consider one of the most important actions taken by the Board of Supervisors this year. Here’s Siri Russell, the county’s director of Equity and Inclusion.

“Following a months-long community engagement process, the Board of Supervisors voted to remove the Confederate monument known as At Ready from Court Square,” Russell said. “So many departments came together to pull this off. So many individuals went above and beyond to really create a community moment that was safe, engaging, inclusive, and ultimately effective.”

There’s also an update from the Office of Housing. Here’s Philip Holbrook, housing program manager.

“This year we’ve been busy, we’ve been able to accomplish a lot even in the midst of COVID,” Holbrook said. “The “[Housing Choice Voucher] 90 is probably one of our biggest program pushes that we’ve been doing which is an ongoing program that we’ve had for years, however, we’ve been expanding the number of local families that we’ve been able to provide subdisides to through our housing choice voucher program. Ninety new families are going to receive vouchers by the end of 2020.”

Take a look at the full video to learn more about what various departments in Albemarle have been up to. Let’s close it out with Jeff Richardson

“In closing it’s been an unbelievable year,” Richardson said. “We have a phenomenal community that is very resilient and we have an organization that continues to be prepared to serve our citizens and residents of this county. I could not be more proud of our organization. I wish you the best and we are all excited about 2021.”

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Today’s show comes with support from the Piedmont Environmental Council, who will celebrate their 50th year in 2022, which is soon to be only next year. Check out PEC’s website at pecva.org or their Facebook page to learn more about what they do and why. Tell them you learned about them on this program.

In today’s show:

James Madison Regional Library Board of Trustees wraps up the year

The sister of a slain Richmond man runs for Virginia Governor

A sinkhole opens up

*There are another 4,088 new cases of COVID-19 reported by the Virginia Department of Health today. The statewide seven-day average for positive tests is now at 12.7 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 77 cases reported today. That’s 25 from Albemarle, 17 from Charlottesville, 13 from Louisa, 12 from Fluvanna, six from Greene and four from Nelson.

The sister of a man killed by Richmond police in May 2019 has announced a bid for Virginia Governor.

“Hello Virginians, my name is Princess Blanding, and today I am grateful to announce my candidacy for Governor of Virginia as a nominee of the newly-formed Liberation Party,” Blanding said in a video posted to her Facebook page. Her brother Marcus-David Peters was shot by police in the evening of May 14, 2019 on I-95 after a taser blast did not subdue him.

Richmond’s Commonwealth Attorney issued a ten-page report in November which cleared officers. Blanding is running to push for further reform.

“Since the murder of my brother, Marcus-David Peters, I stood alongside community members and fellow organizers as we fought tirelessly for changes that would put community care and safety first for all Virginians.”

Blanding joins a race with several Democrats and Republicans who have already announced. On the Democrat side, that includes former Delegate Jennifer Carroll Foy and Senator Jennifer McClellan as well as former Governor Terry McAuliffe. On the Republican side, Delegate Kirk Cox and Senator Amanda Chase have announced their candidacies.

A sinkhole opened up Monday in the median on U.S. 29 north of Seminole Trail, and crews with the Virginia Department of Transportation temporarily closed the left lanes of both northbound and southbound traffic. They used large stones known as rip-rap to repair damage caused. This is an issue VDOT also dealt with in the same general area in 2007 when a leaking drainpipe undermined the integrity of the earth underneath the roadway. (June 2007 Charlottesville Tomorrow article)

A familiar face returned to the Board of Trustees of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library on Monday. Tony Townsend of Albemarle County was introduced by Board President Marcia McDuffie of Nelson County.

“Tony was on the Board of Trustees from 2003 to 2011 and served as president for two years,” McDuffie said. “After that he was on the Friends of the Library Board as well and served as president there.”

McDuffie also pointed out that Townsend is the administrator of a website called the Patrick O’Brian Compendium, which tracks the work of the author of the Master and Commander series.

As 2020 winds down, JMRL director David Plunkett gave an update on the system’s transition to its Tier 3 level of service, which allows for in-person browsing by appointment only. The library briefly closed under Tier 5 in mid-march before gradually restoring service. But JMRL offers more than just books.

“Since July 1, since the beginning of the new fiscal year, JMRL has put on 295 virtual programs that have been attended by 5,333 people,” Plunkett said. “Circulation for JRML materials since July 1 through the end of November [has been] 424,677 items.”

Plunkett said 43 percent of circulation has been of digital materials. The system has also helped to provide Internet service to those who don’t have it at home.

“Since the pandemic began, a little over 42,000 people have signed on to use JMRL wi-fi,” Plunkett said. “42,000 people.”

Slowly people are beginning to return to in-person service by appointment.

“Since September and through the 23rd of this month, Central Library has had 66 appointments made, Gordon Avenue has had 39 appointments made, Northside has had 175 appointments made, Crozet 744, Scottsville 38, Nelson 790, Louisa 464 and Greene 590,” Plunkett said. “So if you think of those as being in groups of either 1, 3, or 5 at a time to keep distances safe, it’s really been a lot of work to get there.”

Plunkett also talked about the financial aspects of COVID for the library. They’ve spent about $50,000 this quarter on PPE and other supplies. There are also no fines at the moment, and fines help pay for new equipment.

“No revenue effectively is coming in to the equipment fund right now,” Plunkett said. “JMRL has not bought any of the equipment that made it into this year’s budget except for COVID-related expenses basically in the first six months of this fiscal year.”

Plunkett and trustees have been meeting with localities about the next fiscal year budget. He described the meeting with Charlottesville officials as “honest.”

“Charlottesville as you might have seen in the news is having some issues with the meals and lodging tasks, nobody expected this pandemic to go so long so the revenue that has come in what they were expecting for this current fiscal year,” Plunkett said. “So they are meeting ends as best as they can and as they think about next year they’re really looking at flat funding for most of their agencies and partners.”

Calendar 2021 is the centennial of public library service in Charlottesville. Plunkett said JMRL will work with the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society on an exhibit.

“We’re also working with filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson on a short film about the history of library service here in the region tentatively called Free and Open,” Plunkett said. “We hope to explore the growth of the institution locally and to confront and discuss the history of the segregationist past of the institution.”

Plunkett and Dickerson will discuss this project on January 27 at a panel held by the ACHS.

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Today’s episode of the show comes to you with support from the Piedmont Environmental Council, the usual sponsor of the Week Ahead newsletter. Every week they support my research into what’s happening at various meetings across the Thomas Jefferson Planning District so that the entire community can know what decisions are coming up. That’s consistent with their mission, and advances mine to make sure as many people as possible know what’s going on. Thanks to PEC for helping me get started this year.

The week begins with the Virginia Department of Health reporting another 2.599 cases of COVID-19 this morning, and the seven-day average for positive tests is 12.3 percent today. That’s a total of 12,260 new cases since our last newsletter on Thursday. The seven day average for new daily cases is at 3,612 a day.

We all now wait to see if there is a corresponding spike in cases related to Christmas gatherings, similar to the one seen after Thanksgiving. The cold weather is also a likely factor that has led to more cases being spread due to more people gathering together indoors. To give you a sense of perspective, the average number of new daily cases for the month of July was 874 a day. That number rose to 1,062 a day in October, and climbed to 1,899 in November. To date in December, the figure is 1,938 cases a day including today’s numbers.

This Friday, the division of the Virginia Health Department in charge of public health in our community will officially become known as the Blue Ridge Health District from the Thomas Jefferson Health District. Here’s a bit why from their press release in early October.

“This change reflects the District’s commitment to ensuring that public health services are inclusive and welcoming to all off of the communities served,” the release releases. “Blue Ridge Health District also aligns with other health districts in Virginia [which are] majorly named after regional geography.”

Either way, they’ve continuing to lead the response in a community that has had 7,297 cases of COVID and 91 fatalities. There has not been a death reported since Christmas Eve. Since Thursday there have been 258 new cases reported in the district. That’s 112 in Albemarle, 38 in Charlottesville, 30 in Fluvanna County, 22 in Greene County, 46 in Louisa County, and ten in Nelson County.

So far, 41,709 people in Virginia have been vaccinated so far according to the Virginia Department of Health’s new vaccination dashboard.

The Blue Ridge Health District will have one more community testing event on Wednesday in Crozet at Henley Middle School from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Call 434-972-6261 today and tomorrow to register for the free event. Details about other testing opportunities can be found here.

A Louisa County man is dead following a shooting early Sunday morning in the 900 block of a public housing complex on South First Street. It’s the second homicide in that area in two months. When Charlottesville police responded to the scene, they found 32-year-old Jamarcus B. Washington dead. For more context, read Nolan Stout’s Daily Progress article.

Today and this week in meeting, singular, the Board of Trustees for the Jefferson Madison Regional Library meets at 3 p.m. today on a Zoom call. On the agenda is the welcome of a familiar face to represent Albemarle on the Board. Tony Townsend was appointed by the Board of Supervisors earlier this month. He previously served on the board earlier this century, including a stint as its president.

Trustees will also talk about the library system’s response to COVID-19. JMRL shut down in-person shortly after the pandemic began in order to limit community spread. Gradually they restored circulation services to curbside appointments, but now patrons can access all facilities, but on an appointment-only basis. JMRL Director David Plunkett will conclude the meeting with his report.

Earlier this year, Plunkett acknowledged the system could change its name as well in the near future. In August, he reminded trustees that JMRL’s mission statement recently changed to reflect a more inclusive attitude.

Director David Plunkett said JMRL’s mission statement was updated to reflect an awareness of the system’s problematic past. (August 6, 2020, Community Engagement)

“The public library of today strives so hard to be free and open to the public, but that was service wasn’t available for Black families for a long time in the area here so that by your bootstraps story about public libraries being a cornerstone of education for Americans to improve their lot in life wasn’t available for Black families,” Plunkett said.

(watch the meeting)

As mentioned in the top of the audio version, today is the third day of Kwanzaa, and today’s candle is to be lit for the principle of Ujima, or collective work and responsibility. I would have liked to have had a soundbite from an interview with someone on this, but I don’t, and I have to get this thing posted for the day. But, I want to say that in 2021 I hope to broaden the kinds of sounds I’m able to bring you each day.

The pandemic certainly awoke my sense of responsibility to others. I’ve taken a leap of faith to pursue the kind of work I feel I’m supposed to be doing to help as many people as I can. I don’t profess to speak for everybody but I do come from a position of wanting life to be as meaningful and fulfilling for as many people as possible. So, let’s think about collective work and responsibility today, especially at a time during this pandemic.

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We’re now nine and a half months into the pandemic, and there are signs that one day this will all be over. This daily newsletter has its origins in a podcast I began in the middle of March to document the experience. This installment sort of doubles up as installments of both products, as our only story today is about the pandemic and the roll-out of the two vaccines that are approved so far.

Over a million people in America have been vaccinated in the past eleven days according to a press release from the Centers for Disease Control. However, cases continue to rise across the country, with over 195,000 reported yesterday. Over 300,000 people have died so far, and we are all watching to see if there is another surge in new cases related to Christmas, just as there has been a spike following Thanksgiving.

Today in Virginia, the Department of Health reports an additional 4,782 new cases, the second record day in a row for the Commonwealth. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 104 cases. Since Thanksgiving there have been just over 1,800 cases in the district, or about a quarter of the total number of cases so far.

There have been 90 deaths in the District, which consists of the city of Charlottesville as well as the counties of Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa and Nelson.

At the center of this pandemic, two area hospital systems have borne the brunt of treating patients and administering the many tests that have been conducted since March. There have been over 175,000 tests and the seven-day average of positive tests is currently 5.6 percent.

But now, a new set of statistics will begin to be reported as more people receive a vaccine. Among the first locally are medical personnel at the University of Virginia Health System. As of Wednesday, nearly 1,600 had received the shot.

Wendy Horton, chief executive officer of the University of Virginia Health System, said they are continuing to vaccinate employees.

“We’re in the process of getting everyone getting scheduled for an appointment to receive a vaccine in the teams,” Horton said. “We currently have about 4,000 individuals signed up for an appointment. And our goal as a health system is to try to vaccinate all of UVA Health by the end of March and that would include the second dose. As you know, these vaccinations require a second dose.”

Horton said UVa has been able to get 380 additional doses of the Pfizer vaccine due to a surplus amount in each vial. UVA also received a first shipment of 2,500 doses of the Moderna vaccine and will switch to that as soon as the Pfizer supply runs out.

Health workers and those who live in long-term care facilities are the first to receive the vaccines. Dr. Costi Sifri is an infectious disease expert who has been leading up UVa’s efforts.

“We’ve been incredibly gratified and excited about this opportunity to provide vaccines for our team neighbors and they’re certainly responding with their excitement as well,” Sifri said. “For many of us, this is some of the most important work that we’ve done. One of my colleague said it’s the most important work she’s even done in her entire career. “

But what next now that there’s a vaccine? There are still a lot of unknowns. At the briefing, UVA Health spokesman Eric Swensen relayed questions from media folks. Let’s listen in.

Swensen: “Can you transmit the virus once you have the vaccine?”

Sifri: “That’s an excellent question and something we’re still trying to learn about. The outcomes from the clinical trials were whether it prevented disease and secondarily whether it prevented severe disease. Whether it prevents virus replication, the presence of virus and the state of being a virus carrier is not known yet.

“There is some suggestion from one of the clinical trials with the Moderna vaccine that perhaps it does reduce the amount of live virus, so that’s going to be a focus as we move forward. So more importantly, because we don’t know that answer, what the instructions are from the CDC, and certainly what we are promoting that even if our team members are vaccinated we still need to maintain the practices to prevent transmission of the virus. Wearing the mask, maintaining social distance, those types of things.

The second question was how UVA is responding to a climb in cases at the hospital. The COVID tracker shows 60 cases at the hospital today. What happens if that number rises with the increased number of cases across the region?

“We’re feeling really overall well prepared,” Horton said. “We have an amazing team that’s really come together to support the needs of the community and the patients that we serve. Just a couple of updates. We have adequate PPE and adequate testing right now and our approach has been for the last several weeks is to really care for both COVID and non-COVID patients and that really means the same. And so we’re checking in multiple times a day to make sure we’re adjusting as needed the operations to care for all of the patient populations.”

“The majority of patients are really being cared for in an ambulatory or outpatient setting both through the COVID clinic and many programs including our home-monitoring program,” Horton continued. “On the in-patient side, we have seen that uptick in our COVID in-patients, and just wanted the team to know that we do have a response plan and there are a series of steps and lever that we monitor every day and we’re titrating and making different plans each and every other day to meet the various needs.”

In late November, the in-house publication posted a Q&A on this topic that I’d recommend reviewing. Let’s continue to keep an eye on this. In the meantime, Horton said the potential for concern does not relate to supplies or infrastructure.

“Our rate limiting step will be our staffing and not really our facility at this point in time so that’s the piece we’re looking at, we’re looking at the skill set and the patient care needs and making sure we’re synching those up and working together as a team to move people around as needed,” Horton said.

Now, back to vaccines. We’re currently in Phase 1A of the CDC’s recommended prioritization of the limited number of doses. Phase 1B and Phase 1C are next, with 1B for people 75 and over as well as frontline essential workers. Phase 1C will be for people 65 and over, people with medical conditions, and other essential workers.

“It remains to be seen when those occur, but they will occur under the guidance of the health department who will be following the CDC guidance we would anticipate,” Sifri said. “I would predict that they would occur sort of in an overlapping fashion. Certainly that’s what been discussed but I think we need to wait to exactly see how that is rolled out.”

Let’s hear some more questions.

Swensen: “Have there been any complications or reactions to anyone who has received the vaccine so far?”

Sifri: “So, no, there have been no serious side effects. People have had local pain and discomfort has been widely reported. We have heard reports of three people who have had complaints after getting the vaccine after they were sitting for their observation period after they got the vaccine, two people with nausea. One person that felt light-headed, but that’s been it so far. It’s fairly well tolerated. I got my vaccine yesterday. Happy to have been able to get mine.”

Dr. Sifri and everyone else who has had a first vaccine will have to get a second dose in a few weeks.

Here’s another question.

Swensen: “Why are two doses required for each of these vaccines? Why do they need to be given roughly 21 days apart?”

Sifri: “This is not uncommon in terms of other vaccine series that you essentially give a first shot to prime the immune system and then a second vaccine to boost the immune system, so there’s a priming and a boosting phenomenon. This is based on the vaccine evaluation when it was going through clinical trials. It started in the laboratory and then moved into those early clinical phases. The scientists that helped develop these vaccines understood that part of immune response. They are immune experts and vaccinologists and so that was how that was determined. That’s also why they are separate by three weeks for the Pfizer vaccine and four weeks for the Moderna vaccine. Again, analysis performed during the clinical evaluations of these vaccines, that was what was determined to lead to the best boosting phenomenon for the two respective vaccines.”

Dr. Sifri said there are two hundred other vaccine candidates in some state of development.

Sifri: “In terms of vaccines that are in late phase clinical trials, there are five that are sort of towards the end of that process. The two that have received authorization we’ve talked about are Moderna and Pfizer. The three that are currently underway and we’re waiting to hear more information about them are based on two different platforms. One are what we call vector-based vaccines so two vaccines that are based on adeno virus platforms so that the vaccine is contained within a non-replicating virus that can be given to people. The two companies are Astra Zeneca and Johnson & Johnson.

“The interesting thing about one of those products is that the Johnson & Johnson is that part of the clinical trial involves a single dose of the vaccine. That would certainly be exciting if that shows to be safe and efficacious similar to the ones we have on hand now just because it would be much easier to administer.

“The fifth vaccine, and again, there are some waiting in the wings right behind it, is a protein-based vaccine and that’s by a company called NovoVax and the platform is rather similar type of concept for what is used for hepatitis-B vaccinations.”

This time last year to most of us, the coronavirus was something far away, a news story from China. Now, over a million Americans have received a vaccine. The next question asked sought to put this in historical perspective.

Swensen: “How does the roll out of the COVID vaccine compare with other vaccines from other major pandemics, diseases, in terms of the length of time it took to get this vaccine developed and actually begin the vaccination process?”

Sifri: “This is a landmark. It’s unprecedented to have gone from the identification of a novel pathogen, a novel virus. Its genome was published on January 10. To have eleven months later to have an authorized, actually two authorized vaccines that are highly efficacious and safe. It’s clearly a landmark of science. The question is how fast is that compared to previous. I think it’s a couple years faster that what has been seen typically. It is under unique circumstances, though, however. We have a worldwide pandemic with high amounts of disease. That actually has leant itself for the development of these vaccines because we can get to the end points and see if the vaccine was effective rather quickly compared to other vaccines that are in development and may take years to get through because it takes a while to accrue the patients and see what the outcomes were. It is unprecedented but it was clearly the best opportunity we had to change the course of this pandemic.

“Our previous experience that is somewhat akin to this was the development of the swine flu vaccine in 2009 and its night and day different compared to that. In 2009, the development of the vaccine was very flow during the course of that pandemic even though the technology was there and we had a very challenging time getting the vaccine out and certainly what the hope is that the process will be much brisker this time.”

Swensen: “I think that’s sort of where this question comes from. This, as you said, this amazingly fast turnaround for the development and delivery of this vaccine, what does that mean for the future kind of dealing with down the in the future, knowing this probably won’t be the last novel pathogen or virus? What will this mean for how we’re able to tackle future potential pandemics like this?”

Sifri: “The learning that we’ve had from this pandemic is important learning that we can’t forget. We’ve now had demonstration that we’ve had platforms that were ready to develop vaccines that were ready to go and by using those platforms, we were able to develop what appears to be at least two effective vaccines and hopefully more in very rapid period of time. That from a scientific standpoint, the ability to have those platforms to plug and play with new emerging pathogens is quite exciting.

“You know, every pathogen, every new emerging pathogen will have challenges, but you’re right, Eric, this is not the last time we’ll see this and hopefully we’ll be able to capitalize on the knowledge that we’ve gained from this pandemic to confront future challenges.”

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In today’s show:

Governor Northam provides unemployment relief to Virginia businesses

City Council agrees to put FY20 budget surplus to capital contingency fund

Charlottesville gives an update on the Belmont Bridge

The Virginia Department of Transportation launches I-81 podcast

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 4,652 cases of COVID-19 this morning, and another 55 deaths. Today’s case count is another new record for a one-day total, and the seven-day average is now at 3,842.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 94 new cases reported today, as well as another COVID-related death in Charlottesville. That brings the total to 90 to date. As for new cases in each locality, there are 43 more cases in Albemarle, 19 from Charlottesville, 15 from Louisa, six each from Fluvanna and Greene and five from Nelson.

Yesterday, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam issued a new executive order intended to speed up the delivery of benefits from the Commonwealth’s Unemployment Insurance program. Executive Order 74 temporarily stops businesses who have laid off employees due to the pandemic from fully having to pay back the Virginia Employment Commission.

“The increase in workers who are eligible as well as the increase in funds distributed to families in the Commonwealth has depleted the Virginia Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund, and resulted in greatly increased levels of employer benefit charges and anticipated increases in the tax rates of covered employers under the Virginia Unemployment Compensation Act,” reads the order.

According to a press release, more than 1.4 million Virginians filed for unemployment benefits this year. That’s ten times the usual amount. Northam signed legislation from the General Assembly’s special session that added $210 million to the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund from which benefits are paid from. This executive order is expected to save Virginia businesses $200 million. Read the details in the press release.

Charlottesville City Council heard details Monday night of how the budget for fiscal year 2020 ended up. Chris Cullinan is the city’s finance director.

“The general fund ended the fiscal year at an operating loss of about $1.8 million,” Cullinan said. “COVID-19 had a significant impact on our large economically sensitive revenues such as meals tax, sales tax, lodging tax, but over all the general fund fund balance finished with a positive surplus of $3.9 million.”

Staff recommended putting the money aside in a contingency fund for the capital improvement program. That could provide additional flexibility for Council as they consider next year’s capital spending, or it could be used to fill any other needs that may come up during the pandemic. At the public comment period, at least one citizen asked for the money to be used for another purpose, but Councilor Lloyd Snook explained why he did not support that at this time.

“I said last month, or two weeks ago whenever it was that we ought to do what staff is recommending and I would note to those who have said ‘why don’t you put this towards affordable housing or homeless relief or something like that’ we may end up having to do that and we may have to do that, I don’t know,” Snook said. “One of the purposes of that reserve was not only to protect against loss revenues but also protect against increased expenses that might come from COVID.”

Council will next meet on January 12 at a budget work session with the Planning Commission.

The city of Charlottesville has given an update on the replacement of the Belmont Bridge expected to get underway next year.

“The Belmont Bridge project is in the final stages before advertising the project for construction,” reads an email from Jeanette Janiczek, the city’s Urban Construction Initiative manager. “The project team has submitted all required construction documents and is awaiting authorization from the Virginia Department of Transportation to proceed with advertisement.”

The final stages include negotiations with CSX to waive a requirement for pedestrian fencing and to complete conditions by which active construction will be allowed to occur in a way to not disrupt regular train service. The city has worked out an agreement with Dominion for utility relocation. Similar arrangements with Century Link and other companies are ongoing.

An information meeting will be held in the spring to communicate how traffic will be maintained during construction of the 236-foot long and 62-feet wide bridge. For more details on what the bridge will be like after construction, including a pedestrian tunnel south of the bridge, visit the project website.

The Virginia Department of Transportation has launched a new website to help people keep up with roadworks and improvements on Interstate 81. That includes a podcast.

The website for “Improve 81” will feature videos and podcast about specific parts of the $2 billion project that seeks to make the 325-mile corridor safer for motorists and truck-drivers. The first installment deals with recent changes to exit 158 in Botetourt County near Troutville.

VDOT is also sending out a monthly newsletter on various projects. They’re all accessible via the Improve 81 website. Listeners to the podcast will be able to learn about what projects have been completed to date and what’s coming up. One voice in the first episode is project manager Dave Covington, a VDOT engineer who also oversaw construction of the Route29 Solutions projects in Albemarle. Now he’s tasked with dozens of I-81 projects.

“We’ve completed one here in the Salem District and two in the Bristol District and we have more coming very shortly, I think we’re going to advertise three more in the Staunton District at the end of this year, so we look forward to that,” Covington said.

In the Troutville project, on-ramps will be extended in part to reduce the risk of vehicle collisions.

“These types of projects are relatively low-cost but if we can prevent crashes from occurring, the cost savings to the public is really immense when we think about if we have a major incident on the Interstate and it closes the Interstate for eight, ten, twelve hours, that’s a major cost when we’re shipping as much goods on I-81 as we are,” Covington said.

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There’s only a few days left until Christmas, but there’s still time to shop online and support Black-owned businesses in Charlottesville. Today’s Patreon-fueled shout out is for you to check out a curated gift guide for several Black-owned businesses. You can see the link in the newsletter. This includes apparel from Dop3 Fashion to gifts from the Hive. Check it out today, and show your support.

On today’s show:

The Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board finishes out 2021

Three major commercial purchases have taken place in Charlottesville this month

The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation hands out some awards

Southwood park gets a name

Since the last newsletter went out on Thursday, the Virginia Department of Health has reported another 18,388 cases, with a seven day average of new cases today of 3,791. Today seven-day average for positive PCR tests is 11.4 percent, down from the 11.6 percent reported on Thursday.

The Blue Ridge Health District has reported another 318 cases since Thursday, and the trend is more cases in the outlying counties. For instance, Louisa County has added 59 cases in the past 5 days, compared with 41 in the city of Charlottesville over that period. Nelson has also had 41 cases reported, and Greene has had 34 cases and Fluvanna has had 28. Albemarle, the most populated locality in the Blue Ridge Health District, has had 115 new cases.

Over the weekend, news coverage surfaced that the latest epidemiological model put together by Biocomplexity Institute at the University of Virginia predicts a surge of 98,000 cases a week in Virginia in the first week of February. The reproductive rate was reported at 1.394 on December 14, with 1 being a number that health officials have said we don’t want to be over.

The final meeting of the Charlottesville City Council happened last night, and we’ll have more from that in the next few newsletters. In fact, the next two weeks will include information from meetings I’ve not had a chance to get to yet. That includes the Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board, which met last Thursday. The public comment during Thursday’s meeting of the Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board gave a chance for people to discuss recent events.

“I want this to be a community engagement session instead of a real public comment in light of what’s been happening in our community the past few months and recently and to give people who want to look at us a liaison between the community and potential police misconduct and a liaison with the city departments that,” said Nancy Carpenter.

The CRB has been asking for a separate attorney to represent its interests, as opposed to someone from the city attorney’s office.

“That is still in negotiations so the city has identified a law firm and the procurement office in that law firm are still working out the numbers so hopefully some time in the early new year we will have the legal representation,” said James Watson, the CRB’s chair.

Carpenter said she wanted the law firm to be able to review the upcoming ordinance changes that will be made to reflect new state legislation on civilian review board.

“The law firm that is going to support us is really only scoped out to support us in the event that we’re conducting a hearing or there is some type of conflict in something that we basically see one way and the city sees differently,” Watson said.

The People’s Coalition, a project of the Legal Aid Justice Center, has offered to provide this legal advice on behalf of the CRB.

Watson said the CRB has received a total of eight complaints since July, six of which are closed. One of the complaints is from the man at the center of a recent controversy between the Unitarian Universalist Church and Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney. Go back and read that here.

“We’ve sent Mr. Hoffman saying that if he would like us to pursue a hearing pertaining to his complaint that we could do so,” Watson said. “I’ve been advised that when we get these complaints and we come on this meeting, you know, we are just limited in what we can talk about in these cases that are under Internal Affairs investigations while those investigations are being conducted.”

The city is seeking applications for a vacancy on the CRB. The deadline to apply is January 22, 2021. Click here for more information. City resident Tracy Hopper told the CRB that she feels the position needs to be filled as soon as possible.

“And I support any and all of your efforts to encourage City Council quickly, as soon as possible, because I’ve been following all the changes with the legislation and also the history of the board to start with, and you guys have a lot of work to do and you need as many people as possible to help you,” Hopper said.

The vacancy was not filled at Council’s meeting last night.

A shopping center on Preston Avenue in Charlottesville has changed hands. The two acre Preston Plaza has sold for $6.5 million to a limited liability company based in Charlottesville. The shopping center was built in 1968 according to the city’s property records. The property was assessed for just under $5 million and the address associated with the new owner traces back to the company PBM Capital, which has offices in Charlottesville.

In another commercial sale, a two-story office building in downtown Charlottesville constructed in 1994 to house National Optronics has been sold to a limited liability company. In November 2018, Charlottesville Tomorrow reported that the property would be redeveloped by 100 Avon LLC as a mixed-use building. Now the property has been transferred at a price of $4.5 million, or about 10 percent less than its assessed value.

The historic warehouse that houses South Street Brewery and several offices has been sold to a company called West South Street LLC. 106 South Street sold for $3.28 million on December 7, or about 39 percent over the assessed value of $2.35 million. The same LLC purchased the building next store in November 2019 for $1.4 million.

Four area nonprofits have been awarded three grants to allow them to expand their operations. The Prana Fund at the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation has announced $22,847 in all.

The Prana Fund is a creation of Karyn and Brice Smith, who seek to support initiatives that

“Integrate environmental education and the visual arts through hands-on educational opportunities for children living in Charlottesville and/or Albemarle County.”

The Rivanna Conservation Alliance and Lighthouse Studio will work together on a project called “Telling Watershed Stories through Film” for Albemarle County middle-school students who speak English as a second language.

The Murray Community School will receive funding to expand its “grab and go” kits for science, technology, engineering and math (STEAM). Their Saturday Series of workshops have not been held due to the pandemic.

Finally, Camp Wildrock will get funding for a summer day camp with city elementary schools.

“By immersing themselves in the wooded areas behind the schools and parks within walking distance, children will develop a feeling of connection and concern for nature in their own community” reads the description.

Residents have named a new park that will be part of the redeveloped Southwood Mobile Home Park. Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville announced that Five Pillars Park will be named that way to reflect values espoused by University of Virginia basketball coach Tony Bennett. According to a press release, Bennett recently met with residents who are helping design the first village. Those pillars are “humility; servanthood; passion; unity; and thankfulness.”

As part of the first village, fifty current Southwood families are getting assistance with their finances to save up for new homes. Habitat purchased the land in 2007 and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors rezoned land for the first phase in August 2019. Construction on the first homes is expected to begin this upcoming summer.

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On today’s show:

The first people are vaccinated against COVID-19 across Virginia

Albemarle Planning Commission recommends approval of housing project for those with low incomes and the homeless

The president of the Free Enterprise Forum ends the year with a carol

The first vaccines in our area arrived yesterday at the University of Virginia. The first person to be given the shot from Pfizer was Dr. Ebony J. Hilton.

“I’m an associate professor of anesthesiology and critical care here at the University of Virginia and today is a really important day,” Hilton said. “It truly is one of those moments in 2020. This has been a long year of us waiting for some light at the end of the tunnel. And it’s just incredible that we did have this vaccine and produced and made available here at the University. I’m excited to see truly how we unroll this not only in the hospital, but also local and statewide.”

It will take months for the vaccine to be distributed, but health care workers throughout our region are receiving it this week.

In the meantime, the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,931 new cases today, and the seven-day average is now at 3,587. The seven-day average for positive cases is at 11.4 percent today. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 63 cases today.

The Albemarle Planning Commission has recommended approval of a rezoning to allow for up to 140 units and commercial space to be built on U.S. 29 adjacent to the Red Carpet Inn. The proposal is from three housing nonprofits.

“The project proponents are Virginia Supportive Housing, Piedmont Housing Alliance, and the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless,” said Lori Schweller, an attorney with Williams Mullen. “VSH intends to develop 80 units of permanent supportive housing for 50 percent or lower [area median income] and PHA intends to develop 60 primarily one and two bedroom units at between 30 percent and 80 percent [area median income].”

The motel will be used as emergency housing for the homeless before development begins by the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless. That agency’s executive director spoke of the benefits of a similar project build by VSH that opened in the spring of 2012.

“We’ve seen in our community when the Crossings opened in downtown Charlottesville that for the years following it that chronic homelessness dropped by half,” Anthony Haro said.

The project would be built under Neighborhood Model District zoning, and that requires a look at Places 29 Master Plan. Megan Nedustop is the Development Process Manager for Albemarle County.

“The master plan does not specify a maximum recommended density for the residential as a secondary use and this proposed development would be between 22 and 38 units per acre,” Nedustop said.

These units would be in two new four-story buildings. One concern that came up at a community meeting was that residents might want to cross U.S. 29 on foot to get to a grocery store and other services.

“Currently there is no safe way to cross U.S. 29 for pedestrians and staff requested the applicant study the intersection of Route 29 and Branchlands and Premier Circle to evaluate whether a pedestrian crossing could be installed at the location,” Nedustop said, adding that the Virginia Department of Transportation had not yet completed their feasibility study.

Transportation planner Kevin McDermott said one option would be create a pedestrian island in the median which would allow people to safely cross the 150 feet span in two cycles.

“There would be some minor impacts to traffic on 29, maybe up to a ten second delay on north and southbound traffic, but it’s fairly minor but if we could get a ped-actuated signal in there it that ten second delay would only occur if a pedestrian actually pushed the button to cross,” McDermott said. However, VDOT would have to approve the crossing, and it would cost at least a half-million dollar.

Commissioner Karen Firehock used to have an office on Premier Circle.

“I used to run across that road every week, several times a week, and I stopped doing that after six months because I decided I wanted to live,” Firehock said. “I am just saying that cars don’t behave well and even with the light there we may have red light runners.”

Another issue staff had is whether the roadway for Premier Circle would remain private or if it would become part of the county’s road network. That would increase the cost of the project and might affect the feasibility of providing low-income housing.

The advocacy-group Piedmont Environmental Council said Premier Circle should be built to public standards.

“PEC recommends that the county require that the interior roads be built to the appropriate standards for incorporation into the public network,” said Chris Hawk, PEC’s land use field representative for Albemarle. “If this is not possible due to the 80 percent concurrence requirement and the road maintenance agreement, PEC recommends denial.”

However, Eboni Bugg of the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation said the benefits of the project were worth a community investment.

“I want to note that homeless in particular during a global pandemic is a public health crisis in addition to a basic human right,” Bugg said. “As a county resident, I do concur with the comments and some of the concerns related to the pedestrian crossing and right of ways. As a foundation, we are also supporters of PEC and recognize the work that they are doing. However, we do not necessarily think that this development should bear the full brunt of the pedestrian need and that as a resident, I believe the county can work with these nonprofit entities to ensure that municipal funding can be used to support the infrastructure and updates needed to make this a success.”

Commissioner Tim Keller suggested that this could be an opportunity for the county to work with private philanthropy to ensure that the urban infrastructure be in place.

“It seems to me that the street should be brought to standard and that there should be some significant thought about pedestrians across against 29,” Keller said.

Commission Chair Julian Bivins liked the partnership behind the project but said he would prefer a different location.

“That has nothing to do with the collaboration and has nothing to with the goal,” Bivins said, adding that the space was prime commercial space in a county that has limited land for development.

However, Bivins voted with his colleagues in a unanimous recommendation for approval. The project heads next to the Board of Supervisors.

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee meets at noon. I’ll be listening for any comment on the draft affordable housing strategy being developed as part of the Cville Plans Together initiative. (meeting info)

Then the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at 1 for their final event of the year. On the agenda is a work session on the Rio 29 form-based code, an update on COVID-19 from the Blue Ridge Health District and then a pair of public hearings in the evening. (agenda)

Finally today, something else that happened at last night’s meeting of the Albemarle Planning Commission. It was their last of the year and despite the pandemic, a tradition continued.

“So, we know what meeting this is,” said Julian Bivins. “And I understand having participated in three that we have this tradition of being are caroled by a particular individual.

The particular individual is Neil Williamson, the president of the Free Enterprise Forum. He delivered a Coronavirus Carol. Listen to it in the newscast, or read it on the Free Enterprise Forum blog.

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Do you still have some Holiday shopping to do? Today’s Patreon-fueled shout out is for you to check out a curated gift guide from local Charlottesville Black-owned businesses. There’s all kinds of possibilities, such as crafts and gifts from The Hive as well as skin care products from North Shea. Find out more in the link in the newsletter.

In today’s show:

Virginia’s Electors confirm the Commonwealth’s vote for President-elect Joe Biden election

Charlottesville Planning Commission gets an update on the Cville Plans Together folks

Charlottesville is developing a Climate Action Plan

A very brief update on Smart Scale

On the day after the first COVID vaccines were administered in the United States of America, the Virginia Department of Health reports another 3,160 new cases. The seven day average for positive cases is now at 3,654. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is at 11.2 percent statewide.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 40 cases reported today and the seven-day average is 73 new cases a day. There has been another COVID-related fatality in Nelson County, bringing the total to 85.

The University of Virginia will make a final decision by January 15 on whether to return to school for in-person instruction, but are operating under the assumption classes will begin on February 1. UVA Today reports that top officials sent an email to students, staff and faculty notifying them of requirements.

Virginia’s 13 electors cast their vote for President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris yesterday in a hearing held on the floor of the Virginia House of Delegates. Ellen J. Scott of Manasass was one of them and made these remarks before the official vote.

“The afternoon of April 9, 1865 at Appomattox Court House, marked the end of the most divisive era in our nation’s history and the healing began in Virginia,” Scott said. “Though not perfect, and fraught with broken promises, there emerged a people determined to hold America to its espoused and its Constitutional declaration that all men are created equal.”

Scott also mentioned the election of the grandson of enslaved people, Doug Wilder, as Virginia’s governor in 1990, as well as Virginia’s vote for Barack Obama in 2008.

“Now, Virginia has helped to elect Joseph Biden and Kamala Harris,” Scott said. “Harris, the first woman and the first Black president of the United States. As we exercise our role as electors, let us never forget that we are heeding the words of Lincoln to bind up our nation’s wounds.”

The final nationwide electoral count was 302 votes for Biden and Harris and to 232 for the incumbents Donald Trump and Mike Pence.

It has been almost a year since the consultant Rhodeside & Harwell was hired to complete Charlottesville’s Comprehensive Plan and create an affordable housing plan. The city’s Planning Commission got an update last week on where the housing plan stands from the project manager of the Cville Plans Together initiative.

“We’re revising the plan now and we’ll have a revision in the coming month or so and the plan right now is to have a conversation with Council in January and then hopefully work towards some sort of endorsement by Council of the plan,” said Jennifer Koch of Rhodeside & Harwell.

The next step is for Council to be presented with the draft plan early next year. Their endorsement will allow the consultant team to move ahead with revising the Comprehensive Plan to include specific language that will lead the city to implement its principles. For instance, if there is to be more residential density, the plan needs to say so. That in turn will inform the new zoning code that the Cville Plans Together initiative is also intended to deliver.

Review and revision of the Comprehensive Plan has been underway since early 2017. In February 2019, Council opted to hire a consultant to finish the work begun by the Planning Commission. Koch said the Cville Plans Together work did not start from scratch.

“We are working from draft chapters,” Koch said. “We’re not starting from zero here so the thought is that we don’t want to go back. We want to move forward from where you all left off.”

One of the topics discussed by the Commission was the status of a future Land Use Map.

“The Comprehensive Plan Land Use chapter contains the Future Land Use Map which incorporates some of the land use goals that are in the plan but also is a long-term strategy for land use in the city,” Koch said. “It often is sort of the basis for some zoning adjustments but the future land use map is also often a longer term vision for land use that zoning may be.”

Commissioner Gary Heaton, who was appointed in October 2018, said the University of Virginia’s role needed to be taken into account.

“Where the city ends and the University of Virginia begins, our land use map should reflect how we envision the future of the city as it pertains to the effect of the University on the city,” Heaton said. He added that he has been a planning commissioner in other university towns including Blacksburg.

“These are places that also have been heavily affected by the University,” Heaton said. “If the city could someone get out in front of there could be ways to address affordable housing.”

On March 10, the University of Virginia announced it would build up to 1,500 affordable units on land it or its real estate foundation owns. The topic came up at a meeting of the Regional Housing Partnership last week. Colette Sheehy is the Senior Vice President for Operations at UVA.

“We have now restarted that initiative, more probably coming in January, but we are trying to get back on track,” Sheehy said.

On Friday, the Buildings and Grounds Committee of the UVA Board of Visitors approved the schematic design for the new School of Data Science on Ivy Road, just to the west of the former site of the Cavalier Inn. It will be the first academic building constructed in the area of the Ivy Road Master Plan.

“The four-story facility will include four ‘smart’ classrooms, faculty offices, and a variety of meeting and research areas that will provide essential learning, research, and administrative spaces to support the SDS,” reads the packet for the meeting. “The programs will interface with industry and other external partners in a “corporate commons” providing opportunities for the exchange of ideas.”

The current land use map adopted by Council in 2013 depicts the area as “mixed use.” Disagreements about the future land use map are one reason the Comprehensive Plan process stalled and the consultant was hired.

A longer version of this story as well as a podcast version will be published later today for paid subscribers, and released to the general public in a few days time.

In October, Charlottesville City Council announced the city would follow Albemarle in writing an action plan to help meet the locality’s climate protection goal. Specifically, the target is to reduce carbon emissions 45 percent by 2030 and to be carbon neutral by 2050. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted such a plan on October 8. Last night, the city held the first of two workshops to kick off the creation of the plan.

Susan Elliott is Charlottesville’s Climate Protection Manager. She said that in 2017, Council signed off on a statement objecting to President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement.

“This is not the first commitment the city of Charlottesville made,” Elliott said. “The first one was actually the U.S. Mayor’s Agreement on climate back in 2006 which is what spurred the city to create the climate protection program in 2007.”

In 2019, Council agreed to a goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent by 2030, and to be carbon neutral by 2050. There is also a corresponding plan to adapt to changing weather patterns with higher temperatures.

“We also heard from the community that they don’t want us to waste time by reinventing the wheel,” Elliott said. “They want us to build on what we’ve done. They want us to build on what their peers have done. They want us to work regionally so that we are building on existing systems for funding, for development, and for cooperation.”

Emissions can be traced to residential, commercial and transportation sources. The plan will identify steps to address each. You can watch the recorded webinars on the city’s website.

We’re about a month away from when the Virginia Department of Transportation releasing the scores for the latest round of Smart Scale. Smart Scale is a process where localities submit projects that are then ranked according to a series of metrics. Submissions were due in August. Chad Tucker is with the Office of Intermodal Planning and Investment and he briefed the Commonwealth Transportation Board last week.

“It’s been a long six months but we’re almost there, thankfully,” Tucker said. “There are 405 total applications that were submitted by applicants.

Fifteen projects were submitted by either Albemarle, Charlottesville or the TJPDC.

They are:

US 29 and Fontaine Ave Interchange Improvement

Hillsdale Drive South Extension - $29.7 million

Hydraulic Road and US 29 - $24.6 million

107 Park and Ride Lot - $2.6 million

Rt. 29 Shared Use Path - Carrsbrook to Seminole Lane - $6 million

Rt. 29/Fray’s Mill/Burnley Station Intersection Improvements- $9.6 million

5th Street Hub and Trails - $6 million

West Main Streetscape Phase 3 – 8th St NW to Roosevelt Brown Ave - $7.9 million

Preston Ave & Grady Ave Intersection Improvement - $6.1 million

Emmet Street Multimodal Phase Two - $4.5 million

Ridge Street Multimodal Improvements - $5 million

Access Management on US 250 East from VA 20 (Stoney Point Rd) east to Hanson Rd - $11 million

Rio Rd/John Warner Parkway improvements

Old Lynchburg Rd./5th St. Ext. /County Office Bldg. Intersection Improvements; Albemarle - $8.5 million

Rt. 20/53 Intersection Improvements - $7.5M

The Commonwealth Transportation Board will meet again at 9 a.m. on Friday. (agenda)

Tonight, the Albemarle Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on a proposal to redevelop the Red Carpet Inn on U.S. 29 as a mixed-use development with commercial space and in between 80 and 140 units. In the meantime, the existing rooms in the hotel would be used as transitional housing operated by the Thomas Jefferson Coalition for the Homeless (TJACH). For this to work, the project needs a rezoning of a 3.75 acre property.

In other meetings:

Charlottesville’s Parking Advisory Panel meets at 3:30 p.m. (meeting info)

Albemarle Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. (meeting info)

Charlottesville’s Sister Cities Commission meets at 4:30 p.m. Last week, City Council agreed to pursue a friendship with Huehuetenango, a city in western Guatemala (meeting info)

Charlottesville’s Board of Architectural Review meets at 5:30 p.m. and will take up an application for an already-approved four-story building at the site of the University Tire on West Main Street. They’ll also have a preliminary discussion on the future parking garage at the corner of Market Street and 9th street. (meeting info)

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Listen now (14 min) | Do you still have got some Holiday shopping to do? Today’s Patreon-fueled shout out asks you to check out a curated gift guide from local Charlottesville Black-owned businesses. Check out this link in the newsletter. There are beauty supplies from such places as

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Listen now (14 min) | In today’s Patreon fueled shout-out: The Local Energy Alliance Program, your local energy nonprofit, wants to help you lower your energy bills, make your home more comfortable, and save energy. Schedule your Home Energy Check-Up to get started - now only $45 for City of Charlottesville and Albemarle County residents. You’ll receive energy-saving products and expert advice customized to your needs.

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Listen now (10 min) | Do you still have got some Holiday shopping to do? Today’s Patreon-fueled shout out is for you to check out a curated gift guide from local Charlottesville Black-owned businesses. Follow this link to learn more and get new gift ideas! In today’s newsletter:

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In today’s newsletter:

Area health director briefs Council on COVID, vaccine prep

Governor Northam signs legislation banning “no-knock” warrants

Downtown business group wants you to buy gift cards

City Council is briefed on an end of year budget surplus

The recent increase in daily cases appears to be a trend with the Virginia Department of Health reporting another 3,860 new cases today. That brings the seven day average for new cases to 3,238. The seven day average for positive PCR tests has increased to 10.9.

There is a new reported case of multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children, the twelfth such diagnosis since the pandemic began. There have been no related deaths.

The VDH reports another 52 COVID deaths, bringing the statewide death toll to 4,260. Nationwide, there have been over 281,000 deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

The head of the Blue Ridge Health District told City Council last night that she is concerned about a “dramatic increase” in local cases.

“We are certainly seeing more positive cases and we’ve had over a hundred positive closes, or close to a hundred for the past three or four days,” said Dr. Denise Bonds said. “When we do our community testing we are seeing increases in the percentage of those individuals who come to the community test that test positive.”

However, Bonds said the number of tests has decreased since dormitories at the University of Virginia have closed for the semester.

Today, there were 52 new cases reported in the Blue Ridge Health District, and the seven-day average remains at 67.

Yesterday, the Virginia Department of Health announced it was altering its rules on quarantines to match new federal guidance from the Centers for Disease Control. Now people who have been exposed can leave quarantine after ten days without a test if they don’t have symptoms, or if they get a negative test after seven days.

“Previously up until the change last week, we were recommending a 14 day quarantine period and I want to emphasize that staying home if you have been in contact with someone who is positive for that full 14 days is still best and it is what we will continue to recommend for health care workers,” Bonds said.

Dr. Bonds said this still comes with a risk because there is still a one percent chance an asymptomatic person can still pass on infections after ten days. As for vaccines, Dr. Bonds said the Food and Drug Administration will hold a hearing on Thursday for Pfizer’s application for emergency authorization. Moderna will get its turn on December 17. Health care workers will be the top priority, followed by long-term care facilities.

“By the end of December we should be well underway with this first priority group and vaccinating,” Bonds said. “After that, we will hopefully continue to receive weekly shipments of vaccine which will allow us to work down the other priority groups. Essential workers is the tentative next group. What that means still needs to be decided.”

Dr. Bonds said it is crucial that people continue to follow all of the protocols that have been recommended because it may take months for the vaccine to work. There are not enough resources to do a full level of contact tracing when there are over a hundred cases a day.

“We are having to triage cases that we investigate,” Bonds said. “We just do not have the staff to really do a full investigation into every single case so we’re working on those that are the highest risk exposures.”

Later in the meeting, Councilor Lloyd Snook suggested repealing the city’s local ordinance because it is no longer necessary. He said that Governor Northam’s recent Executive Order 67 is more restrictive than the ordinance adopted by Charlottesville in late July and he wants the city’s rules to be harmonized with the state’s rules.

“We know the Governor’s order is likely to change repeatedly in the next few months as the Governor is likely to try to do a number of things to get the situation better under control,” Snook said.

Snook said a mismatch in definitions between localities and states could lead to vulnerabilities in future legal challenges.

Interim City Manager John Blair, who was city attorney when the city enacted tougher restrictions than the governor, recommending keeping a city-specific ordinance given the city’s inability to control a sudden influx of people coming back to Charlottesville in mid-January.

“We could very well find ourselves exactly where we were back in July depending on the rapidity of vaccine distribution,” Blair said.

Council backed Blair’s position and the city’s ordinance was updated rather than repealed.

Governor Ralph Northam signed legislation yesterday that bans police from using what are known as “no-knock” warrants. The legislation was prompted by an incident in Louisville, Kentucky where a 26-year old Black woman was killed by plainclothes police officers who forced entry into the wrong apartment unit. Dr. Janice Underwood is Virginia’s Chief Officer of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

“We stand here today somewhat reassured and in solidarity with Breonna Taylor who is undoubtedly with us in spirit that going forward, that the Commonwealth of Virginia, only the third state in the nation, has taken a bold stand against no-knock warrants, an institutional mechanism that disproportionately terrorizes people of color,” Underwood said.

Members of Breonna Taylor’s family were in attendance for the signing ceremony. Soon after, the president of the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police issued a statement of opposition to the HB 5099 becoming law.

“While we continue to disagree with the elimination of this tactic in all circumstances, we remain critically concerned regarding additional changes made in this bill which will place our law enforcement officers and our community in significantly greater danger,” wrote Maggie DeBoard of the town of Herndon.

Senator Mamie Locke (D-2) said when the bill was introduced, she and others were critiqued for addressing something that happened in another state.

“Virginia is not immune to injustice and when injustice happens in Louisville, Kentucky on a no-knock warrant, that did not mean that Virginia was immune to the same injustice, to the same inequality, it could also happen here in Virginia and we do not want happened to Breonna to also happen here in Virginia because Breonna is me,” Locke said.

With uncertainty about the near-term future, the Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville has launched a gift card program to encourage people to support businesses. Roy Van Doorn is on the DBAC’s Board of Directors.

“There are a few ways in our community that can effectively support an entire region and downtown business in particular,” Van Doorn said. “This is one that is substantial, impactful and consequential, today, next month, and next year.”

The gift card program has been in the works for two years. Van Doorn said the pandemic has done much damage to business downtown and purchasing the cards will show financial support. He asked Council for funding to help support the program through marketing efforts.

Council was also briefed on the close-out of fiscal year 2020, which ended on June 30. Finance Director Christopher Cullinan said the city did not meet its revenue targets for the year.

“The city on an operating basis, the general fund did report a decline, a loss of $1.8 million, or about one percent of the adopted budget and this was the result primarily due to COVID,” Cullinan said. “COVID had a tremendous impact on the city’s revenues, especially our most economically sensitive ones such as sales, meals, lodging, utilities.”

The fact that the pandemic hit during the final quarter of the year did not help, and Cullinan said the city did not have time to make enough adjustments to the adopted budget. However, as the budget was closed out for the year, staff followed city financial policy that requires a reserve fund balance of 14 percent of the general fund budget be kept at all times.

“This policy provides the City with sufficient working capital and a margin of financial safety to address unforeseen, one-time expenditure emergencies or significant unforeseen declines in revenues in a specific fiscal year,” reads page A-9 of the city’s adopted budget for the current fiscal year.

“That loss did eat into the city’s general fund fund balance,” Cullinan said. “However, once we deducted out that operating loss as well as some of the other adjustments that we make, the general fund fund balance did end the year with a $3.9 million surplus above our 17 percent fund balance policy

Cullinan said staff’s recommendation was to devote the surplus to the city’s capital improvement program contingency fund per financial policy. That gives the city additional cash to pay for capital projects, slightly reducing the need to borrow money for programs in CIP. Council held a work session about the CIP for next year’s budget on November 20.

Council will have a public hearing on the surplus at the next meeting. Here’s Councilor Heather Hill.

“No final allocations are going to be made at this time but this is essentially a placeholder and allows us to have some more time to see how some other things are going to play out before we actually determine where this funding may go or to see if it’s just going to continue to reside in the CIP,” Hill said.

Today in meetings:

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors and the Albemarle Planning Commission meet in a joint work session on housing policy beginning at 6 p.m. (meeting info)

The Greene County Board of Supervisors meets at 7:30 p.m. (meeting info)

The Albemarle Department of Social Services Advisory Board meets at 3:30 p.m. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. (meeting info)

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In today’s newsletter:

COVID cases are surging across Virginia

Virginia Department of Health prepares to distribute vaccines

Virginia Republicans select a method to nominate statewide candidates

A quick look at wildlife crossings

The statewide seven-day average for new daily cases of COVID-19 is at 3,005 today. On Saturday, the Virginia Department of Health reported 3,793 new cases, but there was a caveat that that figure included backlogged numbers. No such caveats were in place yesterday and today, with daily counts of 3,880 and 3,817 respectively. The percent positivity has increased to 10.8 percent, up from 7.4 percent on Thanksgiving Day. The seven-day average for new daily cases in the Blue Ridge is now at 67, after a district record was set on Saturday with 106 followed by 102 yesterday and 92 today. Percent positivity is at 4.8 percent.

The Virginia Department of Health announced late Friday that the Commonwealth is slated to receive 480,000 vaccine doses by the end of December. These will consist of shots from both Pfizer and Moderna.

“This initial distribution will ensure 480,000 health care personnel (HCP) and long-term care facility (LTCF) residents receive a first dose of the vaccine, beginning the inoculation process for nearly all members of Virginia’s two top-priority groups, if we receive this expected allotment,” reads a press release.

The first vaccine to ship is expected to be from Pfizer, which requires ultracold storage down to negative 70 degrees Celsius and the 72,150 doses will be slated for health care workers who directly care for COVID-19 patients.

Those in long-term care facilities will be administered shots by teams working with Walgreens and CVS through a federal partnership run by the Centers for Disease Control.

“The actual amount of vaccine received in Virginia is a moving target and dependent on when and how quickly vaccination doses are manufactured,” the release continues. “VDH is coordinating future prioritization based on federal guidance.”

For more information, visit the VDH’s vaccine page.

Virginia Republicans will choose their nominee for governor and other statewide offices in next year’s election through an unassembled convention, which means the party will entirely control the process rather than use the state’s electoral mechanism.

In a close vote, the Republican State Central Committee opted against a primary, in which voters would have gone to the polls or voted early to choose a nominee. The motion was introduced by Michael Ginsberg, a representative from Virginia’s 11th Congressional District, who said that a primary might result in a weak Republican candidate.

“I would imagine there will be four to six very strong, very competitive candidates running for Governor next year which means to me I see us heading straight for an iceberg as a party and that iceberg is that we could nominate a candidate that gets 30 to 35 percent of the vote in a primary and that means we’re going to potentially nominate a candidate for whom the Republican party has not voted for,” Ginsberg said.

Ginsberg’s motion initially passed on a vote of 39 to 35. One of those in the minority was Tara Carroll, a representative from the 7th District. She said a primary would be a guaranteed event, whereas a traditional convention might need to be postponed due to COVID.

“I think that it’s a waste of party financial resources and the candidate’s financial and support resources that are better spent in the General Election,” Carroll said. “Additionally I think that conventions can be a very exclusive process that prohibits those of that we need that to have our votes in the General Election. Young parents, military, students, due to time, financial and travel constraints.”

Due to uncertainty related to COVID-19, Republicans acknowledged they could not hold a convention, but did not want the state of Virginia to administer the elections. Steve Troxell is a representative from the 6th Congressional District.

“I like the idea of an unassembled convention because that takes care of the issues of people with small children simply because all they have to do is come through, take care of business, and go away again,” Troxell said. “I’m also concerned about the inability of a lot of registrar’s offices to guarantee that we have a clean election without a lot of spurious or questionable votes coming in.”

Two Republicans from the General Assembly have announced their candidacy. They are former Speaker of the House of Delegates Kirk Cox and Senator Amanda Chase, but Chase has announced she will now run as an independent.

One way to ensure and promote biodiversity is to reduce the number of animals that die when they’re struck by vehicles moving at high speed. A recent video of an overpass crossing Interstate-80 in Utah recently went viral, raising awareness of an infrastructure movement that’s taking hold across America. Susan Holmes is the federal policy director of the U.S. Wildlands Network.

“Wildlife corridor protection is so effective that 12 states, including Virginia and New Mexico, have already taken strong action to safeguard wildlife corridors and crossings by passing legislation or creating corridor conservation programs,” Holmes said.

Earlier this year, the General Assembly passed a bill introduced by Delegate David Bulova (D-Fairfax) to create a Wildlife Corridor Action Plan for the state. This plan is to “identify wildlife corridors, defined as areas connecting fragmented wildlife habitats that are separated by human activities or infrastructure, and recommend wildlife crossing projects intended to promote driver safety and wildlife connectivity.”

But where should they go? Dr. Ron Sutherland is the chief scientist at the Wildlands Network and he has this explanation.

“A wildlife crossing is a structure that is designed to allow wildlife to safely cross under or over a busy road,” Sutherland said. “One of the best places to put wildlife road crossings is of course where you have a wildlife corridor that gets cut off by a highway.”

“As you know, roads are pretty much everywhere and roads are quite skilled at fragmenting wildlife habitat,” said Bridget Donaldson, a scientist at the Virginia Transportation Research Council at the University of Virginia. She and her colleagues installed a pilot project on Interstate 64 west of Charlottesville that used fencing to direct creatures to an underpass. Her research indicates that the intervention reduced collisions by 90 percent.

“These kinds of numbers have been shown time and again with wildlife crossing research, with effectiveness of between 85 percent and as much as 97 percent,” Donaldson said.

Donaldson said so far wildlife crossings are rare, but increased efforts to report carcasses has shown better data that can demonstrate their efficacy.

“And because of the crash reduction that we saw of over 90 percent, and because of the relatively low cost of the fencing, there’s an estimated savings mostly from vehicle property damage at each of those sites of over $2 million over the lifetime of the fencing,” Donaldson said.

Donaldson said thousands of animals now use the crossings, including black bears.

Today in meetings:

The Albemarle Architectural Review Board meets at 1 p.m. and will review a new Sheetz at Airport Road, a preliminary site plan for the Albemarle Business Campus, and a new car was near Forest Lakes.

Charlottesville City Council meets at 6-30 p.m. and among other things will consider a proposal for a city in western Guatemala to become the next sister city. Check out the Week Ahead newsletter to learn more details.

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In today’s newsletter:

Charlottesville seeks cooperation to keep gatherings in city parks below 25 people

Virginia will soon move into a new phase of its rent and mortgage relief program

The Memorial to Enslaved Laborers at the University of Virginia wins another award

The seven-day average for positive PCR tests in Virginia has climbed to 9.5 percent, up from 8.8 percent yesterday, and 7.3 percent a week ago. There are another 2,877 cases reported today. The Blue Ridge Health District posted another 80 cases, with 40 cases from Albemarle, 18 cases from Charlottesville, six from Fluvanna, five from Greene, five from Louisa and six from Nelson. There have been no new COVID-19 fatalities reported in the health district since November 26. The statewide fatality count is 4,160 today.

The city of Charlottesville will begin to more closely monitor gatherings at city parks, including the recently opened skate facility in McIntire Park. That’s according to a press release sent out this morning.

“Last weekend, more than 75 individuals were observed in the Skate Park at one time,” reads the release. “The nature of such activity makes social distancing difficult and many participants were observed without face coverings. Increased supervision and enforcement of the City’s COVID-19 ordinance would lead to City employees being placed at an even greater risk during a critical stage in the pandemic.”

Violation of the gathering rules is either a Class 3 or Class 4 misdemeanor and comes with a $500 fine.

City Council is expected to vote Monday on an extension and update of the local declaration of a public health emergency.

A local regional government agency will soon wind down its administration of a statewide rental and mortgage relief program. Christine Jacobs is the Housing Coordinator for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. She briefed representatives from area localities about the statewide program.

“As of last week, $23.9 million in emergency assistance has been deployed in less than 5 months and over 8,800 households across the Commonwealth have received emergency support,” Jacobs said.

Jacobs said the TJPDC’s contract with the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development will end on December 31. After that, the state agency will contract with one private company that will take applications from landlords seeking relief, and a second will process applications from homeowners and tenants.

Jacobs said the TJPDC stopped taking applications on Monday.

“Starting December 1, which was Tuesday of this week, all new applications are processed through that state level point of intake,” Jacobs said. She said a final report on how much funding TJPDC has been able to distribute will be available in the middle of the month.

“Mid-month also is when they will begin to advertise a public launch of RRMP 2.0,” Jacobs said. “Right now it is more of a soft launch because the regional agencies are still under contract and are able to process applications.”

Locally, the TJPDC has distributed $1.372 million in funding and has another $274,000 request pending with the DHCD.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is prepared to move ahead with regional administration of additional taxes on cigarettes should area localities decide to impose them. Counties can begin to levy such taxes as of July 1, 2021. David Blount is the legislative liaison for the TJPDC.

“Counties are starting to look at discussing their budgets for fiscal year 22 which begins next July,” Blount said. “They are looking at the cigarette tax as an option for implementing in that next budget.”

The TJPDC hosted an information session this week on the tax and how it may be collected. There is a Northern Virginia Cigarette Tax Board that covers 19 localities, and that arrangement is an option for this region.

Blount also briefed the Commission on the upcoming General Assembly session, which is scheduled to convene on January 13.

“There is some question at this point as to if the session is going to be its typical 46 days which is what the short sessions are as opposed to the long session of 60 days, or if its only going to be 30 days,” Blount said.

The Virginia Constitution restricts sessions in odd number years to 30 days unless a two-thirds vote in both the House of Delegates and the Senate agree to extend it. (Article IV)

“Here a couple of weeks ago the GOP Republican leadership indicated they would not be willing to go along with extending the session this year,” Blount said. “That remains to be seen where we land. We’ll get to Richmond on January 13.”

Blount said the General Assembly met for two months in special session this fall, and will meet again for a redistricting special session in the spring. The House of Delegates will meet remotely, and the Senate will meet on site.

“We do expect fewer bills this year because of some limitations that the House and Senate have put on themselves,” Blount said.

In other TJPDC related news, executive director Chip Boyles said the agency is seeking a grant from the Virginia Department of Transportation to pay for a transportation study of U.S. 29 between Airport Road in Albemarle County and Ruckersville in Greene County.

“There’s a lot of growth happening in both Albemarle and Greene in that section,” Boyles said.

In recent years, U.S. 29 in the Hollymead area has been widened to six lanes. VDOT will begin construction of a reconfiguration of the junction of U.S. 29 and U.S. 33 next winter. But what about the miles in between?

“We think it’s really, really important for this corridor of statewide significance to begin to be looked at to fill that gap,” Boyles said.

At the end of the meeting, Commissioners from throughout the region had the ability to check in. Jesse Rutherford of the Nelson Board of Supervisors said his county is working with the Central Virginia Electric Cooperative on an ambitious goal.

“We’re about to cut a deal with the co-op, Albemarle are you listening? Please, I hope you are, that one hundred percent of the residents of Nelson County will have access to fiber internet by 2024,” Rutherford said.

At the conclusion of the meeting. TJPDC Chair Dale Martin had these words.

“To all the Commissioners present, it’s been a very tough year, it’s been a tough year for everyone involved,” Martin said. “I know that you’ve been struggling personally, struggling with your citizens and localities, trying to do what’s best for your community, and also struggling to attend these meetings. This is a very unusual time in our history and I think that each of you are doing a tremendous job as well.”

The TJPDC will next meet on February 4, 2021.

The University of Virginia Memorial to Enslaved Laborers has been awarded the honor of Project of the Year by the Architect’s Newspaper. The memorial was completed earlier this year and was designed by Höweler + Yoon Architecture in collaboration with Mabel O. Wilson and Gregg Bleam Landscape Architect. According to an article on UVA Today, the diameter of the memorial is the same as the Rotunda, and contains the names of those people who are known to have been enslaved as well as placeholders for those whose identities and stories are waiting to be told.

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Today’s episode is brought to you by all of those who have opted to pay for the show through various means. I’ll run down those ways at the end of the show.

On today’s program:

Governor Northam discusses how a COVID vaccine may soon be distributed in Virginia

A Greene County woman was shot early Tuesday morning, the latest in a series of homicides in the region

Albemarle Board of Supervisors agrees to move forward with public hearing for a county cigarette tax

Charlottesville Chamber of Commerce hands out awards at Rebound Ball

Governor Ralph Northam yesterday talked about how Virginia is preparing to distribute a COVID-19 vaccine. But first, he said that all regions of the Commonwealth are experiencing community spread.

“Our percent positivity is now at 8.3 percent,” Northam said. “It was at 5 percent just a few weeks ago. Our hospitals are seeing higher numbers of people hospitalized with COVID than they have during this pandemic.”

Northam said that while Virginia has had lower numbers than many states, the Commonwealth is connected to fellow jurisdictions.

“In our border communities, people routinely cross state lines to work, shop, and visit their families,” Northam said. “What happens in these other states affects us here in Virginia. For example, health officials believe Tennessee’s lack of a mask requirement and other restrictions has increased the spread of the virus in neighboring Virginia communities.”

Northam said that people are letting their guard down by not wearing masks in small gatherings.

“Virginia, you know the truth,” Northam said. “You don’t wear a mask, and you don’t social distance, and you think your right to ignore public health advice trumps your neighbor’s right to get infected by you, these cases will just continue going up.”

Northam did not impose any new restrictions yesterday. He said vaccines are on the way.

“I want to outline for Virginians what to expect in the coming weeks and months,” Northam said. “First of all, we have every reason to believe that these vaccines are safe. Remember that this is a global pandemic and the best science available worldwide has gone into developing and researching these vaccines.”

Northam drew upon his experience as a doctor to vouch for the process, but said Virginians needed to be patient while the logistics of delivering the vaccine to those who need it first are worked out.

“And last night the advisory committee on immunization practices voted to put health-care workers and residents of long-term care facilities first in line,” Northam said. “Virginia is planning a phased approach which aligns with CDC guidelines. As we get more vaccine, we will be able to prioritize other groups such as medically vulnerable people.”

Northam said Virginia is ready to mobilize.

“The Virginia Department of Health has been planning for this vaccine for several months starting in the summer,” Northam said. “They’ve worked with hospitals, long-term care facilities and providers in the community and have the systems in place to keep track of this large scale operation.”

Northam said if the Food and Drug Administration grants the emergency use request to approve, vaccines could ship to states as early as mid-December.

“Virginia expects to get about 70,000 doses from Pfizer in the first wave, enough to 70,000 individuals to get their first dose of the vaccine,” Northam said. This will depend on the procurement and use of ultra-cold storage facilities.

The current vaccines from both Pfizer and Moderna require two doses, so the success of this endeavor depends on those supply chains working out. Northam said vaccines from other companies are also working their way through the approvals process, and that he is personally ready.

“When our turn comes, my family and I will have no hesitancy about getting vaccinated, and I strongly encourage every Virginians to get the vaccine,” Northam said. “That is our only path to getting back to that near normal that we speak about.”

Northam said this will take months, so social distancing, mask-wearing, and hand-washing are necessary to help reduce transmission of the virus.

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 2,023 COVID-19 cases this morning. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests has increased to 8.8 percent today. One thing to note is that the VDH in the past seven days has processed half as many tests as they did the week before. (124,108 in the past seven days, 229,432 in the week before).

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 22 cases reported today, and the seven-day daily average is 27 cases a day.

This weekend, the Blue Ridge Health District and UVA Health will offer 2,000 free self-administering COVID-19 tests at an event at Albemarle High School. The U.S. The Department of Health and Human Services is providing the tests, which will be available for people over the age of 13 from noon to 4 p.m. Pre-registration is required and can be done at this website. If you have questions, contact Dawn Niles at dn8a@virginia.edu or 434-924-2946.

A Charlottesville woman is dead after being shot just after midnight on Tuesday in the 700 block of Celt Road in Greene County. Terry Beigie reports in the Greene County Record that 21-year-old Sara Hammond is the victim, but that the Sheriff's office had not yet ruled the incident as a homicide. In November, three people were murdered in Charlottesville in individually unrelated cases and suspects have been taken into custody in two of those incidents. Charlottesville Police continue to investigate the murder of 31-year-old Tanya Renee Wheeler.

In late November, the Daily Progress reported that Albemarle County Police arrested James Elliott Fitch in the killing of 55-year-old Yyvette Fitch near Covesville. Another Albemarle man was arrested earlier in the month and charged with the second degree murder of Madeline Colvin, according to a report from NBC29.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has agreed to take the next step in a plan to levy a 40 cent tax on all packs of cigarettes sold in the county. Albemarle and the vast majority of Virginia’s other counties did not have that ability until legislation passed the General Assembly this year giving them the enabling authority. Lori Allshouse is the assistant chief financial officer for policy and partnership.

“Up until now, only Virginia’s cities and towns and two counties were able to impose a cigarette tax,” Allshouse said.

Allshouse recommended that Albemarle enter into a regional approach with some of its neighbors to prevent one locality from having a competitive advantage in the former of lower prices for cigarettes. She said Northern Virginia has a regional tax.

“Nineteen jurisdictions have gotten together to administer the tax in a regional way, with a regional board,” Allshouse said. On Tuesday, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District held a webinar on the topic, and executive director Chip Boyles told me in an email that they plan to invite a member of the Northern Virginia Cigarette Tax Board to speak to interested localities.

Allshouse acknowledged that revenue from the tax is likely to decline as cigarette smoking usage continues to drop. She suggested the Board could dedicate the tax to a specific purpose and added that the county will apply an equity lens to the decision.

Albemarle also received the ability to levy a tax on plastic bags, but Allshouse said the county wants to take more time to study the effect that would have on small businesses during the pandemic.

“A lot of times they have to program things different within their stores to be able to impose this tax so we’re pausing on bringing that forward to you today because of that,” Allshouse said.

The Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce held its annual award dinner last night the only way such things really happen these days - virtually.

“Welcome to this year’s celebration of our business community, which has extra special meaning to all of us during this unbelievably crazy and challenging year,” said Elizabeth Cromwell, the Chamber president and CEO.

This year, the Chamber handed out special awards to recognize businesses that adapted to the pandemic. The PIVOT Award went out to:

Animal Connection

Brooks Family YMCA

Chick-Fil-A at Fashion Square

Culinary Concepts AB

Jefferson Area Board for Aging (JABA)

King Family Vineyards

Michie Tavern

Virginia Institute of Autism (VIA).

The PIVOT Award also went to marketing firm Bright Ideas. Here’s the company’s owner, Janet Baellow.

“It’s really ironic that we should win the PIVOT Award because during the past several months, which feels like several years to me, we heard the word ‘pivot’ so many times, ‘this company pivoted, this company didn’t pivot, this supplier pivoted, this supplier didn’t pivot’ and I got to the point with my staff where I said if I hear the word pivot one more time I’m going to scream. Well, I’m really happy to hear the word pivot in this context,” Baellow said the employee.

Another PIVOT award went to Culinary Concepts AB and chef Antwon Brinson.

“This year going into 2020, we were forecast to have one of the best years thus far in our business, and like businesses all around the world, in March, everything came to a screeching halt. And when I say a half, I mean nothing. Flat line. BOOOOOOP! Nothing.”

However, Brinson said he was gifted with more time, which gave him perspective.

“Where people see March as a barrier, I saw it as an opportunity, an opportunity to look at my community and see where the needs where, and create solutions that allow me to fill the gaps,” Brinson said. He ended up spending the early days of the pandemic figuring out how to create virtual classes, and he partnered with 4P Foods.

“They work with regional farmers, giving them an opportunity to sell their produce to business and consumers such as yourself,” Brinson said. “The next stage was how do we connect the dots? How do I educate people around the seasonality of produce? How do I inspire you to get in your kitchen and create something different?”

Attendees of the Chamber’s Rebound Ball also learned about progress made by the Network2Work program. Ridge Schuyler is the dean of community self-sufficiency at Piedmont Virginia Community College.

“Network2Work is built on the principle that a community thrives when all of its residents thrive and to thrive, families need enough incomes to meet their basic needs and begin building wealth,” Schuyler said. “Network2Work identifies people who have been left behind in our community using a novel network of neighborhood based connectors. These connectors match job seekers to employers like you who offer jobs and careers that pay family-sustaining wages.”

Governor Northam has recently announced he wants to take the program statewide. Schuyler said the local program has worked with over 1,000 people looking to recover from setbacks since 2014.

I’ll have more from the Rebound Ball in Friday’s newsletter.

In meetings today:

An advisory group overseeing creation of the capital improvement budget for Albemarle’s next fiscal year meets at 2 p.m. (meeting info)

The Natural Heritage Committee meets at 5:30 p.m. (meeting info)

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission meets at 7 p.m. (meeting info)

The Virginia Festival of the Book has another Shelf Life event. Mystery authors Jasmine Aimaq (The Opium Prince) and Nev March (Murder in Old Bombay) will discuss their debut novels with Meredith Cole. (link)

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In today’s newsletter:

Albemarle zoning appeals board upholds North Pointe construction entrance

Supervisor Donna Price talks budget, broadband, Biscuit Run

Local Food Hub to continue drive-through markets each

Today is the last day to comment on a draft affordable housing plan for Charlottesville

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports 2,417 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia, and the seven-day average for positive PCR tests has increased to 8.3 percent. Governor Ralph Northam is scheduled to address the Commonwealth at 2 p.m. today. He is not expected to announce any new restrictions, according to a tweet from NBC12 reporter Henry Graff.

*The Albemarle Board of Zoning Appeals has ruled that a temporary construction road for the North Pointe development is compliant with the county’s rules and regulations. A former county employee who lives on Pritchett Lane had argued that the original zoning had not authorized the use of his road for construction traffic.

“When I worked in zoning for almost 14 years I was taught by the previous zoning administrator and the county attorney that you must always find where a proposed use is allowed, not prohibited because the zoning ordinance is an inclusive ordinance,” said Stewart Wright, adding that his interpretation of the code was that nothing was written down to allow the road to be used for construction traffic.

“Construction access points along Pritchett Lane were never proposed by the developer, they were not shown as an element of the approved application plan, and therefore were never reviewed by staff, the Planning Commission, or the Board of Supervisors,” Payne said.

The current zoning administrator, Bart Svoboda, had a different interpretation.

“There was no prohibition to prohibit construction access on Pritchett Lane,” said Bart Svoboda, the county’s zoning administrator. Deputy county attorney Andy Herrick agreed.

“I appreciate the appellant’s frustration and I am sure that the residents of Pritchett Lane don’t appreciate the additional construction traffic and I certainly sympathize with that, but I would say that the unmet expectations there are the result of a fundamental misunderstanding of the special use permit conditions,” said deputy county attorney Andy Herrick.

Several people spoke during the public hearing, but the Board of Zoning Appeals must make their rulings based on interpretation of the code, and not public opinion.

BZA member Marcia Joseph said she lives across the street from an active construction site and understands the frustration. However, she said that construction entrances are often depicted as part of the erosion and sediment control plan. That was the case with North Pointe, according to testimony from David Mitchell with the firm Great Eastern Management Company.

“The contractor, Faulconer Construction, they got a land use permit from VDOT and they have permission from VDOT to enter at that point and presumably VDOT has assessed that is an acceptable location,” Mitchell said.

The BZA voted 5-0 to uphold the county’s determination.

*It has been over a year since Donna Price was elected to represent the Scottsville Magisterial District on the Albemarle Board of Supervisors, and by now she and her fellow Supervisors would have had held several town hall meetings. However, the pandemic has put that on hold until now. Last night, Price became the second Supervisor to hold a virtual event to take questions from constituents and to give fiscal updates.

“We are just at the early stages of preparing our budget for next year,” Price said. “There is great uncertainty as to what that budget will actually end up being. The county gets most of its revenue through property taxes and while residential real estate seems to be doing quite well at the market, that does not necessarily means all of our owners of residential property are equally doing as well financially.”

Price said the recent announcement by State Farm that its workers will continue to work remotely and not at the operations center is a demonstration that the market for commercial real estate may be dropping.

During the hour-long session, Price said she had concerns about converting agricultural lands to solar panel fields, wants the county to do more to help provide more rural broadband, and that the county should update a policy that discourages building cell towers.

“I would rather see a cell tower on a hill and know that my neighbors have the ability to call 9-11 in an emergency and have access to the Internet or their business or their child’s schooling,” Price said.

Price also announced that Southern Development has asked to defer a hearing on the Breezy Hill rezoning near Glenmore from December 16 to January 20. She said she would want any altered proposal to go back to the Planning Commission.

Someone asked Price why the county was taking on opening of a park at Biscuit Run. The land had been slated for development, but was purchased by-then Governor Tim Kaine in late 2009 in order to become a park. In January 2018, the county agreed to take on the responsibility and leased the park from the state. The construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline was to have brought $5 million to help pay for its infrastructure, but that project has been canceled. Price said eventually the county will find a way to proceed.

“In time, and it’s not going to be this year or next year, but in time, Biscuit Run will be for Albemarle County what First Landing State Park has been to Virginia Beach, and I think we just have to be patient and continue to work the success that I really think we’re going to be able to get.”

Price said supported an idea from one attendee that a nature education center be included at Biscuit Run, but said that might not be in the first iteration of the park when it is able to open.

*The Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization met yesterday and adopted a new version of its plan to ensure environmental justice for different groups of people. However, there will be a more complete review of the MPO’s Title VI document in the near future.

“We are going to do a study on equity in transportation to learn more about the minority groups and how our transportation planning is affecting them and where they are and connect with them and find out what they want,” said Lucinda Shannon with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District.

Today is the last day to submit comments on a draft affordable housing plan put together by consultants hired by Charlottesville City Council to complete the Comprehensive Plan. As of yesterday, Rhodeside and Harwell had received nearly 200 responses to a request to comment on the plan as well as the guiding principles for the comp plan. People are asked to review the materials on the Cville Plans Together website before filling out the survey. The consultants will revise the draft plan and the goal is to return to City Council with a revised version in January. (survey)

During the pandemic, the Local Food Hub has continued to connect local agriculture with local customers through drive-through markets held in the parking lot of the former K-Mart Building. The nonprofit has recently announced they will keep going in 2021 after taking a brief break after December 18. The markets will resume Wednesday and Friday from 3:30-5:00 p.m. beginning on January 13. Order taking for that market will begin on January 7. (order)

“Developed in response to COVID, the market has been operating since March, and has done over $600,000 in sales,” said Portia Boggs, the director of advancement and communications for the Local Food Hub.

According to a press release, vendors at the market include Recurring vendors at the market include: Agriberry, Back Pocket Provisions, Bellair Farm, Caromont Farm, Clover Top Creamery, Carter Mountain Orchard, delli Carpini, Forking Creations, Free Union Grass Farm, Gathered Threads, Gillispie's County Line, good phyte foods, Foresthill Firewood, JAM According to Daniel, Fairweather Farm, Little Hat Creek Farm, Lone Light Coffee, MarieBette Cafe and Bakery, Millstream Farm, Mountain Culture Kombucha, Sussex Farm, Sweet Greens Farm, Elysium Honey Company, Wandering River, Twenty Paces, Pachamama Peru, and The Pie Chest.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets and will have discuss the possibility of levying a tax on cigarettes, will get an audited financial report for the last fiscal year, and will consider a private sewer system for the new Regents School on Fontaine Road Extended.

On the consent agenda is a report on the Land Use and Environmental Planning Committee, a group of city, county and University staff that replaced a group that consisted of elected officials top UVA officials. (report)

Tonight at 7 p.m., the Albemarle-Charlottesville Historical Society will host the the head of the First Amendment Museum in Augusta, Maine, as part of a new series they are calling Unregulated Historical Meanderings. (zoom registration) (Facebook page)

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In today’s newsletter:

A brief rundown of today’s COVID numbers in Virginia

Jackson P. Burley placed on National Register of Historic Places

Neighbors of proposed event center near Batesville weigh in at community meeting

Chamber of Commerce preparing for Rebound Ball

There are another 2,228 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia this morning as reported by the Virginia Department of Health. That brings the seven-day average of new daily cases down slightly to 2,354. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests rate has increased to 8 percent, up from 7.5 percent yesterday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 36 COVID cases, bringing the seven-day average to 33 per day.

The outbreak in Staunton reported yesterday has traced back to Middle River Regional Jail, which had a facility-wide testing event on November 25. In all 213 inmates tested positive. Today Staunton reports another 48 cases. Augusta County reports 54 new cases and the city of Waynesboro reports 22 new cases. That’s a one-day high for Augusta County and the third highest for Waynesboro. (press release)

Several nearby residents of a historic property near Batesville spoke out last night against a permit the new owners have requested in order to hold up to 18 events per year. Scott Kelley and Nancy Sanford are a couple that purchased Bellevue Farm last December and use the property as their home and want to hold weddings and other events in an indoor riding ring. Lori Schweller of the firm Williams Mullen is their attorney.

“This property is about 145 acres and is zoned rural area,” Schweller said. “The entire property, and this is the home Bellevue, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is under conservation easement with the Virginia Outdoors Foundation.”

Planner Scott Clark said county zoning ordinance allows owners of historic properties to request a special use permit to hold events and the possibility is justified by the county’s Comprehensive Plan.

“The major overarching goal for the rural areas in the Comprehensive Plan are that ‘the rural area will have thriving farms and forests, traditional crossroads communities, protect the scenic areas, historic sites, and preserve natural resources,” Clark said, adding that the provision for events at historic properties predates similar provisions for wineries, breweries and cideries.

“Different types of events have different by-right uses and different special use requirements,” Clark added.

Special use permits can allow for conditions to mitigate impacts, including traffic management plans and limits to hours of operation.

In a question and answer period that lasted nearly two hours, neighboring residents stressed their opposition to the permit, citing traffic, light pollution, noise, and other disturbances. Rory Carpenter is an abutting property owner.

“My wife and I built our house here 30 years ago because of the beauty and tranquility of the area,” Carpenter said. “We raised our two children and we love it here. What we love most is the fact that it is rural and it is one of the most beautiful spots in Albemarle County.”

Mary Ann O’Brien said she did not think the use would benefit the Batesville area.

“We love the quiet, we love the calm, we’re concerned about the traffic the area,” O’Brien said. “We just don’t see any upside for Batesville or the community. We see only negatives.”

Others were opposed to a commercial use in the rural area. Stephen Yowell represents the Greenwood Foundation.

“The bottom line is in my opinion and in many others who I have spoken with about this, this is not an application for a special use permit,” Yowell said. “This is an application for a business license.”

Scott Kelley said their goal is to find a way to continue the working nature of the property and to make use of the agricultural buildings that have been there for decades.

“We’ve got a large farm and we’re trying to figure out what to do with the farm that is consistent with the preserving the nature of the property,” Kelley said. “We’re talking about doing very little to the exterior to any of the existing buildings, in fact trying to improve the one that is by everybody’s estimation is the eyesore is the indoor riding ring.”

Kelley said he and his wife did not have an intention to turn their property into a commercial winery.

The couple now has the opportunity to resubmit their application with revisions based on feedback received at the meeting. When they apply, the matter would need to go before the Planning Commission and then the Board of Supervisors for public hearings.

The high school established by Albemarle and Charlottesville in the middle of the 20th century for Black students is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Jackson P. Burley opened in 1951 on Rose Hill Drive, eleven years after the city had built a new school for whites only. Jimmy Hollins of the Burley Varsity Club alumni group said Burley also was for Black students from Greene and Nelson.

“Burley was a big part of the Black community back in those days,” Hollins said. “When they played sports, football or basketball games, those games was crowded. Pretty crowded. And we not only had Black fans, we would have white fans that would come and stand outside of the gates and look at the games.”

Hollins said that’s because Burley was the only school in the area with a winning record. The National Register of Historic Places is an honorific designation that recognizes the historic significance of a property. (read the nomination form)

“The building represents a rare instance in which two localities—Charlottesville and Albemarle County—sought to achieve “separate but equal” educational facilities during segregation—and at a time when successful legal suits underway elsewhere in Virginia challenged the unequal and overcrowded conditions in black schools,” reads the page for Burley on the website for the Virginia Department of Historic Resources. The two localities built the school in order to justify continued segregation of students by race, a practice that was declared unconstitutional in 1954 in the Brown vs. the Board of Education case. Burley did not close until 1967 after all surrounding counties had lost their fight to keep schools separate.

Albemarle County now owns the building and operates as one of their middle schools despite being within city limits. All across Virginia, the majority of Black schools like the Christiansburg Institute and Dunbar High School in Lynchburg were closed rather than become desegregated themselves. That’s one reason Hollins says this designation is so critical.

“Originally in the state of Virginia, they had as far as Black high schools, they had 115 of the Black high schools,” Hollins said. “Now out of those 115, there are only three that are still high schools today that are working high schools.”

Many of the alumni from those schools today continue to meet under the auspices of the Virginia Interscholastic Association.

Hollins graduated from Burley in 1965.

“Personally I never through Burley would close,” Hollins said. “I always thought Burley would stay open as a high school

Hollins said when the pandemic is over, there will be an occasion to celebrate the listing.

We are a day away from the Charlottesville Chamber of Commerce’s Rebound Ball, where the organization will honor local leaders including handing out awards that celebrate business resilience. A top event at the Ball is a conversation with Priya Parker, the author of a book called the Art of Gathering. She’s also a facilitator and speaker who attended the University of Virginia and will speak about the experience in a conversation with Chamber CEO Elizabeth Cromwell.

“One of my earliest memories there was one of the first questions people would ask me on the Lawn in the cafeteria, in my dorm, was what are you?” Parker said. “And I didn’t understand the question. I thought maybe they were asking me what year I was. I didn’t understand the code.”

Parker grew up in Africa and Southeast Asia, and is biracial. She said she didn’t understand why fellow students would select that question for their first inquiry into her life.

“I began to realize at UVA, specifically at the University and then as I stayed there longer and longer and I think in Charlottesville as well that race was a very big deal there, whether it was looking at parties that were allowed to go into early morning hours on Frat Row and then Black parties being broken up by the cops again and again and again.”

Parker said her questions about race were taken seriously by older students. She became involved with student self-governance.

“And long story short, I learned about a process called sustained dialogue through my research that took a different approach to race relations which was to help people come together in small groups, committed to talking about the issues that most mattered to them that are often kept behind closed doors,” Parker said.

At the Rebound Ball, she will tell the rest of the story of how she pursued the topic as an undergraduate and how it helped led to her career as a facilitator. She and Cromwell will also talk about lessons learned about the art of gathering during the pandemic. (buy tickets)

Today in meetings:

The Albemarle Board of Zoning Appeals meets at 2 p.m. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization meets at 4 p.m. and Scottsville District (meeting info)

Charlottesville’s Tree Commission meets at 5 p.m. (meeting info)

Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price will have a town hall for the Scottsville District beginning at 7 p.m. (meeting info)

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In today’s installment:

Update on COVID-19 in Virginia

Woman murdered early Saturday morning is third homicide in Charlottesville in November

Popular new trail through mountain brings traffic concerns

Owners of historic property nears Batesville seek permit for events

The seven-day average for new daily COVID-19 cases is now 2,400 as new numbers come in from the Virginia Department of Health. On Saturday, a new record of 3,173 cases were reported. On Sunday that number was 2,325 and this morning the VDH reported 1,893 new cases.

These numbers are based on fewer tests being performed last week, perhaps due to the holiday. The VDH processed 165,268 tests between last Monday and yesterday. The week before the health department processed 222,926 tests.

The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is at 7.5 percent today. A month ago on Halloween that figure was 5.6 percent.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 14 cases reported today, and the seven-day average is 33. For the month of November, there have been 834 cases. That compares to 954 in October, 1,081 in September and 769 in August. There have been 82 fatalities in the Blue Health Rigde District since the pandemic began.

Looking around the area, the city of Staunton reports 206 cases today, five times higher than their previous high count of 44 cases from Thanksgiving day. For comparison, Waynesboro reported four cases and Augusta County reported eleven cases.

A 31-year-old Charlottesville woman is dead after being shot early Saturday morning in the 700 block of McIntire Road. Tanya Renee Wheeler is the third person to be murdered in Charlottesville this month. DreShawn McDonald was killed in the 900 block of South First Street on November 5, and a suspect in his murder was taken into custody yesterday in Pennsylvania. On November 14, Teiwan Benstom was murdered in the 700 block of Orangedale Avenue. A suspect was arrested in that case as well. Police are continuing to investigate Wheeler’s murder.

The opening of the Blue Ridge Tunnel connecting Afton and Waynesboro has been welcomed by many who are looking for a new outdoor destination. However, residents of the Nelson County side have reported traffic issues at the parking lot off of Route 6 as more people find out about the mile-long pathway through the middle of a mountain.

“The access road to get to the tunnel's parking lot is only wide enough for one car at a time to get in or out, and the visitors coming here have narrowed the road even further by parking on either side of it,” wrote Victoria Dunham over the weekend in a Facebook post warning people of the large crowds.

Dunham said she supports the tunnel, but asked the head of the private foundation if there had been a traffic study and a plan to handle large crowds. The eastern entrance is recommended for “those seeking a less strenuous experience.” I’ve reached out for comment from the Nelson County Parks and Recreation Department. An email sent to the Blue Ridge Tunnel Foundation refers to the Nelson website for rules and directions.

One nearby resident has set up a Facebook group called Stewards of the Blue Ridge Tunnel to help pick up trash at the new facility, which has no other amenities. The organizer said she picked up five and a half pounds of trash on the trail yesterday morning.

The owners of a historic property on Plank Road near Batesville are seeking a special use permit to hold events, but under a different section of the zoning code than the one for wineries, cideries and breweries.

“The Special Events ordinance was developed expressly for hosting events at historic properties for the public to share the enjoyment of the County's historic resources and rural viewsheds,” reads the narrative of the application from Hilmasco Operations, LLC.

This requires a community meeting which will be held at 5:30 p.m. Several neighbors have already expressed opposition to the project, citing noise and traffic concerns. (meeting info)

The property was originally listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991 as Wavertree Hill Farm, but has since been renamed to Bellevue. Under the proposal, weddings and other activities would take place in an existing indoor riding ring which will be remodeled.

“This structure is not a contributing historic structure, was built in the 1970' s, and is visually inconsistent with the other structures on the Property,” reads the narrative. “Though the Applicant would prefer to raze this structure and to construct a more attractive building in the same location, Section 5. 1. 43( d)( 1) requires each structure used for a special event to have been in existence on the date of the adoption of the section.”

The Virginia Outdoors Foundation holds a conservation easement on the property which will not allow new commercial buildings to be constructed. Under the proposal, outdoor amplified music would end at ten p.m. and all events would be over by midnight. The applicant has requested a special exception that four events each year be allowed to have up to 350 guests. The others would be restricted to 150 or fewer.

In other meetings today, the Crozet Community Advisory Committee meets at seven p.m. tonight.

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Welcome to the 332nd day of the year, otherwise known as Friday, November 27, 2020. I’m Sean Tubbs, and this is the 102nd installment of the Charlottesville Community Engagement newsletter and newscast.

One of today’s monikers for today is Buy Nothing Day, and in that spirit, no pitches today. Extended gratitude to all of those who have indicated support, financial or moral.

In today’s newsletter:

An update on COVID-19 cases in Virginia

Chamber of Commerce and local governments encourage small-business support

Blue Ridge Area Food Bank thanks volunteers for a busy year

Deadline to comment on Charlottesville’s draft affordable housing plan is December 2

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,544 new COVID cases today, and the seven-day average for new cases is now at 2,445. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 43 cases, which is the same as the seven-day average. Of that amount, sixteen are from Albemarle, twelve from Charlottesville, and seven from Louisa.

Of the counties in the health district, Nelson has the highest incidence rate with a seven day average of 22.1 cases per 100,000 population. That number today is 15.6 in Albemarle, 9.6 in Fluvanna, 15.9 in Greene, 19.8 in Louisa, and 20.8 in Charlottesville.

Looking just outside the Blue Ridge Health District, Culpeper’s incidence rate is 94.5 today, with only 2 new cases reported today. In Augusta County that number is 31.4, and it’s 21.8 in Orange County.

With Thanksgiving behind us, the days now move forward to the holiday gift giving that culminates in less than a month with Christmas and the more important Boxing Day. Before that, both the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce and Albemarle County encourage the support of local businesses in these times of shortened business hours and decreased travel.

Albemarle County sent out an email this week to explain the importance of the local economy this year.

“Buying local is an investment in your community,” the email read. “It strengthens our local economy: each dollar spent at small businesses returns three times more money to our local economy than one spent elsewhere.”

One place to start is cvilleshops, a website put together by Storyware to help people purchase gift cards for area businesses ranging from Angelic’s Kitchen to Trinity Irish Pub. The website also encourages curbside pickup from local restaurants in order to help them keep the lights on.

Tomorrow is called Small Business Saturday, a branding exercise supported and promoted by American Express.

Many nonprofits across Virginia are seeking donations as part of #GivingTuesday on December 1. One such organization is the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank, which has an arrangement with Kroger where the grocery store will match donations up to $30,000. According to a release, the Food Bank received enough donations in the 2019 Giving Tuesday to provide up 273,500 meals. They’re hoping to increase that this year to meet a surge in demand due to the pandemic. The organization has more than doubled the amount of food that goes through its distribution network this year.

On Wednesday, the organization released a video where staff thanked the many volunteers who make it all possible. (watch the video)

There are only five more days until the public comment window closes for draft materials produced by the Cville Plans Together initiative. As stated at a steering committee meeting earlier this week, the firm Rhodeside & Harwell has not received nearly as much comment as it did in an earlier public engagement round earlier this year.

State law mandates that each the planning commission in each Virginia locality to prepare a plan “for the physical development of the territory within its jurisdiction” and for each governing body to adopt one. Charlottesville is about to enter the fifth year of review of the plan last adopted in 2013.

Jennifer Koch is with Rhodeside & Harwell. She said at this point, the consultants working on the revision have been working on guiding principles and chapter titles.

“Items we’re sharing for review in terms of the Comprehensive Plan are these high-level community input driven priority statements because we need to discuss these and talk about them and revise them further before we can move forward to the goals and strategies that fall under these vision statements,” Koch said.

The draft guiding principles are expanded from the Community Values chapter of the 2013 plan. There are five draft vision statements.

Equity & Opportunity: All people should be able to thrive in Charlottesville.

Local & Regional Collaboration: From the neighborhood to the region, open conversations and partnerships will make the city stronger.

Environmental Stewardship & Sustainability: The Charlottesville community should demonstrate environmental and climate leadership.

Connections & Access: The City should consider land use and transportation in complementary ways, creating better and safer mobility options for all.

Community Culture & Unity: Charlottesville’s rich and diverse culture should be celebrated, and the entire community should create an environment in which all of the city’s residents feel welcomed, valued, and respected.

“Another way to think about the guiding principles is that they are things that we are keeping in mind and using as a guide as we work towards building this bridge toward the outcomes we have identified,”

A series of previous recordings and webinars are available on the C’Ville Plans Together page. The survey closes on Wednesday, December 2.

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This program comes to you thanks to the financial support from about a fifth of the audience. I am grateful for these contributions, which are helping me to make this a viable option. This is work I believe in doing, and I’m here to work for the community. I’ll make my pitches later in the program but for now, my sincere gratitude to each of you.

In today’s newsletter:

An update on COVID cases in Virginia

Five students at Woodbrook Elementary in Albemarle test positive

Albemarle Broadband Authority briefed on progress of rural internet expansion

Efforts afoot to collect enough glass to attract packaging manufacturer to recycle materials into new products

On this Thanksgiving Day, the seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases in Virginia is almost the same number as today’s report of 2,600 new cases. The seven-day average is 2,588. The trajectory for other indicators is also upward, with a seven-day average of new daily cases per 100,000 population at 30.4 and the total number of new cases per 100,000 within the last fourteen days is 362.5.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 59 cases, with 30 of them reported in Albemarle, and ten in Louisa. The incidence rate of seven days of new daily cases per 100,000 population in Albemarle is 15.1 and the total number of new cases per 100,000 is 166.5. Those numbers for Louisa County are 19.8 and 198.5.

Elsewhere in the area, Augusta County reports another 51 cases today. Their incidence rate is 35.6 and the total number of new cases per 100,000 within the last 14 days is 409.5. In Culpeper County, there are another 75 cases and their total number of new cases per 100,000 population is 1,055.

Five students at Albemarle County’s Woodbrook Elementary have tested positive for COVID-19 and will now isolate at home for the next ten days. That’s according to an email sent to parents and published on Twitter via one of the parents. The county school system entered Stage 3 of its Return to School Plan which returns elementary students on a hybrid basis as well as some older students. A school dashboard with confirmed COVID-19 cases has not yet been updated, but indicates there has been one student at Albemarle High School who has been infected and one at Baker-Butler Elementary.

On Tuesday, the school system sent out an email that laid out the conditions required before they will revert back to a virtual model.

“If for seven consecutive days in Albemarle County the number of new cases per 100,000 persons within the last 14 days exceeds 200 and the percentage of diagnostic tests that are positive during the last 14 days exceeds 8%, ACPS will shift to Stage 1 of our Return to School Plan, which is virtual instruction for all students,” reads the email.

Today, the former metric is at 166.5 and the percent positivity is at 1.46 percent. This is another reminder that percent positivity in the Blue Ridge Health District is skewed downward to the high number of testing at the University of Virginia.

This Thanksgiving, there are likely many of us who are seeing our loved ones from afar thanks to the “magic” of teleconferencing. But, many in the rural parts of our community don’t have the bandwidth to participate. The Albemarle Broadband Authority is working on several projects to expand high speed internet to more of the community. One such item comes through the Virginia Telecommunications Initiative, a program of the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development. Mike Culp, Albemarle’s director of information technology, briefed the authority on how the county is using $291,300 in VATI funds allocated to bring service to 838 homes.

“Eight project areas are under construction so most of the project areas are currently under construction and we’re hearing from many of the residents, some of them who are going up to the folks doing the work and ask them, ‘is this CenturyLink?’ and the answer is yes,” Culp said.

Culp said the goal is to complete these projects by March 5. More information is available in a Frequently Asked Questions list. ABBA is applying for additional projects, but withdrew one specific location due to a request from one of CenturyLink’s competitors.

“One of our project areas was successfully challenged and we have removed it from the application and that’s the Boonesville area,” Culp said. “That’s the Boonesville area. [Central Virginia Electric Cooperative] has a number of members in the Boonesville area that are off of the White Hall substation and CVEC came in and said ‘we would prefer that you not include that in your application’ so we did.”

Culp said the county would have to encourage CVEC to use its Firefly subsidiary to expand coverage in that area.

Albemarle is also working on three broadband projects that have been funded through the county’s portion of the federal CARES act. These are $697,194 toward Shentel for their BEAM wireless service that could serve up to 2,000 people, $230,245 for CVEC’s Firefly service to serve 62 locations in the Midway area, and a $32,500 contribution for Nelson Cable to extend service in the Scottsville area. (details on page 3)

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors will get a report on the authority at their meeting on January 20. Supervisor Liz Palmer of the Samuel Miller District said she wants to make sure they know what is going on.

“We have a lot more work to do but sometimes I think that the Board as a whole doesn’t recognize how much has actually gotten done, which is not enough, but I think it’s a reasonable amount,” Palmer said.

Earlier this month, the Board of Supervisors directed staff to find additional funding to further expand broadband. The authority also talked about upcoming bills in the next General Assembly that might assist localities in providing service. Culp is a member of the 17-member Broadband Advisory Council, which advises Virginia’s governor on the issue. That body meets again on Friday, December 4.

As the new year approaches, localities across the Commonwealth are waiting to see if their projects will receive funding in the fourth round of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale process. Albemarle and Charlottesville are in the Culpeper District, and their eight projects are competing with thirty other projects throughout that jurisdiction for funding. You can review the projects in a link in the newsletter. The total cost estimates for all of those projects is $374 million and $349 million is requested. The results will be announced in January. (presentation)

Though there will certainly not be as many gatherings this Thanksgiving, it is quite likely that there will be plenty of empty glass bottles left over at the conclusion of holiday meals. That’s as good a time as any to give a quick update on efforts to divert those bottles from landfills. Jesse Warren is with UVA Sustainability and a member of the Albemarle Solid Waste Alternatives Advisory Council (SWAAC).

“Glass is one of the unique things about Central Virginia that we can do something about,” Warren said.

That something is working with the many producers of wine, beer, and cider in the region to gather up as many of the empties together to make a viable source for new containers. In late October, SWAAC invited Scott DeFife of the Glass Packaging Institute to talk about an idea.

“We could recover significantly more glass from our region than we do now by getting it out of the landfill and single-stream recyclable streams,” Warren said. “If we could get enough glass through this region, then we can potentially attract a bottle manufacturer to come and take that glass and do what they call beneficiate it into a new product.”

Warren said the issue with single-stream recycling is that the glass is too contaminated with other materials to be useful, so it gets used as landfill cover. Instead, SWAAC is encouraging “source separation” where the end user keeps empties separate from other waste.

Warren said three steps are involved in this process.

“The first one is working with solid waste planning units to get the glass from Fluvanna, Albemarle, Nelson, Madison, Louisa to the Ivy [Material Utilization Center],” Warren said. “[Rivanna Solid Waste Authority] has negotiated a contract with a hauler to allow them to receive this glass with no tipping charge.”

Warren said UVA sends its glass there, and now he is working with localities to assemble more tonnage to go to Ivy. The second step would be coming up with a unified campaign for onsite beverage manufacturers to have dedicated bins that would be picked up by a dedicated hauler for a fee.

“So to put some context to this, UVA does about 40 tons of glass a year and based on our initial calculations we think we could recover hundreds of tons from the region, so our question to these individual businesses is, where are you, and how much glass do you have?” Warren said.

Then the question is, how to find a hauler to do the work? Before then, Warren is asking interested parties to answer a survey.

There are no meetings today, and I hope you are spending meaningful time with the people most important to you.

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For today’s message of support, if you need help with a big clean-up job, consider Monster Cleaning of Charlottesville. Live your best life in a clean, healthy environment. No judgment, professional cleaning services for your home. Owner Charlene Munford now has equipment to help fight COVID. Visit monstercleaningcville.com today.

In today’s newsletter:

An update on COVID numbers in Virginia

For the second time, Albemarle Planning Commission recommends denial of rezoning near Glenmore

Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce preparing for Rebound Ball

On the eve of Thanksgiving, all metrics point to the largest surge of COVID-cases since the state of emergency was announced on March 12, 2020. After nearly nine months of lockdown, Virginia and rest of the United States of America face the possibility of a tragic holiday period.

Virginia has set another new daily record for COVID cases with 2,718 cases reported this morning. The seven day average is now 2,495 cases a day. The seven-day average for new positive tests has increased to 7.5 percent, up from 7.4 percent yesterday.

The seven-day average for new daily cases reported per 100,000 population is 29.3 today. This is known as the “incidence rate” and that figure was 18.7 on November 16. The total number of cases per 100,000 population within the last 14 days in Virginia is 349.8 today. That figure was 249.1 on November 16, and 169.5 on October 16, 2020.

In Virginia, the death toll has climbed over 4,000 and stands at 4,008 today. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there have been 81 fatalities, with all deaths in people over the age of 50. Nearly sixty percent of COVID-deaths in the district are in people over the age of 80.

Looking across the state, the central region has an incidence rate of 25.5 and a percent positivity of 5.9%. The eastern region has an incidence rate of 22.1 and a percent positivity of 7.4%. For the far southwest region, the incidence rate is 46.3 and percent positivity is at 16.7%. The near southwest region has a high incidence rate of 44.7 but the percent positivity is lower at 8.6%.

Northern Virginia has a incidence rate of 29.2 and a percent positivity of 8%. The northwest region has an incidence rate of 25.5 and a percent positivity of 5.9 percent. This is a reminder that figure is likely skewed downward due to a high amount of prevalence testing in the Blue Ridge Health District due to the University of Virginia.

In our immediate region, Culpeper County continues to have a high count with an incidence rate of 81 and a total number of new cases per 100,000 population of 923.7. They reported 64 new cases today and had a high of 175 new cases on Sunday.

The Albemarle Planning Commission last night recommended denial of a rezoning on land within the designated Village of Rivanna growth area. This was the second time the seven-member appointed body saw the proposal for the Breezy Hill neighborhood, which required a rezoning on about 84 acres just to the east of the Glenmore community.

Commissioners received over 200 emails from neighbors who requested denial because of the impacts on U.S. 250. Many cited a line in the executive summary of the Village of Rivanna Master Plan which reads “Future residential development should only be approved if and when transportation improvements to US 250 have been made and sufficient sewer capacity is in place to support that development.”

However, deputy county attorney Andy Herrick told the commission that is a non-binding statement.

“A local government body does not have the authority to enact an ordinance that would establish an outright moratorium on all zoning changes in a portion of a locality until highway improvement is made,” Herrick said. “However, current and projected traffic can be a consideration in individual applications.”

Southern Development had reduced the size of the proposed neighborhood from 160 units to 130 units. They also proffered funding to coordinate traffic signals along the corridor to improve the flow of traffic. (proffer statement)

“The signal improvements that we’re proposing are a complete reconfiguration of the existing signals at Milton Road’s intersection with U.S. 250 and Louisa Road’s intersection with U.S. 250,” said Charlie Armstrong with Southern Development. “By doing that is actually provides additional capacity for those intersections.”

Within the last decade, the Virginia Department of Transportation piloted new signal technology on U.S. 250 on Pantops. This was initially credited with increasing traffic throughout the Pantops growth area.

The idea did not impress Rick Randolph, the planning commissioner for the Scottsville District who previously represented that area on the Board of Supervisors from 2016 to 2019 before opting not to run for a second elected term.

“Those of us that have some experience in the congestion on this corridor and living with it on a daily basis well understand that past technological fixes don’t begin to address the fact that the volume of automotive traffic has been increasing significantly year by year by year,” Randolph said.

In 2019, VDOT estimated that 9,500 vehicles a day went through the intersection of U.S. 250 and Louisa Road. The estimate in 2010 was 7,300 vehicles a day.

Commissioners were unanimous in their recommendation to the Board of Supervisors to deny the rezoning. The matter will go to the Board of Supervisors in December.

The Commission will next meet on December 8 when they will discuss the county’s draft affordable housing plan in a joint session with the Board of Supervisors. That document identifies a need for 11,750 new housing units by 2040 to meet forecasts for population growth. That includes 8,134 units that are approved not yet built and a need for rezonings or special use permits to allow the remaining 3,600 units projected united to be constructed.

There’s only a week left until the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce holds its annual celebration the only way to do so in 2020 - virtually. The Rebound Ball will feature the handing out of 14 local business awards as well as a keynote speech from author and podcaster Priya Parker, whose latest work is called The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why it Matters. Parker is to have a “fireside chat” with Chamber CEO Elizabeth Cromwell about meaningful gatherings in the age of COVID. Each event attendee will receive a free e-book copy of The Art of Gathering.

One of the award winners is Liza Borches who will receive the 2020 Chamber Business Leader of the Year award. Borches is the head of Carter Myers Automotive, which has sixteen dealerships throughout six communities in Virginia.

The award dinner is called the Rebound Ball after the name of the Chamber’s collaboration for local economic recovery - Project Rebound. The awards this year reflect the innovation and determination shown by many during this challenging year. (ticket information)

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Broadband Authority will meet virtually at 5 p.m. One of the items will be a report on the Board of Supervisors’ recent discussion on the strategic plan and capital budget work session. One of the county’s strategic goals is to expand broadband throughout the county. I’m pleased because this means I’ll have at least one fresh soundbite in Thursday’s newscast! (meeting info)

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The number of COVID cases in Virginia continues to rise, with the seven-day average of new daily cases rising to 2,403 today, based on a one-day count today of 2,544. That’s the same one-day total from November 20, tying the one-day record.

The seven-day average for new positive tests has risen to 7.4 percent statewide, up from 7.2 percent yesterday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are 37 new cases, bringing the seven-day average for new daily cases to 38.

North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper yesterday announced new mask requirements due to rising cases in that state.

“We’ve passed the grim benchmark of losing more than 5,000 North Carolineans to COVID-19,” Cooper said. “We hold each of them in our memories and they will not be forgotten. This Thanksgiving week, our state and the country are reporting record high case numbers and hospitalizations.”

The new mask requirement goes into effect at 5 p.m. tomorrow in North Carolina. People must wear masks in all indoor settings. Previously the requirement only applied to businesses.

“I have a stark warning for North Carolineans today,” Cooper said. “We are in danger. This is a pivotal moment in our fight against the coronavirus. Our actions now will determine the fate of many.”

Hat tip to the newsletter Raleigh Convergence for the information. Check them out if you are in Wake County, North Carolina! I learned about them through the Local Independent Online News Publishers group.

The consultant team hired to write up an affordable housing plan for Charlottesville and to complete the locality’s Comprehensive Plan update has not had as much public feedback as it did in a survey cycle earlier this year. Jennifer Koch is with the firm Rhodeside & Harwell.

“We in the first round, taking the survey for example, we got 1,100 responses to that,” Koch said. “We’ve seen about 100 responses so far to the survey.”However, Koch said this time around, participants are being asked to comment on draft materials. Feedback is being taken through December 2. (virtual meeting page)

The steering committee that is reviewing the work met last night to review the high-level principles of the affordable housing plan, which includes an aspirational $10 million a year commitment in city funding for affordable housing projects. Sarah Kirk is with the firm HR&A, a subcontractor hired to produce the affordable housing plan.

“There are three guiding principles that really underpin the whole plan and you will see those referred to throughout the draft plan,” Kirk said. “Those are racial equity, regional collaboration so collaboration completely particularly within the urban ring, but we’re talking about ways to collaborate with Albemarle County and with other regional jurisdictions, with UVA to jointly address affordable housing challenges and we talk about the need for a comprehensive approach. So we think about not only using land use or subsidies, but using both as well as tenants’ rights to the city can advance tenant’s rights.”

On the notion of regional cooperation, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is already spearheading a regional affordable housing partnership and is administering the state’s COVID-related Rental and Mortgage Relief program. On March 10, UVA President Jim Ryan announced that up to 1,500 new units would be built on land controlled by UVA or its real estate foundation. (UVA Today article)

Much of the conversation dealt with that recommendation of $10 million in dedicated annual funding. Phil Kash is with HR&A.

“We think consistency is key here, having an expected level of impact,” Kash said. “One, so the city can build its systems and lay plans around us, but also so nonprofit partners, CRHA and the entire ecosystem of affordable housing can build and scale up to capacity to deploy this this money effectively.”

In the past two months, Council has finalized two major agreements. That includes $3 million in funding for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority for the Crescent Halls renovation and new units at South First Street, and about $5.5 million in funding for the first phase of the Friendship Court redevelopment being undertaken by Piedmont Housing Alliance.

One councilor made this brief comment.

“I’m just going to say that we have to be realistic,” said City Councilor Heather Hill. The city is currently facing the limits of its borrowing capacity.

The panel also discussed the role of homeownership in the plan. We’ll have more from this meeting in a newsletter coming up later this week.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority met last night for its monthly meeting. Executive Director John Sales said that for the first time in a long time, the vast majority of tenants no longer owe back rent thanks to an $80,000 payment from City Council out of its share of CARES Act funding.

“That’s like probably the first time in 15 or 20 years that the account balances are at zero,” Sales said. The two who do have account balances are working out a payment plan with CRHA officials as part of a new eviction abatement program.

Speaking of the two CRHA development projects, the city has issued building permits for both Crescent Halls and South First Street Phase One. Dave Norris is the CRHA’s redevelopment director and he said the next step is to complete financing.

“We’ve cleared those hurdles which is huge and once we have closed on the projects, we’ll be able to get started on the construction,” Norris said.

Norris said they are aiming for a mid-December date to close the financing deal, which includes the $3 million in city payments as well as low-income housing tax credits. (LIHTC).

“That’s mostly due to a last minute delay caused by some bureaucratic issues with [the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development] but we’re working through them,” Norris said.

Planning for a second phase of redevelopment at Phase 2 has been taking place all year and Norris said work has begun to get HUD-required paperwork done in advance. Negotiations between the general contractor are underway to ensure that at least some residents can be hired for the construction through a process known as Section 3.

“Part of that conversation involves getting a little more specific on their Section 3 hiring commitments so that our Section 3 coordinator, Joy Johnson, has a clearer idea of roughly how many positions and what kind of skills and trades they are looking to hire from among the over 80 people she has in the pipeline for Section 3 employment,” Norris said.”

The CRHA Board will next meet in late January.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Planning Commission will meet at 6 p.m. and will hold a public hearing for on a special use permit for outdoors displays at a former restaurant in the Rio/29 intersection that is being converted into a car dealership. They’ll also take action on an altered form of the Breezy Hill subdivision in the Village of Rivanna. Southern Development has lowered the total number of units from 160 to 130 to try to assuage opposition from nearby residents.

In other meetings:

Charlottesville’s Police Civilian Review Board meets at 5 p.m. (meeting info)

Do you have questions about the C’Ville Plans Together initiative? The consultant is holding office hours to answer questions and take feedback beginning at 5:30 p.m. (meeting info)

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Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to plant native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Over 25 partner organizations all want to help you! Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

With three days to go until Thanksgiving, the Virginia Department of Health set another record for new daily cases today with 3,242. As with last Monday, the high number is due in part to database downtime. "The 3,242 case count reported on Monday, November 23 is in part due to a catch-up from the VDH data system being down for upgrades for a few hours over the weekend,” reads a caveat on the website. “A reminder: the number of new daily cases is based on the date VDH reported them. In order to observe the spread of illness most effectively, please review the charts that show cases by date of symptom onset.”

The seven-day average for new cases is 2,343. The seven-day average of new daily cases per 100,000 is now 27.5 statewide, a metric known as the incidence rate. That figure was 18.7 a week ago. The total number of new cases per 100,000 population within the last 14 days is 323.6. That figure was 249.1 a week ago.

There are another 42 cases in the Blue Ridge Health District and the seven-day average for new cases is 36.

Looking around the state, Augusta County has a seven-day average of 27 new cases a day, and their incidence rate is 35.8. Their total number of new cases per 100,000 population in the past 14 days is 332.6.

Culpeper County sets a record today of 173 cases reported, bringing their seven-day average for new cases to 38. Their incidence rate is 72.4 and their total number of new cases per 100,000 population over the last 14 days is 873.5.

Roanoke County has a seven-day average of 79 new cases a day, and their incidence rate is 84.3. The 14-day figure in Roanoke County is 769.6.

Fairfax County, Virginia’s most-populated locality, reports 453 cases today. There are over 1.1 million people in that jurisdiction. Their incidence rate is 24.5 and their 14-day figure is 289.8.

The death rate has not climbed nearly as high as the case count. There are only four deaths reported statewide. None were reported yesterday. There have been 136 COVID fatalities in the past seven days and the statewide total is now 3,942.

An organization that seeks to increase the availability of passenger rail in Virginia wants you to give your thoughts on what it would take to get you back on a train whenever the pandemic is over. Danny Plaugher with Virginians for High Speed Rail said the feedback will be used in their next report on the state of passenger rail in the Commonwealth.

“And as you know with all public transportation, mass transportation, whether it be airlines or rail or buses, have been dramatically been impacted because of COVID so what we’ve done is put this survey together to ask our members, ask every Virginians across the state what would make them feel more comfortable getting back on the train,” Plaugher said.

Plaugher said the group’s previous reports called for the state to invest in rail, something the Northam Administration accomplished late last year when they announced the purchase of right of way from private companies. He said there’s a bright future for rail, but this pandemic year has been brutal to ridership and the survey is intended to inform recovery.

“Our passenger rail on average normally used to handle about 80,000 passengers a month,” Plaugher said. “Our six Amtrak regional trains, in April that was down to 3,000, so a 97 percent decline in ridership. That has slowly been built up a little bit and we’re at about 23,000 riders a month.”

The pandemic has delayed the completion of the state’s purchase of right of way, but Plaugher said the deal will go through. Much of the linear land was sold by Virginia in the 1990’s and when the transaction is complete, it will be under the jurisdiction of the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority. That body met for the first time in late October.

“The good thing about them getting the rail authority and starting to buy these rail corridors is that we’re beginning to fix the mistakes that the state has made over the previous decades,” Plaugher said. “Virginia used to own the D.C. to Richmond rail corridor. All of it until [Governor] Doug Wilder sold it in the 90’s as part of a plan to balance the budget. And he sold this asset for $250 million that is now worth billions.”

Plaugher said his dream is that one day the Commonwealth Corridor will provide consistent east-west rail service between Christiansburg to Virginia Beach.

You can access the Virginians for High Speed Rail survey here. (link)

Today in meetings, the steering committee that is overseeing the C’Ville Plans Together initiative will meet virtually at 4 p.m. today. As a refresher, the City Council in place in February 2019 opted to hire a consultant to complete the Comprehensive Plan review while also writing an affordable housing plan. The firm Rhodeside & Harwell was hired and have developed new guiding principles that will guide the plan, the update of which has been under review since January 2017. Jennifer Koch is the project manager.

“And as part of that update to the Comprehensive Plan, we’ve drafted an affordable housing plan which will feed into the Comprehensive Plan goals and strategies,” Koch said. “Once the revised Comprehensive Plan, including the affordable housing plan, once that’s completely updated we will rewrite the zoning ordinance to ensure it reflects all of these goals and strategies.”

One of the major planks of the draft affordable housing plan is an annual commitment of $10 million for ten years in order to help build more affordable housing units. Last week, City Council held a work session to help make cuts to the capital improvement budget to address the fact that the city is projected to reach its borrowing limit. I’ll have a story about that budget work session out later today.

In other meetings:

Charlottesville’s Social Services Advisory Board meets virtually at noon. They will talk about their annual report to City Council. (meeting info)

The Board of Trustees for the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library meets at 3 p.m. Among the items is another update on the library system’s COVID response. (zoom info)

The Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee meets at 4:30 p.m. On the agenda is a presentation on conservation easements, a discussion of the Purvis Store in Esmont, and an update on new historical markers in the county. (meeting info)

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Today’s program is supported by all of the listeners and readers who are able to make a financial contribution, but also to those who cannot do so at this time. The information in this program is for everyone as everything in it is intended to be for all of us. We are now four months into this program and I’m continuously working on new ways to get civic information to you. Please let me know what you think. I’m here for as many of you who are listening.

The seven-day average for new daily COVID-19 cases in Virginia has now climbed to 2,126 a day. That’s based on today’s report from the Virginia Department of Health of another 2,348 cases. The seven-day average for positive tests has increased to 7.1 percent from 7 percent yesterday.

The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 40 cases today, crossing the 5,000 threshold with a cumulative total of 5,018 cases since March. Of that number, Albemarle reports another 19 cases and Charlottesville has eleven new cases.

The in-person fall semester at the University of Virginia is now over, and as of yesterday afternoon, UVA reported 86 cases with 59 of them students. There have been 1,254 cases identified by UVA officials since August 17. These numbers are included within those of the Blue Ridge Health District.

The Charlottesville City Council spent three hours yesterday in a budget work session to hear more information about capital projects. Staff had hoped for direction on what high-cost large projects are priorities. The two major items discussed were the multimillion dollar West Main Streetscape as well as the multimillion dollar renovation of Walker Upper Elementary and Buford Middle School. In general, no hard decisions were made at the meeting. I’ll have more from that in Monday’s newscast or in a longer story I hope to complete later on today.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors got an update last week on the status of the Crozet Master Plan from White Hall District representative Ann Mallek. The Crozet Master Plan is a document intended to guide development and was first adopted by the Board in December 2004 and updated in 2010.

A long-awaited update is being shepherded by the Crozet Community Advisory Committee. The work is "zooming along" according to Supervisor Mallek.

"There were over 70 participants in the meeting last week," Mallek said. "Lots of challenging new concepts are being introduced by staff to solve problems that hopefully if they work in Crozet will be able to be used across the county in the other growth areas."

One of these is an effort to expand interpretation of the zoning code to allow and encourage more duplexes, triplexes and other multi-unit buildings. The idea is to increase the number of housing units in the county. (story from September)

"This is a little anxious making for the Crozet residents who feel a little vulnerable since nobody knows exactly how it's going to turn out but we're all working very hard together,” Mallek said.

The Crozet Community Advisory Committee next meets on November 30 at 7 p.m.

On the Board's consent agenda Wednesday was a summary of public engagement efforts that will be made as Albemarle begins to look at its rules for stream buffers in the rural areas. A first phase of the stream health initiative looked at the development areas.

Supervisor Liz Palmer of the Samuel Miller District asked for the summary to be removed for discussion. She suggested that rather than talk about the rules in the abstract, the public engagement effort could be more specific in order to explain how water quality can be improved. (staff report)

“Picking a waterway that we know is being impacted, that we know is in trouble now, and needs to be addressed and maybe we could have lessons learned from that in a situation where we already know the areas residents are interested in doing something about,” Palmer said.

Palmer said the Moormans River would be a good waterway to look at because of the impacts of recreational use at the Sugar Hollow Reservoir.

“There’s a lot of trash, erosion, etc,” Palmer said.

Kimberly Biasiolli is Albemarle’s natural resources manager. She said the goal of the second phase of the stream health initiative is intended to be more collaborative than the first phase.

“The report on the agenda today is really about this new phase of the project focused on the rural areas and planning for how to engage the public and stakeholder groups hopefully in new and strategic ways to not repeat necessarily what was done but to build upon it and create more of a collaborative and iterative process where we can receive feedback and incorporate that as we work on building solutions,” Biasiolli said.

According to the report shared with the Board, the discovery stage is expected to begin in January.

Plaugher said previous reports called for the state to invest in rail, something the Northam Administration accomplished late last year when they announced the purchase of right of way from private companies. We’ll hear more from him about that in Monday’s newsletter. You can access the Virginians for High Speed Rail survey here.

Finally today, a repeat of a story from yesterday. A volunteer group of computer programmers and technical experts is holding an information session this afternoon to find out more about what projects it can work on to benefit the greater Charlottesville community.

Jonathan Kropko is the volunteer lead with Code for Charlottesville.

“Code for Charlottesville is a local chapter of Code for America which is a national network of groups that begin volunteers with tech or data or code or design or research skills to work on a project for a community partner,” Kropko said.

So far, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects for the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. To find new partners and volunteers, they are holding a work session today at 4 p.m for people who want to be part of the leadership team.

“There’s a huge movement in the tech industry, the phrase they use is social good and I want to put that in quotes,” Kropko said. “Because a lot of time when they talk about the tech for the social good, it’s not really doing anything good for society. A lot of time these projects fizzle out without doing anything useful.”

Kropko said the goal of the information session is to try to come up with useful projects. He said that starts by recruiting volunteers.

“You have to do a good job with organizing so that people know what they are working on and what the goals are,” Kropko said. “And you have to do a really good job communicating with your partner in the community.

The Code for Charlottesville MeetUp begins at 4 p.m. for people interested in civic tech. Register here.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to plant native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

Virginia has set another one-day total for new COVID-19 cases today with 2,544 new cases bringing the total since March to 213,331. The seven-day average for new cases is now at 2,010. The seven-day average for positive tests has declined slightly to seven percent statewide. The total number of new cases per 100,000 population statewide is now 288.4. That number was 230.4 a week ago and 205.3 two weeks ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 36 cases today, with 12 from Albemarle, eight from Charlottesville, seven from Louisa, four from Nelson, three from Fluvanna, and two from Greene. An additional COVID-19 fatality has been recorded in Nelson, bringing the total for the Blue Ridge Health District to 81. Statewide the death toll is 3,912. Sometime today the nation will cross the quarter-million mark for COVID deaths.

Different parts of Virginia continue to have different experiences with the pandemic this month. While not reliable as a sole indicator of community spread, percent positivity can give a glimpse into what’s happening.

Central - 5.2%

Eastern - 6%

Far Southwest - 15.2%

Near Southwest - 10.8%

Northern - 8.2%

Northwest - 5.5%

The Charlottesville School Board last night cautiously directed staff to continue planning to begin hybrid in-person education in January, though some members stated they would continue to watch the COVID numbers. (presentation from meeting)

“I also want to say that the Board at our January 4, or at our next meeting after the December 19 meeting looks at the data and says the data is going in the wrong direction, which I fully anticipate it doing, that we have to pull back,” said Chair Jennifer McKeever.

Under the current plan, pre-K through 6th grade would begin phasing back to class on January 11 and 7th through 12th would return on February 1.

Sherry Kraft is another member of the School Board.

“I’m comfortable with the idea of affirming or voting to continue working on these preparations with the understanding that we are not locking ourselves that we’re not locking ourselves into what the model says right now,” Kraft said.

Two-thirds of Charlottesville households with students want their students to return in-person according to materials presented to the School Board. Overall, 83 percent of households with students returned the survey. White families had a 92 percent return rate and households identified as People of Color had a 76 percent return rate.

Teachers were also asked to give their preference on returning and were given four options and could only choose one. Of 275 elementary teachers surveyed, 97 said they wanted to be in-person, 77 said online, 26 said both in-person and online, and 75 said they would go wherever they were needed.

McKeever said she was concerned there might not be enough teachers to move forward.

“I want elementary schools to start and to the extent that we have enough teachers, I don’t want us to get into a situation where [human resources] has to tell a teacher that ‘I need you back in the class’ or I need you to resign’,” McKeever said.

Superintendent Rosa Atkins said the school system will do what it can to stay intact.

“COVID will not last forever,” Atkins said. “We are going to get through this. It’s a difficult time for everyone and there are a lot of adjustments we’re all having to make. But we want to make this as clear and transparent as possible. We don’t want to lose any of our teachers. We want them to stay. We want to work with our staff. Keep them on board.”

The School Board will make a final decision at their meeting on December 16. They directed staff to find a way to reduce asynchronous learning in 7th graders and up.

The Board also agreed to hire a firm that can provide temporary bus drivers to provide extra trips to get students to school. COVID restrictions limit capacity to 20 students and assistant director for pupil transit Sherry Eubanks said the additional drivers are required to make sure everyone can get to school.

“We currently are using every driver we have to drive the students that we are transporting right now, so without extra help, even getting the 383 students to school is going to be a struggle,” Eubanks said.

The Board approved a process through which a contract will be worked out for the temporary drivers.

A volunteer group of computer programmers and technical experts will hold an information session tomorrow to find out more about what projects it can work on to benefit the greater Charlottesville community. Jonathan Kropko is the volunteer lead with Code for Charlottesville.

So far, Code for Charlottesville has worked on projects for the Legal Aid Justice Center, the Charlottesville Fire Department and the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights. To find new partners and volunteers, they are holding a work session tomorrow at 4 p.m for people who want to be part of the leadership team.

Kropko said the goal of the session is to listen to what the community wants.

Kropko said the goal of the information session is to try to come up with useful projects. He said that starts by recruiting volunteers.

The Code for Charlottesville MeetUp begins tomorrow at 4 p.m. for people interested in civic tech. Register here.

The Virginia Festival of the Book has announced it will hold next year’s literary celebration in a virtual capacity. The 27th annual festival will take place virtually from March 13 to March 26.

“All virtual events are free and purchasing participating authors’ books is encouraged but not required,” reads the announcement on the Virginia Humanities website.

Since April, the Virginia Festival of the Book has been holding online events called Shelf Life and they say they have had more than 22,000 viewers.

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville City Council will hold a budget work session at 1 p.m. and are expected to make some decisions on the capital improvement program. Last week they were asked to either make cuts or give consent to a plan to fully utilize all of the city’s borrowing capacity. The draft affordable housing plan calls for $10 million in spending every year for ten years. There’s a multimillion dollar project to create a new streetscape for West Main. There’s a long-running request from the schools to reconfigure the middle schools. And on Monday, they were told they’d need to spend up to $4 million to build a roundabout to calm down traffic on 5th Street. I’ll be producing a story on that to let you know what happens.

Tonight at 7 pm, Live Arts will hold another Coffeehouse. These are a series of musical acts from local artists. There are musical performances by Rob Craighurst, Courtney Jacobs, Tanya Kae, Joshua Tucker and more. This is available for free on their YouTube channel, but they are asking people consider paying what they can. Learn more on the Live Arts website.

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For today’s show, I want to take an owner’s draw and tell you to take a listen to the latest edition of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report, a podcast I began back in March to help document Virginia’s response to the pandemic. Just before I finished this program, I published the 50th episode which expands on many of the soundbites you’ll hear in this one. Thank you to all who are financially supporting this work.

There are another 1,954 new cases of COVID-19 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health, bringing the seven-day average for new daily cases to 1,823. The seven-day average for positive tests remains at 7.1 percent for a second straight day. In the Blue Ridge Health District there are another 30 new cases reported today, and the seven-day average for new daily cases is at 26 per day.

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam explained yesterday that new data showing a national surge in COVID-19 cases led him to impose new restrictions late last week.

“What really affected me is seeing mobile morgues outside of hospitals because there’s no place to put the dead,” Northam said. “We don’t need that to happen in Virginia and so I follow the data every day and I made that decision Friday morning.”

Northam said he will continue to look at the data and will make further announcements if needed.

At a press conference yesterday, Virginia Health Commissioner Norm Oliver described the situation.

“Cases have been increasing steadily over the past period,” Oliver said. “Our case incidence rate was about a month ago around 9 cases per 100,000 populations and now we’re doubling that and approaching 20 cases per 100,000.”

As of yesterday, the Virginia Department of Health reported that there have been three million PCR tests over the course of the pandemic. In the last week, there have been 130,000 tests processed.

“We have been doing a lot of testing,” Northam said. “Our average testing is about 20,000 tests per day.”

Last night, Ryan McKay of the Blue Ridge Health District addressed the Albemarle Board of Supervisors. He said that Virginia continues to do better than most states in handling the pandemic.

“While we’re seeing an increase, it’s not quite as sharp as some of our surrounding states and certainly not to the extent that we are seeing in the upper midwest,” McKay said.

McKay showed the Board of Supervisors data that showed how tougher restrictions in some parts of Virginia helped bring down caseloads at different points of the pandemic. Right now, the numbers continue to mount.

“We have been increasing in our cases per 100,000 per day for the last 27 days and again all of this contributes to decision-making that is happening that informs making those amendments to executive order 63 and 64 that implements the stronger mitigation strategy,” McKay said.

That refers to the limitation of social gatherings to 25 people or less, the lowering of the age for mask requirements to 5, and ending alcohol sales in restaurants at ten p.m.

"While the virus can certainly spread at restaurants before ten, we know that the later the event gets the more likely people are to drink and forget about social distancing,” Northam said.

It’s been eight months since Congress passed the last federal relief package for states across America. Northam wants them to take action again soon.

“We are encouraging Congress to pass another stimulus package,” Northam said. “I’ve been in touch with members of our Congressional delegation just this week about this. Now that the election is behind us, Congress needs to come together to get this done and they need to get it done now.”

Today’s positive percentage in the Blue Ridge Health District is 1.8 percent. McKay said this metric is not necessarily a good indicator of community spread.

“What we have found is that percent positive, while it is an indicator of what may be happening here, it has really been a great reflection of what could be happening locally,” McKay said. “The University of Virginia to their credit has drastically increased access to testing for students and faculty. Testing across our district particularly in Albemarle and Charlottesville has increased significantly over time so that number may not be a great reflection of what’s truly occurring in our community.”

The nation’s leading expert on pandemics addressed doctors, health care workers, and the general public yesterday.

"We are in the process of another resurgence as we enter into the much colder months of the late fall and early winter as people go indoors much more than outdoors and they're gathering with friends and with family,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a position he has held since 1984.

Fauci said this is the third outbreak of a novel coronavirus, but this one has not been contained like SARS or MERS had been earlier in the century. He talked about two vaccines that have been developed and said they show promise. But people have to continue to follow rules in place to fight further spread.

"We cannot abandon public health measures, even in the presence of a vaccine that's highly efficacious. A, because it's going to take a while to get the community completely protected as you would say. By completely, a veil of protection that truly is herd immunity for this particular infection. So we don't want there to be a signal to the community that 'ah, we have a vaccine so let down our guard!' No! It should actually be an incentive to double down until we get everybody vaccinated."

Fauci was the last guest speaker in the fall semester of the University of Virginia Medical Hour. The full video is expected to be posted shortly.

For more on this topic, take a listen to the latest edition of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

Today in meetings, Albemarle Supervisor Ann Mallek will hold a virtual town hall meeting for the White Hall Magisterial District. Albemarle has six supervisors, each of whom represent a different magisterial district. That is different from Charlottesville, which elects five people at-large. But because of COVID, Albemarle’s in-person town halls have not been possible this year. The virtual town hall beginning at 7 p.m. is the first of this era. You can ask questions in advance by sending an email to amallek@albemarle.org or asking in the session. (meeting info)

Other meetings:

The Fifth and Avon Community Advisory Committee meets at 7 p.m. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Human Rights Commission meets at 6:30 p.m. (meeting info)

The Fluvanna Board of Supervisors meets at 7 p.m. (meeting info)

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to plant native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page and tell them Lonnie Murray sent you!

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam will hold a press conference this afternoon at 2 p.m. One thing you will hear during his appearance is that there are another 2,071 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today, and the statewide percent positivity rating dropped to 7.1 percent from 7.4 yesterday. One question that may come up at the meeting is what that metric is actually telling us.

Today’s new numbers bring the statewide seven-day average for new daily cases to 2,071. In the Blue Ridge Health District, the statewide seven-day average for new daily cases is 26. There are no new fatalities.

While we’re on the subject, Dr. Anthony Fauci will speak at noon as a regular installment of the University of Virginia’s Medical Center Hour. Dr. Fauci is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. His lecture will cover the latest developments related to COVID-19, including how to prevent transmission, caring for patients with the virus, medical treatments for COVID-19 and vaccine research. (register)

A volunteer group created to help shape policy about parking and transportations issues in downtown Charlottesville has endorsed a proposal from staff to hire a private contractor to enforce parking tickets. Charlottesville Parking Director Rick Siebert reminded the Parking Advisory Panel yesterday that there are many on-street parking spots that stop being free to the driver after the posted time limit expires.

“I believe if we had more consistent parking enforcement that people would only stay for two hours or less in the two hour spaces,” Siebert said.

Siebert was originally hired to implement a parking action plan that included installing parking meters that would raise revenue for the city to pay for downtown improvements, but a six month pilot in 2017 and 2018 was not completed. Siebert said the city can still collect some of those revenues through more consistent enforcement.

“I think it’s difficult with the police being solely responsible for this function for them to focus on that as a matter of importance given the number of issues that they realistically face every single day,” Siebert said.

Siebert said a private contractor would be solely focused on this function and could also expand enforcement elsewhere in the city, including permit parking in residential areas. The idea has the support of Kirby Hutto, the panel’s chair.

“Without consistent enforcement, people learn to take advantage and to just ignore the signs and that’s bad for downtown because then those spaces are not in rotation,” Hutto said.

However, Charlottesville Economic Development Director Chris Engel said not everyone in local government supports the idea.

“There is some reluctance on the part of the police department,” Engel said. “The concern is that what happens when an enforcement officer gives a ticket erroneously and that needs to be appealed. The citizen is naturally going to knock on the police department’s door because they expect that’s where it came from and it creates a situation where people are going to the wrong place, complaining to the wrong person. There could be some confusion there.”

However, the panel unanimously recommended a resolution in support of the idea. Joan Fenton is another member.

“Personally, I think politically its a good time to present this again as people are asking to rethink how the police are, what jobs the police are needed to do and not to do,” Fenton said.

Siebert said that if Council supports the idea, it would likely take six months from issuing a request for proposals for the switch to be made.

The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review has indicated at a preliminary review that it would support a mural on the side of 1001 West Main where Starbucks wants to open a new pick-up only franchise.

“It’s one of our latest new formats of a store that we’ve been rolling out,” said Ena Yang, a designer with Starbucks. “We have three stores that are open. Two in New York City and one in Toronto, Canada. This particular store we do not have any seating. Our lobby space is only 300 square foot where the customers are encouraged to pick up their order and be on the go.”

At issue before the BAR was whether the east-facing wall that slopes down 10th Street should be adorned with a colorful mural. The building in question is a former auto repair shop that is a contributing structure in the West Main Architectural Design Control District. Historic preservation planner Jeff Werner said there were some restrictions

“Anything within a mural that is interpreted as a Starbucks related or coffee related could be interpreted as a sign so be very careful with the artwork so that it doesn’t come across as ‘come in here and buy coffee,” Werner said.

Yang said there would be no images to promote coffee. Chair Carl Schwarz said he supported the preliminary design of the mural.

“This is an interesting part of town where you can have a lot of color and excitement and it’s not going to distract from anything historic,” Schwarz said.

Werner encouraged representatives from Starbucks to reach out to the community and to be ready for comment. Yang said they would do so.

“I understand it is a very prominent location and it’s a very busy intersection,” Yang said. “We don’t want to offend anyone. We are Starbucks. We are a global company. We want to make sure that what we put on a building of this size and at such a prominent location could be messaging that represents Starbucks. As to getting some of the community involvement, I would love your advice and guidance on what are some of the steps we can take to ensure this mural really speaks true to the community.”

Yang said the next step is to continue working with the artist in a way that will not cover up any of the existing windows.

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority got an update yesterday on how the pandemic has affected local from the director of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau. Courtney Cacatian said the area had a brief upsurge in October when local hotels had a 70 percent occupancy rate.

“That is 20 occupancy points higher than the state average for October,” Cacatian said. She added that number includes rooms booked by the University of Virginia for quarantine and isolation purposes, as well as those currently being used to help serve homeless individuals.

However, forecasts of consumer desire to travel indicate levels have dropped to that of earlier this spring.

“The way I read this is that we can still talk about Charlottesville and Albemarle about being a destination because people are receptive to that message, but they are not willing to travel here right now,” Cacatian said.

The CACVB will be pivoting to put out a message for people to buy local in order to help promote small business at this time so venues and establishments can still be open when the pandemic is over. In 2019, about 3,500 people were employed in the tourism sector in Albemarle County.

“The elements about our destination that our visitors enjoy are very similar to the elements that our residents enjoy as well,” Cacatian said.

Cacatian said sharp declines are still projected for November and beyond into the spring.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at 1 p.m. for a meeting that begins with a proclamation in support of front-line workers that reaffirms the county’s commitment to partnerships to help increase the well-being of those who continue to provide services during the pandemic. (resolution)

There is also a work session on the strategic plan and the capital improvement plan. Then the county’s zoning code enforcement officer will make a presentation on how that process works. In the evening there is an update from Dr. Denise Bonds of the Blue Ridge Health District. One of the things she is expected to talk about is how the seven-day average for positive COVID tests is not necessarily a metric to gauge community spread. (agenda)

The Nelson County Planning Commission meets at 7 p.m. in the General District Courtroom in the county courthouse in Lovingston. On the agenda is a review of a major site plan amendment to allow Camp Blue Ridge to build a multi-purpose facility to replace their recently condemned cafeteria and a long-demolished gymnasium. (agenda)

The Ridge Street Priority Neighborhood Task Force will meet at 4 p.m. It will be interesting to hear their thoughts on Council’s discussion regarding the 5th Street roundabout (meeting info)

Later on in the evening, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will hold a town hall and virtual conversation on the State of the Society. This year the ACHS hired a new executive director, Tom Chapman, and he wants to lead a community discussion on the organization’s vision, mission and values. Some of the questions: (zoom link) (facebook live link)

What does the future hold for the ACHS?

What role does history play in shaping our community, and vice versa?

What are the silver linings to the dark clouds of a world-wide pandemic and a national reckoning with racial inequality?

Tomorrow in meetings, the Albemarle County Service Authority meets at 9 a.m. The ACSA is the organization that provides water and sewer to residents of Albemarle County and is governed by a six-person citizen advisory board. There is no equivalent in the City of Charlottesville. (meeting info)

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit communityengagement.substack.com/subscribe

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Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is for the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Campaign, an initiative that wants you to plant native plants in yards, farms, public spaces and gardens in the northern Piedmont. Native plants provide habitat, food sources for wildlife, ecosystem resiliency in the face of climate change, and clean water. Start at the Plant Northern Piedmont Natives Facebook page to learn how you can prepare for next spring.

There is no caveat placed on today’s count of 2,125 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia this morning from the Department of Health. That’s now the highest one-day total without an asterisk, higher than the 2,103 reported on November 7. The seven-day average for new daily cases is 1,693.

The percent positivity for PCR tests continues to rise and is at 7.4 percent today, up from 7.3 percent yesterday and 6 percent on November 7.

Another metric that demonstrates the rise of cases in Virginia is the total number of new cases per 100,000 of population. The statewide figure today is 259.3, up from 169.5 a month ago on October 17.

The number of people confirmed to have died of COVID in Virginia is now 3,835. That’s 413 more people since October 17.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 23 cases, bringing the seven day average to 24. The percent positivity rate for PCR tests dropped to 2.1 percent from 2.7 percent, but that is in part based on an additional 4,668 tests processed yesterday.

Looking around the rest of Virginia, the city of Roanoke posted a record 82 cases this morning reported another 5 deaths today. The city of Lynchburg reported 41 cases today and 43 cases yesterday. Their total number of cases per 100,000 population is 311.7. The city of Harrisonburg reported 35 new cases, though that number is nowhere close to their one-day total of 143 on September 8, 2020, around the time James Madison University returned to in-person instruction.

Tazewell County reported another 28 cases today, and their total number per 100,000 population is 570.3 Roanoke County reported another 64 cases, and their 14-day metric is 456. Wise County reports another 23 cases today, and their 14-day metric is 826.1.

Looking at percent positivity rates throughout Virginia. Keep in mind this is just one metric and it alone does not give a full picture of community spread.

Central - 6.3%

Eastern Region - 6.4%

Far Southwest - 16.4%

Near Southwest - 10.2%

Northern - 8%

Northwest - 5.7%

Charlottesville City Council spent about an hour last night discussing ways to address speeding concerns on 5th Street Extended, a four-lane highway that heads south from downtown Charlottesville that has seen more residential neighborhoods built over the years.

One person concerned with recent crashes on 5th Street lives around the intersection at Bailey Road.

“I walk on 5th Street almost everyday,” said Kristen Lucas. “I bike to work sometimes on 5th Street. And I walked out my door when there was a crash and someone had passed away on 5th Street and I strongly support changes to 5th Street to make it safer not only for drivers but also for pedestrians and bikers and those that are living on this road.”

Lucas and about 1,400 other people signed a petition to ask Council to push for changes to the roadway. She said she wanted more than for the city to limit the speed, and she supported roundabouts and other traffic calming measures.

Traffic engineer Brennen Duncan wrote a report that outlined how vehicular speed has played a role in the five fatal accidents that have taken place in the past four years.

“It’s my assertion that there’s really not a speeding problem with the posted speed limit of 45 but I have said in my report to Council that we do have a corridor that allows for higher speeds for those that want to break the speed limit,” Duncan said.

Duncan’s suggestions for short-term solutions include reducing the speed limit to 40 miles per hour and additional lighting. Mid-term solutions could be informed by studies such as a 2018 study of the entire 5th and Ridge Street corridor.

Joan Albiston of the Willoughby neighborhood singled out a specific intervention that she favored.

“I have read the traffic engineers report for 5th Street and I would like to thank them for their recommendations to make 5th Street safer,” Albiston said. “In particular I would like to thank for recommending a flashing yellow area in place of a green light.”

These would be for permissive left-hand turns. Duncan explains the logic behind adding these flashing yellow lights.

“Nothing changes about the functionality,” Duncan said. “You’re supposed to yield on a green ball anyway but it really has been found that it alerts drivers more they are supposed to yield in that condition.”

For a mid-term solution, Duncan is recommending a roundabout just north of Bailey Road.

“What the roundabout would do is really put a damper on [high speeds] right in the middle of the corridor where drivers are forced to slow down,” Duncan said.

Duncan said that 18,000 vehicles use the roadway every day, and more efforts need to be made to get people out of their cars and onto buses. He said there could be as many as 500 more residential units in this area in the several years if undeveloped property is built upon.

The mother of a man who died in a motorcycle crash had the chance to address Council about the issue.

“My name is Binta Rose and my son was one of the fatalities on 5th Street Extended,” Rose said. “I had some concerns about that roadway as well. Even though speed may have contributed to his fatality I just had a question about the, I know that you guys are talking about some lighting in the area, and I know that the cars that pull out of the driveways there. My son driving down that road, an SUV pulled out into the traffic so he tried to avoid the vehicle and he hit a tree.”

Rose said the crash happened at night when there was no lighting. She also said she wants the roadway’s character to be less of a speedway.

Council agreed to the lower speeds and the flashing yellow light. For other solutions, Council will further discuss the topic at a budget work session on the capital improvement program budget on Friday that begins at 1 p.m.

City Council also approved $100,000 in CARES Contingency funding to go to city employees who have either been laid off or have had their hours reduced. They can request up to $1,000 for assistance, depending on income level. Kaki Dimock is the director of human services.

“A thousand dollars is certainly helpful and it is symbolic,” Dimock said. “It’s not addressing someone’s poverty concerns. It might be very critical for that month but it’s certainly not a sufficient amount of money to address someone’s ongoing concerns.”

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Planning Commission will have a work session at 6 p.m. on technical language intended to translate the vision of an urban Rio/29 area into reality. Michaela Accardi of the Department of Community Development described the existing conditions in the area slated for what is known as a “form-based zoning code.”

“The area that this planning effort is referring to is about 400 acres around the Rio Road and Route 29 intersection and most of the properties in this area are commercial single use properties,” Accardi said. “The vision for this plan is a connected network of complete streets designed for all types of users, a network of public spaces that are sustainable and usable and enrich the community, and a vibrant and diverse mixture of uses.

For more on how this vision has worked in other communities, read this very long article I wrote last summer on how Arlington, Leesburg, and Virginia Beach have employed form-base code.

The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review meets at 530 p.m. and will hold a preliminary review on the conversion of 1001 West Main Street into a Starbucks coffee chain as well as review of a modification to the approved design at Dairy Central and an intermediate review of a four-story building planned at 612 West Main Street where a University Tire Franchise now stands. (meeting info)

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. Among the items on the agenda will be an update on tourism in the area from Courtney Cacatian, executive director of the Charlottesville-Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau. They’ll also vote on a proposal to add public comment at EDA meetings. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Parking Advisory Panel meets at 3:30 p.m. for an update on the future parking structure as well as an introduction of the Parking Action Plan adopted by Council in January 2017 when they purchased the land for said structure at a cost of $2.85 million with no prior public input. (meeting info)

The CVille Plans Together initiative will hold another webinar to introduce the draft affordable housing plan to anyone interested. (meeting info)

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority meets following the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority, which begins at 2 p.m. (agendas for both)

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The Virginia Department of Health is reporting its highest one-day total of COVID cases this morning, but there’s a caveat.

“The 2,677 case count reported on Monday, November 16 is due to a catch-up from the VDH data system being down for upgrades for a few hours over the weekend,” reads a statement on the VDH portal, which goes on to direct people to look at the metrics in a different way.

“In order to observe the spread of illness most effectively, please review the charts that show cases by date of symptom onset,” the statement continues.

With this new information, the seven day average for new daily cases is now 1,594.

The seven-day rate for positive tests statewide has increased to 7.3 percent up from 7 percent on Sunday, and 6.1 percent last Monday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 41 cases reported today, with 16 from Charlottesville, 14 from Albemarle, four from Louisa, three from Fluvanna, three from Greene and three from Nelson. The percent positivity for PCR tests in the district increased to 2.7 percent from 2.5 percent Sunday. The percent positivity for all tests is 3.2 percent, up from 3 percent yesterday.

City Council tonight will discuss options to help reduce speeding on 5th Street, which has been the scene of several fatal accidents in recent years. A petition to change the character of the street now has over 1,400 signatures.

One option is to build a roundabout in the middle of a long stretch of a four lane divided highway. The topic also came up at Council’s budget work session on November 12. (read Duncan’s report)

“That is kind of an interim solution to try and calm some of the traffic and break up the long straightaway that’s there,” said Brennen Duncan, the city’s traffic engineer. “That would go just north of where Bailey us, kind of where the community gardens are today.”

Duncan said the owner of an undeveloped property to the west would be interested in donating land as long as they were able to get vehicular access to the roundabout. He said this is just an idea now and would need further research if Council wanted to move forward. Duncan estimated the roundabout would cost between $3 million and $4 million. In his staff report, Duncan said there are other options to reduce speeds.

“We don’t really have a traffic problem, or a speeding problem for the majority of traffic, but we do have a long straight roadway that will allow people to get up to speed if they choose,” Duncan said.

Last Thursday Councilors were asked to give staff direction on their appetite for tax increases to pay for increased capital spending, or whether they should make cuts to previously approved programs in order to stay within the city’s debt capacity. Read the first part of this story from Friday’s newscast.

However, Council did not make any decisions about what to do because they said they need more information. In summary, the elected officials said they know they will need to make cuts, but need more information about how to proceed. Here’s Vice Mayor Sena Magill.

"There is no way that we're getting out of this without cutting things that we all care about tremendously," Magill said.

Council meets later today, but will also meet on Friday to further discuss the budget.

Those with paid subscriptions will get a more detailed version of this story later on today, and it will be posted on infocville.com before Friday.

Today in meetings:

The Virginia State Board of Elections meets today at 1 p.m. to certify the election. (agenda)

Albemarle County will hold the second of two information meetings for property owners within the scope of the proposed Rio Road form-based zoning code. This virtual meeting begins at noon. This is not the last time we’ll hear about this proposal this week. (meeting info)

The Albemarle Architectural Review Board meets at 1 p.m. The only item listed on the agenda is a decision over what blocks in the Brookhill development should come before the panel for review. Brookhill was rezoned in November 2016 and will bring between 600 and 800 homes. This is a good chance to get an update on where the project stands. (meeting info)

Places 29 Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee meets at 5:30 p.m. There will be a presentation entitled “Neighborhood Strength: Lessons from Bamboo Grove”, referring to a recent rezoning in Crozet. Then the group will get updates on the county’s housing policy, and an update on efforts to increase broadband access. (meeting info)

The Village of Rivanna Community Advisory Committee meets virtually for the first time since the pandemic. They’ll get an update on the “development dashboard” updated by county planners. The Breezy Hill rezoning is not on the agenda, but could conceivably come up in conversation. (meeting info)

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A sudden announcement of further COVID-19 restrictions yesterday has triggered a need for a special Saturday installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement for November 14, 2020. I’m your host Sean Tubbs.

To begin today, I want to draw attention to my friend Charlene Munford’s Go Fund Me campaign to help take her Monster Cleaning business to the next level. Earlier this year, Charlene tackled a huge job at my house, clearing and cleaning a basement gone wrong. Take a look at her story and see what you can do. Her business now offers COVID-19 fogging equipment. Details in the print ad at the bottom of this newsletter.

Governor Ralph Northam has imposed additional restrictions to stop the spread of COVID-19 in advance of the holidays. For instance, private gatherings will be limited to no more than 25 people and restaurants must close by midnight.

“Across Virginia, coronavirus cases are on the rise,” Northam said. “Our statewide percent positivity is going up. And we’re seeing more and more people hospitalized with this virus, and more people are dying.”

Northam said the increase is straining hospitals and medical facilities across Virginia, at the same time that America sets a new daily record of new cases every day. On November 7, there were 125,932 new daily cases. That number climbed to 181,194 yesterday. Northam said it was time to take action.

“All essential businesses will follow the requirements on social distancing, cleaning, and wearing face coverings,” Northam said. “This means grocery stores, home improvement stores and others.”

The requirement to wear masks in indoor public places has been lowered to age 5, down from age 10.

“Numbers are going up in every region of the state and we must act as one Commonwealth to get this virus under control,” Northam said. “Virginia is not an island. While our cases may not be rising as rapidly as some states, I do not intend to wait until they are.”

Northam said contact tracing has revealed that the virus is spreading in indoor places where people take their masks off and in small social gatherings such as dinner parties.

“And it’s spreading when people ignore the science and don’t think they need to wear a mask inside,” Northam said. “Careless behavior by one person puts everyone into contact with at risk.

The changes come in the form of an amendment to Executive Order 67 and Order of Public Health Emergency Seven.

On the day after the announcement, the Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,537 new cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth, and the percent positivity has increased to 6.8 percent. That figure was 6.5 percent yesterday.

There are another 23 cases in the Blue Ridge Health District, with eight from Albemarle, seven from Charlottesville, three from Greene, three from Louisa, one in Fluvanna and one in Nelson. Another person from Albemarle has died, bringing the total in that county to 26 and 80 in the district since the pandemic began.

Cases continue to rise in Southwest Virginia. Some examples. Washington County on the Tennessee border reports another 42 cases today. Three hours to the east, Roanoke County reports another 27 cases and Botetourt County reports another 38 cases. The Centers for Disease Control use a 14-day period to measure percent positivity. As of yesterday, Botetourt’s rate is 10.9 percent, Roanoke’s is 10.6 percent, and Washington’s is 13.4 percent.

Looking elsewhere in the state, Arlington reports another 50 cases today, Chesterfield County reports another 60 cases and the city of Virginia Beach reports another 92 cases. Fourteen day percent positivity is lower in those areas, with 5.8 percent in Arlington, 6.6 percent in Chesterfield and 6.6 percent in Virginia Beach. The percent positivity in Albemarle is 1 percent and 1.2 percent in Charlottesville. However, those numbers are low due to the number of frequent tests of athletes and other personnel at the University of Virginia.

In West Virginia, Governor Jim Justice announced he would toughen the statewide mask mandate in a daily briefing on Friday the 13th.

“Ironically we have had 13 deaths since Wednesday,” Justice said. “In nine months, we have lost 248,000 Americans due to COVID. Honestly, we have got to realize what we are dealing with here. It is really, a massive, massive killer.”

At his briefing, Justice listed recent fatalities in the state before going on to make the announcement. He observed that West Virginia is one of the states with the highest amount of elderly population per capita.

“We have been pleading with people over and over and over again to wear their mask,” Justice said. “We know the situation that the vaccine is on the way but it is not here yet.”

Justice issued executive orders that require facial coverings to be worn indoors at all times. Prior to midnight tonight, the directive was advisory.

“We are making this ultra mandatory especially now, or making this as an ultra mandatory at this time especially for all of our businesses,” Justice said. (Watch Justice’s briefing)

Tennessee does not have a mask mandate, but North Carolina, Maryland and Kentucky do.

Earlier this week, President-elect Joe Biden announced an advisory group for COVID-19. During his remarks, he implored people to wear a facial covering.

“It doesn’t matter who you voted for or where you stood before election day. It doesn’t matter your party, your point of view. We can save tens of thousands of lives if everyone would just wear a mask for the next few months. not Democrat or Republican lives but American lives. Maybe we’ll save the life of a person who stocks the shelves at your local grocery store. Maybe saves the life of a member of your place of worship. Maybe it saves the lives of one of your children’s teachers. Maybe it saves your life. So please, I implore you. Wear a mask. Do it for yourself. Do it for your neighbor. A mask is not a political statement but it is a good way to start pulling the country together.”

For more from President-elect Biden, take a listen to the latest episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

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Do you have triskaidekaphobia? Then today is not the day for you, for it is November 13th, 2020, the second time this year that the 13th day of the month has fallen on a Friday. The last time was back in March, and we all know what happened next. So let’s be extra careful today after hearing this installment of the Charlottesville Community Engagement newscast and newsletter. I’m your host, Sean Tubbs.

Today's Patreon-fueled shout-out is from a supporter who wants you to consider a donation for Monica Johnson, a Pro Strongwoman who will be competing in a charity powerlifting event on November 21 called Make Every Rep Count. Gregory Carey-Medlock is donating 30 cents for every pound Monica squats to the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank. You can choose between three other charities. Learn more at Shenandoah Power. Sponsors accepted through November 14.

There are another 1,235 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today, and the seven-day average for positive tests remains at 6.5 percent for a second straight day. The seven day-average for new daily cases is 1,499.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are four new cases today. This is a good time to remind you that these numbers are always subject to change as new information comes in. For instance, Albemarle’s total number of cases dropped by one to 1,688 since the pandemic began. This could mean that the person’s locality was originally reported incorrectly. Charlottesville, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson all added one case each. The seven-day average for new daily cases in the district is 22 and the percent positivity has increased to 2.1 percent.

The University of Virginia COVID-19 tracker shows 66 active cases with 47 of them students. These numbers have been increasing this week and watch for an update later on this afternoon.

Flood waters have receded all across Virginia, and the Town of Scottsville has contended with the highest level the James River has reached since 2010. According to the National Weather Service, the river crested at 19.5 feet and will slowly lower throughout the next 24 hours.

The town’s fire department reached the second stage of flood control alert and closed off the flood control walls at Perry Street. Scottsville has experienced many floods throughout its history, according to the Scottsville Museum. A levee has been in place since 1990.

Charlottesville’s appointed officials sought fiscal clarity from Charlottesville’s elected officials during a budget work session last night that sought to gauge Council’s willingness to seek additional revenues to pay for major projects. John Blair is the interim city manager.

“As you all know there are a number of large scale capital projects that have been talked about in various iterations through the past few years but what I’ve asked our budget team is to provide you with some numbers that are going to demonstrate using your debt capacity for various projects,” Blair said.

Blair said that the city is close to its debt capacity and more projects will likely require tax increases, but he said that topic was not directly before them. Blair’s budget for FY2022 will not be unveiled until March. It will also be the first to be prepared under this Council.

“Obviously I think a number of you have interest in various capital needs whether it be affordable housing, education, infrastructure,” Blair said. He also said this would send a message to would-be city managers about the kind of city this Council wants it to be.

For now, the budget is in the very early stages of formation because exact revenues aren’t yet known. Budget staff needed to know Council’s thoughts on whether to change a key policy to increase the amount of bonds that could be sold to pay for capital projects. Doing so will increase the amount the city needs to spend on debt service to pay back those who buy those bonds for a steady return.

We have been in fiscal year 2021 since July 1, and a decision was made by Council earlier this year to continue with $25.8 million of projects in the capital budget, and they signaled support for a total five-year plan of $124.1 million.

“We were going to fund $84 million of this five year plan with bonds, and if you recall, due to COVID, just about all of the cash that was originally intended to go to the CIP was held in a reserve with the general fund to offset any of the unknowns,” said Krissy Hammill, Senior Budget and Management Analyst for the city of Charlottesville.

Practice has been to use a mixture of cash and bonds to pay for capital projects and since 2010, the average has been 37 percent. For this year’s capital budget, 93 percent will be paid for through bonds. Currently the city has about $90 million in government debt, $80 million of which is for bonds that have been approved for projects but not yet issued.

“That means that we typically issue bonds on a cash-needed basis so we don’t issue the bonds until the project is either imminent or underway because we do have spending requirements that once we issue the bonds we typically need to spend that money within 24 months,” Hammill said.

Hammill said the city has been building up a fund balance to help reduce the amount of cash that needs to go to debt service each year. But at some point, the city will need additional cash from property taxes to make up the difference. Hammill showed a hypothetical situation where $32 million in new bonds are floated each year through FY2027. That would increase the debt service steadily over time, from $11 million in F2022 to $19.2 million by FY2026.

“You’ve basically built in the need for a penny of additional revenue, that’s equivalent to basically a penny a year,” Hammill said, adding that in further years, the need for additional revenues would continue to grow.

To put it colloquially, Hammill effectively stated that the city can float an additional $52 million in bonds without maxing out the credit card. Potential projects include additional spending at the future parking garage, reconfiguration of city schools and continued investments in affordable housing.

What did Council have to say? I’ll have a report out on that by tomorrow morning, potentially in a Saturday edition of this program.

(take a look at the slides)

The city of Charlottesville is looking for a new human resources director. City spokesman Brian Wheeler confirmed Thursday that Michele Vineyard will leave the position after just over a year. The job is advertised for between $100,000 and $156,178 and the position closes on November 30. Vineyard began work on October 21, 2019 at a salary of $145,000 according to an article that month in the Daily Progress. Wheeler said she will continue to work with the city on a part-time basis to help with the transition to a new director.

How can communities across the mid-Atlantic prepare for predicted bouts of irregular weather and erratic storms? The nonprofit group Resilient Virginia is seeking to draw awareness to the importance of creating plans to be ready for sudden shocks and stresses related to climate change. Annette Osso is the group's managing director.

"As we know and we've seen the Commonwealth is facing increasing challenges from extreme weather events whether they be storms, flooding, sea level rise, tornadoes, and unpredictable weather patterns that impact economic and social life," Osso said November 9 during the latest presentation that is part of her group's 2020 Resiliency Academy.

Speakers were from the Resilient Rural America Project, which creates educational modules for residents and decision-makers in rural areas on how to increase resilience. Dr. Gwen Griffith is the program director of the Model Forest Policy Program.

"The rural lands and waters are vital to all of us, urban and rural alike, in terms of serving our needs," Griffith said. "Rural economics of course is a vital part. It's the underpinning of all of our other economic systems."

Griffith said those services include rivers that provide water to urban areas, and trees and lands that offset greenhouse gas emissions.

"And those natural services are definitely being impacted as changes conditions are happening around the globe and right here in Virginia," Griffith said. "And the most common form of those changes is being seen as extreme weather impacts."

Griffith said in the last five years, there has been $535 billion worth of disaster losses due to extreme weather. However, she said those dollars can sometimes be considered an investment if they can restore conditions in a way that mitigates future weather effects.

"We know now that for example when you do flood mitigation for river flooding, you could have a return of as much of $7 in savings from every $1 you invest in that mitigation activity," Griffith said.

Next up for Resilient Virginia is planning for the conference coming up next July.

The Jefferson-Madison Regional Library is further extending hours for curbside service at the Central Library and the Gordon Avenue Library.

“We're pleased to offer more options for patrons picking up curbside items; adding an additional evening for those working during the day, and Monday morning for those who want to pick up earlier in the week,” said Camille Thompson, Gordon Avenue Library Branch Manager.

Central Library (curbside service only): Mondays 10am to 7pm; Tuesdays through Saturdays 10am to 5pm; Sundays 1pm to 5pm

Gordon Avenue Library (curbside service only): Mondays and Wednesdays 10am to 7pm; Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays 10am to 4pm

There are also expanded hours at the Greene County Library and the Louisa County Library. For more information about hours and services, visit jmrl.org.

In addition, the Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library will begin collecting donations for its annual book sale at the Gordon Avenue location only, Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. I’ll repeat - at the Gordon Avenue location only.

Looking for a movie to go and see tomorrow night? The City of Charlottesville will show the 2013 film Free Birds about two turkeys who travel back in time to prevent the advent of Thanksgiving. Tickets for the event at Charlottesville High School are $20 a car load. (buy tickets)

In meetings today, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority will hold an emergency meeting on safety issues today at 2 p.m. to discuss recent violence, the police response, and the hiring of Millennium Security. (meeting link)

If you're looking for something to listen to, consider a radio play from Live Arts! They will debut ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA IN SPACE! The work on YouTube is written and directed by Alexander Bulova, a videographer, writer, and director living in Fairfax, Virginia. (learn more)

One correction today. Yesterday I reported on State Farm deciding to vacate its operations center on Pantops. I incorrectly stated they owned the property when in fact it is held by an investment group called JDM II SF NATIONAL LLC which purchased many State Farms operations centers across the country in 2014, from another group that purchased them from State Farm in 2013. The property records in Albemarle’s GIS lists the same Bloomington, Indiana, address for the owner as the corporate office of the insurance company.

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Today marks eight months since Governor Ralph Northam declared a state of emergency due to the novel coronavirus, and localities soon followed suit. The seven-day average for positive COVID-19 tests has jumped to 6.5 percent today, up from 6.2 percent yesterday. That number was 4.5 percent on October 12.

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,521 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth today, bringing the seven-day daily average to 1,546. There have been another 17 deaths reported in the last day, bringing the total to 3,758.

There has been another death in the Blue Ridge Health District bringing the total to 79. The deceased is a resident of Albemarle County. Since the pandemic began, all of the fatalities have been of people over the age of 50.

There are another 28 cases in the district and the 7-day daily average is now 27. That consists of 16 from Charlottesville, seven from Albemarle, four from Greene, and one from Fluvanna. Since the pandemic began, there have been a total of 4,761 cases in the district. Of those, nearly 45 percent have been in people between the ages of 10 and 30. People over the age of 80 have made up 5.1 percent of cases, but 59.5 percent of all fatalities.

Looking at Southwest Virginia, cases have been increasing in VDH’s Far Southwest region for 52 days and the percent positivity is 13.7 percent. Outbreaks in congregate centers are also increasing. The percent positivity rate in the Near Southwest region is 5.9 percent and the number of cases has been increasing for 20 days. Percent positivity in the Eastern region is 5.6 percent, 5.9 percent in the Central region and 6.7 percent in the Northern region. Albemarle and Charlottesville are within the Northwest region, where cases have been increasing for 21 days and the percent positivity is 5.3 percent. (VDH’s region metrics page)

Several inches of rain fell on the area within the past day, and the National Weather Service depicts the North Fork of the Rivanna River near Earlysville above flood stage this morning with a projected crest of 17.48 feet. Flood stage is 14 feet. The James River is expected to crest at 20.7 feet sometime early tomorrow morning with flood stage considered at 20 feet. The Town of Scottsville announced on their Twitter feed that flood control pumping is underway and that people should use caution if going to view the river.

State Farm Insurance will no longer use the building it owns on Pantops as an operations center. The Albemarle office is one of 12 such facilities that will be closed but employees will continue to work from home.

“Most employees assigned to these locations have been working from home since March and will continue to do so,” said Gina Morss-Fischer, a public affairs specialist with State Farm. “As a company, maintaining flexibility in how and where we work is just one of the many ways we can better serve customers.”

Morss-Fischer said a timeline will be developed for the withdrawal from the facilities. According to Albemarle’s GIS, the 35 acre property is owned by an LLC called JDM II SF NATIONAL LLC C/O STATE FARM MUTUAL AUTOMOBILE with an address of One State Farm Place in Bloomington, Illinois.

The future land use map in the Pantops Master Plan considers the area an employment district. (page 32, here!)

Parents and guardians of students in Charlottesville City Schools have until tomorrow to tell school officials whether they plan to return to in-person instruction or remain online-only. The city School Board has not yet made a final decision for how to proceed in January and February but there is a plan.

“For students in pre-K through 6th grade we would offer four days a week in-person and with Fridays like they are now,” said school spokeswoman Krissy Vick in a video about the Return to Learn plan. “For students at Buford, [Charlottesville High School] and Lugo-McGinness Academy, the in-person option would be two days a week at school and three days virtual.”

All students will be required to comply with a safety plan and would be asked to quarantine if there was a case in their classroom. The “learning intent form” also requests whether the pupils will need bus services and states that such service will be extremely limited.

More information is available on the school’s Return to Learn website.

Albemarle County moved to a hybrid in-person model this week, but all school buildings will be closed today due to concerns over flooding. The School Board meets at 6:30 p.m. and will get a COVID-19 update from Superintendent Matt Haas. The presentation included in the packet cites low positive percentivity and a 14-day trend of decreasing caseloads. (presentation)

Other items on the agenda include approval of the design for the Boys and Girls Club facility planned for the Lambs Lane Campus and an update on implementation of the division’s anti-racism policy. On the consent agenda, they will also approve schematic design for High School Center II, for which funds have not yet been appropriated. (agenda)

Schools in Greene County are also closed today.

Today at noon, the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership will unveil a new online portal intended to connect people who are looking for housing units whose costs are partially covered with a subsidy or otherwise made affordable. Chip Boyles is the executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, which runs the housing partnership.

“The goal started out to be to help both families and property owners search for and market affordable housing,” Boyles said. “And then the pandemic hit and we determined that there was a much more immediate need to pursue assistance for rental housing knowing that a lot of people might be relocating due to negative effects of the pandemic.”

Boyles said the project will concentrate on rental housing at first but will add for sale units.

“Even at the regional level there are very few for-sale products in the inventory and so having a search tool with only a very limited number of products is not going to be very useful to people,” Boyles said.

Boyles said the regional housing locator will likely soon include Augusta County because of the large number of people who work in the Charlottesville area but reside in that community.

Today in meetings, there’s an awful lot going on today.

Charlottesville City Council meets at 6 p.m. for a work session on the capital improvement program. That’s the separate budget that lays out what big projects the city is going to work on in the next five years. The agenda for meeting states they will discuss the idea of adding additional floors to a future municipal parking garage, whether to spend money to improve access to the Dogwood Memorial in McIntire Park, and funding improvements that would address traffic safety on 5th Street. A petition calling for the latter now has 1,374 signatures.

The main thrust of the meeting is a discussion of current debt and whether taxes may have to be increased to pay for future capital projects. A chart in the presentation projects increased spending on debt service in the next few years. Around $10.6 million is expected to be spent on debt service in the current fiscal year, but that is expected to be over $15 million by FY2027. Of concern is whether the city can continue to keep its AAA bond rating, which keeps interest payments lower.

The current draft of an affordable housing plan being created as part of the Cville Plans Together initiative calls for $10 million a year in funding to increase the number of below-market units in the city. Other questions include if the city wants to proceed with a long-planned project to reconfigure city schools and how it should proceed with future phases of the West Main Streetscape. (presentation)

Other meetings:

The Crozet Community Advisory Committee meets virtually at 7 p.m. and review community input to date on the Crozet Master Plan update. They will also look at a draft Future Land Use Map that seeks to guide the direction of growth in the unincorporated designated growth area. (meeting info)

The Albemarle Solid Waste Alternatives Advisory Committee will meet at 4 p.m. On the agenda is a presentation from Patrick McDonald of Sonoco Recycling. (meeting info)

Interested in the idea of a pedestrian bridge to connect eastern Charlottesville with the Pantops area of Albemarle County? The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission will hold a meeting to demonstrate a feasibility study for two options. One would cost $11.3 million while the other would cost $15.3 million. Neither the Board of Supervisors or Charlottesville City Council have discussed such a project, though the two communities did participate in a 2014 study the TJPDC conducted that looked at alternatives to relieve congestion on Free Bridge. (feasibility study)

The Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board meets at 6:30 p.m. and will get a review from Delegate Sally Hudson on legislation on civilian oversight that passed the special session. (agenda)

The Charlottesville Community Development Block Grant Task Force at 3:30 p.m. (meeting info)

The Louisa County Planning Commission meets at 7 p.m. in person at the the Louisa County office building. (agenda)

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The eleventh day of the eleventh month has arrived, and we remember our veterans today, especially those who may not have made it through this difficult year. This November 11, 2020 edition of the program is dedicated to their memory.

There are another 1,594 new cases of COVID-19 reported by the Virginia Department of Health this morning. That brings the seven-day average for new daily cases to 1,524. The seven-day average for positive test results remains at 6.2 percent statewide today.

There are another 18 cases in the Blue Ridge Health District reported today, bringing the seven-day average to 26. The percent positivity for the district for PCR tests has increased to 2 percent, up from 1.8 percent yesterday.

Governor Ralph Northam is asking Virginians to continue to follow health guidelines to stop the spread of COVID-19 but said yesterday he is not likely to impose restrictions.

“We’re seeing a rise in cases and in percent positivity which is now 6.2 percent and we’re also seeing a ride in our hospitalizations,” Northam said. “This is very concerning, especially because it is getting colder. The holidays are approaching and the temptation to gather with other people is high.”

Northam said the VDH continues to be concerned about Southwest Virginia where a high number of cases were reported late last week. In Wise County, the seven-day average for new daily cases per 100,000 population is 65.8. That figure is 52 for Washington County, 57.7 for Scott County, and 59.3 for Russell County. For comparison, those numbers are 7.8 for Albemarle and 19 for Charlottesville.

“Our team has been in communication with health directors in Southwest Virginia about the spread in that region,” Northam said. “We’re focusing on a communications campaign to emphasize the importance of doing the things that we know work. Avoiding indoor gatherings. Washing our hands. And wearing face coverings.”

Northam reminded the public that Virginia has a mask mandate in place for indoor spaces.

“While we are concerned about southwest Virginia I want to remind Virginians that we are seeing rising cases in other regions and around our nation as well,” Northam said. “The central region of Virginia for example is seeing a steady increase in case counts.”

Thanksgiving is 15 days away, and Northam urged people to remember that the virus spreads more easily indoors.

“I’m not saying don’t celebrate Thanksgiving but if you’re planning to gather with people outside of your household, think about ways to do it more safely,” Northam said. “Consider how the space is ventilated. Or think about ways to have gatherings outdoors.”

I’ll have more from this press conference in the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

A petition created to demand changes to the physical character of 5th Street in Charlottesville now has over 1,300 signatures. Binta Rose’s son Rahmean Rose died following a motorcycle crash on August 30. Fifth street is a four-lane divided highway between Ridge Street and Interstate 64, but more residential streets have been added in recent years.

“When exiting from Bailey Road, Brookwood, Cleveland Avenue or 5th Street Station, oncoming traffic is going entirely too fast,” reads the petition. “Too many families in the last year have lost loved ones to [crashes] on 5th Street.”

The petition calls for the speed limit to be lowered, mandatory high fines for speeding and traffic calming measures in the corridor.

There are several ongoing and recent projects in the area, including a Smart Scale funded improvement for the intersection of 5th, Ridge Street, Cherry Avenue and Elliott Avenue. However, that $6.1 million project is not expected to begin design until January 2024, according to an email from Jeanette Janiczek with the city.

In 2018, the city completed work on a corridor study for the 5th Street-Ridge-McIntire area. A task force that reviews the city’s Community Development Block Grant process is currently investigating potential projects that could be paid for through that funding. Planning Commissioner Taneia Dowell is on that task force. She said she is hopeful for coordination between all of these studies and more.

“A couple of things that we want to take into place before we move forward is how the Elliot Avenue Streetscape Plan, the [Strategic Investment Area], the old Ridge Street plan and the Smart Scale 5th plan will be able to tied together with our recommendations of the task force so that we are not duplicating efforts,” Dowell said.

Last night, the Charlottesville City Council and the Charlottesville Planning Commission met in a joint session to discuss an affordable housing plan that’s been crafted as part of the Cville Plans Together initiative. Today at 6 p.m the consultants working on the project will hold the first of several webinars intended to get public input (register).

“We’ve all been working on this for quite a while and this is the draft that is out there,” said Missy Creasy, the assistant director of Neighborhood Development Services. “We’re looking forward to hearing what the community has to say about this. We hired the consultant team who does this day in and day out and they are providing recommendations that they feel would be helpful for the community.”

Among those recommendations is a commitment to spend $10 million in city funds on affordable housing over ten years. Another is to collaborate with communities throughout the area. That concept has the support of Planning Commission Chair Hosea Mitchell.

“The urban ring is where we’re going to most effectively address this problem,” Mitchell said. “We cannot do it just inside Charlottesville so collaboration is going to be very important.”

Tomorrow, the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership will unveil an online search tool for affordable housing at a meeting that begins at noon. More on that tomorrow.

I will be writing up a full account of the Cville Plans Together discussion in a stand-alone story. Comments will be taken through December 2.

At the end of the meeting, Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg made a pitch to his colleagues to push for a rezoning for the land on which a future municipal parking garage will be built. In January 2017, a previous Council paid $2.85 million to buy land that currently houses a Lucky 7 convenience store and a Guadalajara restaurant. The plan is to build as a parking garage to serve a joint General District court with Albemarle County.

“My primary ask would be for Council to initiate a rezoning to Downtown Extended,” Stolzenberg said. Doing so would allow for additional floors to allow for the structure to be more than just a parking garage. A request for proposals to design and build the garage has not yet been and Stolzenberg said he did not want the possibility to go away.

Council will hold a work session Thursday on the capital budget for next year, and interim city attorney Lisa Robertson said the elected officials will have to weigh in. The current year’s capital improvement program allocated $2 million to the project and anticipates an additional $8 million will be allocated next year.

“It’s going to be a financial decision and I have not talked to staff about whether it’s possible,” Robertson said. “It sounds like there is a good consensus that people would like to see more done with this property and I think you need to make Council aware again of your strong feelings.”

The Commission made a motion to request the rezoning. Councilors were present for the discussion. You can hear the whole 40 minutes discussion on my SoundCloud page.

No meetings today, but let’s preview something happening on Friday. The newest school at the University of Virginia is the School of Data Science, which was created after a gift of $120 million to UVA from the Quantitative Foundation, associated with Jaffray Woodriff. The school will eventually be located on Ivy Road in the new Emmet / Ivy corridor.

On Friday, the school will hold a half-day conference called Datapalooza which includes two keynote speakers and panel discussions on the role data science can play in solving community problems. Danielle D’Andrea is the communications manager for the School of Data Science.

“Data science still is happening not only at the school but everywhere across UVA and the conference started just to highlight all the work that everyone was doing,” D’Andrea said. “Data science happens across discipline, and it lives in all of the schools so the conference started as a way to highlight all the great work students, faculties and staff were completing.”

D’Andrea said the free conference will be virtual which will allow for an unlimited number of viewers as opposed to being limited to who can show up in person. The first keynote speech is on the “Positive Impact of Data Science on Emerging and Reemerging Disease - COVID-19.” The speaker is John J. McGowan.

“He’s the deputy director for science management at the National Institute for Health, specifically for the National Institute for Allergy and Infection Disease,” D’Andrea said.

A panel discussion called “Data Science that Works With and For Our Communities” will include presentations on the Charlottesville Housing Hub (not to be confused with the regional affordable housing locator being produced by the TJPDC), improving open data, and the Center for Civic Innovation.

“Essentially from a high level perspective what that panel will be talking about is just how we can use data to better inform community and community work and how we can partner as data activists to make things more open, more accessible and what we can do to really move community work forward,” D’Andrea said.

Visit the Datapalooza website to learn more, and we’ll have more of a preview in tomorrow’s program.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from an anonymous supporter who wants to say again - "We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."*

There are another 1,435 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today, and the seven-day daily average for new cases is 1,437. The seven-day average for positive tests has increased to 6.2 percent, up from 6.1 percent yesterday.

There are another 31 new cases in the Blue Ridge Health District with 12 from Albemarle, nine from Charlottesville, and three each in Fluvanna, Greene and Louisa counties. There’s one new case in Nelson. A person from Greene County has died of COVID, the fourth fatality in that locality. That brings the death count to 78 in the district. No new fatalities had been reported since October 23.

The University of Virginia’s COVID dashboard lists 41 active cases, with 24 of them students. Since August 17, there have been 1,148 COVID cases associated with UVA.

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam made several announcements yesterday about how some of the state’s remaining CARES Act funding will be spent. Seven million will go to the Federation of Virginia Food Banks for the purchase of food, $60 million will go to a municipal energy relief program to help people who have not been able to pay their bills, $22 million for private higher education institutions, and $25 million in Medicaid for day support programs for adults with developmental disabilities.

However, the House of Delegates in the Virginia General Assembly declined to vote yesterday on a suggested budget amendment from Northam that would have provided more money to the energy relief program. Northam also suggested dozens of changes to how other portions of the CARES Act should be used. Delegate Mark Sickles of Fairfax made a motion to “pass by” on the amendment for the day.

“This amendment from the Governor strikes a lot of language that the committee introduced to better direct in our view the coronavirus relief funds,” Sickles said. “When we came into session on August 18 there was $1.3 billion dollar of CRF funding that had not been spent and it needs to be spent by December 30.”

Sickles said the House version of the bill directed more money to frontline medical workers and hospitals, but Northam’s amendment would have taken that away.

“The governor eliminated our language and we like our language and we think that it’s our role as the legislative branch to direct these funds,” Sickles said. (read the budget amendments)

For more on this, read Kate Masters article today in the Virginia Mercury.

The House also “passed by” on an amendment that would have altered the fee structure related to nutrient credits which are used to help improve water quality in Virginia. Delegate David Bulova represents Fairfax.

“Whether you know about nutrient credit banks or not, they actually play a really critical role in our ability to meet stormwater management requirements as well as Chesapeake Bay restoration targets,” Bulova said. “They do that by leveraging capital from the private sector and in fact we can take a little bit of a point of pride here in that Virginia’s program was recognized several years as a national model for how to achieve water quality standards and do that in a cost effective way.”

Bulova said the Department of Environmental Quality’s stormwater management program is underfunded, but there was concern that the Governor’s approach was not ready.

Other amendments include $1 million to fund a third-party investigation into racism at the Virginia Military Institute. That item passed 52 to 46.

Governor Northam will hold a press conference at 1 p.m. to give an update on Virginia’s COVID-19 response.

There are many meetings today, and for a full review check out the Week Ahead newsletter.

One of the most anticipated meetings is the Charlottesville’s City Council and Planning Commission joint session this evening. They’ll consider a rezoning on Nassau Street and get an update on the draft affordable housing plan that’s been put together by the consultant hired to complete the city’s Comprehensive Plan. This week there will be many opportunities to participate in virtual meetings about the initiatives, but tonight’s discussion between Council and the Commission might give a brief glimpse into what decision-makers are thinking. (meeting page) (draft affordable housing plan page)

A subcommittee of the city’s Housing Advisory Committee discussed the draft affordable housing plan at their meeting on November 4 and have sent their thoughts to City Council and the Planning Commission. The letter from the policy subcommittee expresses support for the plan but also asks that the document include strategies for wealth creation and economic mobility.

“The plan should explicitly acknowledge that housing affordability for many households is an income problem,” reads the letter which also said the plan should better address the high cost of land and how that can be mitigated. They also made suggestions on policies for how the $10 million in annual funding for affordable housing called for in the plan. (read the recommendations)

The Nelson County Board of Supervisors meets at 6 p.m. and one item includes a decision for a rezoning to allow Wild Man Dan Bed and Breakfast to expand its brewery operations (meeting packet)

The Charlottesville Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. and will get an update on the city’s COVID response. There will also be an update on the performance agreement between CEDA and Piedmont Housing for tax increment financing for the first phase of Friendship Court. For those details, take a look or listen to a longer story and podcast I produced from the October 19, 2020 City Council meeting where the agreement was approved by elected officials.

The Albemarle Planning Commission meets at 6 p.m. They’ll have public hearings on reviews to two conservation areas known as Agricultural-Forest Districts as well as a public hearing on a change to zoning involving recycling centers. (meeting info)

While not a government meeting, here’s another event that might be interesting. The Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will have another installment of their Ask a Genealogist series with Dr. Shelley Murphy. She’s the Descendant Project Researcher at the University of Virginia. Visit the Jefferson Madison Regional Library’s website to register and learn more. (JMRL page)

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Gregory Carey-Medlock is donating 30 cents for every pound Monica squats to the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank. You can choose between three other charities. Learn more at Shenandoah Power. Sponsors accepted through November 14.

Over the weekend, the Virginia Department of Health reported the highest number of new daily COVID-19 cases yet with 2,103 new cases reported Saturday. On both Sunday and today, the VDH reported 1,302 new cases. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests has increased to 6.1 percent, up from 5.9 percent on Friday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there have been 70 new cases reported and the seven-day daily average for new tests is 21. The percent positivity in the district is 1.7.

Some middle and high school students in Albemarle County return to classes today for in-person instruction. These are students who haven’t been engaging in virtual learning and will now have access. The metrics on the Centers for Disease Control pandemic dashboard haven’t been updated with today’s figures, but all but one of Albemarle’s metrics are all in green for moderate risk. The total number of new cases per 100,000 persons within the last 14 days is 91.06, indicating higher risk.

However, looking to the west in Virginia will show signs of concern. In Alleghany County, the 14 day metric is at 710.9 today, with 50 new cases reported on Saturday, though none yesterday and one today. In Wise County, the 14 day metric is at 710.3 with 67 cases reported Saturday, 16 on Sunday, and 9 today. The percent positivity for VDH’s Far Southwest region is 12.8 percent and 8.6 percent for the Near Southwest Region. That number is 4.2 in VDH’s Northwest Region, which includes Albemarle and Charlottesville.

I asked VDH about the high number of cases and got this response.

COVID-19 cases reported for Virginia on Saturday, November 7, are the greatest number of cases reported to the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) in one day thus far in the pandemic. The Southwest region of the state continues to experience a surge in cases with substantial transmission. VDH strongly encourages all Virginians to practice physical distancing, wear a mask, and stay home if they are sick, have been diagnosed with COVID-19, are awaiting COVID-19 test results or are a close contact to someone with COVID-19. Visit the VDH website for steps you can take to protect yourself and others.

Oral arguments were held Friday in the Virginia Supreme Court for the city of Charlottesville’s appeal of a court ruling that Confederate statues in city parks were protected war memorials at the time City Council voted to remove them. An injunction remains to keep the statues in place even after legislation passed the Virginia General Assembly this year. Interim City Attorney Lisa Robertson argued that there were two major facts that supported the city’s appeal.

“Fact number one, plaintiffs never asserted there was actual physical damage or harm to the statues,” Robertson said. “Fact number two, Charlottesville’s statues were not installed pursuant to any state enabling legislation, general or special, which expressly authorized them to be erected as war memorials.”

Kevin Walsh represented the Monument Fund, the organization that filed suit against the city for voting to remove the statues and covering them with tarps after the Unite the Right Rally of August 12, 2017. He picked up on a line of questioning from one Justice about whether the tarp was an “encroachment.”

“The words physical damage appear nowhere in 15.2-18.12-1,” Walsh said. “There are four purposes that are listed for which damages may be awarded and they include preserving as well as restoring to pre-encroachment condition. And of course tarps are an encroachment and they were restored to pre-encroachment condition by the order that they were to be removed.”

Walsh acknowledged the General Assembly has changed the law removing the protection, but argued the new provisions do not necessarily apply to the Charlottesville statues.

Justices will issue a ruling at a later date. Previous opinions can be viewed at the Virginia Supreme Court website.

On Saturday, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville dedicated ten new homes at its Harmony Ridge development at the corner of Fifth Street and Bailey Road in the city. The project is the eighth mixed-income neighborhood built by the organization. Dan Rosensweig is the chief executive officer of Habitat for Humanity.

“This day has been a long time coming and the community has been in the making for a number of years,” Rosensweig said. “In fact the idea of a mixed-income neighborhood on this site, a place where people from all walks of life can come together to share a common destiny, has been a dream for many people for almost two decades.”

Abundant Life Ministries had owned the land and they had intended to develop it, but Habitat took over the project. The Piedmont Housing Alliance invested in two homes, and the CFA Institute covered the cost of making the units energy efficient. Rosensweig said a decision was made to complete the units faster once the pandemic hit.

“We just knew that we needed to find a way to not just finish but to expedite the completion of these homes,” Rosensweig said. “Out of the spotlight, this team got to work. They figured out how to build the homes themselves while at all times maintaining social distance. Little heroic efforts like bringing pieces of trim home to paint them and coming back at night to install them.”

You can listen to the dedication on Habitat’s YouTube page. (watch)

The election results last week showed one way that rural and urban America are generally divided. About 15 percent of the population lives on about 72 percent of the nation’s land. Tomorrow, the organization Resilient Virginia will convene a discussion about ways to prepare communities in rural areas for increased incidents of extreme weather associated with climate change. The speakers will be Gwen Griffith of the Model Forest Policy Program and Ned Gardiner of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Visualization Project. They’ll talk about the Resilient Rural America Project. Registration is $20. (register)

Tonight at 7 p.m., Wild Virginia will hold a book club for anyone who has read Janisse Ray’s memoir, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood. I spoke with Janisse last month about her thoughts on the pandemic.

“I focus on nature and culture always with the eye toward thinking about the stories that people need to hear to open their hearts and their minds,” Ray said.

Ray described the beginning of the pandemic in March as a time just like after a car crash when suddenly everyone involved has to figure out what to do next. She said that’s given many an ability to gain new perspectives.

“It’s allowed us this opportunity to really examine how our lives are working, our marriages are working, our jobs, our family life, you know our town, how’s everything working or not working for us,” Ray said.

Ray said she will talk tonight about how she has used this time to anticipate other issues facing our world, such as the climate change crisis hitting earlier than had been expected. For her, spending time at home made her notice something.

“I did not realize how many airplanes were crossing the sky and how many contrails,” Ray said. “So in so many ways, the pandemic is returning to us ways of life that we’d even forgotten existed.”

Ray said she has spent much of the past 20 years traveling across the country to give presentations. Not being able to do that has led her to realize that so much mobility came at a cost.

“The pandemic has forced us to do some of the things that we have always needed to do for the environment but were unwilling to do,” Ray said.

The free event sponsored by Wild Virginia begins at 7 p.m. tonight. (register)

Technically there are six more weeks or so left this autumn, but the Virginia Department of Transportation is already preparing for the possibility of winter weather. According to a news release, VDOT has a $211 million budget for snow removal, more than 11,300 pieces of snow removal, more than 690,000 tons of salt and other forms of grit, and more than 2.1 million gallons of salt brine and liquid calcium chloride.

“Our top priority is the safety of those on our roadways,” said VDOT Chief of Maintenance and Operations Kevin Gregg. “The Commonwealth has more than 128,000 miles of state-maintained roads and bridges, so we prepare year-round to keep Virginia moving when winter weather arrives. Our crews are trained, experienced and equipped to handle snow and ice before and after it hits the ground.”

There’s also an online tracking tool which allows people to chart the progress of snow plows.

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Today at noon is the deadline for mail-in ballots to arrive at local registrars in Virginia in order to be counted. Ten out of eleven of the state’s Congressional Districts have been resolved, but challenger Nick Freitas has not conceded in the 7th District Race and trails incumbent Abigail Spanberger by 4,744 votes. The Virginia Department of Elections website estimates that 90 percent of the absentee ballots were counted, but continues to state that these statistics may not take into account all surrendered absentee ballots.

As of this recording there was still no resolution of the presidential election and early voting and mail-in ballots were still being counted in Georgia, Nevada, Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

There are another 1,568 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today as reported by the state Department of Health. That brings the seven-day average for new daily cases to 1,304. The number of deaths reported by the VDH actually declined by six people for a total today of 3,682. The seven-day average of new positive test results increased to 5.9 percent, up from 5.8 percent yesterday and up from 4.9 percent on October 6.

After a week of single-digit increases for new cases in Albemarle and Charlottesville, both localities went back to double digits today. Albemarle added 18 new cases and Charlottesville added 22 cases. Including those numbers, the soon-to-be-named Blue Ridge Health District added 43 cases. The percent positivity rate for today is 1.8 for PCR tests and 2.1 for all tests.

The University of Virginia COVID-tracker displays 41 active cases with 19 of them students.

Case counts in far Southwest Virginia continue to rise. Wise County now has a total number of new cases per 100,000 population of 613. That number is 531.2 in Washington County, 896.3 in Scott County, 819.8 in Lee County, and 486.9 in Montgomery County, the home of Virginia Tech. For comparison, Albemarle’s total number of new cases per 100,000 population is 105.8 and Charlottesville’s is 220.3. Fluvanna’s is 97.08, Greene is at 116.3, Louisa is at 114.2, and Nelson is at 40.44.

A regional housing initiative coordinated by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission will soon launch an online portal to help people locate affordable places to live. Christine Jacobs is the chief operating officer and housing director for the TJPDC, and she told Commissioners last night that the portal will serve a dual purpose.

“One of them is to provide streamlined access to the resources that currently exist throughout the region both in the localities in the region and the state and so that will be one piece of the website,” Jacobs said. “Another piece of the website will be a way to connect property owners and developers that have affordable units with community members that are searching for those units.”

The website will at first focus on rental issues, but Jacobs said it will increasingly expand to cover for sale units. TJPDC executive director Chip Boyles said roll-out of the regional housing locator has been expedited due to a looming crisis.

“We have really hurried this along as Christine talked about because we think it is so crucial to have the rental portal in place when evictions begin from some of the families that haven’t been able to take advantage of the rental assistance programs,” Boyles said.

The regional housing locator will be presented at the Regional Housing Partnership’s next presentation on November 12.

Boyles also asked Commissioners for their input on a potential name change for the TJPDC.

“A number of agencies and churches are looking at changing their name from Thomas Jefferson to other things,” Boyles said. “It’s something we looked at a few years ago but we haven’t looked at since.”

No one made a comment about the change at the meeting.

The health district will become the Blue Ridge Health District on January 1.

On Wednesday, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors voted 4-2 to deny a special exception to allow a homestay operation on Northfield Road to have five rentable rooms, as opposed to the two allowed by-right. Supervisor Donna Price told the TJPDC Board that Albemarle has rules in place to protect residential neighborhoods.

“We see those as being different from AirBnB type thing because it’s supposed to be an accessory use as opposed to a primary source of revenue and obviously the difference between a location in a residential neighborhood versus in a rural area, distance to other properties, all of those things we have to take into account,” Price said.

Price said that special exceptions currently go with the land rather than the owner, and the Board has asked the county attorney to investigate legislation to make a change.

Oral arguments got underway this morning in the Virginia Supreme Court for the city of Charlottesville’s appeal of a court ruling that the Robert E. Lee Statue in Market Street Park was a protected war memorial at the time City Council voted to remove it. An injunction remains in place to keep the statue in place even after legislation passed the Virginia General Assembly this year.

Work has concluded one month early on a grade-separated interchange on U.S. 29 in Warrenton. The firm Shirley Contracting Company was awarded a design-build contract in February 2018 to remove a traffic signal at Lord Fairfax Drive and Business U.S. 29. Construction began in March 2019 and the interchange partially opened this summer. (project website)

VDOT spokesman Will Merritt gave credit to Shirley Contracting and subcontractor Dewberry for the early completion.

“The interchange was built slightly to the north of the old signalized intersection which allowed the design-build team to complete the majority of the project without interfering with traffic,” Merritt said. “The design of the project coupled with favorable weather and a mild winter in 2019 allowed the project team to get ahead and finish the project one month ahead of schedule.”

Interstate highways cut off wildlife habitat and lead to hundreds of collisions with vehicles each year. Albemarle’s Natural Heritage Committee learned about efforts by the Virginia Transportation Research Council to reduce such incidents through better design.

“Wildlife crossings which are either underpasses or overpasses across a road are really already established over the past two to three decades as the most effective way to reduce collisions and connect that habitat across roads,” said Bridget Donaldson of the VRTC. She said the next federal transportation bill may have up to $250 million in funding for such crossings.

Nine states including Virginia have passed legislation to create plans for where such places could go. Donaldson has worked on a pilot project for fencing along U.S. I-64 in Albemarle County.

No meetings today, but two things to preview. Tonight, Live Arts will hold another virtual studio visit. Box Office Manager Darryl Smith will speak with local artist, actor, poet and storyteller Edwina Herring beginning at 7 p.m. (Live Arts website)

On Sunday, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library and the Friends of the JMRL will hold another in a series of pop-up book sales at the Gordon Avenue Library from 10 a.m. at 2 p.m. Visit the library website for more information.

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Greetings and are you ready to alight your bonfire? For it is Guy Fawkes Day, and today we remember remember the fifth of November! Oh wait. What’s that? I’m being told that this is America, and it’s a different kind of November 5th, with the presidential election still not quite resolved. What will happen today? Who knows? But, we’re in history, and this is the Charlottesville Community Engagement newsletter and newscast for today.

Seventh District Representative Abigail Spanberger will most likely return to Congress having been re-elected in a close race against Republican Nick Freitas. With all precincts in and at least 89 percent of mail-in and early voting ballots in, Spanberger got just over 5,000 more votes, or 50.5 percent of the vote. However, Freitas is not ready to concede.

“Our campaign will be waiting until the canvass officially concludes on Friday, at which we will be making an appropriate statement,” Frietas wrote on Twitter.

Spanberger declared victory last night.

“It has been the honor of my life to serve our community in Congress, to represent the people of our ten counties and I thank you all for putting your trust in me again and re-electing me for another two years,” Spanberger said. “As we celebrate tonight I know there are many who cast a different vote and who volunteered for a different candidate and I know they are disappointed. I hope over time I will earn your trust as a representative even as we disagree.”

As of this recording, neither of the candidates for the presidency have won the required number of electoral votes.

There are another 1,366 cases of COVID-19 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health. The seven-day average for new daily cases is now at 1,288. The seven-day rate for positive cases has increased to 5.8 percent for all of Virginia.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 19 cases today with seven from Charlottesville, five from Louisa, four from Albemarle, two in Fluvanna and one from Greene. It has been two weeks since a new fatality has been reported in the district. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests has decreased to 1.9 percent in the district.

All of Virginia’s health districts are considered to be at moderate or substantial community transmission, with higher burdens reported in the Central, Southwest and Near Southwest regions.

The director of the Roanoke and Alleghany Health Districts has called for high schools in those communities to halt contact sports due to increasing numbers of COVID cases. Dr. Cynthia Morrow cited “core indicators” from the Centers for Disease Control that are in the red zone. As of yesterday, Alleghany had 462.8 cases per 100,000 people over the past 14 days. The positivity percentage over 14 days was at 15.7 percent. The Roanoke district’s numbers were 497.5 and 10.8 percent respectively.

“We are for the second week in a row in high burden, increasing trends of substantial transmission,” Morrow said during a press briefing yesterday. “In addition, the contiguous regions to us are also in high burden, increasing trends of substantial transmission. We are about as high risk right now and with these metrics we really should be operating at phase 1, phase 2 practice.”

Morrow said she talked to school superintendents in the area on Tuesday.

“They asked us how we felt about close contact sports such as wrestling and even basketball and we have to say that we would applaud any effort that they have to reduce transmission by not having those sporting events,” Morrow said.

For the city of Charlottesville, the metrics are currently much lower, with 201.6 cases per 100,000 and the positive percentage over the past 14 days is at 1.1 percent. For Albemarle County, those numbers are at 112.2 and 2.1 percent.

A subcommittee of the city’s Housing Advisory Committee gave an initial review Wednesday of a draft affordable housing plan put together by consultants as part of the overall Comprehensive Plan update known as Cville Plans Together. City Council and the Planning Commission will hold a work session on the 133-page draft plan on November 10.

Subcommittee members were asked to give initial impressions. Christopher Murray represents the development community and he said the plan didn’t seem to address economic issues.

“The supply and demand element that is not acknowledged is the cost of land itself, the availability of land,” Murray said, adding it calls for a land bank but doesn’t contain enough information about land trusts.

Ridge Schuyler, dean of community self-sufficiency programs at Piedmont Virginia Community College, said the plan should also acknowledge ways for households to create more wealth.

“It’s not just the cost of housing but its the amount of income you have to afford that housing and besides one throwaway sentence there was no focus on economic opportunity and helping people earn more income,” Schuyler said.

Among other things, the plan calls for a dedicated $10 million a year in capital funds for affordable housing projects. Last month, the city gave the final approval of $3 million in funds for public housing renovation and redevelopment as well a final approval for a $5.5 million forgivable loan to the Piedmont Housing Alliance for the first phase of the redevelopment of Friendship Court. In all there are to be four phases

“The document does a good job of highlighting [Charlottesville Housing and Redevelopment Authority] and public housing redevelopment but does not once mention Friendship Court redevelopment and I think that’s a gap,” said Piedmont Housing director Sunshine Mathon. “I would like to get into a little bit about the proposed $10 million a year because I think there are some nuances to that number that we should flesh out and make sure we are all clear on.”

Realtor S. Lisa Herndon wanted more emphasis in the plan on pathways to home ownership.

“I definitely believe 100 percent believe that there are multiple ways to create home ownership especially looking at subsidies and I truly am against simply just having a great focus on redeveloping public housing,” Herndon said. “I think that is a model that truly needs to be rethought of.”

Chris Meyer said he was concerned about a call in the plan for seeking state legislation to allow for rent control.

“I was a little concerned when I saw a lot of new suggestions on regulations of landlords and rental properties including a cap on home rentals or regulated rental prices and other things,” Meyer said. “I did like though that they started talking about helping tenants engage in those processes.”

City Councilor Michael Payne said he wanted to see more information in the plan about land banks and land trusts.

“I think the funding is also a really important question especially in light of our budget challenges and given the election results in the Senate I also think that the likelihood of additional money from the federal government is also a lot lower,” Payne said.

You can watch all of the HAC Policy Subcommittee meeting here.

The city has hired a community development director from Georgia to serve as its next Director of Neighborhood Development Services. Parag Agrawal currently works in Milton, a city of about 40,000 people in Fulton County. Before that he served in similar positions in Rhode Island and Bridgeport, Connecticut.

“Parag is a experienced development professional who has a breadth of experience that’s very needed in the Neighborhood Development Services department,” said interim city manager John Blair.

Agrawal said he looks forward to beginning work on November 30.

“The Department has an excellent team of staff members who are very committed, dedicated, and knowledgable and are working on some very important projects that will make our city more sustainable and more affordable,” Agrawal said. “I will say that the city of Charlottesville is such a great city because the residents of Charlottesville are so actively engaged.”

Agrawal replaces Alexander Ikefuna who was demoted in February but will remain with the city.

There are two meetings today. The Natural Heritage Committee will see a presentation on wildlife corridors from the Virginia Transportation Research Council from one of the state’s leading experts on reducing vehicle collisions. Earlier this year, the General Assembly passed legislatio n to create a Wildlife Corridor Action Plan to identify locations where steps can be taken. (meeting info)

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission will meet at 7 p.m. They will be introduced to a new search tool that’s designed to help people find affordable housing. That’s a project of the TJPDC’s Regional Housing Partnership. According to the executive director’s report, there will be a discussion on altering the name of the TJPDC. The Thomas Jefferson Health District will become the Blue Ridge Health District on January 1. The Jefferson-Madison Regional Library system could also soon get a new name.

“We have in the past considered both a change from Thomas Jefferson as well as change from Planning District Commission to either Regional Commission or Regional Council,” Boyles wrote. “Should you desire staff to pursue options, we could report back to you in February.”

And while not strictly a government meeting, the Center will have a virtual presentation from the owners of the Ragged Mountain Running Shop on their walk last year across England. That begins at 4 and is open to all. (info)

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In this unprecedented election, results will be counted in Virginia until Friday, but enough returns are in to reasonably draw certain conclusions. For one, Democrat Joseph Biden has defeated incumbent Donald Trump in Virginia, with 53.65 percent of the vote to Trump’s 44.5 percent. That’s with 2,580 of 2,585 precincts reporting, though a dashboard on the Virginia Department of Elections website shows the percentage of absentee ballots cast in each district.

In the 5th District, 88 percent of the received absentee ballots cast had been counted by 8:44 this morning. Republican Bob Good defeated Democrat Cameron Webb 53.4 percent to 46.3 percent. In a statement, Good said his victory was one for “the conservative values that founded and sustain this nation, for biblical principles, the sanctity of life, religious liberty, free market capitalism, and the importance of faith and family.”

In a concession statement, Webb said the campaign was a “battle of ideas about how to best serve the district.” He congratulated Good and said he looked forward to “continuing to engage with him as we move forward from this election in a unified way.”

In the 7th District, Incumbent Abigail Spanberger was about 800 votes behind Republican Nick Frietas as of 7:51 a.m. As in-person votes were counted, Freitas took an early initial lead but Spanberger drew within a couple hundred votes as absentee ballots came in. The 7th District is listed as having 89 percent of absentee ballots counted, though a disclaimer on the VDE site reads:

Please note these statistics may not take into account all surrendered absentee ballots”

Mail-in ballots have until noon Friday to be received by local registrars in order to be counted. Chris Piper is the Commissioner of the Virginia Department of Elections.

“Virginia is going to count every single vote,” Piper said. “The ballot can be received postmarked by election day, can be received in the office of the general registrar’s office by noon on Friday November 6 to be counted.”

Localities have until Tuesday, November 10 to certify their results. The state Board of Elections will meet on November 16 to officially certify the results.

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 1,157 cases of COVID-19 this morning, bringing the seven-day average for new daily cases to 1,297. The seven-day average for positive tests remains at 5.7 percent for the second straight day.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 14 cases reported today with four from Albemarle, seven from Charlottesville, two from Fluvanna and one from Greene. The seven-day average for new daily cases is 16 and the seven-day positivity percentage for PCR tests 2 percent.

The UVA COVID-19 tracker shows 32 active cases as of yesterday with 14 of those students.

Tourism has the potential to become more local as the country continues to contend with the global pandemic, but industry businesses will need support to make it through a tough winter.

“For the next two years, we are anticipating that people will continue to travel more domestically and that’s great news for us as a destination because we are so centrally located and near large cities,” said Courtney Cacatian, the executive director of the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau. “We’re a small city and a rural destination simultaneously so we have a really good mix of things that people want to do right now.”

Cacatian told the public policy committee of the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce that many spent the summer satisfying their desires to move around.

“American travelers are feeling a bit more settled in than they were especially last spring and prioritizing relaxation and trying to decrease their stress and travel is one of the ways that people do that,” Cacatian said.

However, Cacatian pointed to survey research that showed more confidence in travel during the summer months, but rising COVID cases nationwide as well as colder weather has reversed that trend.

“We’re anticipating that we have hit the peak for October for how many visitors we’re going to get until the spring,” Cacatian said. “October is usually a peak for Charlottesville and Albemarle but the lows are anticipated to be much lower this winter. We just don’t know exactly how low they will go.”

In September, Albemarle County opened up a grant program called Safe Spaces and Places to help businesses pay for ways to continue operating through tents and heaters. Charlottesville businesses that receive grants can also use funding for that purpose.

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee meets at noon. The agenda states that there will be a discussion of housing strategy to date. There are no other materials but I have a couple things they might consider discussing. (meeting info)

Last month, Council approved agreements for how $8.5 million in capital funds for affordable housing will be used by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority and the Piedmont Housing Alliance.

Yesterday, the consultant overseeing development of an affordable housing plan and the completion of the city’s Comprehensive Plan released drafts of their work. They are asking the public to take a look and make comments through December 2. Take a look at the website.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at 1 p.m. One topic on the agenda is a discussion of how new civic spaces in the county’s urban area. That topic will come up when Supervisors get an update on the Rio Road form-based code. Rachel Falkenstein is a planning manager with the county and she said the plan is to help guide Albemarle transition to a more urban place.

“Our current network of streets in Rio 29 is pretty limited to two main roads, that’s Route 29 and Rio Road and then Berkmar Drive but other than that there really aren’t many public streets in Rio 29 so we’ve tried to figure out a code to get new streets but do so in a way that is flexible because we’ve heard that’s important to people,” Falkenstein at the October 22 meeting of the Places 29-Rio Community Advisory Committee.

Other items include the regional legislative agenda and a public hearing on amendments to this year’s budget.

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Today’s installment of the show is brought to you by the fifth of the audience that has generously agreed to invest in this program by making a financial contribution, either through a subscription, a Patreon donation or through a one-time Venmo payment. Thanks to all who are letting this business get off the ground. Or put another way, are helping me sustain my leap of faith.

Today, two different sets of numbers lead our newscast. First, there are another 1,261 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia reported this morning, bringing the seven-day average for new cases to 1,324. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests has decreased to 5.7 percent, down from 5.8 percent yesterday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are three new cases reported today, and Charlottesville reported no new cases for the first time since August 17. The percent positivity rating for PCR tests has decreased to 2 percent.

The University of Virginia’s COVID-19 tracker lists 26 active cases with 13 of them students.

Today is election day, and this time around, recently passed legislation combined with the pandemic led to an expansion of flexibility on how people could cast their ballot. Today is the culmination of a historic election period which in Virginia saw the voter registration deadline extended by a court order due to a cut communications cable that shut down the Department of Elections website on the last day to register.

Nationwide, 98 million Americans are estimated to have voted early in-person or cast a ballot via mail. According to Albemarle’s Twitter account, 41,418 of that county’s residents voted early with roughly a third of those being ballots were sent by mail. That number is just over half of the county’s total registration of 81,683 people. As of 9 a.m. this morning, the registrar reported 7,620 in-person ballots on this Election Day.

In Louisa County, a total of 11,486 people voted early, including 3,263 mail ballots received as of yesterday. The total registration in Louisa is 27,290.

“As of this morning, we have had 4,788 ballots cast in Nelson prior to opening the polls,” said Nelson County registrar Jacqueline Britt. “As of 8:00am, As of 8:00am, we have had 5,599 ballot cast for a 48.1% turnout so far.”

Charlottesville City Council has been briefed on the recent discovery of unmarked graves at Pen Park that are now believed to be those of enslaved individuals dating back to the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The city hired Rivanna Archaeological Services to use ground penetrating radar to confirm a hunch.

“The city acquired Pen Park in the 1970’s,” said Jeff Werner, the city’s historic preservation planner. “Dr. George Gilmer had acquired it in 1786 and gave it that name.”

A family cemetery on the property has several marked graves of Gilmer descendants as well as two other families who bought the property in subsequent years. But Werner and others noticed the possibility of other burial sites with no markings by noticing surface depressions.

“The GPR data suggests the likelihood of 43 unmarked and unrecorded graves outside the walls of the three family plots,” Werner said. “The majority of these graves lie outside the Gilmer and Craven sections and we know that both of those families enslaved individuals and the evidence suggests that these graves are those of individuals enslaved at Pen Park.”

Werner said he felt the city has a responsibility to memorialize the graves given that it is on city property. Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker agreed.

“We have an obligation here and it’s something that we would want to do right,” Walker said, saying she supported staff’s recommendation to proceed with further study but to be careful not to disturb the graves.

“It’s so important to make sure that the families, as many as possible, are aware of what the options are and something they are on board with,” Walker said.

Archaeologist Ben Ford said he believed that could be accomplished.

“This type of research has been done and there are individuals who I believe would be willing to lend their expertise on how to pursue this type of research, the contacts that need to be made and how productive it would be.”

The Albemarle Architectural Review Board has given their nod to a plan for how to manage the landscapes underneath 1.6 linear miles of electric line on U.S. 29 north of Dickerson Road. The Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors will soon consider a special use permit to allow the Rappahannock Electric Cooperative to install a new powerline on existing poles. As part of the conditions, REC had to run an Integrated Vegetation Management (IVM) plan by the ARB. The plan governs what vegetation will be allowed along the easement.

“Trees within the right-of-way will be allowed to remain if they are low growing, compatible species such as redbuds, dogwoods, winterberry, serviceberry, etc.,” reads the plan. “Trees that are incompatible, such as yellow-poplars, oaks, maples and other “timber-sized” species will be removed every five years.”

Attorney Valerie Long appeared before the ARB to explain that IVM is intended to do more than just protect the lines from being taken down by falling trees.

“The most important [goal] for Rappahannock Electric is always the safety for the public and doing everything it can do to reduce outages that are caused by vegetation but obviously also working to promote pollinator habitat, diverse species, control invasive species, but also recognize that this utility corridor is along a very important entrance corridor for the county,” Long said.

The ARB voted 3-1 to approve the plan on the condition that native species be used.

The Scottsville Planning Commission has endorsed a small area plan for West Downtown that sets out a community vision for eventual redevelopment of a derelict factory.

“The currently unused tire plant presents both liability and potential to the Town of Scottsville and its residents,” reads a summary in the plan. “With proper consideration and careful site plan review, we can shift the balance from it being a negative feature to a positive one.”

The former Uniroyal plant was built in 1944 and makes up sixty percent of the 100 acres covered by the plan. The factory was most recently owned by the Hyosung company

Small Area Plans are not binding documents, but are intended to give direction on what the community would like to see. The 60 acre site is owned by limited liability companies tied to veteran developer Charles Hurt.

In 2019, the town of Scottsville received a $30,000 grant from the Virginia Department of Community Development that helped pay for flood studies. Matt Lawless is the Scottsville Town Manager.

“We’ve learned a lot together,” Lawless said. “Doing the planning work, meeting our neighbors on this, we’ve gotten to understand the town’s goals and what we are trying to do in this downtown neighborhood a lot better. I feel a lot more comfortable I can do the kind of staff work that’s going to meet with the community’s approval.”

The next step is for the plan to go to Town Council.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from an anonymous supporter who wants to say again - "We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is steadily increasing in Virginia with that metric at 5.8 percent today. That’s up from 4.5 percent on October 2 and 5 percent a week ago. The seven-day average for new daily cases statewide is 1,306. The number of new cases was 1,551 on Saturday, 1,202 on Sunday and 1,026 today. The total number of cases in Virginia since the pandemic began is 183,418.

Another metric that is increasing is the total number of cases per 100,000 population within the last 14 days. Today that figure is 194.8. On October 15 the number was 166.9.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another nine cases today, with the seven-day average of new daily cases at 21. There have been no new fatalities reported since October 23. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is at 2.4 percent today.

The Blue Ridge Health District is within the VDH’s Northwest Region. The pandemic metric page shows that cases in the region have been increasing for the last 11 days, but percent positivity has been decreasing.

Since August, Albemarle County has been encouraging its residents to vote early in-person or by mail in order to avoid long lines at the polls tomorrow.

“And my goodness, did they respond,” said Jim Heilman, the secretary of the Albemarle Electoral Board. At a press briefing on Friday, he gave a snapshot of how many have voted.

“We have had 23,152 people vote in person at the county office building on 5th Street,” Heilman said. “We have processed 16,026 mail ballots that we received and that’s a total of 39,178 people have already voted.”

Heilman said that’s about half of the registered voters in the county. He projected an 80 percent total-turn-out, which would be a modern day record.

All thirty polling places in county will be fully staffed and operational from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Heilman said all election officers will wear masks, surfaces will be cleaned on a regular basis, and face-shields will be in place. Voters will be asked to wear face masks. Mail-in ballots will be received through noon on Friday, but they must be postmarked by November 3 to be counted.

On election night, Albemarle will report out preliminary results.

“On election night as the results come in from the polling places we will be reporting those as we traditionally do,” Heilman said. “Starting probably about 7:30 p.m. we will be getting results from the polling places and we will be posting those and we’ll also at the same time be posting those on the state website. At some point in the evening, probably by 9:00 p.m. and possibly not before 11:00 p.m we will also be posting the results of the early in-person voting and the mail balloting. That’s going to be the big number.”

Heilman said the State Department of Elections will combine the early in-person and mail-in numbers combined as one. He said the county will likely not provide any updates on Wednesday, but will do so on Thursday and Friday. Heilman said there may not be a final report on Albemarle’s results until Monday, November 9.

As the community seeks pathways to become more sustainable, one way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is to stop discarded materials from being trucked to landfills far away. Is it possible to find a way to manufacture new glass bottles from those consumed in this area?

A subcommittee of Albemarle County’s Solid Waste Alternatives Advisory Committee (SWAAC) has been reviewing the financial feasibility of such an idea.

“So the operations team is looking into how we can get glass from users to Ivy [Material Utilization Center] where it can be turned into more glass products,” said Jesse Warren is the sustainable program manager at UVA Sustainability and the head of the SWAAC Operations Team. “Ivy MUC is willing to take glass and they’re willing to take it for free.”

Warren is referring to a facility owned by the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority built at a now-closed landfill. He led a discussion last Thursday about how beverage producers in the area can come together to discuss ways to haul used glass to that location. The idea of making new bottles locally is more feasible if enough raw material can be brought together.

Several industry representatives said they would be willing to do so.

Rob Gustafson is the owner and director of operations at Harvest Moon Catering.

“A good outcome for us would be figuring out any way we could get rid of our glass without having massive piles of broken disgusting stuff laying around next to our dumpster and ending up in the trash and not in the recycling, unfortunately,” Gustafson said, adding he would be interested in having some way to have glass picked up from catering events.

Elizabeth Tuel is with Devil’s Backbone Brewing Company, one of several alcohol-related businesses in Nelson County.

“I know there’s a lot of interest just within our business community about glass recycling options,” Tuel said.

Kerry Woolard is the general manager of Trump Winery. She said she wanted to know more about what initiatives have been worked in the past and why they stopped.

“I recall a time where we did recycle glass and then I recall a time where we used a single-stream recycling and then went away so it feels like we’ve gone backwards a little bit here but I don’t have the context of why or how,” Woolard said.

Scott Elliff is with DuCard Winery and he said he’s never had recycling on site in Madison County.

“We used to take our bottles down to McIntire Road in the back of my pick-up truck but that’s gotten to be pretty impractical and we’d rather see things go in a much larger basis,” Elliff said. “We’re ready to be do anything anytime on this. By volume it’s by far the biggest part of our overall waste stream.”

Scott DeFife is the president of the Glass Packaging Institute. He said there are 45 glass manufacturing facilities scattered across the United States. There is a crusher in Fairfax, and container factories near Williamsburg and Danville.

“We have kind of a gap here in this area,” DeFife said. “That doesn’t mean that we can’t make it work right now. It just means that we have to do a little bit of extra work.”

DeFife said one solution could be greater use of rail to reduce vehicle miles traveled by hauling trucks. I’ll have more on this discussion coming up in a future story on infocville.com.

In meetings today, the Albemarle Architectural Review Board meets at 1 p.m. and will review the design of a new car wash at the intersection of U.S. 29 and Woodbrook Road at the former Allen, Allen, Allen, and Allen building. (ARB meeting info)

Charlottesville City Council meets at 6:30 p.m. and among the items on the agenda is a discussion of unmarked graves at a family cemetery in Pen Park. The bodies are believed to be those of enslaved individuals. (meeting info)

Check out yesterday’s Week Ahead newsletter for more details about Monday’s meetings as well as the rest of this week.

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Tonight and tomorrow, Decades Arcade will have a costume contest and scavenger hunt for Halloween this Friday and Saturday. Details are in this instagram post. Visit decadesarcade.com for more information on how you can book and their COVID-19 rules and precautions. You’ll also learn that for $200, you can rent the place for two hours for a private party.

There are another 1,456 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today, bringing the seven-day average for new daily cases to 1,194. The seven-day average for positive tests has increased to 5.4 percent, up from 5.3 percent yesterday. An additional case of Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children has been reported, bringing the number of cases to eleven.

Another metric to watch is the total number of cases per 100,000 people within the last 14 days. That number is 182.2 today, trending upwards from 171.8 a week ago.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 31 cases, bringing the seven-day average to 29. That’s 13 new cases from Albemarle, eight from Charlottesville, three from Fluvanna, one from Greene, and six from Louisa.

In October to date, the district as a whole added 896 cases, or about a fifth of the total cases since March. Albemarle has added 285 cases and Charlottesville has added 341 cases. Their October are also around a fifth of the total to date.

Fluvanna did not experience as steep an increase this month, with 52 new cases to add to its total of 433. Much of that number is related to an outbreak at the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women.

Louisa added 114 cases in October, or just over a quarter of their total of 410 to date. Greene added 71 caes for a total of 294. Nelson added 33 cases this month to date, bringing their total to 140.

The seven-day average for positive PCR testing in the district is 2.6 percent. That figure is 2.9 percent when all tests are included. In all there have been 100,972 testing encounters in the district since the beginning of the pandemic.

No serious changes on the University of Virginia COVID-tracker. There are 56 active cases listed as of yesterday afternoon, with 43 of them students. Five percent of quarantine rooms are in use, as are three percent of isolation rooms.

Earlier this week, officials with the Blue Ridge Health District briefed UVa, Charlottesville and Albemarle County officials on the health district’s pandemic response. Ryan McKay is the director of policy and planning at the district.

“In September and October we saw some pretty big increases in the daily cases. We’ve dropped off a little bit in early October but now we’re picking up again,” McKay said. “I think this is sort of the nature of how COVID is going to work. We’ll see increases, we’ll work quickly to mitigate and hopefully contain spread and then at some point we see another increase.”

Cases roses as UVA began classes on September 8. But McKay said they were largely contained to the UVA community.

“I will say that even though we say larger numbers of cases coming from the University setting, we did not see transmission from students or faculty into the community,” McKay said.

However, the University has been conducting a lot of tests, and they all count toward the percent positivity rating. On September 6, the positive percentage for PCR tests was 7.5 percent. That number was at 2.6 percent today.

“It’s important to understand that positivity rate may be being skewed by all of those tests that are being done,” McKay said. “We really need to look at what we’re seeing in terms of the raw data, the number of cases we’re seeing, and where that transmission is occurring.”

McKay pointed to a key demographic when it comes to the impact of COVID-19.

“We also see a pretty significant change when it comes to age,” McKay said. “Even though the majority of our cases are among those who are 10-19 and 20-29, those who are dying of COVID are of older populations, 50 and above.”

For the rest of this discussion, take a listen to the latest episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. Download McKay’s presentation here.

The election is a few days away, and tensions are running high across the Commonwealth and the nation. The Center for Politics at the University Virginia will take one more look into Sabato’s Crystal Ball on Monday to give their final thoughts. On Thursday’s episode, Larry Sabato said the national polls are showing Joe Biden ahead, but that may not mean anything.

“The polling average as of Thursday is between eight and nine percent lead for Joe Biden, and that’s national, and that’s a healthy lead assuming that the data machine isn’t broken,” Sabato said. “In the swing states, though, it is closer.”

Sabato said Biden is leading in California, a state where the high number of votes there won’t gain any electoral votes in the electoral college.

“All of those other votes are wasted and they tend to inflate his polling average, his national average in the polls. We certainly think you’d rather be Joe Biden than Donald Trump right now, but I think it’s important to point out that we can see a clear path for Donald Trump to get to 270. Not that it’s easy. A clear path isn’t easy.”

You can watch this installment on the Center for Politics’ YouTube page.

In-person voting in Albemarle County was briefly disrupted this morning when emergency crews showed up to investigate a potential gas leak. According to a release, the building was evacuated for about half an hour, and in-person voting resumed soon after.

Today and tomorrow are the last days to make a contribution through Patreon for this month. This weekend I’m going to revamp how I use Patreon to emphasize the “behind-the-scenes” content you can get there. You’ll also begin to see the Patreon-fueled shout-outs at the end of these newsletters rather than the top.

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To begin with, I want to draw attention to my friend Charlene Munford’s Go Fund Me campaign to help take her Monster Cleaning business to the next level. Earlier this year, Charlene tackled a huge job at my house, clearing and cleaning a basement gone wrong. Take a look at her story and see what you can do.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Virginia has increased by another 1,429 cases today and the percent positivity rate for PCR tests has increased to 5.3 percent, up from 5.1 percent yesterday. The number of reported deaths increased by 20 to a total of 3,636. The seven-day average of new cases is now 1,154.

The Blue Ridge Health District reports another 29 cases today, with ten from Charlottesville, 8 from Albemarle, six from Louisa, three from Nelson, and two from Fluvanna. The seven day daily average of new cases is 28. There has not been a new fatality reported since last Friday, and so the death toll remains at 77. The seven day average for positive tests in the district remains at 2.7 percent today. The average for all tests in the district is 3 percent.

The University of Virginia reports 59 active cases as of yesterday, and 45 of those are students. Four percent of quarantine rooms are in use as are two percent of isolation rooms.

A spike in cases in southwest Virginia prompted Governor Ralph Northam to address the Commonwealth yesterday, and he urged everyone to be vigilant.

“Case numbers are rising in most states and around the world,” Northam said. “In other states and other countries, they are re-imposing restrictions to get case numbers under better control. Nobody, nobody wants to have to do that but this virus remains a very real threat.”

Northam said the Virginia Department of Health is working with local health officials in southwest Virginia to address the issue. He said he is aware of COVID fatigue.

“Most people are doing the right thing and they are tired of seeing other folks disregard the rules and disregard the health and safety of other people, “ Northam said.

Northam announced an additional $30 million in federal CARES Act funding will go into the Rebuild Virginia grant program which is providing money to eligible businesses.

“We’re upping the maximum grant amount of $100,000, up from $10,000,” Northam said.

Northam had other things to announce as well. The General Assembly’s special session has ended and he has had legislation to sign.

“Today Virginia becomes just the third state to ban no-knock warrants,” Northam said. “These reforms also reduce militarization of police equipment, standardize law enforcement training requirements and strengthen the process to decertify officers when needed.”

You can hear more from Northam later today in the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

Top officials from the University of Virginia met with elected leaders yesterday to discuss equity issues as well as the pandemic. This was the first time that President Jim Ryan addressed Albemarle Supervisors and Charlottesville City Councilors at a meeting.

“I believe that making our communities more equitable and inclusive is both the right thing to do and the smart thing to do,” Ryan said. “You may have heard me say that I think the University of Virginia should be both great and good and for that to happen, we absolutely need to be a diverse, inclusive and equitable community but we also need to be a good partner to Charlottesville and Albemarle County.”

The three entities learned about efforts made in the past year including the President’s Council for UVA-Community Partnerships and the Equity Institute.

“That brings faculty and community expertise to bear on racial and economic inequities,” Ryan said. “And it’s also why we’re planning to do a review of our staff, hiring, retention, promotion and procurement policies to make sure those are equitable.”

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she was glad that the meeting between the three groups was taking place.

“If we are more in synch, [we] can create a better life for the citizens in our community,” Walker said. “I am often saying, especially in the time that we’re in now, the unprecedented time that people keep speaking of, wondering how we prevent historians in the future from saying that these are things that we could have done differently.”

I’ll be producing a special report about the meeting that should hopefully be available by the end of the day tomorrow.

An organization that connects Charlottesville school students with agriculture has received a five year half-million grant from the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation. The Charlottesville School Yard Garden will use the $500,000 Shaping Futures Grant to help improve overall community health by promoting health outcomes.

"That group’s project is designed to improve the health of Charlottesville youth through healthy school meals, engagement in school gardens, and cultivating leadership and lifelong healthy living skills," reads a release from the CACF.

The School Yard Garden became part of the Cultivate Charlottesville organization earlier this year. In all there are nine sites across the city including one at City of Promise.

Today in meetings, the only item on the calendar is a meeting on the Urban Rivanna River Corridor Plan that is being coordinated by the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. The Rivanna serves as the border between Albemarle and Charlottesville.

“This is a joint planning process between the county of Albemarle and the city of Charlottesville to create a vision and implementation strategy for what the urban section of the Rivanna River should look like,” said Sandy Shackelford with the TJPDC. “The goal is to balance a lot of different interests that people have with using the river and making sure that the river continues to be a valuable asset to the community moving forward.”

This is the second phase of the study. The first took a look at existing conditions and was published in late 2018. The meeting begins at 6 p.m. (details)

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Before we begin today’s program, I want to mention that Decades Arcade will have a costume contest and scavenger hunt for Halloween this Friday and Saturday. Details are in this instagram post. Visit decadesarcade.com for more information on how you can book and for their COVID-19 rules. You’ll also learn that for $200, you can rent the place for two hours for a private party. Visit decadesarcade.com.

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,345 new cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth Today, or a seven-day average of 1,140 daily cases. The percent positivity rating for PCR tests has increased to 5.1 percent from 5 percent yesterday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 31 cases with 15 from Albemarle, nine from Charlottesville, three from Louisa, two from Fluvanna, one from Greene, and one from Nelson. The percent positivity rate for PCR tests is at 2.7 percent today, up from 2.4 percent on Monday. The seven-day average for new cases is 30.

The University of Virginia had 56 active cases listed on their dashboard as of yesterday afternoon, with 42 of those students. Four percent of quarantine rooms are in use, as are two percent of isolation rooms. Later on today, Dr. Denise Bonds of the Blue Ridge Health District will address the issue today at a joint meeting of Charlottesville City Council, Albemarle Board of Supervisors and top UVA officials. (agenda)

The Virginia Department of Transportation is expecting to begin the first phase of construction work at Interstate 64’s exit 124 this December. The traditional intersection is being reconfigured into a diverging diamond interchange (DDI), which allows for higher traffic volumes.

“The DDI improves safety by reducing the number of spots where vehicles could collide and can handle more than 600 left-turn movements per hour, twice the capacity of a conventional interchange,” reads VDOT’s project page.

VDOT constructed one at Zion Crossroads in 2014, and the Commonwealth Transportation Board approved this project in the second Smart Scale funding round. This project and five others are being built by Curtis Contracting of West Point on a $28.5 million design-build contract.

VDOT officials gave details last night to the Pantops Community Advisory Committee. The first phase will be mostly in the medians.

“The real meat of the project is going to happen in phases two and three so that construction will likely ongo for the peak season next year into fall,” said Steve Ordung, project manager with Curtis Contracting. “The work itself will be at night if it requires any lane restriction other than the normal traffic flow that goes through that intersection. The restrictions are from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. and will likely be for Sunday evening through Thursday evening.”

The project is expected to be complete by May 2022, though those dates could change.

Other projects include a roundabout at Route 151 and U.S. 250 and another at Route 20 and Proffit Road. (project page)

The Greene County Board of Supervisors and the Rapidan Service Authority are in a legal battle over the future of the community’s water supply plan. This summer, the RSA refused to proceed with a plan by Greene County to build a new reservoir.

“Greene County has a solid approved water supply plan to provide for our future and made agreement in 2005 with the Rapidan Service Authority, our regional water and sewer operator, to build our future water supply consistent with our regional regional water supply plan for our community,” said Mark B. Taylor is the county administrator.

However, the Orange and Madison members of the board voted against Greene and opted to stop charging facility fees that Greene was counting on to pay for the project, which had an estimated cost between $45 million and $60 million. Greene asked to leave the RSA but were denied. The RSA then denied the ability of Greene to participate in its meetings.

“The decision to not release us from the RSA partnership but to refuse to allow us to speak at RSA meetings and to refuse to allow us to vote put us in a regrettable prisoner status as a member of RSA,” Taylor said. “We’re still a member but the chairman of their board says they’ve cut ties with us.”

Taylor said Greene has spent millions to move the project forward, including purchasing land and purchasing stream credits to comply with terms of the permit approved by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. That permit is valid through September 12, 2022. The two parties are now in litigation over the matter. (learn more)

The Greene Board of Supervisors also heard about efforts by the Rappahannock Electric Cooperative to bring broadband internet to its customers in rural areas.

“This was a big issue before the coronavirus hit and it’s become a massive issue,” said John Hewa, president and CEO of REC. “About a year and a half ago we launched a fiber backbone project.”

Hewa said there is a potential chance for investment from the U.S. government. On Thursday, Federal Communications Commission will hold an auction for Phase 1 of something called the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund.

"The auction will award up to $16 billion over 10 years to service providers that commit to offer voice and broadband services in fixed locations in eligible unserved high-cost census blocks," reads the public notice for the auction.

Hewa said there was not much more he could say more, but that REC would be participating.

“We very much want to be part of the solution for our counties in terms of the broadband needs and we remain very focused on this issue,” Hewa said.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA) is spending nearly $2 million on new lights at the Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant to become compliant with Albemarle County’s zoning ordinance. Scott Schiller is the engineering manager for RWSA.

“The facility is well lit,” said Scott Schiller, the engineering manager for RWSA. “Unfortunately it is also well lit by some stadium type of lighting which is not in accordance with county regulations and needs to become compliant.”

Those stadium lights will be replaced with what are known as “full cut-off” fixtures that help prevent light pollution and sky glow.

Today in meetings:

As mentioned, the Board of Supervisors, City Council and top University of Virginia officials meet at 2 p.m. for a joint meeting with a focus on equity. (agenda)

Albemarle County will convene a panel discussion on glass recycling at 3 p.m. (meeting info)

The Albemarle Broadband Authority meets at 5 p.m. (meeting info)

The Nelson County Planning meets at 7 p.m. (agenda)

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Listen now (8 min) | This second email today contains the audio for today’s newsletter. There was a network error that prevented the upload, but I am posting it here to make sure it goes to everyone who subscribes in a podcast player. The show is available through iTunes

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This installment is supported by those who have made a financial contribution to support the program, either through Substack, Patreon, or Venmo. All of it goes to a business called Town Crier Productions, which I formed in order to help me do this work for a very long time. Thanks to all who have provided initial support!

The seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases in Virginia is now 1,064 as reported by the state Department of Health. On Saturday, VDH reported 1,088 cases, 999 cases on Sunday and 904 this morning. There have been 3,581 fatalities in Virginia, all part of the 225,000 reported nationwide. The seven-day average for positive tests is at 5 percent today, down from 5.1 percent on both Saturday and Sunday.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, the seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases is 31, with 44 reported Saturday, 36 on Sunday, and 14 today. That’s 25 new cases in Albemarle and 34 new cases in Charlottesville. There have been a total of 77 fatalities since March. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is 2.4 percent in the district. That percentage is 2.7 when all tests are factored in. So far, a total of 96,286 tests have been conducted in the district.

Our area is in the VDH’s Northwest Region. As we begin the week, the trends for the region are fourteen days of decreasing cases and 47 days of decreasing PCR positivity percentage. However, the number of outbreaks have been increasing for nine days. Visit the VDH page to learn more.

On Friday, the VDH unveiled a new dashboard that lists outbreaks in educational settings across the Commonwealth that are reported to the agency. Virginia Health Commissioner Norm Oliver said in a statement that a top priority is to re-open schools. (educational settings dashboard)

“By providing additional information on where outbreaks are occurring we hope to provide a broader picture of the impact of COVID-19 and help communities decide where to place resources to prevent and control outbreaks,” said Dr. Oliver. “Given the changing nature of the pandemic, we felt providing these data at this time poses no risk to public health investigations or to compromising patient anonymity.”

The dashboard will be updated every Friday. So far there are no outbreaks listed from the Blue Ridge Health District. There was an outbreak in September at the Grace Christian School in Staunton that saw a total of 19 cases.

There will soon be a new name for a project to bring a botanical garden to Charlottesville’s largest park. Jill Trischman-Marks is the executive director of what will stop being called the McIntire Botanical Garden. In 2015, the nonprofit entered into an agreement with the city of Charlottesville to open a botanical garden on about eight acres of land in McIntire Park.

“The city chose us to be a partner because they knew that they weren’t providing the environmental education to the community that the community deserves,” Trischman-Marks said. “After the events of August 2017 we saw a dual mission of a place where we could bring the community together.“

Trischman-Marks said many in the community did not feel welcome with the garden named after Paul Goodloe McIntire, who donated parkland on the condition it be reserved for white people only. She said MBG has lofty aspirations for the space.

“It’s not just a place to study botany,” Trischman-Marks said. “It’s a place to bring people of all ages and backgrounds together and learn about one another, demystify who one another is, and ultimately one of our goals is to heal the community with this safe and neutral greenspace in the heart of Charlottesville.”

Trischman-Marks said MBG has received over 200 potential new names for the organization and will unveil the final answer soon.

“Obviously there were people who felt very strongly that Paul Goodloe McIntire had been very generous to this community and that we got some negative feedback about the idea of changing name,” she said. “[But] the land that has been designated for McIntire Botanical Garden was actually never part of the package of land that Paul Goodloe McIntire donated to the city.”

Trischman-Marks said the organization continues to seek feedback on what people want the garden to be.

A panel convened to oversee nearly 60 projects to address safety concerns on Interstate 81 met on Friday. The Virginia Department of Transportation studied the entire length of I-81 in 2018 and identified nearly $2 billion in projects. Shannon Valentine is Virginia’s Secretary of Transportation.

“Of the 56 projects identified in the I-81 corridor improvement plan, 40 of them area are already in the six-year planning window, 8 have completed, 32 are in some phase of design, pre-engineering, environmental, or construction,” Valentine said.

The work is being funded through increased truck registration fees, a regional fuel tax, and an increase in the diesel tax that goes into effect on July 1 of next year. Some sections will be widened, in other places there will be additional lanes, and in others curves will be straightened.

Today in meetings:

The Virginia Passenger Rail Authority meets for the first time and we’ll have audio from that tomorrow

The Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee meets at 4:30 p.m. and will discuss its potential contributions to the Urban Rivanna Corridor Master Plan (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority meets at 6 p.m. Last week, the City Council approved an agreement governing how $3 million in city funding will be used in the Crescent Halls renovation and the first phase of the South First Street Redevelopment. Tonight the CRHA Board will get an update on that as well as the scope of work for a required financial sustainability plan. (CRHA agendas)

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Today’s show is supported through every contribution made by readers and listeners so far, either through a Patreon contribution or a subscription through Substack. Someone even paid me $2 through Venmo for a long story I did this week on West Main Street! This newsletter and newscast will remain free as long as it’s been produced, and your donation helps others learn information about the community as well. Thanks to those who have given initial support!

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 1,180 cases of COVID-19 today and the state remains at a percent positivity at five percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 28 cases reported. Another death has been reported from Louisa for a total of 77 in the district. The percent positivity in the district is at 2.4 percent today.

The University of Virginia has announced they will begin their spring semester on February 1 with classes ending on May 6. There would be no spring break. According to a message from Provost and Chief Operating Officer Liz Magill, the plans reflect a cautious approach.

“They also reflect our confidence in the capacity of this University and its people to continue to limit the spread and keep each other safe,” Magill said. “As we finish this semester strong and look to the future, we are ready to put those lessons to work to advance the mission of this University as safely and effectively as we can.”

This year’s semester will end on November 24 with online exams in December. The January term will be all online. No decision had been made yet on how graduation ceremonies will be conducted for both the Class of 2021 and the Class of 2020. Read more on UVA Today.

The Charlottesville School Board met last night and heard details of a proposal to gradually return younger students to in-person instruction in early 2021 on a hybrid model. They did not take a vote. Under the proposal, pre-K, kindergarten,1st and 5th grade students would return to school two days a week beginning on January 11. Second, third, fourth and sixth grade would return on January 19. Ernest Chambers teaches health and physical education at Burnley-Moran Elementary and is a member of the committee that made the recommendation. (presentation)

“We believe that a four-day model is optimal,” Chambers said. “We are concerned about the division’s ability to staff this model. A two-day hybrid model would reduce face to face contact with teachers, but we recommend this over remaining virtual for the rest of the year.”

The presentation lays out a list of requirements for reopening, such as a duty-free lunch for teachers and a plan for how sick days and quarantine days would be handled. Another is to create a plan for transitioning back to all virtual learning if schools have to close again.

“This must be fleshed out,” Chambers said. “Do we need to close the school? The classroom? We need to work that out.”

Families would have the option to remain virtual-only. A survey will be sent to parents. The full video will be available on the city school’s YouTube Channel.

Earlier this month, the Albemarle School Board voted 4-3 to return to in-person education for Kindergarten through 3rd grade under a hybrid model beginning on November 9. This is known as Stage 3 under their rubric. Yesterday, Katherine Knott with the Daily Progress wrote a story about how more than half of eligible families want their children to go back to school at this time.

Virginia Senator Tim Kaine said he is hopeful for a Congressional agreement on a new round of stimulus funding, but there are other issues happening that are distracting the Senate and the House of Representatives.

“We’re in the Senate this week in my view rushing a Supreme Court nomination that we should wait on until after the election, and continuing to delay action on a 5th COVID bill, a key of which has to be support for people facing problems with eviction or foreclosure,” Kaine said. “We’ve got to provide rent and mortgage support in the next COVID bill.”

Kaine said one such bill was defeated in the Senate this week. He was a guest on a panel discussion held by the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership. That’s a program of the regional planning district.

“In the Thomas Jefferson Planning District, you’ve got all kinds of challenges about affordable housing under normal pre-COVID times,” Kaine said. “It’s an area that’s had a lot of success economically but that leads to housing costs being significant in putting affordable housing out of the reach of many.”

Kaine said that nationwide more than 8 million people are facing eviction. Locally, the TJPDC is administering this region’s allocation of CARES act funding for rent and mortgage relief.

A transit working group made up of Albemarle, Charlottesville and UVA officials talked about lessons learned as buses have been running at reduced capacity due to the need for physical distancing. Charlottesville Area Transit Director Garland Williams said CAT Director Garland Williams said his agency is using money from the CARES Act to cover the high cost of disinfecting buses.

“There needs to continue to be that level of cleaning to make sure the public feels safe when riding public transportation,” Williams said. “Our cleaning bill is fairly high. We’re at half a million dollars already and growing.”

Another topic is whether transit agencies will resume collecting fares after the pandemic. On CAT buses, passengers now enter through the side door bypassing the farebox as a safety precaution.

Albemarle County Supervisor Diantha McKeel said she wanted to know if that could be continued in the future as a way to boost ridership.

Chip Boyles, the director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, said he supported such a study but said the term “fare-free” can be misleading from a budgetary standpoint.

“A lot of people think fare-free and it’s not,” Boyles said. “Somebody’s paying. It just may not be the end consumer handing a dollar bill over to the driver. Somebody’s paying, but I have seen it directly experienced where there are a lot of benefits.”

During the pandemic, that means contactless transit. It also would mean not having to pay someone to account for collecting the fares, or installing expensive fareboxes. He said fare free transit usually works in college towns where the school picks up the tab.

“Somebody writes one check instead of a million people handing over 75 cents,” Boyles said.

Williams said he believes CAT could go fare-free in the future and he is working on a pilot project. For more from the discussion, read a longer story posted on a new website I’m slowly launching.

Now that the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors has adopted a Climate Action Plan, county staff is presenting it to various citizen groups. Last night the Places29-Rio Community Advisory Committee had a chance to learn more. The plan provides a series of strategies to help Albemarle achieve its goal of a 45 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 and to be emissions-free by 2050.

“Transportation according to our 2008 greenhouse gas inventory makes up about 50 percent of the climate impact from the local community, government included, and buildings are another 45 percent,” said Greg Harper, the county’s chief of environmental services.

Some of the remaining percent comes from carbon emissions that emanate from landfills. While local landfills have been closed for a couple of decades, Albemarle’s carbon footprint does include the vehicle emissions used to truck solid waste to those that are open elsewhere in Virginia.

Audrey Kocher of Places29-CAC said she would like to see more done to reduce waste.

“I think recycling is what many community members see and react to and respond to is the trash all around and I think it’s one way that we could get people engaged in the climate change issues,” Kocher said.

Andy Lowe, Albemarle’s environmental compliance manager, reminded the CAC that the county also has a Solid Waste Alternatives Advisory Committee.

“They’re tasked with this specific topic, solid waste alternatives, increasing recycling, increasing organic diversion, reducing litter,” Lowe said.

The SWAAC committee next meets on November 12.

(Above: From the Climate Action Plan)

In one meeting today, the committee appointed to oversee over 60 projects to address safety concerns on Interstate 81 began meeting at 9 a.m. this morning. The Virginia Department of Transportation studied the entire length of I-81 in 2018 and identified nearly $2 billion in projects. The work is being funded through increased truck registration fees, a regional fuel tax, and an increase in the diesel tax that goes into effect on July 1 of next year. Some sections will be widened, in other places there will be additional lanes, and in others curves will be straightened. (agenda) (April 2019 article)

And in one meeting tomorrow, the TJPDC will hold the first of two virtual meetings to take input on the Urban Rivanna Corridor Plan, a joint planning effort between Albemarle and Charlottesville. The Rivanna River is a dividing line between the two localities. (project page)

“In and near Free Bridge, Woolen Mills, and the Pantops area, the river corridor is and will be a vibrant place where people experience a quiet and serene natural environment, enjoy healthy outdoor activities and venues, and appreciate important historic and cultural points of interest,” reads a vision statement for the plan.

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To start today’s show, a shout-out to a Go Fund Me campaign for my friend Charlene Munford . She is seeking funds to bring her cleaning business to the next level. I hired Charlene for a big job earlier this year, and I’m very satisfied with the work. Take a look at the Go Fund Me page today to learn more.

This morning, the Virginia Department of Health reported another 1,332 cases of COVID 19 in the state, and the seven-day average for positive tests rose to 5 percent, up from 4.9 percent on Wednesday. The seven-day daily average for new cases is now at 1,023.

For the second day in a row, the Blue Ridge Health District reports 39 new cases, bringing the seven-day average for new cases to 28. Albemarle added 18 cases, Charlottesville reports seven new cases, and Greene County has eight new cases. The positivity percentage in the district is 2.3 percent.

The University of Virginia added 15 new cases to its COVID-19 tracker yesterday, all students. The number of active cases is listed at 74, with 54 of them students. Six percent of quarantine rooms are now in use, as are five percent of isolation rooms.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has signaled they will defer a planned increase of the county’s property tax rate that had been anticipated for next fiscal year. Supervisors met with the Albemarle School Board in a joint virtual meeting to get an initial look at the budgetary picture.

When the two bodies last met in November 2019, the world was a different place. Jeffrey Richardson is the Albemarle County Executive.

“Today is the 225th day of our global pandemic and the associated national, state, and local level of emergencies. and national,” Richardson said.

To give a sense of how fast the situation changed, the original title of the budget for the current fiscal year was Expanding Opportunity. The document had to be revised quickly to anticipate the economic shutdown that happened. That included a new name - Respond, Recover, Recalibrate. How well has the county done?

“Looking at it today through a leadership lens of what we have learned, and what I would tell these two board today is that it is not back to business as usual,” Richardson said. “We have not recovered. We have not been able to recalibrate and part of that is due to the structural damage to our economy.”

The discussion marked the first public presentation by Nelsie Birch, Albemarle’s new chief financial officer. She said Albemarle did not adopt a five-year capital improvement program this year because of the financial uncertainty.

“There was a recommended budget that had to be dramatically shifted and changed and much of that was holding back on the operations side, and also pausing capital projects,” Birch said, adding that both boards have the opportunity to move some of those projects this year. These included the new $21.2 million high school center and a $20.4 million expansion of Crozet Elementary.

Another decision in the near future will be how much of a increase of a salary increase teachers and school staff may receive next year. A planned increase did not move forward due to the pandemic-related budget changes. The School Board does not have taxing authority, so the Board of Supervisors has to consider that in its budget deliberations. The usual market studies used to help determine compensation are not ready yet.

Birch said the pandemic gives Supervisor and the school board a chance to do things differently.

“The bit of good news we have is that we don’t have to present a budget today, so as we continue to move forward and information comes available to us that helps to inform the decisions we need to make in 2022, that will help guide us to the new reality,” Birch said, adding both boards have time to make careful decisions.

For more on this subject, read Katherine Knott and Allison Wrabel’s story in the Daily Progress.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has voted to make sure the Planning Commission reviews a controversial rezoning application before it comes back to them. Breezy Hill is a proposed 160-unit development near Glenmore that was recommended for denial by the Planning Commission in July. Developer Southern Development deferred a public hearing and vote by Supervisors in September and made some alterations of the project. It had been scheduled to come back to the Board in November.

“I believe that this particular application carries such significance that it would be appropriate for it to go back through the Planning Commission before it came to the Board,” said Supervisor Donna Price, the Scottsville Magisterial District representative.

Price acknowledged the delay will add costs to the project but she wanted the Board’s land use advisors to weigh in. Supervisor Ann Mallek of the White Hall District agreed.

“I just think it’s helpful to the applicant that they take the time to explain whatever the substantial changes are which they are proposing so that they have a better chance of getting approval because racing in with the same old stuff isn’t going to get them anywhere,” Mallek said.

The pandemic we’re in now is a historical echo of the so-called Spanish Flu outbreak of a hundred years ago. This week, the Albemarle County Historical Society invited the author of a 2017 article in the Albemarle County History magazine called "The Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919 in Albemarle County and Charlottesville.” Before recent emergency, there had been no scholarly research into what happened back then.

“There was nothing written about what happened locally and there’s never been a book about what happened in Virginia,” said Addeane Caelleigh, a retired UVA School of Medicine curriculum developer, and former editor of Academic Medicine, the Journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

Caelleigh said much of her research was based on reviewing hospital logs, something that may not be possible to future scholars due to privacy restrictions in place now. We’re still in the middle of this pandemic, but reviewing the one from a hundred years ago is useful.

“The pandemic came in three waves and the first one was a relatively mild form, lasted about three days, it was quite debilitated, it was quite contagious but it did pass,” Calleigh said. “But right behind it came the virulent form and that’s what we think of with the high death count and case counts.”

Caelleigh said 700,000 Americans died in the influenza pandemic. She estimated that meant around 400 deaths occurred in the Albemarle Charlottesville area. The entire audio of the event is available on the Town Crier Productions SoundCloud page.

Today in meetings, the Places29-Rio Advisory Committee will convene at 6 p.m. They’ll get a briefing on the Albemarle Climate Action Plan. They’ll also get an update on the Rio29 form-based code, which seeks to incentivize multistory buildings in the area around the intersection of Rio and 29. Recall that the other day, the Albemarle Architectural Review Board saw details for a new look for the Rio Hill Shopping Center. NBC29 has a story on that meeting. (meeting info)

The Regional Transit Partnership meets at 4 p.m. for a full meeting with updates on planning grants for area transit agencies, impacts of the pandemic on service, and a discussion of long term goals. Earlier this month, Charlottesville Area Transit director Garland Williams gave an update on some of that information to City Council.

At 3 p.m. the director of the planned McIntire Botanical Garden will give an online talk on the status of the project at the Center.

“The input phase of the garden design process is not complete and through reaching out to other organizations, we are hoping to gather more feedback to ensure the built garden will represent the hopes and dreams of the entire community,” reads the blurb for the free event. (info)

At noon, the Central Virginia Regional Housing Partnership continues a speaker series on navigating affordable housing in the area. Today’s talk is on Successful Regional Housing Strategies & Policies and the guests are Executive Director of Partnership for Affordable Housing Elizabeth Hancock Greenfield and Director of Community Planning and Services Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments Paul DesJardin. (register)

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from The Local Energy Alliance Program. LEAP wants you to consider a Home Energy Check-Up as the first step toward lowering your energy bills. For a $45 consultation, Albemarle and Charlottesville residents can have their homes audited to see what can be done to reduce energy consumption. Sign up today!”

The Virginia Department of Health has reported another 1,018 cases of COVID-19 today, bringing the seven-day average for new daily cases to 1,023. The seven-day average for positive tests is at 4.9 percent today, up from 4.6 percent last Wednesday. There were another 30 deaths reported, for a total of 3,515 since the first death was recorded on March 16.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 39 cases reported, bringing the seven-day average to 26 a day. Of today’s cases, there are 21 cases from Charlottesville, six from Albemarle, two from Greene, two from Louisa, two from Fluvanna and six from Nelson. That’s one of the biggest one-day increases for Nelson. The percent positivity for PCR tests for the entire district is at 2.4 percent today.

UVA now reports 59 active cases, 40 of whom are students. Five percent of quarantine rooms are occupied, as are four percent of isolation rooms.

UVA Today has an interview posted with Dr. William Petri about the global surge in COVID cases and what can be done. Dr. Petri is the vice chair for research in the Department of Medicine.

“I am leading the UVA part of a multi-center phase 3 study of a cocktail of anti-spike glycoprotein monoclonal antibodies for the prevention of household transmission of COVID-19,” he told writer Fariss Samarrai. “If this is shown to be successful, and if the cocktail can be mass-produced in adequate amounts, it would offer an additional approach to prevention before a vaccine becomes available.”

The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review has passed a resolution that makes it easier for businesses in design control districts to expand operations outside. The motion states “the BAR unanimously expresses that outdoor tents and any supporting equipment or conditions including sides of tents, locating that does not conform to the current permits, access to electrical facilities, and other measures to support outdoor economic activity in the City, be permitted for as long as the Governor’s state of emergency is in effect.” The resolution came a day after Council temporarily reduced the cafe rental fees for outdoor eating spaces.

Susan Payne with the Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville welcomed the change.

“As the weather turns colder the new change in the city ordinance to allow tents on the Downtown Mall will allow restaurants to extend the time that they can remain open for outdoor dining,” Payne said. “By remaining open, restaurants will continue to add tax revenue to the City and keep staff employed.

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority got an update yesterday on the status of efforts to increase internet access in the rural area, an issue that has gained sudden prominence in a time of virtual education. Mike Culp is the information technology director for Albemarle County.

“The Albemarle Broadband Authority (ABBA) was formed in 2017 by the Board of Supervisors under the state’s wireless services authority act,” Culp said. “Under that act, that legislation does not allow the broadband authority to process payments or tax incentives.”

However, the broadband authority can enter into partnerships, and they’re doing so with the Central Virginia Electric Cooperative.

“They’re building fiber to their membership and we were fortunate to participate in a tax grant incentive agreement with them,” Culp said.

Gary Wood is the president of CVEC which serves 3,600 accounts in Albemarle.

“When we started the project, we were looking at a $110 million investment across parts of 14 counties over a five-year period,” Wood said. “Our original feasibility study indicated that our subsidiary, we’d have to create a subsidiary to provide internet service in Virginia because electric coops aren’t allowed to provide internet service by law.”

So CVEC created an entity called Firefly Fiber Broadband which leases fiber lines that the co-op is installing. Firefly Fiber Broadband then sells to households and businesses. However, the arrangement wouldn’t make financial sense without public investment.

“The original feasibility study indicated that our subsidiary would not reach break-even on an annual basis until the 7th year of operation and that it wouldn’t pay off those first seven years of losses and actually make the true dollar of profit until year 11,” Wood said.

CVEC has asked counties for investments in return for increased tax payments that CVEC will eventually pay on the revenues. They’ve also assembled funding from other state grants.

“Together with those various programs we have ended up with enough funding so that we will be in the black this year with Firefly which is really good news as this is our our second year of operation,” Wood said.

In Albemarle, CVEC is currently working in the southern and eastern ends of the county and is building $11 million worth of fiber. Wood said they are surpassing expectations in the feasibility study.

“What we’ve seen is, particularly in the Midway and Cash’s Corner area of Albemarle County, we’ve over 70 percent of the homes we’ve passed take service from us which is just an incredible take rate, well beyond our expectations,” Wood said.

That’s double what they had estimated. CVEC will continue to build out Firefly fiber along its electric lines but plans to expand by working with other utility companies.

The pandemic has changed commuting habits across the country, and those working to lower greenhouse gas emissions argue this time can help communities achieve reduction goals. The Community Climate Collaborative explored the topic at a Lunch and Learn as part of the Better Business Challenge.

Sara Pennington of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission runs the RideShare program, which helps to reduce single occupancy vehicle usage.

“Rideshare is a local program that focuses on congestion mitigation and reducing greenhouse gases,” Pennington said. “One of the ways to do that is telework, and we are funded through the localities and the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.”

Pennington said one concept is flex scheduling where people build their work day around their own schedule. Statistics on telework were different before the pandemic.

“It’s interesting to know that pre-crisis or pre-pandemic, that eighty percent of workers surveyed through global workplace analytics showed an interest in teleworking, so even before COVID-19, people wanted to explore the potential to telework,” Pennington said.

Pennington said research from Global Workplace Analytics has demonstrated that employers in the United States have been able to save billions a day by shifting their workers over to teleworking.

“The pandemic, it was an emergency change where we all pivoted to figure out what we could do,” Pennington said. She added that working at home does present distractions as workers share space with family members. Pennington said she is hopeful more businesses will continue with teleworking even after the emergency is over. She said firms that offer teleworking could help with recruitment and retention, and offered tips on how to come up with policies.

Madeleine Ray is corporate sustainability manager for Apex Clean Energy and she said that technology helped power their transition.

“Something we have found that really helps with teleworking was Microsoft Teams, it’s been a great tool for communication within each team and then if you have a quick question for someone you can drop in on them with a chat or call,” Ray said.

Ray said the company was using the software before the pandemic, but not even close to the full capacity that Apex uses now.

The Better Business Challenge lunch and learn will be available soon on the Community Investment Collaborative’s YouTube channel.

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee meets at noon, and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at one p.m. They’ll have a joint meeting with the county school board to begin preliminary discussions on the next budget.

They will also have a work session on proposed guidelines for anti-displacement and a tenant relocation policy. The Board adopted a general policy on September 18 but will now see more specific proposals. (agenda)

“The guidelines are designed to provide benefits for residential tenants who will be displaced by housing demolition, substantial rehabilitation, conversion to nonresidential use, or sale of a residential property under a sales contract that requires an empty building,” reads the staff report.

Supervisors will hold public hearings. They are for a special use permit for an a veterinary clinic, a new telecommunications lease at the county’s property on Buck’s Elbow Mountain, and to take public comment on changes to county code to remove gendered language.

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This installment is a little unusual. I felt the main story is one that needed to be documented with more than soundbites. I’ll be back to the usual format tomorrow.

There are another 926 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia as reported by the state Department of Health this morning. The seven-day average for positive tests has dropped to 4.8 percent today, down from 5 percent yesterday.

For the third day in a row, the Blue Ridge Health District has reported 16 new cases across its five counties and the city of Charlottesville. The percent positivity for PCR tests is at 2.6 percent today, down from 3.3 percent yesterday. The University of Virginia is reporting 56 active cases at the moment with 36 of them students. Five percent of isolation rooms are in use, as are six percent of quarantine rooms.

Charlottesville City Council had a full meeting last night that may take a few newsletters to get everything to you. This newsletter is a little different, because some of these subjects don’t lend themselves to quick soundbites.

Council first approved a plan to waive fees for outdoor cafes for March and April, and cut those in half through next March. As part of that plan, they’ve also agreed to charge half of the usual parking rental fee for any restaurant that wants to use an adjacent parking space for service.

“This has been done by at least one restaurant and considered by one or two others and in the interest of trying to encourage outdoor dining while the season permits, we felt it was useful to reduce the fee for that rental space,” said Chris Engel, the city’s economic development director.

Council then began a long discussion of how to move forward with subsidized housing projects including the renovation of Crescent Halls and new units at South First Street. Those are public housing units operated by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority, which is a separate governmental entity from the city.

CRHA currently is authorized by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to operate 376 public housing units, and many units were built in the 80’s and have not been well maintained. Brenda Kelley is the director of redevelopment for the city, and she presented Council with an ordinance to grant the CRHA $3 million in city funds to help finance the work.

(read the staff report including the draft ordinance)

“CRHA and its partners have been engaged in robust resident-led redevelopment planning efforts,” Kelley said.

One of those partners is something called the Charlottesville Community Development Corporation, which is actually the CRHA Board of Commissioners, a body appointed by Council. The CCDC is a nonprofit entity that is eligible to receive and distribute Low Income Housing Tax Credits which help to subsidize the projects through private investment.

“The funding will be disbursed as a grant to CRHA, CRHA will provide the funds to the CCDC, whereby the CCDC will lend the funds to the project as an interest-free 30-year loan,” Kelley said. “One hundred percent of the units constructed will be provided for rental by low and moderate income persons having household incomes at or below AMI. No fewer than thirteen units will be public housing units at South First Street phase one, and no fewer than 53 units will be public housing units at Crescent Halls.”

Above: Project cost breakdown for South First Street Phase One

CRHA would not own the properties, but will continue to own the land and operate the buildings, but the CCDC will own the structures. That means they will be responsible for paying taxes. We’ll come back to that in a bit.

These details are worth documenting.

“The private sector project owner has an investment member and the investment member has a right to sell its interest in the project prior to the end of the 30-year LIHTC term,” Kelley said. “If the investment member’s interest cannot be bought out by CRHA, this could potentially result in termination of an extended use agreement after year 15. So year 15 may be a significant milestone whereby CRHA has an option to purchase the project. This raises unknowns also including how much this purchase price would be and where will CRHA obtain the funding.”

Council’s discussion centered around two issues.

One is a clause in the resolution that compelled CRHA to complete a financial sustainability plan that was requested by Council in February 2019. CRHA has to complete that plan anyway as part of a plan with HUD. The federal agency considers CRHA to be a “troubled” agency and the local authority must document how they can hit performance measures.

The ordinance before Council required that plan to be in place in order for the CRHA to get a third payment from the $3 million.

CRHA Executive Director John Sales said that requirement would prevent the project from breaking ground by the end of this year.

“It’s going to be really hard for us to close on both loans with that requirement in there because we won’t be able to show a bank that we’ve satisfied that requirement in order to close, so that could really put both projects at a point where they would not go forward,” Sales said.

Council discussed a financial sustainability plan for CRHA in February 2019. Since then, it has gone through a leadership change, and Sales just became director in August.

Councilor Heather Hill said she wanted the sustainability plan to be completed.

“I want to know that by the time we get to that third draw which is our intention that we’re seeing real progress made to a reasonable end to the sustainability study because I just think that the longer this goes on, it’s not to our advantage,” Hill said.

Councilor Michael Payne said he would be willing to drop the requirement

“I’m certainly willing to be flexible,” Payne said. “Our intention is not at all to have this jeopardize any funding or jeopardize these projects.”

Council agreed to require the plan to be produced by the time a second phase for South Street moves forward.

The other issue regarded the taxes. The CCDC will not be exempt from local taxes.

Sales said the existing resolution did not give a guarantee that future Councils might stop paying an annual subsidy “equal to the dollar amount of the real estate taxes assessed and billed to the new project owner.” Currently the CRHA makes an annual payment to the city in lieu of taxes.

Jeff Meyer at the Virginia Community Development Corporation said the project will not attract investors if there is the potential for future liabilities that are not built into their proforma.

“No one is going to go forward with lending money or investing money into the project if we understand from the very beginning that they are not economically feasible because they have to pay the full liability for property tax,” Meyer said. “The concern would be that a future city council could overturn what’s written in the ordinance here.”

Under Virginia Law, elected bodies cannot appropriate funding beyond one fiscal year.

“You can budget for payment of your obligations from one fiscal year to the next but you can’t enter into binding obligations over a long term that aren’t subject to what we call a non-appropriations clause,” said interim City Attorney Lisa Robertson.

Robertson said there was no legal way for the city to waive the property taxes CCDC has to pay on the buildings. The CRHA will still own the land.

One solution would be for the city to pay the next fifteen years of property taxes in one lump payment that could be put into an escrow fund that the CCDC could draw down from.

Council chose to not go with that option.

“Our budget picture is pretty brutal and there’s still substantial uncertainty about what the impact of COVID will be this budget cycle,” said Councilor Payne.

Mayor Nikuyah Walker asked Meyer if the project would be halted if Council could not cover the cost of paying the next fifteen years of property taxes in advance.

“I think we’ll make every effort to go forward the with project but I can’t say something won’t come up once the language in the ordinance becomes something that our other partners and the others funders are going to read, and everyone who is going to review all of the documents,” Meyer said.

Walker pointed out that three current Councilors will serve until 2023. Payne said he would continue to support the city’s annual subsidization of property taxes for CCDC.

“It’s not difficult fiscally for us to fund that each year and maintain that but to put it all up front in one year, especially at this time, is a challenge,” Payne said. “I certainly get the uncertainty but I think the community and the Council has a 100 percent commitment to this.”

As this was only the first reading of the resolution, staff will take a look at potential ways to address Meyer’s and Sales’ concern. One option is a line item in the capital improvement program.

“It would set forth the idea that there is a plan and the intent is that you are going to fund this over the five years,” said Krissy Hammil, Senior Budget and Management Analyst for the city of Charlottesville.

Speaking broadly about public investments in housing, Walker said it was important to understand what these complex arrangements will mean for future Councils. Later in the meeting they took action on $5.545 million request for Piedmont Housing Alliance for the first phase of the Friendship Court redevelopment.

“It’s important for us to understand what we’re setting future councilors up for and when you talk about commitment to housing, then we have to say that this is our commitment to housing,” Walker said. Walker is a member of the CRHA and CCDC Boards.

Walker said Council also had to remember there would be future requests from CRHA and PHA for future phases.

“I just think if there’s a vote in favor of this, and I think both of these projects are very important, and I think the other Councilors agree, then we need to understand our limitation on doing other major projects while we figure out these two projects,” Walker said.

I’ll have more from this meeting in future installments of the newsletter, or possibly a special podcast just about this meeting. I’ve got four more hours to listen through.

Now, today in meetings.

The Commonwealth Transportation Board meets in Richmond all day, and among the items is an update on revenues that provide funding for infrastructure projects throughout Virginia.

According to David Blount with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission, budget committees in the General Assembly have given the CTB “flexibility to reprogram up to $1.1 billion in revenues from existing projects and the phased implementation of new allocation formula adopted in 2020, due to reductions in transportation revenues currently estimated at $871 million.” (agenda) (Blount’s weekly update)

The Parking Advisory Panel meets at 3:30 p.m. The group was created in the wake of a Parking Action Plan adopted by Council around the time in early 2017 when they spent $2.85 million to purchase land on Market Street for a future parking garage. The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review will meet at 4:00 p.m. and will begin with a discussion of a refined process for design review. (agenda) (meeting info)

The consent agenda has details for an expansion of the Center for Christian Study site at 128 Chancellor Street. The BAR will have a preliminary discussion on renovations to buildings that will be used as part of the new joint Albemarle/Charlottesville General District Court.

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. They’ll get an update on the Albemarle Broadband Authority and the recent rezoning of the Albemarle Business Campus. The EDA and the county have a performance agreement with developer Kyle Redinger that was signed on April 15. One of the terms is that Redinger must reserve up to 25,000 square feet of space for a primary business in exchange for $100,000. In return, Redinger will also provide enhanced connectivity, provide bike racks, and construct an enclosed bus shelter. (meeting info) (agenda)

The Albemarle Planning Commission meets at 6 p.m. and will have a work session on transportation issues. No materials have been provided in advance, but transportation planner Kevin McDermott recently provided the Board of Supervisors with this quarterly report. (report)

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*The Virginia Department of Health has reported 2,014 new cases of COVID-19 since our last report on Friday, with 1,114 Saturday, 900 Sunday and 690 today. Add in the previous four days and that’s a seven-day average of 1,037. The seven-day average for positive tests is at 5 percent today, up from 4.8 percent reported Friday morning.

The Blue Ridge Health District has reported 60 cases since Friday, with 28 on Saturday, 16 on Sunday and 16 again this morning. The seven-day average of new daily cases is 23 for the district. For Albemarle, the seven-day average is 4 new cases a day and in Charlottesville that figure is 6 today. The percent positive rate in the district for PCR tests is 3.3 percent today and 3.5 percent for all types of tests.

The University of Virginia will update its COVID-19 tracker later on this afternoon.

Very late tonight, the Charlottesville City Council will get an update on the city’s climate action plan. Earlier this month, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors adopted a series of goals and strategies to meet the county’s gas greenhouse reduction goals. Now the University of Virginia has unveiled a new ten-year framework to guide the school’s efforts. The 2020-2030 Sustainability Plan has ten goals including reducing waste, nitrogen and water consumption each by thirty percent. The plan also seeks to increase sustainable food by thirty percent and to become carbon neutral by 2030 and fossil-fuel free. (read the plan)

In a letter included in the plan, President Jim Ryan said a key UVA goal is to be a good neighbor, both to the local community and the world at large.

“We should always consider our collective impact on our community and the world,” Ryan wrote.

“But we need to do more than express our commitment to sustainability; we need to follow through on that commitment.”

UVA officials will hold a joint work session with City Council and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors next Wednesday at 2 p.m.

Today the Community Climate Collaborative (C3) and the Virginia Discovery Museum will deliver “climate action kits” to families whose young children are participating in City of Promise programs. According to a release from C3:

“The kit includes activities to help kids connect everyday actions to climate solutions: a fun scavenger hunt to learn about household energy use at home; a leaf-scratching art project to get outside and learn about the benefits of trees; art materials to decorate a reusable grocery bag; and a recycled egg-carton veggie market with fresh fall veggie cut-outs for imaginative kids to display and “sell“.

The cost for the kits have been covered by C3 and the Earth Day Network. They are aimed at children aged three to eight.

The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality has completed an Environmental Justice Study co-conducted by a Charlottesville group. The work by Skeo Solutions and the Metropolitan Group is intended to provide direction to the agency as it makes a cultural shift.

“Virginia DEQ finds itself at a pivotal moment in history,” reads a portion of the 47-page report. A consulting firm run by former Charlottesville city planner Ebony Walden was commissioned for the study.

“The time is ripe for acknowledgement of environmental justice issues within the Commonwealth of Virginia and adopting a new mindset supporting the advancement of environmental justice through DEQ programs,” the report continues.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency defines environmental justice as “the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies.”

Recommendations include strengthening legal authority to integrate environmental justice into DEQ programs, hire more staff to support the mission, and develop tools to provide more information on environmental conditions to the public. For instance, recommendation 5E calls for an expansion of the state’s air quality and water quality monitoring system. (read the plan)

Tonight the organization Wild Virginia will host a virtual lecture with writer Janisse Ray on the topic What the Pandemic is Teaching Us. Ray is the author of five non-fiction books as well the memoirs Ecology of a Cracker Childhood and Wild Card Quilt.

“I focus on nature and culture always with the eye toward thinking about the stories that people need to hear to open their hearts and their minds,” Ray said.

Ray said she has spent much of the past 20 years traveling across the country to give presentations. Not being able to do that has led her to realize that so much mobility came at a cost.

“The pandemic has forced us to do some of the things that we have always needed to do for the environment but were unwilling to do,” Ray said.

The free event sponsored by Wild Virginia begins at 7 p.m. tonight. Please register in advance.

This afternoon, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will host a concert outside at its headquarters on Market Street Park. The Socially Distanced Brass Quintet will play from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m on the ACHS’s front lawn. The quintet is a component of the Charlottesville Municipal Band.

*Today in meetings, I refer you to the Week Ahead newsletter for full details. But in summary, Charlottesville’s Council has major items related to the future of subsidized housing in the city. The Architectural Review Board will review a new look for Rio Hill Shopping Center and the Places-29 Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee will get details for another affordable housing project.

The Piedmont Housing Alliance and two other groups are seeking a rezoning to allow for redevelopment of the Red Carpet Inn on U.S. 29 for low income housing, including a repurposing of existing motel rooms to serve as emergency supportive housing. Details in the newsletter.

Finally today, a quick plug for my friend Charlene Munford whose work as a bartender is on indefinite hold due to COVID-19. She’s launched her own cleaning business called Monster Cleaning. I hired her to do some work at my house to handle a difficult job. The work was excellent. Now she has an opportunity to expand her business, but needs financial assistance to help cover the costs of hiring new employees. Go visit her Go Fund Me page to learn more of her story.

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Today’s Patreon-powered shout-out:

The Local Energy Alliance Program wants you to consider a Home Energy Check-Up as the first step toward lowering your energy bills. For a $45 consultation, Albemarle and Charlottesville residents can have their homes audited to see what can be done to reduce energy consumption. Sign up today!”

There are another 1,183 new cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth today as reported by the Virginia Department of Health. The seven-day average for positive tests has increased to 4.8 percent, up from 4.7 percent on Thursday.

The Blue Ridge Health District added another 40 cases with 14 new cases in Albemarle and 18 in Charlottesville. Another death was reported from Charlottesville bringing the total to date to 32 in the city and 75 in the entire Blue Ridge Health District. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests remains at 3.2 percent today. However, that increases to 3.5 percent when you factor in all the kinds of tests.

The University of Virginia reports 105 active cases as of Thursday, with 78 of those students. There have been 1,019 cases among UVA personnel since August 17. Ten percent of quarantine rooms are in use as are six percent of isolation rooms.

The Blue Ridge Health District is within the Virginia Department of Health’s Northwest Region. According to the agency’s pandemic metrics page, the region has seen an increase in the number of cases over the past 16 days though percent positivity has been decreasing for 37 days, as are the number of outbreaks and the number of affected health care workers. The VDH deems the region as being “at moderate community transmission.”

Virginia’s Central Region is at “substantial community transmission” according to the metrics page.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Directors was briefed last night on the status of long-planned public housing redevelopment projects.

“We want to add to our community’s inventory of affordable housing,” said Dave Norris, the CRHA’s redevelopment director. “We haven’t finalized what that number is going to be yet but we are confident in saying over the course of this redevelopment effort we’re going to add hundreds and hundred of new units of affordable housing to the city’s stock.”

Norris said the CRHA gets one annual subsidy from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development but he said it does not cover the annual cost.

“It’s never sufficient and it hasn’t provided and it doesn’t provide the funding we need to maintain our housing stock and operate the agency it really should be operated,” Norris said. “Through redevelopment we are incorporating new streams of financing that will put us in more of a sustainable position.”

Norris said ground is soon to break on the $19 million renovation of Crescent Halls, which will see 105 rebuilt units. The work will see two floors under construction at any given time.

“The skeleton of the building is in decent shape so we’re not having to knock down the building,” Norris said.

The other imminent project is a two-phase redevelopment of South First Street with the first step being 62 new units and a community center constructed on a current ball field. When that is completed in 2022, existing residents of South First Street can be relocated into the new building, and 113 units will be built where the existing structure. A third phase at South First Street might also happen, as well as a renaming.

“I think that’s going to be part of the upcoming resident planner conversations as we flesh out the plans for phase 2,” Norris said.

Financing for the projects comes through the federal and state Low Income Housing Tax Credit program, $5 million from the Dave Matthews Band, $10 million from Red Light Management, and $15 million in capital improvement program funds from the city of Charlottesville.

“All told we’ve now secured commitments if not actual funding for over $70 million in the last year and a half for our redevelopment efforts,” Norris said.

Norris said construction will begin a month after the financing deals are completely close. City Council will consider a funding agreement at their meeting on Monday.

Albemarle County has unveiled the latest update of its development dashboards, which track the number of residential units and other buildings that are working their way from proposal to occupancy. The website states there are currently 53 active construction projects in Albemarle and that another 11 projects are under review. Visitors to the site can filter results based on where they live. (dashboard)

The Virginia Department of Health has lifted a harmful algae advisory that had been in place in parts of Lake Anna. The Middle Pamunkey Branch of Lake Anna had been under an advisory for some time but samples taken in mid-September and earlier this month indicate safe levels. Some species of algae contain hazardous toxins that are harmful if accidentally swallowed. (press release)

Time is running out to apply for the second round of Albemarle County’s Community Lift Grants, which is intended for nonprofits. Groups can apply for up to $50,000 toward lost revenues and would-be applicants are asked to fill out an inquiry form by Monday.

On Monday, Charlottesville will open up the second round of grants to city businesses. This round will offer up to $825,000. Grants of up to $10,000 are available. Both programs are funded through the federal CARES Act.

Tonight, Live Arts will debut another program as part of its Forge Ahead season. However, the theater company is moving away from Facebook Live in favor of the YouTube platform. Live Arts will hold another Coffeehouse performance tonight this time with Four County Players. Musical performances by Shannon Montague, Doug Schneider, and Kristen Bell. Dance performance by Mariko Schaper Doktor and Perry Medlin. The Coffeehouse will be hosted by Edward Warwick White and Linda Zuby.

In addition, Live Arts is also selling tickets to virtual performances this weekend of the play Lost Home, Win Home by playwright Shelby Marie Edwards. The show “follows the individual perspective of a Black Charlottesville native as she recounts the events leading up to the Unite the Right/Neo-Nazi rally that occurred on August 12, 2017.”

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Today’s installment, and all the other installments, is made possible by contributions from readers and listeners either through purchasing a subscription to this newsletter or setting up a monthly donation through Patreon. All of it goes to making sure I can continue keeping an eye on things for the foreseeable future. About ten percent of you so far are doing so, and I thank you for that.

There are another 1,331 new cases of COVID-19 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health, and the seven-day percent positive rate for PCR tests has increased slightly to 4.7 percent, up from 4.6 percent yesterday. The total number of new cases over two weeks per 100,000 population is now at 166.9.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 25 cases reported today with one from Fluvanna, two from Nelson, three from Greene, five from Louisa, five from Albemarle, and nine from Charlottesville. Louisa County is seeing its sharpest rise in cases to date, with 11 new cases reported over the weekend. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests is at 3.4 percent today in the district.

The University of Virginia’s COVID-19 tracker reports 105 active cases as of yesterday among its population, with 80 of them students. Since August 17, UVA has tracked 1,000 cases, with 893 of them students. As UVA is not a separate health district, those numbers show up officially in counts for the localities in the Blue Ridge Health District.

On August 17, Albemarle reported 913 cases and Charlottesville reported 560. As of today, Albemarle has added 539 cases for a total of 1,452 and Charlottesville has added 921 cases for a total of 1,481.

A Charlottesville committee charged with advising the School Board on the eventual transition to in-person instruction is recommending that virtual learning continue through the end of the calendar year. The second nine-week academic period begins on November 9, and the Covid-19 Advisory Committee recommends waiting until January to begin a phased approach to in-person education. (slides for meeting)

The committee is suggesting that pre-K through 6th grade students have the option of returning to school four days a week beginning on January 11 and January 19. If demand is high, this could be switched to a two-day hybrid model. The group also recommends that 7th grade through 12th grade could begin in-person instruction two days a week beginning on February 1.

The email sent to parents includes a question about why the committee recommends waiting.

“Much of the committee’s conversations have focused on Charlottesville’s data, including its higher-than-recommended new case counts (presently 2x higher than the CDC’s threshold for “highest risk”),” reads the email from Superintendent Rosa Atkins. “Additionally, the impact of the arriving flu season has yet to be seen. And finally, the coming disruptions (and increased travel) during the Thanksgiving and winter breaks reduced the value and safety of returning prior to January.”

The information is just a recommendation and is not intended to be construed as a plan.

The Albemarle School Board voted 4-3 last week to have Kindergarten through 3rd Grade students resume in-person education two days a week on a hybrid model. (coverage)

Today in meetings, the Natural Heritage Committee meets at 5 p.m. and the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee meets at 7 p.m. Both are virtual meetings. The latter get a briefing on the creation of an affordable housing policy in Albemarle. (NHC meeting info)

The Board of Supervisors were briefed on the status of the draft plan last weekend. One of the most confusing aspects related to the cost of housing is the federal definition of the word “affordable” which for any given area is tied to a statistic known as the Area Median Income, or AMI. Stacy Pethia is the county’s housing coordinator and she said about a fifth of the county’s households struggle to afford where they live.

“The current policy focuses primarily on affordable housing and it defines affordable housing as safe, decent housing where housing costs do not exceed 30 percent of the household income,” Pethia said. (draft housing policy)

Albemarle is an affluent area, statistically, and has a median annual income of $93,900 according to data on Virginia Housing (new name for Virginia Housing and Development Authority). That means price restrictions allowed through voucher programs and designated “affordable” housing are much higher than people expect. If you listen to the soundbite, you’ll hear an exasperated gasp from Supervisor Ann Mallek.

“For reference the current fair market rent for a two-bedroom unit is $1,262 per month and the maximum affordable sales price for Albemarle county is set at $243,750,” Pethia said.

The new housing policy is intended to find ways to encourage development of more housing within Albemarle based on the idea that more supply will lead to lower prices. The draft policy has 12 policy objectives and 39 strategies to achieve them as the area population continues to rise.

“According to the Weldon-Cooper Center population estimates, Albemarle’s population is expected to increase by about 26 percent by the year 2040,” Pethia said. “To accommodate this growth, Albemarle County will need to add 11,750 housing units to our current stock over the next years.”

The 5th and Avon area of Albemarle is home to several future developments including the redeveloped Southwood Mobile Home Park, the Albemarle Business Campus, and Spring Hill Village. The CAC will also get an update on Southwood this evening. (5th and Avon CAC meeting info)

The Charlottesville Human Rights Commission meets at 6:30 p.m. (meeting info)

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Today we have a new Patreon-powered shout-out. The Local Energy Alliance Program wants you to consider a Home Energy Check-Up as the first step toward lowering your energy bills. For a $45 consultation, Albemarle and Charlottesville residents can have their homes audited to see what can be done to reduce energy consumption. Sign up today!”

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam has given his first press conference since he and his wife were diagnosed with COVID-19.

“We know that we have been very fortunate that our experience with this disease was mild,” Northam said. “Many other people have not been so lucky and our hearts continue to be with those who have lost loved ones.”

As of this morning, there have been 3,381 COVID-19-related deaths in Virginia and over 200,000 nationwide.

Northam said that none of his close contacts have been diagnosed with the disease. He attributed this to mask wearing and spoke to the importance of contact tracing. Dr. Danny Avula is the director of the Richmond City and Henrico County Health Districts.

“The role of the local health department in every new case of COVID that we have, we follow up that case and we identify when was their onset of symptoms or when was the date of their positive test,” Avula said.

Contact-tracers then interview the person to try to identify who they were around.

“And we determine who actually met the definition of a close contact, so having spent 15 minutes or greater within six feet of somebody is the epidemiological definition of a close contact,” Avula said.

Anyone who meets that definition is now considered to be exposed and they are asked to go into quarantine for 14 days. That’s the period when the virus can incubate in a person’s body. Avula said tracers tracked down 65 individuals across seven health districts who met the definition. None tested positive.

This morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports another 805 cases today, and reported 1,235 yesterday. The numbers of yesterday were made available later than usual due to a communications problem we’ll discuss more in a moment. The statewide seven-day average of positive tests increased to 4.6 percent.

There have been 38 cases reported in the Blue Ridge Health District since Monday, with 19 new cases both today and yesterday. A recent spike in new cases has appeared to slow. The seven-day daily average for new cases is now at 8 in Albemarle and 12 in Charlottesville. The seven-day average of positive tests in the district is at 3.6 percent today.

Last night the Greene County Board of Supervisors got an update from emergency services director Melissa Meador. That body had not met since September 22.

“Our numbers in Greene County stand at 255 as of today,” Meador said. “When we met last met it was at 212 so we are up 43. 12 hospitalizaiton, up 2, and 3 COVID related fatalities, no change there.”

In all there have been 74 fatalities in the Blue Ridge Health District to date.

The number of active cases at the University of Virginia is now at 95 people with 74 of those individuals being students. Yesterday, UVA officials announced they would loosen restrictions on gatherings from five people to ten people. They also said that all students living in dorms would be tested on a regular basis, or at least every nine days.

Governor Northam said it is crucial to avoid complacency as the seasons change.

“We are heading into the colder months and all of the outdoor socializing we’ve been able to do is getting harder,” Northam said. “People are going to be less likely to want to meet up outside when it’s 40 degrees or below.”

Northam also announced yesterday that he has signed legislation recognizing Juneteenth as a state holiday. Legislation passed the General Assembly in the ongoing special session.

Now, about that fiber cut.

A federal judge has extended the voter registration deadline in Virginia one day after the line was cut in Chester that served the online system. Several groups ranging from the New Virginia Majority Education Fund to the League of Women Voters filed a complaint asking for an extension, which required judicial action. Here’s judge John A. Gibney Jr.

“I will order, as you requested, all registration may occur until 1159 p.m. on tomorrow, October the 15th,” Gibney said, just before thanking the attorneys for working together to allow more people to register.

Today is the first day of operations for the new Greene County Department of Emergency Medical Services. The Greene Board of Supervisors authorized the move in May after the University of Virginia opted to not renew a contract to provide the service for the county. Here’s Melissa Meador again.

“All 14 full-time positions are filled and we have hired an additional 13 part-time employees,” Meador said.

Supervisors praised Meador and her staff for putting together the department in such a short amount of time.

“I went from a little bit of anger earlier this year when the contract was terminated, quickly to awe for what Ms. Meador and her new team has accomplished,” said Supervisor Bill Martin.

The Virginia Department of Health has issued a warning against eating fish caught in the Upper James River due to elevated levels of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) found in tissue samples. This affects a stretch of river from headwaters at Iron Gate to Balcony Falls Dam near Glasgow. (press release)

Over 90 percent of the office space has been leased in the Dairy Central project according to an email from the firm Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer. In all, the Dairy Central will include 50,000 square feet of Class A office space and 180 upcoming apartments, as well as a food hall. Tenants for office space include the Costar Group and Virginia Humanities.

“The Dairy Market targets an opening in late 2020 where Starr Hill brewery will anchor a 16-stall market hall featuring a talented roster of Virginia's leading purveyors, culinary talents and artisans,” the email reads. “Market Hall stalls are entirely subscribed with tenants including cult classics Moo Thru and Take it Away Sandwiches, The Milkman's Bar, and an exciting and diverse lineup of additional tenants.”

Today in meetings, The Crozet Community Advisory Committee convenes virtually at 7 p.m. for a meeting that a discussion of a special use permit to amend previous approvals for the private Claudius Crozet Park to allow for a “Community Recreation Facility.”

There will also be a presentation on the many projects the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority is planning for the Crozet Area. The RWSA Board of Directors were given this presentation in late August. There’s a capital cost of about $41.5 million in projects to increase capacity and improve safety at Beaver Dam. (slides)

Thanks again to LEAP for their Patreon-fueled shout-out. You too can help fund this show and get the word out about a nonprofit, an idea, a cause, or someone’s birthday. For now, you will get four shout-outs a month for $25.

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It’s Tuesday the Thirteenth of October which may not be an actual scary thing, but it is 2020, so let’s be a little extra careful today. I’m Sean Tubbs and this is the Charlottesville Community Engagement Newscast and Newsletter. If you’ve only read if to this point, today’s the day to listen. Don’t be scared to click the button!

As the newsletter goes to production, there are several information technology problems affecting state government websites. That includes the Virginia Department of Health as well as the registration database for voter registration. The problem traces to a fiber cut in Chester according to a tweet from the Virginia Information Technologies Agency. Crews are working on the issue.

Yesterday, the Albemarle registrar reported that over 20,000 ballots have been cast by county residents, or about a quarter of the total registered voters. Almost 11,400 votes were made in-person and 9,431 were received in the mail. Charlottesville’s registrar reported there have been 4,738 in-person voters and 3,197 mail-in ballots received as of yesterday at 11:40 a.m.

Charlottesville’s new fire chief will start on December 1 after wrapping up a long stint in central Florida. Dr. Hezedean Smith has been with the Orlando Fire Department since 1996 and is its current assistant chief.

“In looking forward to starting my role on December 1, it will be a very special day for my family and I because I will join an organization that embodies itself as a family with integrity, respect, and excellence,” Smith said.

Smith began his public safety career in the Air Force. He has a Doctor of Management degree in Organizational Leadership and a master’s degree in Organizational Management from University of Phoenix.

“It is worth noting that Dr. Smith has over thirty years of experience in the fire service and that he has an extensive array of experience from operations, to budgeting, to [Information Technology] to EMS operations as well,” said interim city manager John Blair.

Smith said he looked forward to starting work.

“Given the current challenges facing our nation, state and city, I look forward to utilizing my skills, my knowledge of emergency services and leadership and management skills to help move our city forward,” Smith said.

Smith fills a vacancy left when Fire Chief Andrew Baxter resigned following a public dispute with former City Manager Tarron Richardson. Richardson himself resigned last month. The city is seeking a search firm to help with finding a permanent replacement.

Today in meetings, we report on Buckingham County for the first time. The Board of Supervisors there will hold a public hearing on a zoning change that would allow “core sampling for commercial use in an agriculturally zoned district with a special use permit.” Last month, the county’s zoning administrator told a Canadian company that work they had been conducting was in violation.

The group Friends of Buckingham is calling for the change to be denied because it could lead to gold mining operations which would be harmful to the environment. Aston Bay Holdings has arrangements to explore nearly 5,000 acres of land in the county as they announced last March.

“The parcel contains a recent gold discovery located adjacent to the past producing Gold – Pyrite Belt of Central Virginia,” reads the website. “The focus of exploration will be an associated gold-in-soil anomaly that extends for a distance of over 900 metres (m) with values up to 0.4 grams/tonne (g/t) Au in soil.”

Virginia has a long history of gold mining but there has no been active commercial mines since 1947, according to the Virginia Department on Mines, Minerals and Energy.

The Buckingham County Board of Supervisors begins at 6 p.m. and can be viewed on YouTube.

The Charlottesville Planning Commission will consider a multifamily dwelling unit on vacant land in Fifeville, south of the University of Virginia. The 2013 Comprehensive Plan calls for this to be low density residential, but the applicant is proposing a way forward. After that discussion, Commissioners will be briefed by consultants on the comp plan update. Jennifer Koch with Rhodeside and Harwell described the process to the Commission back in August. (meeting info)

"The effort that we're calling Cville Plans Together is an effort that we as a consultant are working with NDS, the Planning Commission and others to continue the update to the Comprehensive Plan that was started in 2017, 2018," Koch said. "That includes a big focus on housing and housing affordability with a specific housing plan that will be part of the housing chapter of the Comprehensive Plan."

The Albemarle Planning Commission meets at 6 p.m. for a work session related to a recycling facility by the airport that processes material from demolished buildings. (meeting info)

At the same time, Albemarle will hold a town hall meeting this evening for active and former military personnel who work for local government and the school system. One of the speakers will be Col. Lettie J. Bien (Ret.), Program Coordinator for the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce Defense Affairs Committee (DAC). The event is being put on by the Albemarle County Veterans Affinity Group.

The Greene Board of Supervisors meets at 7:30 p.m. and one of the items on the agenda is an initiation of that county’s Comprehensive Plan, which was last adopted in June 2016.

There will also be an update on the Shenandoah National Park, which gets a new superintendent this month when Patrick Kenney takes over.

“Compared to 2019, Shenandoah National Park is enjoying a slight increase in visitation and in entrance fees,” writes Bill Henry in an email. “Visitation through August was up 1.6 percent. Weekends have seen visitation numbers that rival October leaf season weekends.”

There will also be a presentation for a proposal for Stanardsville to become twinned with the village of Tarland in Scotland.

“They both are nestled in a rural landscape, surrounded by rolling fields in the foothills of nearby mountains,” reads the materials. “The Piedmont region of Virginia and the Howe O’ Cromar in Aberdeenshire.”

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The forecast today calls for a Monday, and the world has answered with October 12, 2020. This is the Charlottesville Community Engagement newscast and newsletter and I’m your host, Sean Tubbs. Tomorrow is the last day to register to vote in Virginia, and this is the final we’ll hear this Patreon-fueled shout-out.

"Early voting is underway for all registered voters. Vote in-person or request a ballot by mail. Register to vote by October 13. Visit elections.virginia.gov/registration/voter-forms"

Today is the first time ever that Virginia will commemorate the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Governor Ralph Northam made the proclamation on Friday.

“Indigenous Peoples’ Day celebrates the resilience of our tribal communities and promotes reconciliation, healing, and continued friendship with Virginia’s Indian tribes,” Northam said in a video message. “In making this proclamation, we pay tribute to the culture, history, and many contributions of Virginia Indians and recommit to cultivating strong government-to-government partnerships that are grounded in mutual trust and respect.”

In all, there are eleven state-recognized tribes, seven of which are federally recognized. One of the latter is the Monacan Indian Nation which has spent much of the past year raising awareness of the historical significance of Rassawek near the confluence of the Rivanna River and James River.

The James River Water Authority (JRWA) had been planning to place a water pump station at the site for a public water supply for Zion Crossroads, but pressure from an onslaught of public comments has them looking now at alternative locations. The JRWA has a meeting scheduled for Wednesday, but there is no agenda. (meeting page)

To learn more about the Monacan Nation, read this March 2018 piece in C-Ville Weekly by Erin O’Hare.

As the week begins, Virginia’s statewide seven-day average for positive PCR tests is at 4.5 percent this morning, back where it was on October 1. Over the weekend, the Virginia Department of Health added another 2,921 cases but the more meaningful number to consider is that the seven-day average of new daily cases is 1,002.

In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 28 cases reported this morning, with the seven-day average for new cases is at 29. The seven-day average for positive tests is now at 4 percent, down from 5.2 percent last Monday.

On Friday, the Virginia Mercury published a draft copy of the Northam administration’s plans for COVID vaccinations. The working document was submitted to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last week. The 59 page document lays out how a limited vaccine might be distributed beginning in November, but states that any vaccine would be approved or licensed through the U.S. Food and Drug Administration through an Emergency Use Authorization.

Such a plan is intended to control supply, and states that the VDH will partner with commercial entities such as grocery chains to “reach the initial population of focus.” A “preparedness gap” on page 17 estimates it will cost $71 million to support local health districts in setting up mass vaccination clinics.

The city of Charlottesville will hold a second wave of economic relief grants for businesses . The application process for Small Business Relief Grant 2.0 opens next Monday and offers funding of up to $5,000 for businesses with fewer than 10 full-time employees, and up to $10,000 for larger companies. Funding can be used for “operating expenses or adaptive resiliency efforts.” All businesses in the city are eligible to apply, but there are some caveats.

“Priority is given to those businesses that are considered retail, restaurant, hospitality, tourism, and service related,” reads the notice on the city’s website. “A limited amount of grants will be awarded to non-profit organizations, whose primary focus is connected to hospitality, tourism, or supporting economic development/business causes.”

A webinar will be held on Wednesday at 1 p.m. for those who are interested in learning more. There is $825,000 allocated to this round.

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This installment’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for me to say…

"Early voting is underway for all registered voters. Vote in-person or request a ballot by mail. Register to vote by October 13. Visit elections.virginia.gov/registration/voter-forms to do so!”

The Albemarle School Board has voted 4-3 to proceed with a return to school for students in Kindergarten through 3rd grade beginning on November 9, a month from today. What is known as Stage 3 will also involve more in-person students for instruction on English as a second language, special education, and for those without broadband internet. This was the recommendation of Superintendent Matthew Haas.

“It is our job of course to balance the expert advice we have about the health and safety issues with school against what’s in the best educational interest of our kids,” said Kate Acuff, representative from the Jack Jouett Magisterial District. She said she was concerned about the potential for the achievement gap to grow, and that parents should have the option to decide for themselves whether to proceed.

Before the vote, one of the members said they got an email from a bus driver concerned that students on pupil transport would not be sitting six feet apart from each other because all seats would be used. One administration official acknowledged that would be the case, but that mask-wearing and hand sanitizing would be sufficient mitigation.

Another School Board member asked whether athletic activity would include competition.

“Our athletic directors have been working through a lot of different protocols,” said Jay Thomas, director of secondary education. “In July for three weeks they actually piloted conditioning. What would happen is that they are in the process of putting together and finalizing protocols and procedures for each of the sports to be able to condition in November for VHSL sports that start the first week of December.

Superintendent Matthew Haas said there are already 1,000 students whose parents or guardians who have pulled out of the school district all together. He said there are many who cannot do so.

“The people who have the means have their children either in pods in the community, spending thousands and thousands of dollars to pay, I hate to say it, but paying some of our teachers who have resigned or have gone on long-term leave to be their teachers in that pod,” Haas said.

Haas said attendance for synchronous virtual learning for high school students is below 60 percent for those on free or reduced lunch.

Acuff, Dave Oberg, Jonno Alcaro and Katrina Callsen voted for the move. Graham Paige, Judy Le and Ellen Osborne voted against. Let’s hear some of their voices.

Osborne said she was concerned that some of the students would have new teachers.

“We always hear how important the relationships are and now we’re willing to disrupt that for going to school every other day, and I’m not convinced that the trade-off is worth it,” Osborne said.

Le thought the move will be premature.

“The risk is too great, I still think the list is great,” said Judy Le. “And then we’re going to break that for the reward that is questionable of two days of in-person learning and three full days of asynchronous, and breaking these relationships.”

Paige cited three reasons why he voted against the proposal.

“That’s the fact that cases in our area continue to rise,” Paige said. “The positivity rate is above the state average and we can’t really say with any certainty what’s the transmission rate going to be because we don’t have walls that separate us from UVA or the city.”

Dave Oberg understood all of these arguments.

“My gut, just my gut, my heart says why would we risk it? But my brain says, listen, we have experts who have done this analysis who have said as long as these things are followed, it’s safe,” Oberg said. “I haven’t seen any analysis that’s contrary to it.”

Acuff said that if the number of cases suddenly rise with more outbreaks, they can reconsider the decision. Haas has the authority to go back to a lower stage at any point.

“I was very much heartened by the improvements in our communication with the health department, the improvements in testing ability, the protocols for contact tracing and just the turn-around in terms of the testing,” Acuff said.

After the vote, Paige said the Board would pull together to support the transition despite the split vote.

“We’ll be moving forward then as a unified system, not as a 4-3 split but a 7-0 division,” Paige said.

There are another 1,114 cases of COVID in Virginia today, and the statewide seven-day average for positive tests remains at 4.8 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District, there are another 39 cases, with another 17 in Charlottesville and another eight from Albemarle. Yesterday, the city surpassed Albemarle in total counts. Today there have been a total of 1,438 cases in Charlottesville compared to 1,417 in the county. The seven-day average for the Blue Ridge Health District is 5.3 percent today, up from the 4.5 recorded on October 1.

Some demographic information of note. Since the pandemic, 44 percent of cases have been between people between the ages of 10 and 30. However, there are no deaths within that range. All of the 73 deaths to date have been people over the age of 50, with over the vast majority of those of people over the age of 70.

The Blue Ridge Health District is within the VDH’s Northwest Region, where overall the number of cases has been increasing for eight days, with burden considered in the high threshold. Percent positivity in the region has also been increased steadily, as has the number of healthcare workers with positive cases. This data can be seen on the VDH’s pandemic metrics page.

The University of Virginia reported 219 active cases yesterday, with 189 of them students. Twenty-one percent of quarantine rooms are filled, as are eight percent of isolation rooms.

The election is three and a half weeks away, and the talk this week has been split between the president’s positive COVID diagnosis and the vice presidential debate on Wednesday. The Center for Politics at the University of Virginia took another look into Sabato’s Crystal Ball this week and invited vice presidential expert Joel Goldstein to weigh in.

“To put into perspective, it was a debate where the fact that the candidates are older than has ever happened before in our history, and the fact that the president has been diagnosed positive for with COVID puts some more greater emphasis on the vice presential candidates,” Goldstein said. “It’s also the first time that a woman of color has been a vice presidential candidate or on a national ticket.”

To watch the rest of Goldstein’s review as well as commentary on the fly, visit the Center for Politics channel on YouTube.

More than 1,000 homes and businesses in Albemarle County and Charlottesville were without power this morning, according to Dominion Power. This included City Hall, where in-person voting still continued despite the outage.

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After two days where the number of new cases COVID-19 were below the seven-day average, the Virginia Department of Health has reported 1,844 cases this morning. The statewide seven-day average for positive cases remains at 4.8 percent for a second day.

Seeing a potential anomaly, I contacted the VDH and got this response.

“The case count reported on Thursday, October 8, includes 689 cases that should have been reported on Wednesday, October 7, but were not because of a surveillance system reporting issue,” reads a notice posted on the website. “A reminder: cases are not reported on the day the patient became ill, but on the day they have been classified as meeting the case definition for COVID-19. In order to observe the spread of illness most effectively, please review the charts that show cases by date of symptom onset.”

Likewise, the number of new cases in the Blue Ridge Health District is also higher than the seven-day average, with 64 cases. In Charlottesville, there are another 35 cases, above the city’s average of 21 new cases. In Albemarle, the new cases reported today is 19, above the county’s average of 13 cases.

(A reminder: the Blue Ridge Health District is the new name for the Thomas Jefferson Health District, effective January 1. )

The University of Virginia reports 217 active cases as of Tuesday, with 190 of them students. Twenty-one percent of quarantine rooms are in use, and eight percent of the isolation rooms are in place.

The Albemarle County School Board will be briefed tonight on a plan to return kindergarten through third grade students to in-person class for two days a week. What is known as “Stage 3” would involve around 4,000 students, or 2,000 students a day. Virtual learning would continue for most pupils, though optional in-person access would be extended to English learners, special-education students, and “students exhibiting a lack of engagement in the virtual experience.” This stage would also allow athletics and extracurricular activities to recur upon individual approval.

Slides provided in advance of the meeting state there would be no more than 12 students in each classroom at any time. One of the metrics the School Board will be asked to take into account a dashboard provided by the Centers for Disease Control with core indicators including the total number of new cases per 100,000 in the past 14 days, and the percentage of positive tests during the past 14 days. On the dashboard, the former is colored in the “higher risk” category and the latter is in the “moderate risk” category.

Dr. Denise Bonds of the Blue Ridge Health District has issued a statement about the recommendation by Superintendent Matthew Haas to proceed to stage 3.

"The value of in-person education for preK - 3rd grade is critical to this age group's overall development and growth. Providing the opportunity for students to return at this time is important and the current public health conditions in the community support a decision that enables parents and guardians to send their children to school for in-person instruction. The public health considerations that are being met and support this decision include the implementation of masking and distancing policies, widespread access to testing, quick turnaround for results, and as of right now lower community transmission among Albemarle County residents than in July. Based on the current public health conditions and Albemarle County Public School's plan for minimizing risk within school settings, the Thomas Jefferson Health District supports a decision to implement a hybrid teaching model for preK - 3rd grade."

Read the slides for more information.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has adopted a plan that offers a wide array of strategies to help the community reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to meet the ambitious goals of a 45 percent reduction by 2030, and to be “net zero” by 2050.

“The list of strategies and actions that make up the heart of the plan were developed from ideas suggested by the community,” said Greg Harper, the county’s chief of environmental services. “At its most reductive level the plan is a list of strategies and actions designed to contribute to the mitigation of global climate change through decreases in community-wide greenhouse gas emissions and increases in carbon sequestrations in the county’s landscape.”

The vote on the plan was unanimous, but Supervisors also gave notes to staff on what they’d like to see improve. Supervisor Ann Mallek said she was concerned the plan did not adequately cover one area.

“I am worried that solid waste seems to be completely set aside in here except for some mild-mannered paragraph, so if that’s coming in some way, that’s great, but if there is a way to focus on very specifically cutting the use of single-use plastic,” Mallek said.

The next step is for the county to conduct a new inventory on greenhouse gas emissions. The last was conducted in 2008. Supervisor Donna Price said the plan demonstrated how many of the county’s plans and initiatives can work together if coordinated.

“My hope is that we will collect objective data and metrics that will allow us to provide detailed analysis of the progress and shortcomings for future improvement to the plan,” Price said.

Supervisor Liz Palmer suggested that the plan should also help inform what legislation the county seeks in the General Assembly.

“There’s a lot of things we could be doing if we had help from the state,” Palmer said.

Notably, Palmer would like Virginia to encourage glass recycling by requiring beverage producers to participate in programs, thereby increasing the potential market.

Supervisors also approved a rezoning for the Albemarle Business Campus, a proposed mixed-use development across from the county’s office on 5th Street Extended.

Charlottesville City Council has agreed to keep an advisory board intended to provide guidance on how Charlottesville Area Transit is operated. Garland Williams is the director of CAT.

"I do think that we need to particularly look at how it is constructed," Williams said. "I think it doesn't have the mix that we need to have it move to more of a regional model. There's no individual from the business community at all."

Williams said there is an opportunity to use the CAT Board to figure out how the agency might secure more funding in order to become a regional model. CAT is in the running for a planning grant, while the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is seeking funding from the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transit for a vision plan for regional service, including a transit plan for Albemarle County.

Two other transit agencies in our community are Jaunt and the University Transit Service. Garland Williams explained some of how transit works currently in the region.

"You don't have oversight over the University Transit System, but you have total ownership over CAT and I think we just need to position CAT that we really dive into it and figure out how we can position an advisory group of peers and individuals in this region to really put CAT in the position to put CAT to go to the legislature three to five years from now and say, this is what we want because we've done the hard work and we want potentially to position ourselves like Richmond to get dedicated funding for CAT for the region."

Council discussed the matter at an October 6 meeting where they discussed the future of various boards and commissions.

There is also a Regional Transit Partnership that has been meeting for three years. The next scheduled meeting is on October 22. Councilors Lloyd Snook and Nikuyah Walker are the city's representatives. Council will meet with the Albemarle Board of Supervisors and top University of Officials on October 28.

In meetings today, the PLACE Design Task Force meets at noon for a gathering that includes another discussion of its own future. On Tuesday, Council opted to convert this board to a staff-advisory panel. (agenda)

The Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board meets at 6:30 p.m. (meeting info)

Correction time!

In the Building Goodness Foundation segment yesterday, I used the incorrect word to describe the disposition of the group's international projects. They paused those projects and hope to resume them when they can.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for me to say…

"Early voting is underway for all registered voters. Vote in-person or request a ballot by mail. Register to vote by October 13. Visit elections.virginia.gov/registration/voter-forms"

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 509 cases this morning, and the seven-day average for positive tests is at 4.8 percent. In the Blue Ridge Health District (soon to be formerly known by a different name) there are another nine new cases.

Both counts are down sharply from recent trends. The state count is below the seven-day average of 774 new cases a day. Albemarle’s seven-day average for new cases is 12 a day, and Charlottesville’s number is 20.

The statewide seven-day average for positive tests is at 4.8 percent. The Blue Ridge Health District is at 5.7 percent today, an increase over 4.3 percent last Wednesday.

The UVA COVID-19 tracker lists 224 active cases as of Monday, with 200 of them students. Twenty-two percent of quarantine rooms were in use, as were eight percent of isolation rooms.

The Building Goodness Foundation has unveiled the first recipients of work that will come from their new C’Ville Builds Initiative. Jack Horn of the firm Martin Horn is the president of the Board of Directors.

“C’Ville Builds Supports construction repair and restoration areas in the Charlottesville area, specifically for nonprofit organizations that are working towards racial equity, low-income homeowners and small businesses that are struggling as a result.”

In the first phase, five projects are set to begin soon thanks to the funds that have been raised so far. They include work to create a outdoor patio at Pearl Island in the Jefferson School Center, Culinary Concepts AB, St. John’s Family Life and Fitness Center, outdoor meeting space for On Our Own, and work at a private homeowner in Esmont. Horn said this is an extension of the foundation’s original mission.

“The Building Goodness Foundation was founded in 1999 on the simple idea [that] when individuals join together and each of us brings our unique talents, skills, and passions, we can effectively build equitable communities for all people,” Horn said.

Horn added that the pandemic as well as systemic racism has made the Foundation’s mission more important than ever and has focused them to look within the community. They have paused most of their international building projects.

Sober Pierre is the owner of Pearl Island, a Caribbean-inspired food establishment. He said the pandemic hit his business hard. The Cville Builds project will create more shelving inside and a place for people outside.

“For the shelving, it’s really just a way to create space, more storage space, be more organized and work more efficiently,” Pierre said. “For the outdoor patio, it’s an opportunity to in addition to the delicious food we are creating, to give them a nice space outside both for existing customers and new ones. As a small business in Charlottesville, our mission is to reach the community.”

In all, the group is seeking to raise $300,000 to raise to complete 25 projects. Learn more on their website.

Albemarle County has opened up a second round of support grants for local nonprofits. The Lift Grant offers an opportunity for qualifying nonprofits to apply for up to $50,000 towards lost revenues. The funding comes from the county’s CARES Act allocation. To apply, would-be recipients must fill out an inquiry form by October 19.

“Applications will be considered based on the extent of COVID-19’s impact to the organization and by how the grant funds would be used to serve Albemarle County residents,” reads a news release for the grant.

The Community Investment Collaborative has been working with Albemarle County to help sift through applications for various economic development grants. Stephen Davis is CIC’s executive director.

“It’s been an interesting and challenging year for business owners, just like for the broader community with the pandemic and even if the business hasn’t been affected financially, it’s still that stress of running a business during all of this is incredibly challenging so we’ve been doing our best to adapt and to respond to business owner needs and partner with a lot of others in the community to help address some of those needs,” Davis.

Davis made his comments during an interview with Mary Davis Hamlin as part of the Center for Nonprofit Excellence’s Hope and Resilience series. The full audio will be posted later today in the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report and on the CNE website.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors has a doozy. They will vote on the Climate Action Plan, hear a report on how to increase the amount of housing in the county, get updates on transportation projects, and will hear a rezoning for the Albemarle Business Campus. The meeting begins at 1 p.m. and is live-streamed. Let me know if you have any questions. (agenda)

If you’re interested in more on climate issues, I wrote up the Supervisor’s last discussion in June. This link goes to a staging area I’ve set up for more content in the future.

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Tuesday, October 6, 2020

Today’s edition is made possible through contributions through Patreon or subscriptions through the newsletter. Your support enables the research and the writing, and I am deeply humbled and thankful to those who have stepped up to date. Thank you!

The director of the Thomas Jefferson Health District told the Charlottesville City Council last night that COVID cases at the University of Virginia do not appear to be spreading to people not affiliated with the school, but the recent rise in cases is a cause for concern.

“We have not seen a large number of cases amongst community members that we’ve been able to link back to students,” said Dr. Denise Bonds. “That being said, we are seeing more cases among individuals who work at UVA either as faculty or over in the hospital and they are our community really but they also affiliated with UVA.”

Since UVA announced a return to in-person classes on August 28, Charlottesville has added 758 new cases and Albemarle added 366 cases.

Dr. Bonds said she could not rule-out cross-spread, but contact tracing has linked UVA cases back to other UVA staff, faculty or personnel. She said she and her staff work with UVA Health and she is supportive of the school’s efforts to place further restrictions on person to person contact.

“They are beginning to think about the cold weather and what’s going to do that to what where their students go and hang out,” Bonds said. “I think they are trying to be very proactive about it but this is not the only University town and it’s not the only University town seeing an increase in cases amongst University students.”

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker said she wanted to know the extent UVA was considering the safety of people who transfer infected UVA students to quarantine and isolation rooms.

“What does the cab driver know about this transport and how are we protecting them?” Walker asked. “I just think in those conversations with the University if we’re just making sure that we’re covering everybody that’s involved in this situation.”

Dr. Bonds said she would follow up. She also encouraged everyone to wear masks, even when outdoors in part aerosol droplets still carry outside. She also said it was important for people to get a flu shot.

“It’s really important particularly this year for everyone to get a flu shot,” Bonds said. “The symptoms of flu and COVID overlap significantly and we really need everyone to be protected against the flu. It’s a very effective way of either preventing yourself from getting the flu or certainly reducing your flu symptoms.”

Dr. Bonds also encouraged people to begin to think through their holiday plans. For more on Council’s briefing, look for a new episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report later on today.

The Virginia Department of Health reported another 625 cases of COVID-19 today, with another ten cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District. That’s the lowest one-day total since September 15 when three new cases were reported. The district reported another two fatalities with one in Charlottesville and another in Louisa. There have been 73 deaths to date in the district and 3,291 deaths in the state since March.

Speaking of the local health district, its name will change to the Blue Ridge Health District effective January 1 according to a news release sent out this morning.

“Changing our name is symbolic of the deeper work we are doing as an organization to create an inclusive, equitable environment for our staff and clients and to acknowledge and address the impact of racism on health,” said Dr. Denise Bonds, TJHD District Director

Bonds requested permission to change the name last fall. Only two other health districts in Virginia refer to a person while the rest refer to geography, Lord Fairfax and Mount Rogers. The move continues a trend in our area away from naming things after Thomas Jefferson.

City Councilor Lloyd Snook paid tribute to John Conover at the beginning of the City Council meeting last night. Conover died last week after a long career of community services, including serving on the board of Live Arts. He served one term in Council from 1980 to 1984 and during that time helped prevent the Virginia Department of Transportation from widening a bridge on Ridge Street that would have led to a four-lane highway running south from downtown.

“He noted that we already had a history of running four-lane roads through Black neighborhoods like Preston Avenue and Ridge-McIntire and Fifth Street Extended, and we should not do it again even if only for a few blocks because he did not want Ridge-McIntire and Fifth Street Extended to be shown on maps as a cut-through between U.S. 29 and I-64,” Snook said.

For more on the life and times of John Conover, read Bryan McKenzie’s article in today’s Daily Progress.

A nonprofit organization of developers has announced a new program to help cover the cost of building repairs for low-income residents, small businesses and others struggling during the pandemic. The Building Goodness Foundation is seeking $300,000 for C’Ville Builds, which seeks to finish 25 projects between now and the spring of 2022. So far they’ve collected about a third of their goal.

A pilot project to increase space for pedestrians and cyclists on the Belmont Bridge is now in its second week. The city’s bicycle and pedestrian coordinator said there has been initial support.

“There has been a lot of enthusiasm for the pilot,” Said Amanda Poncy. “We received a number of thank you emails before the barrels even went up. We [have] also installed count equipment and will be further evaluating over the coming weeks.”

Construction of a new replacement for the Belmont Bridge is currently scheduled to begin next year.

2020 has been an atypical year for Charlottesville’s City Market, but the market has placed second in a contest held by the American Farmland Trust. According to a news release, more than 1,250 markets across the country entered. The market will receive $500.

“In 2020, the Charlottesville City Market had to make several operational changes due to COVID-19 and switch from an in-person downtown shopping experience to a pre-order and pick-up model at several locations throughout the year,” wrote City Market Manager Justin McKenzie in a release. “The market staff would like to thank the vendors and loyal customers for continuing to make the market a success during these trying times.”

The City Market usually operates on a city-owned parking lot downtown. The market will likely not do so again until physical distancing measures are repealed.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle County Planning Commission will have a virtual public hearing on a rezoning to expand the Forest Lake Shopping Center. Charlottesville City Council will hold another meeting at 4 p.m. to discuss the future of Boards and Commissions.

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The city of Charlottesville has now had almost as many COVID cases as Albemarle County, despite the latter having twice the population. According to data from the Virginia Department of Health posted this morning, Charlottesville added 16 new cases for a total of 1,380 to date, whereas Albemarle added 15 new cases for a total of 1,383.

Since August 29, Charlottesville has had 758 residents test positive for COVID-19 whereas Albemarle has added 366. Up to that date, Albemarle had 1,022 cases and Charlottesville had 648 cases.

The rise in cases is believed to be attributed to the return of students to the University of Virginia. UVa began virtual instruction shortly after the pandemic and students were sent home after spring break, but many began to come back to apartments in early August. The return of students who live off campus to Charlottesville was one reason cited by administration officials for beginning in-person classes.

“The vast majority of our students will be here in Charlottesville, living in private houses and apartments, regardless of whether classes are all online or not,” wrote President Jim Ryan in an August 28 announcement that classes could meet in-person. “By welcoming our students into classrooms and on Grounds – with adequate testing, rules about gatherings and mask-wearing, and enforcement – we will be in a better position to monitor what’s happening and to contain any outbreaks.”

UVA has not updated their official COVID tracker since Friday afternoon, when they reported 270 active cases, as defined as someone with a positive test result in the past ten days. Of that number, 252 are students. Other information on the website is likely out of date by now.

Statewide, there are another 687 new cases of COVID today, and a total of 42 new cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District. To date, Fluvanna County has had 384 cases, Greene has had 239 cases, Louisa has had 312 and Nelson has had 110 cases. The seven-day average for positive tests statewide is at 4.8 percent for the second straight day. The figure is 5.2 percent in the Thomas Jefferson Health District for the second straight day.

Five of the eight Republican challengers running for U.S. House seats in Virginia have not disclosed financial assets on forms required by the Ethics in Government Act of 1978.

One of three Democratic challengers has also not disclosed their assets on the form according to information retrieved from the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Candidates are required to file the disclosure forms once their campaign has raised more than $5,000.

Three of the Republicans filed the required documents, but did not disclose any assets. That includes 5th District challenger Bob Good who lists salary and liabilities information, but lists no assets. His Democratic challenger Cameron Webb did list assets, including retirement and savings accounts.

Third District Republican John Collick, 4th District Republican Leon Benjamin and 1st District Democrat Qasim Rashid also filed forms but listed no assets. There are no online records of either Second District Republican Scott Taylor or 11th District Republican Manga Anantatmula submitting the form.

Incumbent members of Congress are required to file periodic reports on their financial transactions. Read previous coverage of this topic on CBS19 and on the Rappahannock News.

In all, Virginia has eleven districts and ten of them are contested this year. Only the 5th District race is a contest between two newcomers, as incumbent Denver Riggleman was not renominated for a second term by his party.

Former City Councilor John Conover has died, according to reports on social media. Conover was elected in 1980 and served one term during a time when Albemarle and Charlottesville entered into a revenue-sharing agreement to prevent further annexation of land by the city. Conover was an attorney with the Legal Aid Justice Center who was also an elected member of the Thomas Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation District.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Architectural Review Board reviews a new three-story building including a coffee shop on U.S. 250 east of Exit 124, as well as an updated design for a redesign of the Albemarle Square Shopping Center for a new Aldi.

Charlottesville City Council meets at 6:30 p.m. and has a public hearing on how to spend $4.1 million in a second round of CARES Act funding. There’s also a review of the Home to Hope initiative, a project to help people released from prison reenter society. The Louisa County Board of Supervisors meets at 5 p.m. For more information, check out this week’s Week Ahead newsletter on local government meetings.

Interested in learning more about our feathered friends? At 3 p.m., Schuyer Lawson will lead a discussion at the Center on what equipment you need to become a birdwatcher and what science citizens can contribute to the field. Lawson is a Ph.D. Candidate in the School of Public Health at the University of Buffalo. Visit the Center’s website to register.

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There will be more money available for rent and mortgage relief in our area. The regional organization that provides support to local governments in our area has received a third round of $450,000 from the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) to go to people in need. Christine Jacobs is the housing coordinator for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

“The way that it works is as they front us the first tranche of money, and then we report to them with a remittance report, “Jacobs said. “Based on our usage, we continue to qualify for funds based on that demand.”

Jacobs said as of September 24, the Rental and Mortgage Relief program has written $535,000 in checks to individual households in the district.

“We’ve served 308 and households to date,” Jacobs said. “But a couple of those are folks that are returning for a second or third month of support.”

Jacobs said the DHCD has increased the amount of rent relief they will pay to 100 percent of arrears.

In all, about a $1 million in funding will be distributed in the first two rounds of the program, which includes surrounding counties. The program was announced in July. Jesse Rutherford is on the Nelson County Board of Supervisors.

“It’s amazing how quickly $1 million just went poof!” Rutherford said.

The TJPDC is working with Nelson County on a grant to revitalize the unincorporated town of Lovingston as well as a plan to bring more broadband internet to the county through fiber.

“In today’s times, it’s kind of nice to have some good or exciting news,” Rutherford said. “You don’t really get it too often. So Lovingston is one thing to look forward to, and fiber.”

The TJPDC’s Board of Directors met last night. The representative from the Greene Board of Supervisors gave an update on the water supply plan battle between that county and the governmental entity it shares with Madison and Orange counties.

“We are currently in litigation with the Rapidan Service Authority, our water authority,” said Dale Herring. “Basically we have asked them to allow us to withdraw and they have said no. And they have barred the Greene County representatives from voting or speaking on topics and they are making decisions related to the water rates and water projects in Greene county.”

Herring said Greene plans to move forward with impoundment of White Run to create a new reservoir for an urban water supply. Terry Beigie of the Greene County Record has a story yesterday about a second lawsuit the county is filing against the Rapidan Service Authority.

There are another 966 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia as reported this morning, and another 49 cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District. That’s another 16 cases in Albemarle and another 24 cases from Charlottesville. The statewide seven-day average for positive tests is at 4.5 percent for the third straight day. Calculations for the Thomas Jefferson Health District were not available at production time.

There are now 250 active cases at the University of Virginia according to the official COVID-19 tracker, with 235 of those students. In all, 33 cases were reported yesterday with 28 of them students. The number of quarantine rooms in use increased to 30 percent and the number of isolation rooms in use remained steady at five percent.

*The University of Virginia’s Center for Politics took another gaze into Sabato’s Crystal Ball yesterday, before news broke that the president of the United States and the First Lady tested positive for COVID-19. Prior to that the biggest election news of the week had to do with Tuesday’s debate.

“It was the worst, most awful presidential television debate in American history and you’re talking to an old guy here and watched everyone live and in real time including the four Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960,” said Larry Sabato. “I remember it well because I had to beg my parents to stay up.”

Sabato also called the debate the worst advertisement for American democracy. To watch the rest of the event, visit the Center for Politics’ YouTube channel.

This October is the first-ever Pedestrian Safety Month recognized by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. According to the agency’s website, the reduction of available light at dusk is a major reason to raise awareness.

“From September to February, over 30% of pedestrian fatalities occur between 6 p.m. and 8:59 p.m.,” reads the website which offers tips for both motorists and pedestrians.

The Virginia Department of Transportation has a Pedestrian Safety Action Plan which aims to decrease the amount of people struck by vehicles each year. In 2018, pedestrians 12 percent of all traffic deaths in Virginia. One of the goals of the action plan is to identify road improvements as part of the Highway Safety Improvement Program.

This week, the city of Charlottesville began a pilot project on Belmont Bridge to increase the amount of space for pedestrians and cyclists.

Live Arts will have another studio visit on Facebook Live as part of their Forging Ahead season. Darryl Smith will speak with painter Sarah Boyts Yoder about her work. According to the materials, her work reflects “a visual lexicon of symbols that she has generated over time, her colorful, abstracted works articulate how space extends and collapses all around us in liminal celebrations of cacophonous graffiti.”

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There are another 450 new cases of COVID-19 reported by the Virginia Department of Health today. That’s the lowest number since July 6, when 354 cases were reported. However the seven day average for new daily cases is 747. The statewide seven-day average for positive PCR tests remains at 4.5 percent today.

In the Thomas Jefferson Health District there are another 46 cases, bringing the seven-day average for new cases to 42. That’s another 28 cases in Charlottesville and 15 in Albemarle. Charlottesville’s seven day average for new daily cases is 22 while that figure in Albemarle is 15. The district’s seven-day average for positive PCR tests is also at 4.5 percent today.

The University of Virginia reported another 45 cases yesterday, with 42 of them students. The officials COVID tracker lists 224 active cases, with 214 cases of those students. The number of people in isolation rooms has dropped to five percent and the number of quarantine rooms remains steady at 29 percent.

Some of those quarantine rooms are in local hotels, as reported by Raghda Labban and Ava MacBlane in the Cavalier Daily yesterday in a story about what life has been like for the students in residence halls where outbreaks have occurred.

The Cavalier Daily also has a story today by Sierra Martin about how coursework and examinations are changing during an academic term in which only one quarter of classes have an in-person component.

Last week, UVA President Jim Ryan imposed a five-person limit on students gatherings on and off Grounds to help slow the spread of COVID. If cases were to become less manageable at UVA, there is another level of further mitigation that could be triggered. The in-house publication UVA Today has a Q&A with officials about the “Short-Term Restricted Operations” that would include ending in-person classes.

Charlottesville City Council has reiterated a desire to remove the Lewis and Clark and Sacagewea statue from the intersection of West Main Street. The topic came up during a work session on the future of a road improvement project for the street, which has seen construction of at least seven multistory buildings in the past ten years.

The statue is within the first phase of the project, which runs from Ridge Street to 6th Street NW and has a cost estimate of $17 million. That’s the result of an urban design study that began in 2013 and was approved by City Council in March 2016. The work will involve removing the slip lane that allows vehicles to travel south onto Ridge Street in favor of a public park. Council discussed how to move forward with removing the statue, and directed staff to proceed with cost-reductions through a “value-engineering study.”

“Being one of the newbies I was not around during any previous discussion but part of what I want this project to do is to connect the University of Virginia to downtown at a bike and pedestrian level in a way that is inviting,” said City Councilor Lloyd Snook.

I’ll have a longer story and podcast about this available for paid subscribers shortly.

This weekend, Charlottesville public works crews will begin using street sweepers to clean selected roadways in Albemarle County’s growth area. This is a pilot program where the county is paying to use city resources in order to avoid having to purchase their own machines. A quick web search reveals that the cost of a used 2016 model is $170,000. According to an email from the county’s director of Facilities and Environmental Services, the work this weekend will attempt to sweep the John Warner Parkway, Rio Road East and West, Hydraulic Road, Georgetown Road and Barracks Road.

“Combined those roads are the longest of the three work areas, and the widest, so it will be a challenge to complete the work in a single weekend,” said Lance Stewart “It also represents the kind of assumption we want to test as part of the pilot – how long it will take per lane mile of busy commuter roads.”

In addition to making bike lanes safer, street sweeping helps remove sediment and debris that would otherwise enter into the watershed as pollutants. They are considered one of several dozen Best Management Practices (BMP) in the long-going quest to improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay.

This weekend, the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will add Sunday hours back at the Central branch downtown. However, the library doors will remain closed and items will be circulated through curbside pick-up. The goal of opening from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. is to give additional opportunities for those unable to some during the week or on Saturday.

"This is the ONLY Sunday service in JMRL, so it is a crucial piece of customer service for working families,” said David Plunkett, the system’s director.

In meetings today, The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission’s Board of Directors meets at 7 p.m. with two items related to pandemic relief. That includes a vote on an agreement with the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development and an update on the Rental and Mortgage Relief Program administered by the TJPDC.

As of September 22, the program had received $664,704 in funds and distributed $565,000 in relief. The TJPDC uses 15 percent of the funding to cover its internal costs. In Albemarle, 165 households have received a cumulative $240,087 in funding with another 291 applications pending. Ten were denied. In Charlottesville, $45,778 has been distributed to 32 households with another 171 pending. Twelve were denied.

You can see the details in the packet. (agenda packet)

You can also find out how Tuesday’s presidential debate may have affected predictions about the outcome. The Center for Politics at the University of Virginia will take another gaze into Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball at 2 p.m. in an event that can be watched live on the center’s YouTube channel.

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The Virginia Department of Health has launched a new dashboard to give the public a better glimpse into how the pandemic is affecting different parts of the state. The COVID-19 website now has daily updates for how each region of the state is doing, a weekly update on something called “transmission extent” and metrics offered by the federal Centers for Disease Control to guide decisions about school reopening. Dr. Laura Forlano is

“The composite picture, or the description, or the picture that’s created when one considers all of this information together with local context is intended to help inform local and state decisions about how to respond to the pandemic,” said Dr. Laura Forlano, the Deputy Health Commissioner for Population Health. “For example, a high level of transmission necessitates increases in case investigation, or contact tracing, or more testing or more focused testing in certain populations.”

Forlano said the data can also be used to help guide decisions for when more stringent limits might be placed on gatherings. For instance, UVA has now limited that number to five while in-person classes continue, and both Albemarle and Charlottesville have ordinances in placethat are more stringent than other parts of Virginia.

Forlano said there were some ways the dashboard should not be used.

“It should not be used to take one indicator alone to make a very complex decision,” Forlano said. “It should not be used to compare concretely with other localities in absence of more detailed information or local context.”

One of the measures is Region Metrics. The Thomas Jefferson Health District is in the Northwest Region, where cases have been decreasing for 14 days and percent positivity has been declining for 23 days. However, the number of cases among health care workers has been increasing for nine days, with 5.9 percent of active cases.

Weekly transmission extent is another measure and was last calculated on September 26. The Northwest Region is considered “at moderate community transmission.” That’s the middle category among five ranging from “At minimal” to “at substantial.”

The University of Virginia updated its COVID-19 tracker Monday afternoon, adding 81 new cases from the weekend. For Friday, they reported 41 new cases, the exact same amount reported on Thursday. For Saturday UVA reported 23 cases and 17 for Sunday. The number of quarantine rooms in use is at 30 percent and the number of isolation rooms at nine percent. The latter is for students and staff who tested positive. There are currently 240 active cases, 229 of which are students.

The Virginia Department of Health today reported another 923 cases. The seven-day average for positive tests dropped to 4.6 percent, down from 5.5 percent a week ago. The Thomas Jefferson Health District reports another 24 cases, with nine from Albemarle and eleven from Charlottesville.

Some Charlottesville residents who request mail-in ballots from the registrar received materials that did not include the actual ballot. According to a press release, a clerical error lead to “a small number” of the 8,968 ballot requests being sent out prematurely.

“Ballots were mailed in three batches,” reads the statement. “The second-half of the smallest third batch was inadvertently labeled “ready” before Envelope A, containing the ballot, was inserted. This issue has affected a small number of voters in Johnson, Buford, Venable and Alumni Hall precincts.”

Those who did not receive the ballot are asked to call the registrar at 434-970-3250.

So far, Charlottesville had 2,060 people vote in person as of close of business Monday. As of yesterday morning, Albemarle had 4,501 people vote in person and mailed out 18,356 ballots.

“We’re getting a really good turnout at the county office building and we’re getting very good marks from the voters as to the way we are doing it, keeping it efficient and keeping it safe,” said Jim Heilman, secretary of the Albemarle Electoral Board. He gave an update last night to the Pantops Community Advisory Committee. “The first six days we had this, we average 766 people a day.”

The deadline to apply to vote by mail is October 23. The last day to register to vote is October 13.

Charlottesville City Schools will not return to in-person instruction until at least November 9. Last week, news emerged about a scenario that had contemplated returning kindergarten through 3rd grade students to school in mid-October. However, school spokeswoman Beth Cheuk sent an email to families with an update. “The committee met again this week, and again, they discussed topics such as data, instructional models, timelines, and more -- but they did not generate any specific recommendations,” Cheuk said. She recommended people visit the committee’s website for up to date information. The School Board meets on October 1. Meanwhile, the Virginia Department of Education continues to leave decisions up to localities.

“We remain committed in our recommendations that the decisions to alter K-12 programming including decisions about in-person instruction, school closures or hybrid learning be handled at the most local level possible,” said Holly Coy, assistant superintendent for policy, equity and communications.”

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville City Council will hold a six-hour work session on the city’s Strategic Plan, which is a policy document intended to guide city staff in their operations. This meeting was to have taken place two weeks ago, but was delayed following the resignation of City Manager Tarron Richardson. There will be two more six-hour work sessions in late October, but Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker said at the September 21 meeting that they may need to make further changes in the future.

“Since we’re going through a leadership change, we may have to reconvene after the new city manager is hired and have this discussion as a team,” Walker said.

The facilitator for the event is Selena Cozart of the Institute of Engagement and Negotiation at the University of Virginia. The meeting begins at 11 a.m. and runs until 5 p.m. (meeting info)

The Albemarle Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. It is the first meeting for one new member appointed following the resignations of three others this summer.

On the agenda is a third update of a performance agreement between the EDA and the developer of the Woolen Mills as well as an update on the Albemarle Business Campus. The latter goes before the Albemarle Board of Supervisors on October 7. (meeting info) (Zoom link)

One correction, during yesterday’s story on the Thomas Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation District, some incorrect numbers were given. The actual number of acres in riparian buffers protected is 2,944 and the amount of stream bank restoration is 261. District Director Anne Coates said they will surpass 3,000 and 300 respectively in the near future.

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The seven day average for positive test results in Virginia has dropped to its lowest level yet with 4.7 percent reported by the state Department of Health. That’s down from 5.7 percent a week ago. Over the weekend, the state passed the two million mark for the number of PCR tests conducted.

On Saturday the VDH reported 975 new cases, 736 on Sunday and 449 this morning. In Charlottesville, 78 new cases have been reported since Friday, with 41 in Albemarle. In Charlottesville, the seven-day average of new cases per 100,000 is 40.7. In Albemarle that figure is 9.9 today, and statewide the figure is 9.1 today.

The seven-day average for positive tests in the Thomas Jefferson Health District is at 4.1 percent. That number was also 4.1 percent last Monday and increased to as high as 4.9 percent in the last week.

The University of Virginia reported 41 new cases of COVID-19 on Friday afternoon, and will not update their official tracker with the weekend’s results until later on today. Later this week residents of two residence halls will receive follow-up tests, including Hancock where the University reported 16 cases among 115 residents on Thursday. There have been no new updates on the the UVA Facebook page since. Last week, President Jim Ryan announced a five-person limit on gatherings for students on and off Grounds as well as mandatory mask use.

Water that fell on the Charlottesville region this weekend is slowly finding its way into the Rivanna River, and one major overarching environmental goal of the last century is to prevent as many pollutants from going along for the ride. On Friday, a governmental agency that seeks to promote awareness of the Rivanna River’s watershed gathered virtually for an online conference.

Anne Coates is the director of the Thomas Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation District, part of a nationwide network formed nearly a hundred years ago when few considerations were given to how land was used and the air was thick with sediment windborne from poorly managed properties across the country.

“We were formed in the 1930’s in response to the dustbowl,” said Anne Coates, the TJSWCD’s director. “[President] Roosevelt sent letters to all the Governors nationwide asking them to set up local legislation that would allow for what he considered to be for important local influence. He wanted local landowners to work with local directors and decision makers to really determine what the resource concerns were in their area and not have their federal government tell them they needed to do something specific.”

Nationwide there are 3,000 such districts, and the Thomas Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation district is one of 47 in Virginia. The local district dates back to 1939 and consists of elected and appointed officials in Albemarle, Charlottesville and surrounding counties, with direct election of ten of its board of directors.

Coates said our district focuses mostly on agriculture, though residential property owners can also qualify for funding in some situations. The goal is to reduce the amount of nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment that makes it way into the Chesapeake Bay, which is where rain that falls here ends up. They do that by helping to pay for projects like keeping livestock out of creeks and streams.

“Most of our programs are voluntary programs, certainly our agricultural program is, and that’s been primarily, the success of the program is because it’s voluntary based,” Coates said.

Coates said partnerships between the government and landowners have resulted in protection of over 3,000 acres of riparian buffers and 300 miles of streambank in the district since 1998. In Albemarle County, that number is 122 miles of streambank.

Over six months have passed since the beginning of the pandemic and that’s enough time to get some sense of how the sudden change in the economy affected the local real estate market. Dr. Lisa Sturtevant is chief economist for Virginia Realtors and she was the first speaker in a series the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission is putting on to promote its Regional Housing Partnership. She set the stage by describing where the sales market is at the moment.

“We’ve gone through a really dramatic downturn in the economy and we are now in sort of a period of recovery,” Sturtevant said. “And we’ve heard all sorts of different letters for how the recovery may happen. A V-shape, a W-shape, an L-shape. And the latest letter is K and this K shape recovery is one way to think about how some people are benefitting in this recovery more than others.”

Sturtevant said some sectors of the economy were hit harder than others, with sharp decreases in the hospitality sector. Still, Virginia and the nation have seen four straight months of job growth, and in August the unemployment rate was 6.1 percent.

“But keep in mind last year at this time the unemployment rate was about three percent,” Sturtevant said. She said the number of people who applied for benefits hit a peak in March and April, and then tapered down.

“And in mid-September, about 186,000 Virginians were receiving unemployment which is well below where we were this spring but well above where a typical economy would be,” Sturtevant said.

Sturtevant said the housing market has improved faster than the rest of the economy. A lack of supply is increasing sales prices across the state.

“Inventory, though, supply, remains the major constraint and COVID has exacerbated what was already a tight housing market in just about every regional housing market across Virginia,” Sturtevant said. “We’ve seen similar trends in the Charlottesville area where inventory has been on the decline really for five or six straight years and in August, the number of active listings was down by about 43 percent compared to a year ago.”

The next installment of the Regional Housing Partnership’s Speaker Series is set for October 22 and the topic is Regional Housing Strategies and Policies.

Today in meetings, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority meets at 6 p.m. with updates on safety and redevelopment efforts. There’s still no date for when ground will break for new public housing units at South First Street or when work to renovate Crescent Halls will begin. However, a redevelopment update in the meeting packet has a lot of details about what needs to happen first.

Interested in parks and greenways in the Pantops area? The Community Advisory Committee for that part of Albemarle meets at six and has an update from parks planner Tim Padalino. (meeting info)

Interested in Albemarle history? You might consider the Albemarle Historic Preservation Committee will begin its regular monthly gathering at 4:30 p.m. They will get an update on the Crozet Master Plan and potential conservation easements. There will also be a further discussion of new historical markers in Albemarle as well as potential policy options to increase historical preservation efforts in the county. (meeting info)

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Over 3,540 Albemarle voters have already cast their ballot in early voting, according to county registrar Jake Washburne.

Jim Heilman, a member of the county’s electoral board, gave an update to the Places29-Rio Community Advisory Committee last night as part of their monthly meeting.

There are 39 days including today until November 3, the final deadline for voting in this year’s federal election. Early voting is underway across Virginia and local election officials are trying to get the word out about what has changed in this pandemic year.

“We have basically a perfect storm of an election this year,” said Jim Heilman, a member of the Albemarle County Electoral Board. “All presidential elections are a storm for sure but this one has a lot of added things to it. We have a whole raft of new election laws.”

These include expanded early voting and no-excuse absentee voting. Heilman said the electoral board is not seeing a spike in new voter registrations.

“Voter registration is something that normally is spiking right now in a presidential year, but it’s not spiking here,” Heilman said. “It’s going up but it’s not spiking, and I think the main reason for that is because the normal ways of getting voter registration up by door-to-door registration drives and registration drives at concerts, Fridays after Five, none of those are happening.”

Heilman and the rest of the electoral board and staff are recommending people vote in advance to avoid large crowds on election day. There is a pandemic after all.

“However we do want to assure our voters that all 30 of our polling places will be open, and that we are making out best efforts to make that they are safe and clean on election day,” Heilman said.

If you still need to register to vote, visit this site.

There are another 941 cases of COVID-19 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health, for a total of 144,433 since the pandemic began. At some point, Governor Ralph Northam and First Lady Pamela Northam will be among that number, as both tested positive for COVID-19 yesterday. That means they will be isolating for ten days.

“As I’ve been reminding Virginians throughout this crisis, COVID-19 is very real and very contagious,” said Governor Northam in a release. “The safety and health of our staff and close contacts is of utmost importance to Pam and me, and we are working closely with the Department of Health to ensure that everyone is well taken care of.”

Contact tracing is now underway.

Another 23 deaths are reported today, but that figure represents a continuing update as death certificates come into the VDH. The seven day average for positive PCR test results has dropped to 5.1 percent. Statewide, there is an additional case of the Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children, for a total of nine to date.

There are another 48 cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District with 25 new cases in Charlottesville, and 18 from Albemarle. Looked at another way, there are 52 new cases per 100,000 people in Charlottesville, and 16.6 new cases per 100,000 in Albemarle. The seven-day rate for positive tests is now at 4.9 percent, up from 4.7 percent.

The University of Virginia reported another 22 cases yesterday, all students. The official number of active cases is now at 238, and that means people tested at UVA who were positive in the past ten days.

Many who live in this region are unaware the confluence of the Rivanna and James Rivers in Fluvanna County is sacred ground for the Monacan Nation. Now the National Trust for Historic Protection has named the site known as Rassawek as one of its 11 most endangered places.

“Researchers verified Rassawek’s location in the 1880s, the 1930s and the 1980s,” reads a Preservation Virginia blog post on the announcement. “It is the Monacan equivalent of Werowocomoco, the Powhatan capital now planned to be a national park.”

The James River Water Authority has planned to locate a pump station on the site as part of an effort to bring public water to Zion Crossroads. In August, public pressure from the Monacan Nation and others led the Authority to hit pause on the planning process to explore previously discarded alternatives. The next meeting of the James River Water Authority is October 14.

(read Allison Wrabel’s Daily Progress article from August)

Every part of the Earth contains plants that are home to that specific region. Some of these have fruits that make their way into the rest of the world, if they are a product that can be sold. But, what about the rest of the ecosystem from which that food comes from? Enrique Salmónis an ethnobotanist whose work is based on the belief that “all life-forms are interconnected and share the same breath.” That’s according to the materials for a presentation the Virginia Festival of the Book offered yesterday on Salmón’s book, Iwígara: American Indian Ethnobotanical Traditions and Science. He said he often gives his students this example.

“I ask them, ‘well, how many of you like guacamole?’ And of course most of them will raise their hands although there are always a couple that don’t like the texture of avacado,” Salmón said. “I ask them where does guacamole come from, and most of them will know that it’s avocado. And then I ask them what does an avocado tree look like, and that’s when only one or two hands will go up and then I ask when do you pick avocados and most of the time, they don’t really know.”

Salmón is head of the American Indian Studies Program at Cal State University-East Bay, in Hayward, California. The event can be watched on the Virginia Festival of the Book’s Facebook page.

There are two meetings today both under the auspices of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission (TJPDC). The TJPDC’s Regional Housing Partnership begins a fall speaker series. At 11 a.m., Dr. Lisa Sturtevant, chief economist with Virginia Realtors, will talk about the impact of COVID-19 on the Charlottesville Area housing market. (register)

The Rivanna River Basin Commission will hold its annual conference at noon, this time virtually. There will be an update on the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Improvement Plan (WIP), a presentation on Best Management Practices for Stormwater Management, and updates on local efforts to improve water quality. You can listen to the 2018 conference here. (more info and registration)

If you made it to this point, I thank you. You are also likely someone who would be interested in filling out this survey I am doing as part of a course I am taking with the Community Investment Collaborative. As I launch this new venture, I am seeking ways to understand more about how what people think about news and information. This is my first ever attempt at market research, and if you have a moment, I’d love to get your thoughts.

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There are another 902 cases of COVID-19 reported in Virginia today, above the seven-day average of 862 new cases per day. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District there are another 35 cases, and the seven-day average for new daily cases is now at 40.

The University of Virginia’s COVID-19 official tracker added another 15 cases yesterday, and lists 221 active cases. That’s defined as “new cases with a positive test during the past ten days” and these numbers only cover tests “administered or provided through UVA.”

The tracker did not alter the number of isolation and quarantine rooms in use. There were still listed as seven percent and 26 percent respectively.

On Tuesday morning, residents of the Hancock dorm were ordered to participate in prevalence testing according to an article in the Cavalier Daily. Later that day, President Jim Ryan imposed a five-person or less gathering limit.

“Testing residence halls is part of our ongoing asymptomatic prevalence testing program,” said UVA spokesman Brian Coy. “In some cases that’s in response to a known uptick in cases in a residence hall, in some cases it’s wastewater indications or some other factor.”

The Virginia Department of Health also monitors water quality in the state’s rivers and lakes. An advisory remains in place for the Middle Pamunkey Branch of Lake Anna due to the ongoing presence of a harmful algae bloom. However, an advisory for the Upper North Anna Branch has been lifted due to water samples that show levels of algae have dropped to safer levels. According to a release, “some harmful algae, called cyanobacteria, can cause skin rash and gastrointestinal illnesses, such as upset stomach, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea.” (VDH release)

Operations at branches of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library are supported by a group called the Friends of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library which raises funds for books, equipment, and other essentials for a successful system. However, the pandemic has meant the main event has not been possible to put on. Peter Manno is the manager of the Friends of the Library.

“What we’ve had for over 50 years are some pretty well renowned and wonderful book sales that now are spring and fall, for a long time they were spring only, and that is 90 percent of our funding,” Manno said. “The libraries closed down just two weeks before our traditional spring sale.”

That has meant that the basement of the Gordon Avenue Library has been filled with books donated by members of the community. The fall sale has also been canceled, but Manno said the Friends have held two Pop Up Sales and will have another this one Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Gordon Avenue Library.

“It’s a big change from our usual book sale where you would come in and you would browse the books, handling them, they would be individually priced on the inside,” Manno said. “Obviously that’s not going to fly for safety reasons.”

Instead, volunteers have pre-packaged and sealed bags with at least five books from a specific genre for $5 a bag.

“For this sale coming up we have mystery, literary fiction, popular fiction, sci-fi/fantasy, biographies, young adult books, and books for preschool aged kids, pre-literate kids, picture books fundamentally,” Manno said, adding that the first two sales exceeded expectations.

The Friends of the Library have not been accepting new books since March, but Manno said they may be able to do so in the future. Visit the library website for more information.

Tonight, Live Arts continues its Forging Ahead Season with two short plays that will be livestreamed beginning at 8 p.m. The Locally Sourced series consists of material created by members of the Live Arts Playwrights Lab, and will be made available without a ticket. The theater company asks that people contribute what they can or purchase a season pass. For a list of what’s on tonight, visit the Live Arts website.

In meetings today, the Places29-Rio Community Advisory Committee meets at 6 p.m. They will see the same presentations from Jim Heilman of the Electoral Board and Brad Sheffield of Jaunt on that agency’s ideas for on-demand transit. (meeting info)

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Students at the University of Virginia are now under rules that are stricter than those in Albemarle County and Charlottesville. President Jim Ryan announced yesterday that gatherings are limited to five people or less and that masks are to be worn at mostly all times.

"Over the last few days we've become more concerned about the spread of COVID-19 within the UVA community,” Ryan said. “Some of this has been driven by a rise in positive cases in our community. But we've also gotten reports of a few large student gatherings, both on and off Grounds as well as reports about inconsistent adherence to masking and distancing guidelines. This has caused concern among our public health experts who worry we may be headed in the wrong direction and that if we don’t get back on track quickly, we could end up in a situation where have to severely restrict where students can go or risk running low on isolation or quarantine space.”

The UVA COVID-19 Tracker reported yesterday that 26 percent of quarantine rooms are in use and seven percent of isolation rooms. Seven new cases were reported for Monday, all students. The number of active cases is listed as 224. According to the tracker, these are “new cases with a positive test during the past ten days who require isolation or quarantine. The Cavalier Daily reported yesterday that a fifth dorm was placed under testing.

The 5-person-or-less restriction on gatherings applies to students on and off grounds.

“Students will still be able to gather outside safely including on the Lawn, but will have to do it in groups of less than five or fewer,” Ryan said. “If this limit is not respected we may have to consider additional restrictions including curfews.”

A third restriction involves who can visit the students.

“We’re going to ramp up enforcement of our travel and visitor policies for students, which should be simple to understand and easy to follow,” Ryan said. “Please do not leave Charlottesville over the next two weeks and do not invite visitors to come to town. This is to protect people outside of this community as well as to prevent more of the virus being brought back to Grounds.”

Ryan said in-person classes would continue. Watch the whole video on UVA Today.

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 580 cases of COVID-19 today, the lowest one-day total since July 6. That brings the seven-day average for daily new cases to 890. The seven-day average for positive tests remains at 5.5 percent for the second straight day. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District there are another 16 cases reported today, with a seven-day average of daily new cases now at 53. Another death has been recorded in Nelson County for a total of 69 since the pandemic began.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority’s Board of Directors met yesterday, and it was perhaps the last meeting in the area to be chaired by Dr. Tarron Richardson, whose tenure as Charlottesville City Manager is over at the end of the month. Richardson was honored with a resolution for his time serving on the RWSA, and he ended up chairing his final meeting.

“Dr. Richardson, on behalf of this board, we want to take this opportunity to give you a heartfelt thanks not only for your service not just to the city and the community, but also to this Board,” said Albemarle County Executive Jeffrey Richardson.

Richardson tendered his resignation to City Council earlier this month.

Albemarle County has launched another initiative to help businesses cover some of their pandemic-related expenses. The Safe Spaces and Places Grant Program is intended for those companies that have spent money to expand to outdoor operations or otherwise be able to serve customers during the pandemic. This could include tents, sanitizing stations, outdoor furniture, space heating, and other items that could help slow the spread of COVID-19 while allowing business to continue. Others include extended WiFi and computer systems to allow easy payment through cards. Qualifying purchases may have occurred between March 1st and the end of this year, and payouts are up to $25,000.

“Only non-residentially zoned parcels are eligible to apply,” reads an inquiry form for the project, which will be administered by the Community Investment Collaborative on behalf of the Albemarle Economic Development Authority. “Costs will be reviewed for reasonableness and applicants must certify that expenses are in response to the COVID-19 crisis.”

Albemarle will hold a webinar on the program on September 25 at 1 p.m. The inquiry form closes on October 2. (inquire) (attend the webinar)

This morning, Albemarle County also launched another initiative for residents struggling with hardships due to the pandemic. The Board of Supervisors voted earlier this summer to allocate over $1 million in funding from the federal CARES ACT for emergency financial assistance.

“Albemarle County residents experiencing lost wages or earning ability as a result of reduced hours or loss of employment due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic can apply for funds for rent/mortgage assistance, utility payments, groceries/prescriptions, or childcare,” reads a press release for the program.

“Residents are eligible for a one-time payment for rent/mortgage assistance that will be allocated based on the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Developments program guidelines determined by the household size or up to $1,000 per household for emergency funds for all other expense types,” it continues.

The funds are being disbursed in partnership with the United Way of Greater Charlottesville. To apply, call 434-326-0950, 9 am - 6 pm, Monday-Friday. Para Español - marque 434-373-0930, 9 am a 5:30 pm, de lunes a viernes. Other languages are available upon request.

In meetings today, the Ridge Street Priority Neighborhood Task Force will meet virtually at 4 p.m. The group is made up of people appointed to review potential projects to be paid for through a federal program known as the Community Development Block Grant, or CDBG. Each year, the city selects a neighborhood to receive funding, and for this year and the next two, the Ridge Street Neighborhood has been chosen. City Council discussed whether some of the $150,000 could be used for housing issues. City Councilor Michael Payne asked this question:

“Could that pool of money should the Ridge Street Task Force receive applications and vote on it, go to things related to homelessness services or public housing or other things that may be connected to housing in some way?” Payne asked.

“The Ridge Street, or the priority neighborhood funding typically goes to funding public infrastructure improvements to better improve that community,” said Erin Atak, the city’s grants coordinator. “It really depends on the type of activity that they are looking to fund.”

Previous projects funded by CDBG funds through this process include sidewalk improvements in the 10th and Page neighborhoods, as well as intersection improvements on Monticello Avenue and a partial streetscape on Cherry Avenue.

One thing for the task force to keep in mind is that the city received $6.1 million in Smart Scale funding for a project at the four-way intersection of Ridge Street, Cherry Avenue, Elliot Avenue and Fifth Street Extended. However, that project doesn’t have an anticipated construction start time until 2028.

Speaking of Smart Scale, the area body that makes decisions about regional transportation projects meets at 4 p.m. On the agenda of the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization is a new design for a reconfiguration of the intersection of U.S. 29 and Fontaine Avenue into something called a “modified continuous flow intersection.” (MPO agenda)

There will also be a discussion of the needs for electric vehicle charging stations in the community.

“MPO staff would like guidance on developing a network of key stakeholders to assess and build strategies for supporting the use of electric vehicles in the TJPDC region,” reads the Action Item section of the memo on the topic. (learn more)

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There are another 872 cases of COVID-19 reported by the Virginia Department of Health, just below the seven-day average of 928 new cases per day. The seven-day average for positive test results has declined to 5.5 percent from 5.7 percent yesterday. The Thomas Jefferson Health District reports another 15 cases, lower than the seven-day average of 53. There is another COVID-19 related death, this time of someone in Louisa County.

The University of Virginia updated their COVID-19 tracker Monday afternoon, three days after last giving new official numbers for the ongoing outbreak. They reported 50 new cases on Friday, 15 cases on Saturday, and seven on Sunday. That’s a total of 562 cases since August 17, with 508 of them students.

However, a more useful number tracks active cases which are defined as “new cases with a positive test during the past ten days who require isolation on or off Grounds.” More than a quarter of the quarantine rooms are occupied, and seven percent of isolation rooms are occupied. Quarantine is defined as “for those who may have been exposed to someone who has tested positive for COVID-19” and isolation is “for those who have tested positive for COVID-19.”

As many as four residence halls have been identified for testing, with residents of Leferve being told Sunday they would need to go through tests after early detection measures raised the alarm.

“The University will continue to conduct wastewater and prevalence testing throughout the UVA community in order to detect cases as early as possible and take action to limit the spread of the virus,” reads a message posted to UVA Facebook page on Sunday.

Total enrollment is down this year in Albemarle County School by five percent according to figures presented yesterday to the Places-29 Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee. However, School Board Chairwoman Kate Acuff said the decline is higher when you include only elementary school pupils. There were 6,483 students in the county’s 15 elementary schools on September 30, 2019. That number on September 9 was 5,856, a 9.7 percent decline. (presentation)

“Two thirds of the drop in enrollment are elementary school kids,” Acuff said. “[They] are the ones who probably have the most difficulty navigating in virtual education and of the elementary kids, half of them are kindergarteners, or would have been kindergarteners.”

Albemarle County Schools are currently in stage two, which means mostly all students are receiving virtual instruction. A move to stage three would be a hybrid model for pre-K through 3rd grade students and officials are currently studying whether conditions merit that change.

“Under this protocol, Dr. Haas, the superintendent, is obligated to make a recommendation halfway through a term about whether we should move to another stage or stay where we are,” Acuff said.

The Places29-Hydraulic CAC was also presented with plans from Jaunt for their on-demand transit project. CEO Brad Sheffield has been visiting many elected and appointed bodies to get feedback on the idea.

“This is really not a big jump for us,” Sheffield said. “It’s more of a slight evolution of where we are headed with the types of services that we want to provide and how we want to be able to provide those quickly.”

Sheffield said Jaunt and other transit agencies are currently experiencing lower ridership and reduced revenues due to being fare-free. But he added that the goal is to make transit work better for people in the future, especially those who may qualify for subsidies.

“We want to make sure that the customers just don’t have to worry about where or how to get to their locations or even about what to pay,” Sheffield said. “If there are different programs or different types of services that they are eligible for, and that helps cover the cost, that’s what this type of platform would answer for them almost immediately.”

Sheffield said data collected through pilot projects will help improve the overall transit system.

The Wintergreen resort in Nelson County will open the winter ski season on December 11.

“In addition to following all CDC and local regulations, Wintergreen will require face coverings, will make the necessary changes to allow for physical distancing, and will closely monitor employee health including requiring employees to stay home if they are sick,” reads a September 14 letter from Rod Kessler, Wintergreen’s General Manager. If there is a need for enforcement limits on a given day, priority will be given to season pass holders. The resort is also giving anyone who has already purchased a pass the opportunity to defer it to next year.

More than 70 miles of railway between Charlottesville and Clifton Forge will get an upgrade thanks to $13.7 million in federal grants announced yesterday. Funding for the Buckingham Branch Railroad North Mountain Subdivision will cover the cost of upgrades to 14 at-grade rail crossings, improve bridges and new drain systems in the tunnel that runs through the mountains at Afton. Senators Tim Kaine and Mark Warner announced the funding from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements Grant. Last year, the state of Virginia and CSX reached an agreement to purchase the railway, which will continue to be operated by Buckingham Branch.

“The benefit of the suite of projects reduces maintenance costs on [Buckingham Branch Railroad],” said Haley Glynn with the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

Part of the work also includes eliminating some clearance restrictions.

“While removal of the clearance restrictions benefits freight services, maintaining class track safety standards and installing continuous welded rail allows passenger speeds up to 60mph, improves signal reliability, and results in a noticeably improved ride quality for passenger trains, including the Amtrak Cardinal Service which operates over this segment 3 days per week,” Glynn said.

Yesterday, the Albemarle Architectural Review Board took a look at several projects including a new Sheetz in the northwest corner of the intersection of U.S. 29 and Airport Road. That project had to undergo several changes including a smaller fuel canopy.

“I think that the prominence of this site, it’s elevation above U.S. 29 maybe does make it more of a concern here that it is across the street or in some other locations where we have looked at larger canopies where grade effectively mitigates the appearance,” said ARB member Dade Van Der Werf.

They have also been asked to reduce the number of fuel dispensers from eight to six. Lee May is engineering and permit manager for Sheetz and he said that might be an issue.

“Operating 600 of these locations, we’ve learned over time what works and what doesn’t work and whenever we drop to six its really important they be spread out to serve the same volume of customers,” May said.

The ARB asked May to reduce the width of drive aisles in order to help move the building closer to the street, a key design guideline in Albemarle County.

The ARB also reviewed an application for a redesign of the southern portion of Albemarle Square to make way for a new Aldi store, which would feature a corner tower with the trademark logo. The building was formerly a Fresh Market, and before that a Circuit City building. Frank Hancock is another ARB member who favored the design.

“It works surprisingly well with the existing architecture and I think it’s more successful than the Fresh Market in its response and connection to the Rio Road corridor,” Hancock said.

The ARB will hold another work session on the Aldi after a more refined design is submitted.

Today in meetings, the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority meets at 2:15 p.m. items include an agreement between the RWSA and the University of Virginia to study ways to boost wastewater capacity on campus, and a presentation on how the water and wastewater systems operated by the RWSA work. (meeting info)

The Greene County Board of Supervisors meets at 7:30 p.m. One item is a public hearing on through truck restrictions on Fredericksburg Road (Route 609) between U.S. 29 and U.S. 33. There is also a presentation on a new Post Office facility near Dyke, an update on CARES Act funding, and a progress report on the Business Disruption Grant Program. There’s also first reading on a resolution to begin review of the county’s Comprehensive Plan. (agenda)

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

As the week begins, the statewide seven-day average for positive COVID test results is 5.7 percent, down from 7.2 percent last Monday. Over the weekend, the Virginia Department of Health added 2,436 new cases with 953 on Saturday, 856 on Sunday and 627 this morning. There have been 3,021 deaths, with many of the ones reported last week actually having happened earlier in the pandemic and not reported until now.

There were 137 cases of COVID-19 added over the weekend in the Thomas Jefferson Health District, with 64 on Saturday, 54 on Sunday and 19 reported today. Two more deaths have been reported since Friday for a total of 67.

The University of Virginia’s COVID tracker has not been updated since Friday, despite reports in the Cavalier Daily that day that as many as four residence halls have had their populations tested due to positive tests and early detection in wastewater.

With the end of September approaching, Albemarle and Charlottesville are coming closer to the first nine-week period of the public school year. Last week, news came out that Charlottesville City Schools have put together a committee to help “plan a safe return to in-person learning.” Slides distributed after a meeting last week show that one option is to return pre-K through second grade as early as October 13 for four days a week. Older students would begin in-person instruction soon after. (reopening slides)

“A survey will be sent to families next week regarding their intent to remain on a virtual schedule or plan for their children to return to school with the proposed plan,” reads one of the slides.

Krissy Vick, the school’s community relations liaison, sent an email to parents that said the slides were a starting point for the committee’s discussion.

“Returning to in-person instruction will take time, information, and multiple revisions to a plan,” Vick said “The School Board will vote on the final plan. Keep in mind that we will continue to offer families the choice for all-online learning -- and to the greatest degree possible, we will allow staff this choice, also.”

The next scheduled School Board meeting is on October 1.

Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville has broken ground for the redevelopment of the Southwood Mobile Home Park off of Old Lynchburg Road in Albemarle County. Habitat purchased the site in 2007. Dan Rosensweig is president and CEO of Habitat.

“See, thirteen years ago, this community was facing a deeply uncertain future,” Rosensweig said. “Like a lot of trailer parks in the nation, it’s underground infrastructure had basically passed its useful life.”

Rosensweig said there was also development pressure on the property and residents asked the owner at the time to sell to Habitat. The organization was working on redevelopment of the Sunrise Trailer Court in Charlottesville. Now Habitat has been working with Albemarle County on a multiphase effort to redevelop the site without displacing residents.

“We come up with a plan of development that within the next ten years or so is going to turn this wonderful community of people into a wonderful community of people who are here, new people who are joining the community, new homes, and a little downtown core,” Rosensweig said.

Albemarle Supervisors voted on a rezoning last year that paves the way for the first phase, which will take place along Old Lynchburg Road and does not involve any of the existing trailer homes. Scottsville District Supervisor Donna Price was not on the board when the rezoning happened, but she is supportive of the funding Albemarle has committed to the project.

“When I think of Southwood, I think of the core values of non-displacement and sustainability,” Price said. “When I think I see Southwood, I see a representation of an essential public-private partnership that will produce a neighborhood consistent with Albemarle County’s Comprehensive Plan.”

In a time of restaurant closings, one space on the Downtown Mall is set to reopen tomorrow. The Champion Hospitality Group will take over the Commonwealth Restaurant with a new space called Passiflora. The new restaurant will offer “a Baja-Mediterranean-inspired menu of small plates.” According to a release, the restaurant will open for dinner with limited indoor and outdoor seating, following CDC guidelines for safe social distancing. Last night, Bashir’s restaurant in the same block had a farewell dinner to mark its impending closure.

Today in meetings, the Albemarle Architectural Review Board meets at 1 p.m. (meeting info)

Sheetz is building a convenience store in the northwest quadrant of the U.S. 29 and Airport Road intersection and needs design approval. The ARB did not grant an approval at its June 1 meeting. (materials for meeting)

The ARB will hold a third review of a new auto dealership at 1300 Richmond Road on Pantops as part of a development that includes a Holiday Inn Express and a storage facility (materials for meeting)

The ARB will review signage for the redevelopment of the former John Deere dealership at 2415 Ivy Road (materials for meeting)

The ARB will take a look at the new Aldi that is planned for Albemarle Square in the former Fresh Market (and former Circuit City) space (materials for meeting)

The Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee meets at 5-30 p.m. They will get an update from Albemarle County School Board Chairwoman Kate Acuff, an update on voting from Jim Heilman of the Albemarle County Electoral Board, as well as an update on the office buildings coming to the corner of Georgetown Road and Hydraulic Road. (meeting info)

City Council meets at 630 p.m. For those details, take a look at yesterday’s Week Ahead Newsletter.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

The University of Virginia has recorded 52 positive tests on its COVID-19 tracker after three days of only reporting single digit numbers. All of the cases are from students and that brings the total to 430 positive cases since August 17, with 382 of them students. The Cavalier Daily reports that the high number is due to a testing machine being “temporarily offline.”

“The large number of cases include a number who were tested earlier in the week and do not represent a sudden spike over the last 24 hours,” said deputy spokesman Wes Hester in a statement.

Changes will be made to the UVA dashboard today, according to the Cavalier Daily. Students in the Balz-Dobie dormitory remain in mandated quarantine while waiting for test results after five residents tested positive. Those five tests were not reflected in the 52 cases reported Thursday, but UVA announced this morning that follow-up testing yielded another ten cases in Balz-Dobie for a total of 15.

“In accordance with the University’s COVID-19 Prevention, Detection, and Response Plan, students who tested positive have been notified and are being placed in isolation housing,” reads an update on UVA’s Facebook page “All students with positive tests are doing well. Their close contacts, including roommates, are being placed in quarantine housing.

Statewide there are another 1,242 cases of COVID-19 this morning, and a total of 77 new cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District. Of that figure, sixty are reported as being from Charlottesville and eight are from Albemarle. That may represent the cases at the University of Virginia. There are only five new cases from Fluvanna County, which has seen a spike this week due to a test of all inmates and staff at the women’s prison there.

Early voting starts today at registrar’s offices across Virginia and runs for 46 days through November 3. What will the results be?

“Three words -- we don’t know,” said UVA presidential prognosticator Larry Sabato on a Center for Politics webinar Thursday. “That’s why your crystal ball is being more cautious than certainly we were in 2016 and frankly more cautious than some are being this year. This is an unprecedented presidential election. We have never had a presidential election during a pandemic.”

Sabato said there has also not been a presidential election during such a severe downtown in the economy. He said different models published in recent weeks by the Center for Politics show different results.

“Alan [Abramowitz] believing that Biden will win fairly handily and Jim [Campbell] projecting a close popular vote which to me says that Trump will win the electoral college in all probability,” Sabato said. “The fact that these two very able political scientists could produce results so different should suggest to all of us that while we love to jump to conclusions and we love to jump to conclusions and we love to fill in and color a map and not leave any states out, we really ought to express a little bit of humility.”

Episode 5 of the Sabato’s Crystal Ball - America Votes 2020 is available for viewing on YouTube.

A nonprofit group that matches caring adults with children that need guardians is seeking new families. Community Attention Foster Families works in Albemarle, Charlottesville and Greene County and trains people to become “compassionate caretakers” who support vulnerable children. Those sessions take about 27 hours to complete and prepare families for the experience.

“Becoming a foster parent is an incredible way to give back to our local community,” said CAFF Recruitment Specialist Nicole Hawker, in a press release. “You have the opportunity to empower children and youth as well as their biological families towards hope, healing and family restoration.”

Hawker will lead an informational session on foster care on Monday. If you or someone you know is interested in participating, send her an email at CAFFinquiries@charlottesville.gov.

There were 218 children in foster care in the three communities as of the beginning of this year.

Tonight is the launch of Live Arts new season, albeit an atypical one that is being streamed on Facebook rather than at the theater on East Water Street. The Forging Ahead Season will begin at 7 with a “coffeehouse” hosted by Shelby Marie Edwards and with live performances from Amrita Shankar, Johnny Butcher, Monica Edwards, and Nathaniel Star. The event is free but Live Arts will request viewers to pay what they can and to purchase a season pass. (watch)

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Support today comes from Soul House Love, Charlottesville's Guide to Alternative Wellness. This Friday, Soul House Love is taking reservations for a New Moon Ceremony in a gorgeous outdoor location, with powerful guided meditations to cleanse your energy. Visit soulhouselove.com for more information and to reserve your spot.

There are more positive cases reported from the Fluvanna Women’s Correctional Facility today and the first cluster of cases has been reported at the University of Virginia.

Of the 84 new cases reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District today, 48 of those in Fluvanna County. Yesterday there were 41 new cases in Fluvanna. Testing has been conducted at the women’s prison this week, including all inmates and staff.

“The facility will conduct internal contact tracing for the women in the facility,” said Kathryn Goodman, spokeswoman for the TJHD. “Once the contact tracing on the inmates are completed, they share the information with TJHD. It would be a challenge for us to speak with the inmates so this is the best practice for these types of facilities. TJHD will conduct the contact tracing on staff as we do with any other cases.”

There has been another COVID-19 death in Albemarle, for a total of 20 in the county and 63 in the district. There were 26 cases reported in Charlottesville.

The Cavalier Daily reports there is an outbreak at a University of Virginia residence hall with testing revealing that five students tested positive. The 188 students in the Balz-Dobie dormitory have been told to quarantine while waiting for the results of tests that were conducted last night. It is unclear whether these cases are captured in the COVID-19 tracker, which was updated yesterday to add another five cases for a total of 378 total positive cases since August 17. The outbreak was also detected through monitoring of wastewater.

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 1,101 cases of COVID-19 today, and another 36 deaths. The higher-than-usual death rate stems from a data backlog according to officials. The statewide seven-day average for positive tests is at 6.7 percent today, down from 6.9 percent yesterday.

Before the news was announced, the Albemarle Supervisors were briefed by officials from the TJHD, including Ryan McKay. (download the presentation)

“We’re certainly seeing increased number of cases among students,” McKay said. “We’re beginning to see some cases that are occurring on Grounds. Working with UVA, we meet with them on a daily basis to make sure we are communicating regularly, with transparency between what we’re seeing in terms of numbers, what they’re seeing, and then how we’re trying to support students.”

McKay told Albemarle Supervisors that the area is moving towards more community transmission in urban areas.

“And I think this is largely attributable to case counts that have been seen and positivity rates certainly in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County,” McKay said. “We are seeing increased numbers here in Charlottesville.”

The Virginia Senate has passed legislation requiring most utilities to develop debt repayment plans for those who have not been able to pay for electric, gas, or water service. The legislation sponsored by Senator Jennifer McClellan (D-9) was approved 24 to 12 with one abstention. (bill)

The Virginia Department of Historic Resources today will meet to consider nominations for two area properties to be listed on the Virginia Landmarks Register and the National Register of Historic Places. One is Jackson P. Burley High School on Rose Hill Drive.

“Opened in 1951 as a joint high school for African-American students in both Charlottesville and Albemarle County, Burley graduated its last high school class in 1967,” reads the Burley nomination.

“Burley is great, and that it continues to function as a school is I think fantastic and I can say as a coach in the city schools and at Charlottesville High School, I wish the student athletes would go over there and walk the halls at Burley and see the accomplishments of back in the fifties and early sixties,” said Jeff Werner, the city’s historic preservation planner. “It’s just an extraordinary place.”

The other is River View Farm, which is now known as the Carr-Greer House at the Ivy Creek Natural Area.

“River View Farm was established by Hugh Carr, born enslaved, with an initial down payment on land in 1870 near the confluence of Ivy Creek and the Rivanna River,” reads that nomination. “By the time of his death in 1914, Carr had amassed a farm totaling 108 acres, and was among the largest African American landowners in Albemarle County.”

The State Review Board meets at 1 p.m. (agenda)

The Jefferson Madison Regional Library has announced it will reopen some library branches for limited hours by appointment, and that curbside service hours will be extended at the others. The in-person hours wil bel offered at rural branches in outlying counties.

“JMRL has worked hard to be able to re-open some doors, and is looking forward to the opportunity to serve the people of Greene, Louisa, and Nelson inside library buildings again,” said JMRL director David Plunkett in a statement. “The Library knows that the people in these communities need access to the resources in their local libraries, and are glad to be able to offer these again on a limited and safe basis.”

Beginning Monday, the limited in-person appointment services can be used for up to 45 minutes by five individuals at a time. This is a move to tier 3 service, down from tier 4. Additional curbside service will come to Northside and Crozet libraries beginning on September 28. Call for more information.

Louisa County Library: 540.894.5853

Greene County Library: 434.985.5227

Nelson Memorial Library: 434.263.5904

In local meetings today, The Albemarle Natural Heritage Committee meets at 5 p.m. Among the items on the agenda is a discussion of using volunteers to clear out invasive species in county parks. (meeting info) (agenda)

The Places 29 North Community Advisory Committee meeting that had been scheduled for tonight has been canceled. The 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee meets at 7 p.m. The group will get an update on the High School Center II that is planned for county-owned property off of Mill Creek Drive near Monticello High School. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Human Rights Committee meets at 6:30 p.m. (meeting info)

At 2 p.m., the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia will take a look at Sabato’s Crystal Ball in a virtual event. (watch)

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

A mass testing event at the Fluvanna Women’s Correctional Facility has resulted in the biggest one-day rise of COVID-19 cases in that county. That’s according to a spokeswoman for the Thomas Jefferson Health District, which reports 41 cases in Fluvanna this morning.

“The uptick in Fluvanna County cases is due to point prevalence testing done at the Fluvanna Women’s Correctional Facility,” said Kathryn Goodman, spokeswoman for the TJHD. Overall, the district reported 60 cases today, with 12 from Charlottesville and five from Albemarle.

Statewide, there are another 845 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth as reported by the Virginia Department of Health this morning. The statewide seven-day average for positive tests has dropped to 6.9 percent today.

UVA reported another four cases yesterday, and their COVID-19 tracker now states that eleven percent of quarantine rooms are in use, up from eight percent the day before.

Governor Ralph Northam pointed to declining positive testing rates statewide as a sign of good news in the pandemic, but urged continued caution yesterday. Last week, Northam ended restrictions in the Hampton Roads such as early closings for restaurants after two and a half weeks of declining positive test rates.

“We however continue to keep an eye on some other regions in Virginia,” Northam said. “For example, Southwest Virginia is seeing more new cases per day per on average, 229, than any other region in our state, even Northern Virginia.”

Northam said southwest Virginia has fewer hospitals and medical capabilities so the Department of Health is monitoring the situation closely, even with declining positive test rates there. He said the rate was 8.1 percent on Tuesday.

The governor urged people to continue following physical and social distancing guidelines, and to wear masks indoors. He also announced that more than half a million people have downloaded the COVIDWISE tracking app.

“We estimate that’s around 12 percent of Virginians between ages 18 and 65,” Northam said.

The State Corporation Commission has agreed to extend a moratorium on utility cut-offs through October 5. The moratorium had been set to expire at midnight, six months after it was first issued. In a release the SCC indicated there would be no further extension.

“The mounting costs of unpaid bills must eventually be paid, either by the customers in arrears or by other customers who themselves may be struggling to pay their bills,” reads the statement. “Unless the General Assembly explicitly directs that a utility's own shareholders must bear the cost of unpaid bills, those costs will almost certainly be shifted to other paying customers.”

“The budget I sent to the legislature includes a moratorium on utility disconnections, a repayment plan structure, and a debt forgiveness program,” Northam said.

Yesterday the Virginia Department of Health reported 96 deaths, the result of a data entry backlog. Health Commissioner Norm Oliver commented on this at the press conference.

“Occasionally there will be a spike as we have in this number, and that just represents catching up with death certificates which come in much later than what we get from the hospitals,” Oliver said. “If you look at a different graph which is the deaths recorded by the date of death, you’ll get a much better picture of the course of the disease and you’ll see that we had a peak earlier in the year and it has been leveled off and we have been in the low teens for many weeks now.”

More from the Governor’s Press Conference will be in the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

Early voting season begins this Friday, and Governor Northam said yesterday that the Department of Elections has received 790,000 requests for absentee ballots by mail. Jim Nix is a member of the Charlottesville Electoral Board.

“People have been getting the word on voting early either in-person or by mail,” Nix said on the September 15, 2020 edition of C’Ville 360. “We already had as of yesterday morning about 6,500 requests for ballots by mail which is astounding.”

Normally in a presidential year we would have fewer than 2,000 through the whole cycle according to Nix. Melissa Morton is Charlottesville’s registrar.

“Currently my team is processing and preparing the absentee mail ballots to go out this Friday on September the 18th,” Morton said. “We have approximately 9,000 mail ballots that will go out.”

Morton said a dropbox for absentee or early ballots will be installed this week and social distancing measures are being placed inside her office for anyone who decides to vote in-person. You can watch the rest of the program here.

In meetings today, the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee meets at noon and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at 1 p.m. The latter group has a long day ranging from a discussion of a special exception to the county’s home stay ordinance for a property at 2405 Northfield Road, and an update on long range planning in Albemarle. There are several public hearings in the evening, including a developer’s request to reduce the scope of an intersection onto Route 20 south of Piedmont Virginia Community College. There’s also a renewal of the COVID-19 ordinance passed in late July, and a hearing on a county-initiated amendment of the zoning ordinance to place more restrictions on the use of fill dirt in the rural area.

Before we go today, one small correction from yesterday. All of the PTO’s for Charlottesville city schools have come together to raise funds for supplies for virtual learning, and a press release yesterday announcing a matching opportunity gave the incorrect total raised so far. The actual amount was $56,500 but hopefully by now that figure has increased already! If you want to learn more, click through to the link.

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Usually this is the spot where there’s a Patreon-fueled shout out, but the cupboard is bare today. $25 a month gives you four mentions in the newsletter and newscast!

There is a large spike today in the number of COVID-19 deaths reported by the Virginia Department of Health. The agency lists 2,839 fatalities today, a rise of 96 over yesterday.

“Regarding the death data for Tuesday, September 15, 2020, there is an existing data backlog,” reads a disclaimer posted on the site today. “VDH is working diligently to identify COVID-19 related deaths using vital record death certificate information.”

There are another 943 cases statewide and the seven-day testing rate decreased to 7.1 percent from 7.2 on Monday.

The first person from Nelson County has died due to COVID-19, according to new data released this morning for the Thomas Jefferson Health District. The two other deaths are one individual from Albemarle and another from Louisa County. The district reports only three new cases today, with no new cases in Albemarle. That’s the first time that has happened since June 17.

The University of Virginia has reported a total of 369 positive cases since August 17, with 321 of those as students. The UVA COVID Tracker is not updated on weekends.

Governor Ralph Northam is expected to address Virginia and the press at a news conference today at 2 p.m.

Last week, a subcommittee of the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors got an update on several new projects, including the 60,000 square foot home of the School of Data Science. They also got details on the 223,000 square foot UVA Hotel and Conference Center.

Both are part of first phase of the Emmet / Ivy Corridor, a future section of the UVA campus that the UVA Foundation has slowly been acquiring over the years. Renderings presented to the Buildings and Grounds Committee depict a pond in the southeast corner of the precinct, a pond fed by streams that will be daylit throughout the site. It has now been two years since the Cavalier Inn was demolished to make way for the new era for this part of the community.

A joint fund to help improve the virtual learning experience for low-income students has received a potential boost from two area philanthropists. The Charlottesville City Schools Reopening Fund is powered by the city’s Parent-Teacher Organizations and raised $56,500 in its first month of operations. Now the Bama Works Fund of the Dave Matthews Band and the Smith Family’s “Always Am” Fund will each chip in $25,000 if an additional $25,000 can be raised by the community. You can donate here.

“School-level committees have begun authorizing expenditures for headphones, manipulatives, books, supplies for home classrooms, assistance to families for virtual learning center tuition, and more. To ensure resources are directed equitably, distribution percentages are based on each school’s population of students receiving free and reduced lunch,” reads a press release that went out this morning. “The use of the funds are determined by individual school level committees comprised of a PTO representative, teacher, administrator, and an equity committee representative.”

Tonight, the Albemarle Planning Commission will hold a work session on how applications for new neighborhoods calculate the number of vehicle trips they will generate. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors received a briefing on September 2 on the“traffic impact analyses” (TIA) that go into land use planning.

“TIA’s are also sometimes referred to as traffic impact statement, and they evaluate a proposed project’s effect on the transportation system,” McDermott said. “They are done for rezonings and special use permits and they are requested when a development would substantially affect transportation on public roadways.”

These studies can also help developers and planners come up with ideas for ways to mitigate the impacts on the new development, currently usually discussed in terms of proffers.

“They have to be specifically attributable to the development that is proposed, they have to be reasonable, and they are offered by the applicant, so we can’t require those,” McDermott said.

The meeting begins at 6 p.m. In another work session, the president of Jaunt will give a presentation on the on-demand service his agency will pilot in the coming months. (agenda) (presentation)

In other public meetings, the Charlottesville Board of Architectural review will consider two applications to alter two Individually Protected Properties, or IPPs. These are structures protected by historical protection or design ordinances which require review by the BAR.

In one case, an applicant seeks permission to demolish outbuildings on a historic property in Fifeville that dates back to the 1860’s. In the other, another applicant wants to build a new apartment building on the sideyard of an historic building in the Rugby neighborhood. (Fifeville staff report) (Rugby staff report)

Live Arts continues to prepare for the beginning of their Season Launch this Friday. The move to all virtual performances, for now, begins with a Coffehouse featuring performances from Amrita Shankar, Johnny Butcher, Nathaniel Star, and Monica Edwards. The event begins at 7 p.m. on the Live Arts Facebook page.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled nonprofit mention is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

Over the weekend, the Virginia Department of Health reported another 2,931 cases of COVID-19, with 1,300 on Saturday, 874 on Sunday and 757 this morning. There have been another 32 deaths for a cumulative total of 2,743 since the first fatality was recorded on March 16. The seven-day average for positive tests dropped to 7.2 percent this morning from 7.5 percent on Sunday.

In the Thomas Jefferson Health District there have been another 84 cases reported over the weekend, with 46 reported Saturday, 17 on Sunday, and 21 today. Over the weekend, the VDH launched a new tool on their COVID-19 tracker which provides more detail. For instance, Albemarle has a seven-day average of seven new cases a day, and 2.8 new cases per 100,000 residents. In Charlottesville, the seven-day average is 19 new cases a day and 29.1 new cases per 100,000 people.

The UVA COVID-Tracker has not been updated since Friday afternoon, with data reflecting through September 10. As of last Wednesday, there have been 321 positive cases since August 17 with 276 of those as students. As of last Wednesday, eight percent of quarantine beds were in use, and one percent of isolation beds.

On Saturday, a small crowd watched in Court Square as the At Ready statue was removed from its place atop 5th Street outside the Albemarle County Courthouse. The now-removed statue was erected in 1909 and was for many years a protected war memorial. The Albemarle Board of Supervisors voted to begin the process to remove it in early July, just days after a new law went into effect that removed that protection. Albemarle County live streamed the entire event and here is Siri Russell, the director of the Office of Equity and Inclusion.

“You may hear the sound of the crane backing up as the Johnny Reb statue starts its first movement off of the pedestal and away from Court Square,” Russell said. “This certainly is not the end of the day but it is a moment that many watching have been long awaiting.”

On Sunday, community members gathered to celebrate the space as one of renewal. Read Katherine Knott’s coverage of that event in the Daily Progress.

Meanwhile, the University of Virginia Board of Visitors (BOV) met late last week and voted to support removal of the statue of George Rogers Clark on University Avenue on the Corner. The statue was a donation from Paul Goodloe McIntire in 1920.

“At the time the statue was erected, it was described by the Alumni News as Clark ‘explaining the futility of resistance,’ which supports a popular sentiment at the time of the natural superiority of white Americans over Native Americans and other nonwhites, which is not a view endorsed by members of the University community now,” reads the adopted resolution.

The BOV also agreed to remove the name Curry from the School of Education and Human Development, and to re-contextualize the statue of Thomas Jefferson near the Rotunda. They also agreed to drop the name Withers from Withers-Brown Hall at the School of Law. (full BOV meeting packet)

The COVID-19 pandemic began six months ago, and since then many people's lives have been transformed due to the uncertainty, the economic slowdown or they have had to stay within lockdown to avoid getting the virus. The Center for Nonprofit Excellence has been recording a series of conversations with area leaders on Hope and Resilience. Ridge Schuyler is the Dean of Community Self-Sufficiency Programs at Piedmont Virginia Community College.

“You know, it has been quite the journey for all of us and a friend of mine, their analogy was that it was like we got hit in the head with a rock,” Schuyler said. “And now we’re standing up, we’re still dazed, they’re still blood coming into our eyes but we’re still standing.”

Schuyler said the crisis will continue to unfold slowly as the search for a vaccine goes on, but the last six months have shined a light on inequities in our community.

“I spend a lot of time my trying to figure out what can I do to help us address not just the crisis of the moment with the long-term impacts of the pandemic,” Schuyler said.

You can hear the rest of that interview at this link on my SoundCloud page.

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This is a special edition of the Charlottesville Community Engagement newscast and newsletter for September 11, 2020.

Charlottesville City Council met today at a meeting that brings to a close a brief chapter in the city's government history. At the beginning of the meeting, Dr. Tarron Richardson was the city manager, the top administrative official and Council's main hire.

"I move to approve the resolution accepting Dr. Richardson's resignation,” said Vice Mayor Sena Magill.

(resolution accepting Dr. Richardson’s resignation)

(resolution amending Dr. Richardson’s contract)

City Attorney John Blair will serve as acting city manager and deputy city attorney Lisa Robertson will serve as acting city attorney.

Richardson's resignation is effective September 30, but Blair will take over duties tomorrow. Here's Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker.

"On behalf of the Charlottesville City Council I would like to thank him for his service and I wish him well in his future endeavors," Walker said.

"For the past sixteen months it has been an honor to as your city manager," Richardson said. "I would like to thank City Council, the residents, and business owners for the opportunity to serve this community. Due to personal reasons I have decided that the time is right for me to tender my resignation."

Mayor Walker said a robust search for a replacement would be found. In the meantime, John Blair will work with Richardson as he assumes the position in the short-term.

"I would like to thank the Council for the honor to serve as a temporary bridge until we get a new city manager hired for Charlottesvlle," Blair said. "I deeply believe that this city, its residents, its Council and its workforce can work together and we can make this city a more just, fair, equitable and prosperous place."

Richardson said he was ready to leave.

"We worked through COVID which took up a lot of time," Richardson said. "We worked a lot of hours and then from that with the untimely death of George Floyd we started having a number of protests and different things like that in the city and working day in and day out, many many hours, takes a toll on you mentally and physically."

The audio version of edition this contain consists of questions and answers from the press and the public. Take a listen, and share with your friends, family and co-workers.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

Today the Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,115 cases of COVID-19 and another three deaths. The seven-day average for positive tests dropped to 7.5 percent. There are another 53 cases reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District, with 34 of those from Charlottesville and eleven from Albemarle.

Yesterday, the University of Virginia updated its COVID-19 tracker with data from Wednesday, and reported another 25 cases for a cumulative total of 282 since August 17. Of those, 238 are students. The tracker also reports six percent of quarantine rooms are in use, as well as one percent of isolation rooms.

Charlottesville may soon be close to hiring someone to run the department that oversees planning within the city’s 10.4 square miles. Earlier this year, the director of the Neighborhood Development Services was demoted as part of a reorganization ordered by City Manager Tarron Richardson and a new person has not yet been hired. City Councilor Lloyd Snook gave this update on the process at Thursday’s meeting of the PLACE Design Task Force.

“There is a person, and some of you may have been involved with the interview process, who had some video interviews and zoom interviews and apparently where we stand with that right now is that that person would like to come to Charlottesville actually physically before deciding to take the step,” Snook said. “This person has familiarity with Charlottesville over thirty years but not currently.”

Snook told PLACE he has been frustrated by an inability to enact many of his campaign platforms because of COVID-19 and because of “difficulties of what’s been going on in City Hall.” (watch the PLACE meeting)

City Council is having a special meeting at 1 p.m. today to discuss a personnel matter.

Last night a local group that promotes tech companies in the Charlottesville area handed out its annual awards at a virtual gala. Chiedo John, a software engineer at GitHub, served as the master of ceremonies for the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council’s 2020 celebration of the tech community.

The first award went to Ting for Business of the Year.

“Ting has been serving Charlottesville for over five years and from our inception, CBIC has been our conduit to the start-up, innovator and technology infrastructure that fuels the Charlottesville business community,” said Kara Chandeysson of Ting while accepting the award.

The Educator of the Year Award went to Dominique Morse, youth entrepreneurship facilitator of Albemarle County's Murray High School and Community Middle School.

“To you that means a person that comes in and works with your children on design and also taking those designs and potentially turning that into a business or just thinking about the entrepreneurial aspect of how something I’m doing in school can affect the community,” Morse said.

The CBIC Entrepreneur of the Year went to Cynthia Adams of Pearl Certification.

“We make home value visible through a platform that collects data on energy efficient and renewable features so that homes can appraise for more at resale or re-fi,” Adams said. “We launched Pearl Certification and currently are headquartered here in Charlottesville because this community is so supportive when it comes to clean tech, sustainability and entrepreneurship.”

The Innovator of the Year went to Welld Health, a division of ACAC.

“Welld Health is an innovative software platform that was built from scratch here in Charlottesville and is designed to make prevention sustainable,” said Chris Craytor. “How do we as a country live a healthier lifestyle and how do we make sure we have the prevention we need to avoid the health care that we don’t want is accessible for all.”

The Top Jobs Creator of the Year was to go to “a technology or tech-centric business for its noteworthy achievement of generating secure well paying, primarily tech jobs and retaining highly skilled workers.” This year that went to Commonwealth Computer Research Inc, or CCRi.

“We were not expecting this, this is a big surprise, we’ve only been a tech company in Charlottesville for 31 years,” said Julia Farill, director of people operations at CCRi. “That’s not long enough, is it?”

The CBIC Partnership of the Year award this year is sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce and was introduced by President Elizabeth Cromwell.

“The CBIC Partnership of the year award recognizes new partnerships built in the last 18 months that model collaborative innovation and achievement that inspires others,” said Elizabeth Cromwell, president of the Chamber.

This year’s prize went to New Hill Development Corporation and the Fountain Fund for their work on financial literacy. Here is Yolunda Harrell of the New Hill Development Corporation.

“We are so excited about the partnership we have with the Fountain Fund,” Harrel said. “Part of our role at New Hill Development Corporation is to focus on financial capability. Everyone is capable of achieving the financial dreams that they would like.”

The Social Good Award went to Antwon Brinson for Culinary Concepts.

“Culinary Concepts was designed as a solution for folks that are in the food and beverage industry that are looking for a step up,” Brinson said. “There’s a lot of folks that don’t want to go to culinary school but they found themselves in this industry and they’re looking for certifications or some type of foundational training to elevate their skills to be able to move up the ladder. So I designed this program to give people the foundational skills they need to grow.”

The Start-Up of the Year went to Cardboard Live, a firm that seeks to transform the board game experience. The Student Entrepreneur of the Year went to Roman Bohuk of MetaCTF.

“We have some exciting things coming up in October,” Bohuk said. “October is Cyber Security Awareness Month so a lot of our clients are looking to do things, and run trainings.”

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Today’s Patreon-inspired shout-out is from a supporter who wants to say one more time…

“Vote. That's it. Just vote. Vote early. Take your friends to vote early. Vote in person. Vote early! Did I already mention that?” And we have a news item on this today! *

Nearly one thousand people registered yesterday for the first and possibly last campaign forum featuring the two candidates for Virginia’s 5th Congressional District. The event was put on by the Senior Statesmen of Virginia, and was held virtually on a Zoom call. The audio is available on the Charlottesville Podcasting Network.

Dr. Cameron Webb is an attorney and physician who works for the University of Virginia Health System and served on the White House Health Care team in both the Obama and Trump administrations. Webb said in his opening statement that his decision to go into politics stems from his wish to heal the community.

“Being a doctor, being a physician, it means that we’re leaning into the issues that make our patients sick, and often times those issues that make them sick, they’re issues related to education, and housing, or food insecurity, challenges with earning a decent wage or having a good paying job, those are the factors that really drive the outcomes in my patients.” Webb said.

Bob Good has worked in the finance industry, served as an athletic director at Liberty University and has served on the Board of Supervisors in Campbell County outside Lynchburg. In his opening statement, he said he understood what it was like to live in poverty.

“I know what it was like to get free lunch at school, to be in the lunch line with the free lunch voucher if you will and to know what that feels like as a young kid,” Good said. “I know what it’s like to get sent by your mother to walk a mile down the street to the grocery store because we didn’t have a car and to buy groceries with food stamps... I had to work for everything all of my life as long as I can remember and as we struggled for the essentials and we certainly didn’t have any of the extras, so I learned to work at a young age and I think that’s one of the most important things for a young person to do, is to learn to work and to learn the value of things, that has shaped me all of my life.”

Webb had limited his opening statement to his own biography, but Good opted to go on the attack.

“My opponent is aligned with the radical socialist left that has become much of the Democrat party,” Good said. “If he were elected he would do everything in his power to stop President Trump’s agenda or God forbid enact the Biden/Harris agenda if President Trump was not reelected.”

In response, Webb cited a string of endorsements.

“I’m proud that I am endorsed by the entire span of the Democratic party,” Webb said. Moderates, centrists and also progressives that shows my ability to build consensus. The reason why I have members of the current Trump administration still acknowledge all that I contributed and how I think that I am a pretty awesome guy.”

The audio is available on the Charlottesville Podcasting Network.

Early voting in Virginia begins next Friday and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors got an update this week on what the process will be like. The General Assembly passed a law in 2019 allowing anyone to vote absentee in advance without an excuse. The law was amended this year to open up the window to 45 days before the election. Localities must offer the ability for people to vote at the registrar’s office. Lance Stewart, the director of facilities and environmental services in Albemarle, said the county is working to make early voting safe.

“We have state mandates to follow in relation to protection of citizens and others from COVID-19,” Stewart said. “We have our own local ordinance and there are a slew of best practice recommendations from the state and the CDC that we are going to try to observe.”

Early voting in Albemarle will be at the county office building on 5th Street Extended. Earlier this year, the county had considered moving the registrar’s office to a more central location on U.S. 29, but the plan was reconsidered soon after the pandemic began. Stewart said the county is encouraging people to vote by mail in order to limit crowds.

“We don’t know the exact volume that we might get from this early voting opportunity,” Stewart said. “Predictions were that they might be significant with as many as 60 percent of people who vote.”

Steps taken include dedicating parking spaces for voting, creating a way for people to move through the office building without passing each other, and expanded hours closer to Election Day.

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,236 cases of COVID-19 today, and another 11 deaths. The seven-day average of positive tests is at 7.6 percent today. There are another 28 new cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District with half from Charlottesville. The seven-day average for TJHD has dropped to 5.8 percent

The University of Virginia reported another 26 cases on September 8, with 24 of those students. That brings the total to 257 positive cases since August 17, with 214 of those students. Five percent of quarantine beds are in use, as are one percent of the isolation beds set aside.

Tonight is the night of the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council’s Gala, happening around virtual tables in a virtual gathering space. CBIC helps promote and advocate the technology community in the area, and tonight the annual awards will finally be handed out at the gala.

Craig Honick, the incoming chair of CBIC, explains why they decided to hold the event electronically rather than postpone until safer times.

“We just felt this really important part of our function is to celebrate local businesses that are stand-outs and we didn’t want that to get interrupted,” Honick said. “We had done the voting in preparation for the May gala and then instead of canceling it we decided to move it to the fall.”

Honick said tonight’s event offers a chance for people to get involved with the tech community by watching the awards being handed out. Usually there are about 400 attendees, but the audience tonight could be larger.

“The event is free,” Honick said. “There’s an opportunity to make a donation to the organization if you’d like to support but anyone can attend. They just have to register.” (learn more and register)

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 882 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth and another 11 deaths. Today’s statewide seven-day average for positive tests is at 7.6 percent today.

In the Thomas Jefferson Health District there are another 27 cases reported today, with 22 of them coming from Charlottesville. Another death has been reported in Albemarle for a total in the district to date of 58.

The University of Virginia’s COVID tracker now reports 231 total positive cases since August 17, with 190 of those students.

Dr. Denise Bonds of the Thomas Jefferson Health District briefed City Council last night on where we are six months into the pandemic. She said Charlottesville is within the VDH’s Northwest Region, and she said the situation here is officially described as “fluctuating.”

“Our case number has been rising for the region and we’re at 12 per 100,000 incident rates and that has been increasing,” Bonds said. “We see an upward arrow and it’s been increasing for 17 days.”

However, Dr. Bonds said the seven-day average for testing rates has been below ten percent in the region. Another metric available in the non-public dashboard is the number of medical personnel who have been infected with COVID-19, and that number in the northwest region is at 3.5 percent. Dr. Bonds said that number is closer to 7 percent in the Charlottesville area.

About eighty percent of hospital beds in the region are occupied, but that includes all patients.

The last week has seen an increase in the daily number of cases in the Charlottesville area.

“The case incident rate for the Charlottesville area as of yesterday was 32 per 100,000,” Bonds said. “We had a dramatic steep increase between August 24 and yesterday with a substantial number of cases if you look at the day rolling sums, we went from 29 to 92 to 108.”

Bonds said that epidemiologists are watching case loads at UVA very closely.

“What they’re really seeing is students infecting other students rather than students infecting people in the community and vice versa, so we tend to have community members that we can trace back to a known source in the community, someone at their work site, a family member, they attended some community event where we had an outbreak in, and we have students that we can typically trace their infection back to another student group.”

This Saturday, Albemarle County will remove Confederate markers from Court Square, and the Board of Supervisors voted yesterday to give them to a group known as the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation. The Foundation will get the statue, cannonball and cannon “as is” after it is dismantled. Supervisor Bea Lapisto-Kirtley represents the Rivanna District.

“I like the fact that they will preserve it and rededicate it as the Virginia monument for all soldiers,” LaPisto-Kirtley said.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel said she favored removing the statue and materials this weekend, but suggested they be placed in storage while Albemarle decides if any remnants of the materials would be used in efforts to tell the good and bad of county history.

“Maybe a pause in storing it would allow us to discuss at a higher level how we want to contextualize our Albemarle County history and present ourselves for future generations,” McKeel said, a thought echoed by Supervisor Donna Price.

However, Supervisor Ann Mallek said photos could be taken to preserve what is on the statue, and she wanted the materials to just go.

“We in Albemarle have the chance to take this decisive step and really forward the feeling in our own community,” Mallek said. “We’ve been careful and we’ve been thoughtful and it’s not just the last couple of months. We’ve discussed for many years how to deal with this.”

The removal of the statue will be televised on a video live stream to be provided by the county.

The pandemic has claimed another business. Breadworks is a bakery on Preston Avenue that has employed people with disabilities since 1967 but according to a Facebook post, the store will close on September 25.

“All persons with disabilities who are employed at Breadworks will be referred to other WorkSource programs,” reads the page. “The majority will be seeking employment in the community, so we hope that area employers looking for dedicated and talented staff will offer persons with disabilities served by Breadworks opportunities for employment.”

Charlottesville City Council has approved a new nine-story building at 218 West Market Street off of the Downtown Mall. Developer Jeffrey Levien has proposed redeveloping a shopping center that currently is rented by stores such as the Artful Lodger. Levien has proposed building eight units that would be sold below market value, four of which would be at the standard rate of 80 percent of area median income with two units at 60 percent and two units at 40 percent.

“This one project is not going to solve everything for the city but it is a start and we need every start that we can get,” Levien said.

Levien said he may work with nonprofit groups to build the units offsite, and not within the new structure. He told Council that the cost to him and the benefit to the city would be about $825,000. That’s more than he would be required to pay into the city’s affordable housing fund, but restrictions that keep rents below market would only last for a limited time. Six units would be kept affordable for eight years and two would be restricted for sixteen years.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker was the lone vote against the project in part because of the time limits.

“It’s good that you’ve added the extra units but by the time the family got settled in to the unit that would be potentially expiring,” Walker said.

Levien is also the developer of two luxury apartment buildings on West Main Street.

In meetings today, the Albemarle Supervisors hold a retreat from 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. today with presentations on “Contemporary Trends in Local Government” and “Operating Guidelines for High-Quality Governance.” (agenda)

The Crozet Community Advisory Committee meets at 7 p.m. with a discussion of next steps for the Crozet Master Plan. (CAC meeting info)

The Charlottesville Planning Commission meets at 5:30 p.m. and has a new member now that City Council has appointed Liz Russell to an open seat. Commissioners will discuss a zoning change to allow more daycare facilities within city limits, and will also hold a work session on a proposed rezoning on Stribling Avenue for up to 181 units. That’s higher than an application Southern Development brought to the city in 2019.

Charif Soubra is with Southern Development.

“The feedback that we got directly from the Planning Commission was that… they were hoping to see a little more density and more of an innovative design,” Soubra said.

At a community meeting last week, many nearby residents expressed concern about increased traffic volumes and the city’s perceived inability to build infrastructure to address the impacts of growth.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from a patron who wants to say:

“Vote. That's it. Just vote. Vote early. Take your friends to vote early. Vote in person. Vote early! Did I already mention that?”

He did. And he has one more shout-out to go!

Classes start today in-person at the University of Virginia and virtually in Charlottesville and for most pupils in Albemarle. Students in Fluvanna and Nelson counties are also in class remotely. Louisa and Greene County are on the hybrid models with a mixture of in-person and virtual participation. (Virginia Department of Education Map)

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 836 cases of COVID-19 this morning, and another two deaths. The seven-day average for positive tests has dropped to 7.5 percent down from 7.7 yesterday. There are another 13 cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District, with eight from Charlottesville, three from Albemarle, one from Fluvanna and one from Greene. The district-wide percent positive rate dropped to 6.4 percent from 7.1 percent reported yesterday.

The University of Virginia COVID-19 Tracker was updated late Monday afternoon and the official tally increased to 227 positive cases reported since August 17, with 186 of those listed as students. There were 18 positive test results reported for September 4, two for September 5 and six on September 6. Numbers for September 7 were not available at production time.

Efforts to bring more passenger rail service to Charlottesville came one step closer last week. The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation and other governmental entities completed paperwork for the expansion of a bridge that crosses the Potomac River.

“Currently, there is insufficient capacity, resiliency, and redundancy to accommodate the projected demand in future railroad services,” reads the executive summary for the Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Long Bridge Project. “The Project is needed to address railroad service demands and to ensure the Long Bridge Corridor continues to serve as a critical link connecting the local, regional, and national transportation network.”

A series of recent transportation projects known as the Route 29 Solutions initiative included funding for a second daily train to come through Charlottesville on its way between Roanoke and D.C., but the current crossing cannot handle additional traffic. That has delayed the start of that services.

The new structure will be owned by the state of Virginia and will carry two tracks adjacent to the existing bridge. The project also includes a new bike and pedestrian bridge. (Long Bridge FEIS)

While work continues on the long-running update of the Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan, the city is launching a review of the Strategic Plan, a document that guides “decision and policy-making” in city government.

“The City Manager evaluates the performance of each department against their specific objectives, performance measures, and initiatives,” reads a press release announcing a series of five public meetings where the update of the current plan will be discussed.

The current plan has five goals, one of which is to be an “inclusive, self-sufficient community.” Each goal has a series of metrics to see if the goal is being met. A dashboard for the current plan indicates the city is not meeting its goal to create more subsidized affordable housing units.

The Comprehensive Plan is a different document that is mandated by state law that is more about government overall.

“The Comprehensive Plan guides decision-making processes for matters related to land use, community facilities, housing, transportation, environment, economic sustainability, historic preservation, urban design, and more,” said city Communications Director Brian Wheeler in response to a question.

“The two plans work together and the goal for increased affordable housing is a good example,” Wheeler added.

The firm Rhodeside and Harwell is currently overseeing a review of the Comprehensive Plan while also drafting a new zoning ordinance and affordable housing strategy. That process is known as the C’Ville Plans Together initiative.

City Council will hold a six-hour work session on the strategic plan next Tuesday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

But first, City Council will meet tonight beginning at 6:30 p.m. for a long meeting that includes a public hearing on the issuance of $27 million in bonds, a rezoning for a car wash off of Long Street, and a resolution to prohibit firearms on city property. There’s also a special use permit for a nine story building at 218 West Market Street that was deferred by the last City Council at their penultimate meeting in 2019.

In Albemarle, the Architectural Review Board will consider a proposal that involves a car dealership replacing the Hardee’s at the southwest corner of Rio Road and U.S. 29. This project went before the Places29-Rio Community Advisory Committee late last month and Scott Collins is its engineer.

“The applicant is looking to move his dealership over to this site and utilize a lot of the existing facilities on the site but make some improvements,” said engineer Scott Collins at the August 27 meeting of the Places29-Rio Community Advisory Committee. “The building itself would be reused with some minor modifications such as removing the drive-through canopy and removing the refrigeration on the back.”

Buffering and landscaping appear to follow elements of the Rio Road Small Area Plan, which seeks to guide the redevelopment of Albemarle’s commercial strip area.

On Saturday, September 12, the Confederate markers in Court Square will come down. At 5 p.m. today, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will meet to select an entity that will receive the statue, the cannon and the stack of cannonballs.

“To date, Albemarle County has received offers from the Shenandoah Valley Battlefield Foundation, the Petersburg Federal Correctional Complex, a private citizen, Gordonsville Grays, Isle of Wight County Historical Society, Sons of Confederate Veterans, Civil War Museum at the Exchange Hotel, Trevilian Station Battlefield Foundation, and Hampstead Farm,” reads the staff report for the item. “A final list will be provided to the Board on September 8.”

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

Since Friday morning, the Virginia Department of Health has reported another 2,792 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth. That adds up from 948 cases reported Saturday, 1,199 reported Sunday and 645 reported this morning. There are another 22 deaths since Friday, with six reported this morning. The seven-day average for positive test rates is at 7.7 percent, where it has roughly been since the beginning of the month.

The Thomas Jefferson Health District has reported another 78 cases since Friday morning, with 27 of those from Saturday, 40 on Sunday, and eleven today. From September 1 to today, there have been 108 new cases reported from Charlottesville and 59 from Albemarle. Over the weekend was move-in weekend for the University of Virginia, prompting concern from many on social media that the number of cases might rise.

The University of Virginia’s COVID-19 Tracker has not been updated since Friday so there is no official change from the 201 cases reported through September 3. That includes 161 student cases. A spokeswoman for the Thomas Jefferson Health District said in an email that cases among students do show up in the VDH data.

“We are tracking and doing contact tracing for all UVA cases,” said Kathryn Goodman. “UVA cases will be reported wherever the student lives - so if they are in City of Charlottesville limits, they'll be in city numbers and if they're in Albemarle County limits, they'll be in the Albemarle numbers.”

The epidemiological model put together by the Biocomplexity Institute and Initiative at the University of Virginia has raised the number of predicted cases anticipated by Thanksgiving. In the latest report published on Friday, forecasters suggest 15,609 more cases by that holiday, or a total of 203,492. A week before, the report stated 187,883. The increase is due to a rise in the virus’s reproductive rate in the state to slightly above one. (model report)This week the model report also added new language to describe the rate of growth in health districts, which are now classified as if they are declining, in plateau, slow growth, or in surge.

“Fewer health districts have been classified as surging in the past two weeks,” reads the report. “This does not mean growth has stopped. The surge trajectory is narrowly defined as having a current increase in cases of at least 2.5 per 100,000 per week.”

Only Richmond City and the New River Health Districts met that criteria when the latest model report was published. The Thomas Jefferson Health District was considered to be in plateau. However, the report wants that could all change.

“Weather patterns are beginning to change and with that comes the start of the flu season,” reads the report. ”When Virginia last entered a period of significant change following the transition to Phase III of the Forward Virginia Plan, we observed a second peak in cases statewide. The upcoming seasonal changes could bring a similar, or even larger, increase in cases. This is a critical time for Virginians to modify behavior and place extra emphasis on safety and health.”

The toy store Alakazam will be closed for the next couple of weeks, according to the mall shop's Facebook page. The owner has tested positive for COVID after a customer reported their own positive test. Other employees tested negative, but the post states they will continue to quarantine.

The COVID-19 pandemic is causing many nonprofits to shift their business model to grow membership while not necessarily growing revenue. Preservation Piedmont is one of those groups and Liz Russell is the president of its Board of Directors.

“We are going to waive our membership dues in 2021,” Russell said. “That’s partly in light of the fact that we have not been able to have in-person events this year but also we really want to expand our audience, and our diversity, and our perspective.”

Russell said this gives people the chance to try out the organization for a year, and for the organization to expand. They’re also expanding the amount they will give for historic preservation grants up to $3,000.

“The application is due October 31 and there is more information on our website but the categories could include documentation and research, preservation, education and interpretative initiative,” Russell said. “Any kind of stabilization of a historic structure or repair, and any kind of preservation related publication research.”

Visit Preservation Piedmont’s website for more information.

It is in fact Labor Day, and I will be spending this respite from meetings to catch up on a lot of stories I’ve been hoping to write. The weekly Week Ahead newsletter will be coming your way shortly. After that, paid subscribers will get a long story on the Crozet Master Plan. But for the rest of you, that story will also be available for free on Real Crozet VA.

That’s one example how support for this work through a subscription or through Patreon goes a long way to help build community journalism. I want to spend my time writing about these things, and every contributions leads to more work. For instance, supporters in the $10 tier on Patreon get access to the Week Ahead podcast I do, where I think more casually about what’s coming up in government meetings.

And if you like this program, please share it with friends and family!

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

There are another 1,111 cases of COVID-19 reported this morning by the Virginia Department of Health and another 10 deaths. The seven-day average for positive tests has increased to 7.8 percent. There are another 35 cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District with 26 of those listed as being from Charlottesville, seven from Albemarle and two from Louisa. Another Albemarle resident has died for a total of 57 in the district to date. The positive rate for the district has increased to 7.3 percent.

Last night, the Charlottesville School Board was briefed on local conditions by Dr. Beth Baptist, the director of city schools. She has access to VDH health metrics that are not available to the public. She reported that the city of Charlottesville on August 31 had a much higher seven-day positive rate than surrounding counties.

“For the overall health district we are at 7.1 percent,” Baptist said. “Charlottesville is 9.7 [percent]. When we get to ten, that’s when it becomes a red indicator and so we’re very close to that. Last week it was 3.6 [percent].”

City schools open virtually on Tuesday, the same day that the University of Virginia will open to in-person instruction.

This morning the University of Virginia COVID Tracker has recorded another 20 cases reported, all of them students. That brings the official total to 194 total cases, with 155 of them students. Students are expected to move into residence halls this week. Meanwhile, James Madison University students are moving out of dorms there as that school has opted to go virtual for at least the month of September. The image below is a screenshot taken this morning before the tracker was edited.

Governor Ralph Northam has asked the Virginia Supreme Court to extend the moratorium on evictions in the Commonwealth. A temporary halt on eviction notices expires at midnight on Labor Day. The Governor wrote Chief Justice Donald Lemons to point out that the General Assembly is still in session with a bill pending to address the issue, and new federal directives on a nationwide eviction moratorium is still being assessed. That action came this week in the form of a Centers for Disease Control directive.

“While my administration works with our federal counterparts to understand the implementation of the CDC order, and while we continue to work with the General Assembly on protections that will enable more landlords and tenants to utilize the rent relief funding, I write to seek additional time from this Court,” reads the letter.

Northam specifically wants the moratorium to last through the end of September. (Northam’s letter)

The General Assembly remains in special session this week, and members of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission got a brief update last night. David Blount is the legislative liaison for the TJPDC.

“They have a over $200 billion budget gap to fill for the rest of the fiscal year 2021 and fiscal year 2022,” Blount said. “I think they’re going to cover that largely by using the money that was frozen from this past regular session and they went and reduced that to largely fill the gap.”

Blount said he did not anticipate the state will tap into a reserve fund at this time. Both the House of Delegates and the Virginia Senate meet at noon. (General Assembly schedule)

TJPDC Directors had the opportunity to update their counterparts from across the region. Albemarle Supervisor Donna Price relayed the news about the decision to remove Confederate markers in Court Square on September 12.

“We expect that we will have several applications in [from] groups or organizations that are interested in receiving those items and we’ve been very pleased with the community engagement we’ve had in keeping our constituents informed of the process,” Price said.

Price said the Albemarle Board plans to continue to keep meeting virtually as cold and flu season approaches and with no concrete plans for a vaccine.

Fluvanna County is using its CARES money for economic development and expanding Internet coverage along Route 6 and U.S. Route 15. Supervisor Tony O’Brien said the county is also hopeful for more businesses to locate in the community, especially now that public water is coming to Fluvanna’s portion of Zion Crossroads.

“We continue to see some positive growth on the economic development site,” O’Brien said. “We should have some announcements coming out in the near future but we’re getting a lot of momentum there and we’re sharpening up our economic development package.”

Nelson County is also investing in broadband with a recent $1.25 million investment to expand access to the Internet, and another package is underdevelopment.

“We’re looking at doing that again and trying to get to another 500 plus households within the next 12 months,” said Jesse Rutherford of the Nelson County Board of Supervisors.

Dale Herring of the Greene County Board of Supervisors updated the TJPDC on the impasse over Greene’s proposed water supply plan. In July, the Rapidan Service Authority voted to stop collecting facility fees intended to pay for the impoundment of White Run for a new reservoir. The RSA consists of officials from Madison and Orange counties as well as Greene.

“We voted to pull out,” Herring said. “They voted to not allow us to pull out. The resolution that the board has approved stated that if we were not allowed to pull out of the authority, we would seek legal action. At this point in time we are trying to determine what needs to be done. The bottom line is they have the authority to say there’s not enough water to approve our project, and they also have the ability to say they will not expand the water access.”

Herring said the RSA has offered another solution but it not acceptable to the Board of Supervisors. The Greene County Board next meets Tuesday.

Tonight, Live Arts will hold the first in a series of Friday events the theater company plans to use to stay engaged with its patrons. Darryl Smith is the Box Office Manager at Live Arts.

“This season, Live Arts is embracing First Fridays in our lovely community here,” Smith said. “Every first Friday of the Month, I will go out into the community of artists and performers and do a little of snippet, an interview about their art and the inspiration about their art.”

Tonight, Smith will speak with writer Jocelyn Nicole Johnson who will read from some of her work, including a story in the form of a list called “Buying a House Ahead of the Apocalypse.”

“I’m going to read a super, super short reading,” Johnson said. “I actually wrote this last summer before the pandemic and before quarantine. I was thinking about even last summer about how to plan for a future that seems particularly fragile or even tilting towards catastrophe.”

Tonight’s interview is free to the public and will be streamed on Facebook Live, but you don’t need an account to access it.

“This will be a way to give people a taste of what a Virtual Studio Visit will be like,” said Katie Rogers, marketing coordinator for Live Arts. The company is switching to a Season Pass model for programming that offers weekly content including radio plays and more.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from a patron who wants to say: “Vote. That's it. Just vote. Vote early. Take your friends to vote early. Vote in person. Vote early! Did I already mention that?” He did, and now he has two shout-outs left!

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,126 cases of COVID-19 this morning for a total of 123,668 to date. There are another eleven deaths for a total of 2,652 to date in Virginia. Nationwide there have been 184,083 deaths as of yesterday according to the Centers for Disease Control. In Virginia, the statewide rate for positive tests remains at 7.7 percent today.

The Thomas Jefferson Health District Reports another 47 cases today with 33 of those from Charlottesville, eight from Albemarle, two from Fluvanna, three from Louisa and one from Nelson. There are three more deaths for a total of 56 in the district. The positive test rate in the district is at 7.1 percent for a second straight day.

The University of Virginia COVID-19 tracker reports another seven cases today, all students.

The end is near for Confederate markers that are currently outside the Albemarle County Courthouse in downtown Charlottesville. They will be dismantled on September 12, but there will be no provisions for in-person public viewing. Doug Walker is the deputy county executive.

“On the 12th, that Saturday, we expect work will begin around sun-up and by the time the work is complete it will be late that day or early on Sunday, we expect the statues, the cannons, and the cannonball will be removed,” Walker said.

Walker said the restrictions due to COVID-19 mean the county will not have a public event but a Facebook Live event will televise the entire removal, including lectures, interviews and conversations about the statue and the future of Court Square.

“We think that the show will be compelling and we know it will also offer the best vantage to watch the removal happen in real time,” Walker said. “We appreciate the community’s support in attending with us together, but at a distance.”

Supervisors will review offers to purchase the materials at a special meeting on September 8. Localities in Virginia have only been to consider removal of Confederate statues since a new law went into effect on July 1.

Yesterday, the United Way of Greater Charlottesville held its annual Laurence E. Richardson Day of Caring, an event that began in 1992 as a way to promote volunteerism and charity. This year’s event was a little different due to the pandemic, as explained by United Way Board Chair Juandiego Wade at the kickoff breakfast.

“This is a very special day of caring, different from one we’ve ever held before, but it will be an amazing day,” Wade said. “There is so much important work to accomplish.”

Wade said needs are much greater this year due to the economic slowdown.

“It has been a challenging year for everyone, especially for the communities of color who have been disproportionately impact by COVID-19,” Wade said. “We all have seen the terrible impact of this pandemic but our community has demonstrated that we can come together even in a socially distanced atmosphere to lend a hand to those who are most in need.”

This year, over 600 people volunteered and about 25 projects took place in on September 2 according to community outreach coordinator Anna Porter. She said in total there are about 80 Day of Caring projects taking place this week in person and virtually.

Charlottesville City Schools begin their academic year on Tuesday with virtual learning. That’s changed the dynamic for teachers who usually need to ensure there are enough school supplies to serve pupils in a given classroom. Now, that teacher needs to make sure there are enough for students spread across other spaces connected through virtual platforms. To help cover the cost, the Parent-Teacher Organizations from across the city are raising funds. Chris Meyer is the co-chair of Jackson-Via Elementary School.

“This is of course different than our normal school year and will require different sets of tools, learning materials for students, and thus increase costs and expenses that all too quickly come out of teachers’ own pockets,” Meyer said.

All of the city’s PTO groups have come together to raise funds for the Ready to Teach, Ready to Learn CCS Reopening Fund. The funding will be split among city schools based on the number of students who are on free and reduced lunch. Proceeds can be used to cover the cost of Internet, fees for Virtual Learning Centers, and physical materials that teachers might consider necessary.

“We’re already approved our first distribution so the teachers and administrators will have resources available to them this week to purchase materials so they can get those in the hands of students and families and support them,” Meyer said.

The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation is providing administrative support for the effort.

The owners of Edgecomb’s Imported Auto have announced they will close the business at the end of September. The company began operations in 1979 and according to a blog post, business has been down sharply since the pandemic began.

“With travel and commuting at a minimum due to the Covid-19 pandemic, revenue has simply not kept up with expenses,” reads the post. ”Combined with changes in the industry that favor much larger operations, it became clear that, like all good things, Edgecomb’s Imported Auto was destined to end.”

Today in meetings, the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission meets at 7 p.m. and will have a public hearing on an annual report that has the acronym CAPER. That stands for the Consolidated Annual Performance and Evaluation Report and it takes a look at how federal funding for affordable housing projects has been spent in the city of Charlottesville and surrounding counties.

The TJPDC will also approve a plan for Nelson County to use $350,000 of its CARES COVID-19 relief funding for a grant program to provide relief for small businesses. There is also the possibility that the Commissioners will publicly announce the purchase of property for new offices for the TJPDC.

At 5:30 p.m, the developer of a proposed 181-unit residential community in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood will hold a community meeting for a proposed rezoning. (register) (PUD materials)

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

Governor Ralph Northam held his first COVID-19 press conference since early August yesterday in order to warn Virginians against being complacent as the holiday weekend approaches.

“Overall, the coronavirus is moderately contained in Virginia,” Northam said. “The case numbers remain steady and the percent positivity is not spiking but again we continue to watch this very closely and we need to remain vigilant, we continue to monitor the data.”

For an audio record of Northam’s press conference, take a listen to the latest episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

In the question and answer period, Northam was asked whether he would intervene if cases spiked at public colleges and universities that open to in-person instruction. The University of Virginia is expected to do so in six days on September 8.

“We have provided specific guidelines,” Northam said. “The colleges and universities have been working with [State Council on Higher Education in Virginia]. Their plans were certified by SCHEV and we’re watching this very closely. We expect our colleges and universities to continue to follow their plans and to also work with the local health districts. As long as we see that continuing to happen, then I think we can proceed. But if it’s not, then I certainly have the opportunity to intervene and make changes.”

This is a link to UVA’s reopening plan as filed with SCHEV. There is a section on page eight about the criteria if shutting down is necessary at UVA.

“UVA will follow Governor Northam’s statewide executive orders regarding restrictions and potential return to previous phases of opening/closure. As noted above in the monitoring of campus outbreaks, UVA will closely monitor the campus community using a dashboard of key metrics including but not limited to capacity for isolation and quarantine, as well as in the UVA Medical Center. Criteria for shutdown in the absence of an executive order are still being finalized.”

Just four hours after Northam’s press conference, James Madison University announced plans to reverse course and go to online-instruction only. That happened after the school’s COVID tracker showed more than 500 cases. JMU started class on August 26.

The University of Virginia’s COVID tracker announced 31 new cases today, including 28 among students. That’s for a total of 155 positive cases since August 17. That’s 117 positive student cases. The tracker also states that out of 17,203 pre-arrival tests taken by students, 55 were positive. (COVID-tracker)

There are another 927 cases reported today by the Virginia Department of Health, and another 29 deaths. The seven-day average for positive tests remains at 7.7 percent today. The Thomas Jefferson Health District reports another 25 cases, and another 3 fatalities bringing the total to 53. The seven-day average for positive tests in the TJHD rose to 7.1 percent today, up from 6.6 percent yesterday.

A Charlottesville Police Officer has been charged with assault and battery stemming from a March 3 incident on Prospect Avenue that resulted in two arrests. According to a release that was briefly on the city’s website, one of the arrests was for drunk in public, and the arrestee was later found not guilty in Charlottesville General District Court. After body camera footage was viewed in court, a complaint was made claiming that one of the arrestees had been assaulted by one of the officers. On Monday, a Magistrate found probable cause for a warrant to arrest Officer Jeffrey Jaeger on misdemeanor assault and battery charges. His court appearance is scheduled for September 14.

Shortly after this news release was posted, Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker interviewed Police Chief RaShall Brackney on the city’s talk show, Charlottesville 360. Walker began the program by asking the chief why she wanted to take the job and Brackney responded she appreciated the challenge.

“If you could reclaim the narrative of Charlottesville, if people could really just understand the pain and where some of the pain comes from in Black community, and if there was a way I could even be a bridge or a conduit to some of that healing, particularly the pain that law enforcement had caused in this community when they had not lived up to their expectations in any way of the type of service the community wanted and expected of them, I firmly believe we were led here and I firmly believe that we were led here for a time such as this,” Brackney said.

Last week, the city appointed a final member to the city’s Police Civilian Review Board. Former City Council candidate Bellamy Brown was appointed one day after Council had appointed a city employee to the CRB, something that was in violation of the group’s by-laws.

The two-hour conversation is available for viewing on the city’s website. (watch)

One in five Virginia households has not yet filled out their Census forms, and time is running out. Kelly Thomasson is the Secretary of the Commonwealth and she asked anyone who has not yet completed the Census to do so now.

“The Census is a population count and the Census data is used to determine how federal funding is used to determine how federal funding is distributed to states and to how many seats we get in Congress,” Thomasson said. “It is also used by our state and local communities to shape public safety planning, to determine where schools and hospitals are built, and more.”

The Census began in March and Thomasson said over 80 percent of Virginia households have either responded or been counted by an official enumerator. The U.S. Census Bureau is ending all counting efforts on September 30, a month earlier than originally planned.

The main meeting today is of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors, where they will discuss the possibility of “hybrid” public meetings with in-person and electronic participants. In the afternoon, they’ll also get an update on the county’s legislative priorities, a briefing on how land use developments estimate how much traffic they will generate, and more. In the evencbicing there is a public hearing for the proposed Breezy Hill subdivision on U.S. 250 in eastern Albemarle. For more on the 1 p.m. meeting, go back and look at Sunday’s Week Ahead newsletter. (meeting agenda)

Today in corrections is a minor one. Yesterday I had a small piece on the Charottesville Business Innovation Council’s upcoming gala. It begins at 5 p.m. and not 7 p.m.

If you go at 7, you’ll miss the networking opportunities!

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“Vote. That's it. Just vote. Vote early. Take your friends to vote early. Vote in person. Vote early! Did I already mention that?” I think he did.

There have been another 1,021 cases of COVID-19 reported by the Virginia Department of Health today, for a cumulative total of 121,615. There have been another 32 deaths recorded for a total of 2,612 to date. The statewide seven-day average for positive tests increased to 7.7 percent today, up from 7.4 percent yesterday. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, there are another 15 cases and no new deaths reported today. The seven-day average for positive tests was not available at recording time.

The University of Virginia reports another eight cases of COVID-19 today, with six of those being students. That brings the total number of cases since August 17 to 123, with 89 of those students. UVA returns for in-person classes a week from now, on September 8. (UVA COVID tracker)

With the pandemic entering its sixth month, thousands of Virginians face eviction as the economic slowdown has put so many out of work. Governor Ralph Northam announced yesterday a $4 million payment to the Legal Services Corporation of Virginia to hire more attorneys to represent those who will end up in court to challenge eviction notices. A moratorium on evictions expired on June 28 and was reinstated in August. That now runs out again on September 7. In the meantime, there are a lot of pending cases.

“Ten thousand eviction cases were docketed in Virginia courts from mid-July to August,” Northam said. “The Virginia Poverty Law Center estimates some 230,000 eviction cases could be filed through the end of this year.”

More than a million Virginians have filed for unemployment benefits since the pandemic began. The Northam administration has created a Rent and Mortgage Relief Program that has $50 million in funding, including $450,000 in the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Still, many of the eviction cases will proceed, and Northam said hiring more attorneys can help affected households navigate the process.

“Legal Aid makes a real difference if you’re facing eviction,” Northam said. “In fact, when Legal Aid attorneys represent people in eviction proceedings, 72 percent have successful outcomes.”

The $4 million payment consists of a $2 million repayment from IKEA for unemployment benefits its employees received from the state when stores were shut down in the early days of the pandemic. The other half comes from the proceeds of taxes on skills machines in Virginia.

For more on the state of evictions in the state of Virginia, read this August 31 article by Ned Oliver in the Virginia Mercury.

Local sales tax collections are up sharper this year in the communities that surround Albemarle and Charlottesville, but the city’s revenues have declined. That’s one conclusion drawn from the Free Enterprise Forum’s Retail Report for the second quarter of 2020.

Forum President Neil Williamson and former Chamber of Commerce president Tim Hulbert analyzed data collected from each community and found that local sales tax revenues increased by 18.5 percent in Fluvanna, 18.5 percent in Greene and 24.3 percent in Louisa. Albemarle collected one percent more than in the second quarter of 2019, and Charlottesville’s sales tax collection was 11.6 percent less this year over last year.

The report states that one factor is a reduction in people commuting to Charlottesville and spending money in their home communities. Another theory is that dramatically fewer people were in Charlottesville as a result of the closure of the University of Virginia in March.

“As enterprises continue to pivot their business models to accommodate social distancing and other COVID-19 realities, we are hopeful that the economic rebound we see in some localities becomes a region wide trend,” Williamson and Hulbert write in the report, which also attributes some of the higher numbers to the recent Supreme Court decision mandating localities to receive sales tax from online purchases made within their jurisdiction.

In nine days, the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council (CBIC) will finally hold its annual awards gala, just three months after the pandemic caused the May event to be canceled. Each year, the CBIC gala honors tech companies and innovators in the community and this year’s event will be a little different. The gala will be held electronically but not on a regular Zoom call. Instead, participants will be seated at a virtual table and can interact and network with their seat mates. Heidi Tombs is the co-chair of the CBIC Gala.

“We were looking for the virtual solution to put on this event,” said Heidi Tombs, co-chair of the CBIC Gala. “We were really looking to capture some elements of the gala that our attendees have given us great feedback about in the past and two of those essential elements are connecting with our local innovators through Innovators Row and being able to network, whether you are looking for your next job opportunity or looking for investors or just looking to connect with other people in your industry who can help you make your way.”

Awards include Business of the Year, Partnership of the Year, and the Social Good Award. Review the finalists on the CBIC Gala website. This year’s event is open to admission on a pay as you can basis. The event takes place on September 10 beginning at 5 p.m.

There are three meetings of note coming up today that might be of interest. The first is the Albemarle Board of Zoning Appeals, which has a routine public hearing on a sign for three new buildings coming to Pantops at the corner of U.S. 250 and Route 20. As a reminder, these are a Wawa, a self storage unit, and a 122-room hotel. (meeting info)

Next, the Albemarle Planning Commission will have a work session on Crozet’s future land use map, and specifically a discussion about what is known as “middle missing” housing. That refers to structures with multiple residential units, such as duplexes, fourplexes and other forms.

“They are referred to as “missing” because they have typically been prohibited from being constructed by zoning ordinances across the United States and are typically a more affordable option than single-family homes due to the cost of land,” reads a handout that county staff made for participants in the on-going Crozet Master Plan update.

Finally, Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker will join Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney on a new episode of Charlottesville 360, the city’s in-house talk show. This conversation begins at 5:30 p.m. (details)

A couple of corrections. Yesterday the newsletter reported the incorrect daily figure of new COVID cases for Virginia. The correct number was 847. In addition, in the Week Ahead newsletter I stated that a planned unit development project had already been approved, when in fact the item has not yet been scheduled for a public hearing with the Planning Commission and City Council. These items will be corrected in the archive.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out is for Abundant Life Ministries, “working hard to create a better future for the Charlottesville community.”

On Friday evening around 5 p.m., the University of Virginia announced they would proceed with plans to begin in-person instruction on September 8, two weeks later than originally planned. That also means that residence halls will open to students at two-thirds capacity, or about 4,400 people.

“We know some will be delighted to hear this news and others will be disappointed,” reads a statement signed by officials including President Jim Ryan. “To be frank, it was a very difficult decision, made in the face of much uncertainty, and with full awareness that future events may force us to change course.”

The statement goes on to explain the decision was made in part because local conditions in Virginia and the Thomas Jefferson Health District have been improving. He also said “thousands of students” have been slowly returning to Charlottesville and UVA to work in labs, the medical and nursing schools, and professional students.

“One thing we have learned from this virus is that you can do everything in your power to plan and prepare, but it still might not be enough, as things can change rapidly,” Ryan and others wrote. “That is why we will continue to monitor conditions closely and, if necessary, will put more restrictions in place, move classes online, and, if need be, send students home.”

As of this morning, the official number of positive cases of UVA faculty, staff, and students is listed on the COVID-19 tracker as 115 since August 17, with 83 of those students. This morning, another three positive cases were reported, with two of those students.

The Virginia Department of Health has reported an additional 3,002 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth since Friday morning, for a total of 120,494 to date. That includes 1,217 cases reported Saturday, 938 reported Sunday and 847 reported today. The positive test rate increased yesterday to 7.4 percent, up from 6.5 percent a week earlier.

In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, there have been another 103 cases of COVID-19 reported since Friday morning, with 52 reported Saturday, 34 reported Sunday, and 17 reported this morning. The positive rate jumped to 6.7 yesterday, up from 5.6 a week earlier. Today the figure decreased to 6.6 percent.

The latest report from the people putting together the University of Virginia’s COVID-19 forecasting model states that surges in health districts across the Commonwealth are abating. According to analysis by the UVA Biocomplexity Institute, only one health district, Mount Rogers in far southwest Virginia, is considered to be surging.

The model currently suggests there could be around more 57,000 cases in Virginia by Thanksgiving, or 187,883. Adjustments were recently made to the model to anticipate the effects of seasonal change. (model report)

“With the new modeling approach, the current course predicts that confirmed cases already peaked at 7,358 cases per week during the week ending August 9th,” reads the report. “Anticipated seasonal changes in the Fall due to schools and universities re-opening, changes to workplace attendance, and the impact of weather patterns could lead to a surge beginning around Labor Day.”

The third page of the report talks about the effects schools re-opening could have on transmission in Virginia’s localities.

Albemarle County has announced the launch of another round of LIFT grants funded by the CARES Act. This time around, county officials are seeking applications from non-profit groups. Applications are not yet opened, but would-be applicants are asked to complete a form to be notified when the window opens. The Community Investment Collaborative will administer the funding.

A coffeeshop on Elliewood Avenue that has been closed since the pandemic began is reopening today. Grit sent an email to customers Saturday morning to notify of the change and to state that “safety protocols have been implemented” including a continued ban on indoor seating. Grit’s four other stories have been open to take-out and curbside pick-up but the store on the UVA Corner has been closed.

Two members of a group charged with overseeing urban design in Charlottesville have resigned, including chair Mike Stoneking. Stoneking and architect Fred Wolf have both sent letters to the city stating they now longer want to serve on the PLACE Design Task Force, which was created in 2012. Carrie Rainey, the city's urban design planner, sent a letter to remaining members telling them they could call for a special meeting to appoint new leadership. That meeting will happen on September 10 at the regular time.

Developer Katurah Roell has submitted new plans for a mixed-use building on Roosevelt Brown Boulevard in Charlottesville. A sign for the SoHo building has been standing on the half-acre property has been standing for several years. Staff in the city's Department of Neighborhood Development Services had approved a site plan for 6 residential units and over 40,000 square feet. The new plan would increase the residential units to 24 and would cut the commercial space to about 11,000 square feet. Both projects are allowed by-right under the zoning, which is a special district created for the Cherry Avenue corridor. In recent years, the city commissioned the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission to create a small area plan for the area to guide future development. City Council has not yet adopted the plan.

With no end in sight for physical distancing rules and bans on public gatherings, there are no scheduled curtain openings for live theater. However, Live Arts is shifting to an online model that begins with programming this week. Jeremy Duncan Pape is the interim creative director at Live Arts.

“One of our primary focuses is obviously going to be on flexibility and adaptability because there is so much that we don’t know about the state of the word for the next year or so we have a lot of ideas,” Pape said.

This year’s season will be driven by local content. Ann Hunter is the executive director at Live Arts.

“When COVID hit, seems like a lifetime ago, Live Arts had a choice to either hunker down or to forge ahead and we chose the latter. That choice led to the creation of a reimagined forging ahead season,” Hunter said. She added that they are asking patrons to purchase a season pass to help subsidize the cost of programming for those with limited means.

“The goal here is pretty simple, to lower the economic barrier to theater during a time of social, emotional and financial hardship for our neighbors,” Hunter said.

Programming kicks off this weekend when box office manager Daryll Smith interviews writer Jocelyn Nicole Johnson as part of a First Friday event. You can get a preview in the Live Arts Season Reveal which is available on YouTube.

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Today’s shout-out is for the Parent-Teacher Organizations of the Charlottesville City Schools, and their request for donations to the jointly organized Reopening Fund: Ready to Teach, Ready to Learn. Visit their website for more information and to make a contribution.

This is the day that the University of Virginia is expected to announce whether it will continue on with plans to open to in-person instruction on September 8 and whether residential housing will open to students. As of this morning, the University of Virginia is reporting a total of 67 positive cases on its public COVID-19 tracker, with 40 of those being students. (UVA COVID tracker)

The Virginia Department of Health reports another 1,013 cases of COVID-19 statewide today, and an additional 23 fatalities for a total of 2,550 to date. There are another 36 cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District and another death. Albemarle added another 12 cases, Charlottesville added 19, Greene added two, and Louisa added four. There have now been 49 fatalities in the district.

The city of Charlottesville has warned drivers to expect road closures and traffic delays downtown this afternoon from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. for a “planned freedom of speech event.” The event is a Black Lives Matter march intended to commemorate the 57th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s I Have a Dream speech organized by local activists that will go from Tonsler Park to the police department. The city released a statement warning that it will issue fines to organizers for being in violation of a ban on special event permits that has been in place since the beginning of the pandemic.

“Over the last three months, large crowds gathered in both Washington Park and Market Street Park,” reads a statement from City Manager Tarron Richardson. “These gatherings have obstructed nearby public streets and intersections. While the City of Charlottesville has supported the community’s right to peaceably assemble, obstructing city streets and using parks without the proper permits will no longer be allowed

The Daily Progress reports that the city will issue a $500 fine on the organizers of a Juneteenth celebration held in Washington Park. Richardson’s statement suggests there will be more charges.

“While the City of Charlottesville has supported the community’s right to peaceably assemble, obstructing city streets and using parks without the proper permits will no longer be allowed,” Richardson wrote.

Even though the University of Virginia is not yet in session, activity around Grounds has increased. The University Transit Service (UTS) is running on a new set of routes in part because McCormick Road is now closed to motorized vehicles. Becca White is Parking and Transportation Director at UVA and she spoke at yesterday’s meeting of the Regional Transit Partnership (RTP).

“We’re already seeing more passengers riding this week than pretty much we had all summer on any route besides our employee routes,” White said. “But we are still limiting to 20 passenger boarding. We’re still using all the same precautions. Rear door boarding. A barrier in the aisle so that passengers can’t get six feet from the drivers.”

White said UTS will continue to run if in-person instruction does not happen, and that there would not be as many buses. She said Jaunt, Charlottesville Area Transit (CAT) and UTS have created a makeshift transit hub on Whitehead Road.

CAT director Garland Williams told the RTP Board that his agency continues to run on its restricted “lifeline” service. He said there is an protocol by which drivers get frequent tests.

“CAT did have one positive case,” Williams said. “That individual has gotten over it and we are really fortunate it wasn’t a bad case. They have returned back to work. We have a testing program that is in place that happens every other week, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.”

The RTP also got an update on new daily bus that travels through Charlottesville between Danville and D.C. The Piedmont Express is being funded by the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation as part of its growing fleet of Virginia Breeze bus lines. Neil Sherman with the DRPT said the agency decided to proceed even with the pandemic.

“For many reasons right now the ridership is very low but we just thought it was time to get the bus operating,” Sherman said. “There is a restriction of I think it’s 27 riders which is normally a 50 passenger coach and masks are required.”

The Piedmont Express also calls on Dulles Airport. The RTP also learned about another bus service that will soon be launched between Staunton and Charlottesville. The project known as the Afton Express has been shepherded by the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission (CSPDC). Sara Pennington of the TJPDC said bus line awaits final funding approval, but is moving forward.

“They have finalized all of their logos, branding and the color schemes,” Pennington said. They have gotten the route timings and the stops have been finalized.”

The COVID pandemic has meant fewer places for people to discard used books. Neither the Jefferson Madison Regional Library or Goodwill are accepting books and periodicals that people want to get rid of. Since the pandemic began, they have also not been accepted at local recycling facilities. This week the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority (RSWA) discussed the status of the book bin at the McIntire Recycling Center in Charlottesville, which has been in a shipping container that had been modified with shelves with no dedicated staffing.

“Basically it allowed people to bring in books when they did house clear-outs or whatever and the idea was that people could take books as they wished and bring books back and present a book exchange that was free to the public,” said Phillip McKalips, the Director of Solid Waste.

However, McKalips said the book bin has been closed since the pandemic began and its condition deteriorated in the months it was not used. He presented replacement alternatives to the RSWA Board on Tuesday. (staff report)

Albemarle County Supervisor Liz Palmer said the book bin helped promote the reuse of materials, but she was not interested in spending money to staff it. She saw the value in having a larger discussion.

“What is the lay of the land of used books in the area?” Palmer asked. “I do think that it is a value for a lot of folks and I think it is valuable to be looking into trying to relocate it.”

City Councilor Lloyd Snook said the RSWA should seek to work with the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library.

“I think it might be useful for us to sit down and talk with them and figure out what we would like to see in the way of the entire ecosystem

While their annual library sale has been postponed until spring, the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library and the Friends of JMRL will hold a pop-up book sale on Sunday, Sunday August 30 from 10am to 2pm at Gordon Avenue Library, at the lower level by the parking lot. People who want to purchase books will pay $5 for a “pre-selected bag of 5 hardback and/or trade paperback books.” According to their website, people will have a choice of mystery, popular fiction, or literary fiction.

In business news, the owners of the Crozet Running store have announced on Facebook they will close their doors on September 30. Since September 2013, they have rented space for the business in the lower level of the Crozet Library. In May, the Board of Supervisors declined a request to provide rent relief to Crozet Running and other entities that lease space on county property.

“This has been a difficult year for everyone and after much soul searching on the best path forward for our family, we were led to this very tough decision to close the store,” wrote the owners of Crozet Running. There will be a sale while their doors remain open.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from an anonymous supporter who wants to say - "We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

There are another 1,121 cases of COVID-19 reported by the Virginia Department of Health this morning, for a cumulative number of 116,579 to date. There are an additional 12 deaths for a total of 2,527 to date. The seven-day positive resting rate increased to 6.5 percent this morning, up from 6.4 percent yesterday. There are another 27 cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District and an additional death for a total of 48 in the district to date.

The University of Virginia has released an online dashboard that tracks COVID-19 cases among faculty, staff, and students. As of this morning, there are a total of 14 positive results among those tested, with all of those listed as students. The public dashboard does not include the number of tests conducted, which would yield a positive test rate. The dashboard indicates that there are no students in isolation, but five percent of the rooms UVA has set aside for quarantining students are currently occupied. (UVA COVID tracker)

If the pandemic had not happened, students in Albemarle and Charlottesville public schools would have already started classes in person. However, they won’t start virtual learning now until September 8, the day after Labor Day. The issue of school opening was discussed at length yesterday as part of the Leadership Charlottesville Alumni Association’s Courageous Conversations series.

Juandiego Wade, a member of the Charlottesville School Board, said that before that body made their decision, there was a lot of correspondence in favor of opening the schools.

“And for us as decision makers, and at this point I’m speaking for myself, safety was above all, and that was safety for the students, safety for the teachers, and ultimately the entire community,” Wade said. “September the 8th was not going to be the time for us to bring back the students in-person.”

The majority of students in Albemarle will go to school virtually, but some special needs students and English-language learners will attend in person. Students with no access to Internet at home can also physically go to class. Latishia Wilson, the principal at Stony Point Elementary School, explains how those pupils have been selected.

“For special education, our special education department developed some very specific criteria that they looked at and looked at the needs of the students to see which students they could provide services for in a virtual environment and which students really required being in-person instruction,” Wilson said. “As far as students who didn’t have access, they really worked hard to create equity because that was definitely a challenge in the spring. We already knew that many of our students didn’t have access but the turn-around was so quick.”

The architectural firm VMDO has the contract to reconfigure city schools at Walker and Buford, but it is on hold due to the pandemic. Architect Shawn Mulligan said this offers the chance to think about how schools can be redesigned. He said the work happening now to make sure all students have access to education will inform the future redesign.

“How do we know that each family is getting the service they need and that each student is able to thrive to the best of their abilities, and how do we as architects and we as a community create a full wrap-around services both that the school can provide but the after-hours care, the before-hours care, the family that’s necessary to really make sure that families and students are supported through this difficult time,” Mulligan said. “I believe that right now we are looking at a massive and looking equity crisis. I think our country is having a deep, detailed and really probing conversation about the history of race and racism in our society.”

Mulligan said there is an effort to create a Civilian Education Corps to help with the long-term effects of virtual education. The video will be available on the LCAA webpage.

The Charlottesville Tree Commission met for the first time since the pandemic began and welcomed four new members to the group. The first line of the group’s purpose statement reads “the Tree Commission will serve strictly in an advisory role assisting City Council, the Planning Commission and City staff on issues regarding tree planting, protection, preservation and removal.”

However, some members of the commission say they have struggled to be heard by any of those groups, and some have put together a presentation to explain the role trees play in a community that is healthy and equitable and hence the need for a Tree Commission

“Generally, our main guiding thing is to protect and improve the urban forest,” said Paul Josey, a member of the Tree Commission. This year the city will get an update on the tree canopy, a term that refers to the percentage of city land covered by trees. According to the city’s website, the tree canopy decreased from 47 percent to 45 percent from 2009 to 2014. Josey said areas with low tree cover are unhealthier and tend to be in areas with low-income.

“There are these hot spots, and in these hot spots there are also higher amounts of heat-related illnesses,” Josey said. “That’s heat stroke, heat exhaustion, heat cramps, and heat is actually the number one most deadly weather-related hazard in the U.S.”

Josey said the city needs to do more to enforce regulations and policies intended to increase tree cover, and in his presentation he made the case for the Tree Commission to play a stronger role in reviewing site plans for development.

“We have a lot of talent at reading site plans on the commission who get to look at these and know the codes and say, these are opportunities, these are areas where we’ve missed and figure out the big picture, so we’ve worked on a lot of advisory comments for these groups. We’re not a binding commentary group. Our comments are to help the developer meet the best management practices and make sure they are meeting the city’s codes,” Josey said.

However, Josey said no site plans have been shared with the Tree Commission since the Tarron Richardson took over as City Manager last year. He is asking for that to change. The full presentation can be viewed on the city’s webpage. (watch)

Today in meetings, the Regional Transit Partnership meets virtually at 4 p.m. and the Places29 Rio Community Advisory Committee meets at 6 p.m. One potential link between these meetings is the role that bus service might plan in alleviating congestion issues on Rio Road.

But today the RTP is scheduled to hear an update on Jaunt’s plans to introduce an on-demand service. They’ll also be briefed on the intrastate bus that now travels through Virginia between Danville and D.C. (RTP meeting info)

The Places-29 Rio committee will get an update on the city’s housing policy, which is under development. There is also a community meeting for a special use permit for an auto dealership on U.S. 29. (Places 29-Rio meeting info)

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The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 823 cases of COVID-19 today, and another 21 deaths. The seven day average for positive tests remains at 6.4 percent for the third straight day. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, there are 15 new cases and another death for a total of 47. The newly deceased is from Albemarle. The seven day average for positive tests in the Thomas Jefferson Health District remains at 5.5 percent for the second day in a row. That’s down from 6.4 percent a week ago.

The Greene County Board of Supervisors got a small update last night on the future of planning for a new reservoir to expand its urban water supply plan. In July, the Rapidan Service Authority voted to stop accepting facility fees from each bill to pay for the project. Bill Martin is chair of the Greene Board of Supervisors and a member of the RSA Board of Directors. He had invited RSA’s executive director to attend the meeting, but that invitation was declined for now.

“It’s clear that there is a dispute between Greene County and RSA and I thought it would have been a good opportunity for RSA general management to speak to all of us and citizens in particular,” Martin said, adding that RSA’s director of projects had a conflict.

Martin did brief his colleagues on the August 20 meeting of the RSA board at which RSA officials stated they could expand the water capacity by new technology at the existing water treatment plant that takes from the Rapidan River. At $10 million, that would be a cheaper alternative than the new reservoir. Read Terry Beigie’s coverage in the Greene County Record for the full story.

Two natural events prompted the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA) to implement emergency action plans earlier this month. Executive Director Bill Mawyer said heavy rains on August 6 caused concern.

“There was more than three inches of rain coming across the Sugar Hollow reservoir dam,” Mawyer said. “All worked out fine but that’s an example of how we manage the reservoirs particularly during storms.”

An earthquake in Sparta, North Carolina with a magnitude of 5.1 forced RWSA safety engineers to have to inspect all of the dams to make sure they suffered no damage. One of those inspectors is Jennifer Whittaker, the RWSA’s chief engineer. She briefed the Board of Directors on several projects designed to increase drinking water capacity in Crozet, one of Albemarle’s designated growth areas. The COVID-19 pandemic has increased consumption but that is within acceptable range.

“What we’re seeing right now is that our peak day number is staying fairly high, particularly associated with warm weather,” Whittaker said. “Because Crozet is 80 percent residential we believe we are seeing an impact from people working from home perhaps more historically than they have.”

One of the planned pieces of infrastructure is a new pump station at Beaver Creek Reservoir. While this new facility would be on county property, an easement across private land is required for an underground pipeline.

“They understand for the most part what we’re trying to do,” Mawyer said. “We understand that they might not be so happy that we may need an easement across their property and we’re looking at all the alternatives.”

The RWSA also reviewed a study on what to do with land purchased in the 1980’s for a dam that was never built due to environmental concerns. The RWSA owns 1,314 acres of land in northwest Albemarle and some landowners want to buy back their property. Scenarios envisioned in the plan include selling all or portions of the property, retaining the property, or a mixture of the two. The RWSA Board adopted a resolution to develop a comprehensive property management plan for the agency to retain the property. They will also seek to manage the property in a way to offset the RWSA’s carbon footprint.

Albemarle's historic preservation committee voted Monday to recommend a historical marker be created to commemorate the role the Union Run Baptist Church in Keswick played in local history. The exact text remains to be written. Union Run is a Black church founded in 1865 by newly freed people after Emancipation and the Civil War. An acre of land was given for the church by Thomas Jefferson's grandson, who had owned many of the parishioners. Pastor Robert Hughes oversaw the congregation for thirty years.

There is a deadline of October 1, 2020 to get information to the Virginia Department of Historic Resources. The Historic Preservation Committee wants to install several markers to commemorate Black history in Albemarle, as well the role women have played throughout time. They will be seeking input from the community. (Union Run Baptist Church website)

A Charlottesville artist is among 40 recipients of a $5,000 grant from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and the Northam administration. The Virginia Artist Relief Fellowship Program will distribute $200,000 to visual artists of all kinds. The selections were made from more than 350 applications and the funding comes from the museum’s existing endowment. The person selected from Charlottesville asked not to be named. (release)

In meetings today, the Leadership Charlottesville Alumni Association will hold another “Courageous Conversation” at 2 p.m. This time around a series of panelists will discuss the challenges facing public schools who will open virtually to begin the academic year.Guests include parent and architect Shawn Mulligan, Juandiego Wade of the Charlottesville City School board member; and LaTishia Wilson, the Principal of Stony Point Elementary School.

The Charlottesville Tree Commission meets at 5 p.m. One of the items is a presentation from member Paul Josey about the roles the commission and city government can take to improve city canopy, including the site review process. Josey has expressed concern about the decreasing amount of tree canopy coverage in the city and increasing canopy inequality present in the city. (register) (agenda)

One clarification today. In yesterday’s newsletter, I reported on housing vouchers being granted by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. The 49 vouchers on the street and the 20 additional ones planned are supplemental vouchers added in recent years in excess of the 350 or so already in use. Thanks to those who pointed this out and I am glad to further clarify.

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Editor’s note: I accidentally sent yesterday’s email to the wrong setting, so you most likely didn’t get it. I caught this well after sending it out and there’s no way to send it again without creating a new post. I’ve reused some of the info in today’s newsletter, so some of you may have seen this twice! Do take a look at yesterday’s edition if you missed it.

Today’s shout-out is for the Parent-Teacher Organizations of the Charlottesville City Schools, and their request for donations to the Reopening Fund: Ready to Teach, Ready to Learn. Visit their website for more information and to make a contribution.

There are another 1,005 new cases of COVID-19 reported today by the Virginia Department of Health and another 23 new deaths. The seven-day positive testing rate remains at 6.4 percent statewide. There is one more death reported in Charlottesville for a total of 46 to date in the Thomas Jefferson Health District. The district reported 25 new cases today with 12 from Albemarle, eight from Fluvanna, three from Charlottesville and three from Greene. In the district the seven-day positive testing rate is at 5.5 percent. That figure was at 6.4 percent on August 18.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners last night got an update on the redevelopment of public housing sites in the city. The long-awaited renovation of Crescent Halls as well as the first phase of new units at South First Street are getting closer to breaking ground. Dave Norris is the director of redevelopment at CRHA.

“We’re making good progress in getting to closing on our first two projects and there’s a number of hoops we have to jump through but one of the final hoops was a approval from the fair housing office at HUD,” Norris said.

HUD is the acronym for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and their approval was for something called the Site and Neighborhood Standards Review Process. Norris said the city has assisted CRHA in getting bonds to finance the project, and that closing on all of the financial paperwork should take place by October 1.

“And then it will take a little bit of time to mobilize and get some construction activity going but we’re still hoping to break ground this calendar year, and that’s to be determined, but we’re getting there,” Norris said.

There are currently 58 vacancies among the city’s 376 public housing units as of August 24, with 26 of those at Crescent Halls in order to prepare for those units to be upgraded as part of the renovation. Executive Director John Sales said they are working on ways to get those units refurbished so they can be returned to service.

“So right now we are working with Habitat,” Sales said. “Habitat has pledged us some construction managers and possible volunteers to assist us with a few units. We currently have a contractor going through some of the units as well.”

Sales said 49 of the CRHA’s housing vouchers are in use with families living in an affordable living arrangement, and there is a goal of adding 20 more in recent weeks. However, there are obstacles to doing so.

“Unfortunately, the more vouchers we put on the street, the harder it is for individuals to find housing units and we already have low numbers of being successful in finding units in a short amount of time,” Sales said, adding it takes between 90 and 150 days for a housing voucher recipient to actually move in.

The CRHA has been discussing ways to incentivize property owners to accept the vouchers.

The Charlottesville Chamber of Commerce has been identified as a world leader for the way it has helped local businesses adjust to the COVID-19 pandemic. The International Association of Facilitators will give the Chamber one of 17 Facilitation Impact Awards for the Project Rebound program. The recognition also goes to the Organizational Excellence program at the University of Virginia. In May, the Chamber held over three dozen meetings to get input before launching its Blueprint for Economic Resiliency in the Greater Charlottesville Region on June 25, 2020. The facilitation work is credited with translating business concerns into concrete ideas embedded in the plan. The award will be handed out at a virtual ceremony on October 26.

Part of that will include greater data about where flooding occurs, data coordinated by the Commonwealth Center for Recurrent Flooding Resiliency. Retired Navy Admiral Ann C. Phillips is Northam’s Special Assistant for Coastal Adaptation and Protection.

“You can go in and look at coastal Virginia using this new nuisance flood overlay data and the intent is that it will help localities and communities better understand the context of nuisance flooding which we are seeing more and more and more of and which we will see more and more and more of in our future, and then overlay that with sea level rise projections and also with a cat 1 or a moderate Northeaster storm,” Phillips said.

Phillips said nuisance flooding today in some places will lead to permanent inundations but there can be remedies that also improve water quality. Earlier this year, the General Assembly passed legislation that strengthens the role the plan will play in Virginia’s conservation programs. Phillips made her comments Friday at the annual meeting for Resilient Virginia. The group aims to increase planning for and awareness of adaptation to a changing climate.

The word of the day in government meetings today is “reservoir.” First, the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority will meet at 2:15 p.m. One topic will be the unveiling of a master plan for land that had been purchased in the 1980’s for the Buck Mountain Reservoir. That project never went forward because of the presence of an endangered species. Some original landowners have requested the land to be sold back to them. (master plan) (full agenda)

The Greene County Board of Supervisors will get an update on the proposed water supply plan that was to have been undertaken by the Rapidan Service Authority. Last month the Madison County and Orange County representatives on the RSA Board voted to stop collecting facility fees to pay for impoundment along White Run for a new reservoir. Prepare for this by reading Terry Beigie’s latest story in the Greene County Record.

Another meeting today is the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee which meets at 1 p.m. The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority also meets shortly before the RWSA. The two will hold a joint strategic planning meeting as part of the RWSA agenda. (full agenda)

Thanks for reading or listening! Why not do both? Sometimes you will see differences between what I record and what ends up in the text. Either way, I’m really glad you are here. Please consider sending on this edition to a friend, family member, co-worker, or elected official.

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Publisher’s note - this installment was inadvertently set to the wrong setting, hence it is coming out later than usual.

The state of Virginia has added another 2,770 cases of COVID-19 since Friday, with 664 of them reported this morning. There have been another 35 deaths reported since Friday for a total to date of 2,471. The seven-day average for positive tests declined to 6.4 percent today, down from 6.6 percent on Friday. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, there have been 52 new cases reported over the weekend, including eight today. There have been two new fatalities in the district for a total of 45 to date. The seven-day average for positive tests was at 5.6 percent on Sunday, continuing a downward trend.

The latest report on the model from the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute states there could be 11,306 new cases in Virginia for the week of September 27, The report also states that “anticipated season changes in the Fall could lead to a surge beginning around Labor Day with schools and universities open.”

The report notes that both the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University re-opened for in-person instruction on August 10, but have already shifted to online due to clusters of COVID infection among students. (UVa Model)

The University of Virginia welcomed its incoming class in a virtual ceremony Sunday night. Dean of Students Allen Groves began the Convocation event by speaking into a camera rather than directly to a crowd of first-year and transfer students. (UVA Today article)

“As you are all too aware, COVID-19 has up-ended many of our traditions and plans but this doesn’t alter in any way the fact that you are starting what I hope will be one of the most memorable journeys of your life,” Groves said, promising that students would be able to walk down the Lawn when they graduate.

“While it’s true this fall that you may not get to play rugby in Mad Bowl, or enter Old Cabell Hall for an a capella concert packed with your friends, or sway with a hundred other students singing the Good Old Song, or huff and puff your way up Humpback Rocks with 25 of your closest friends, this will still be a memorable time in your life with lots of opportunities to bond with friends and enrich your mind,” Groves said. “And we will overcome the current COVID-19 challenge and be right back to doing all of these things that we love so much.”

President Jim Ryan said this year at UVA will be unlike anything before and that there would be many challenges. In-person classes are not scheduled to begin until September 8, two weeks after originally planned because of rising caseloads in the Thomas Jefferson Health District in reporter in early August. Ryan said Convocation is not about COVID but about welcoming students, no matter where they are.

“You belong here,” Ryan said. “I don’t mean by this that you need be here physically.”

Ryan’s speech contained many references to the need to wait until it is safe to have the full experience, such as office hours or large gatherings. He also urged students to eventually connect with people who live in this area.

“Look for a chance to build a bridge to the broader Charlottesville community. This is a wonderful place but like other small cities it has its challenges and a complicated history. I encourage you to learn about this history and to engage with this broader community. There are countless ways to do so, including some amazing programs at Madison House.”

Last week, the city’s Human Right Commission discussed their concerns over UVA’s opening. Kathryn Laughon is a member of the Commission.

“I would like to ask the University to not have the undergraduate students return in person,” Laughon said. “They can’t control what the students who don’t like in dorms do. Jim Ryan has said he doesn’t want to bring the students back if he doesn’t think that they are going to be able to stay for the whole semester.”

A final decision about whether to proceed with in-person classes on August 28.

Virginia’s coastline was hit fairly hard earlier this month by Tropical Storm Isaias which spawned several tornadoes on the eastern shore and caused flooding throughout much of the Commonwealth. That’s part of a continuing trend toward a more turbulent climate. This fall, the Northam administration will release a master plan to deal with rising sea levels, which are experienced now in the form of more frequent sunny day flooding. The plan is informed by better data about where flooding occurs, data coordinated by the Commonwealth Center for Recurrent Flooding Resiliency. Retired Navy Admiral Ann C. Phillips is Northam’s Special Assistant for Coastal Adaptation and Protection.

In meetings today, the Board of Trustees for the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will convene virtually at 3 p.m. and among other things will discuss the system’s COVID-19 response.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority meets at 6 p.m. and items include an update on the next generation of public housing in the city. The CRHA is finalizing construction contracts with the firms hired to begin work on the renovation of Crescent Halls as well as new units that will be built at South First Street. (meeting info)

The Steering Committee for the C’Ville Plans Together initiative is scheduled to meet virtually at 4 p.m. for another meeting. Jennifer Koch of the firm Rhodeside & Harwell explains what it’s all about.

I wrote a summary and produced a podcast of the August 11 Charlottesville Planning Commission discussion that is now the first item to be available through a premium subscription. You can support my work either through the paid subscription or through Patreon. This is all still a work in progress!

This daily newsletter and newscast will remain free!

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Today’s shout-out goes to the Parent-Teacher Organization of the Charlottesville City Schools, and their request for donations to the Reopening Fund: Ready to Teach, Ready to Learn. Visit their website for more information and to make a contribution.

Incoming students at the University of Virginia are invited to view the annual convocation virtually on Sunday with remarks from President Jim Ryan and others. The event is traditionally held on the Lawn. According to a story on UVA Today, first year and transferring students will not sign the honor code at the convocation, but will “pledge their honor” in some other way to be announced later. The convocation can be seen on YouTube at 6 p.m. Almost 4,000 new undergraduates and hundreds of transfer students will begin study at UVA this fall, whether it be online or virtual. The plan is still to begin in-person instruction on September 8, the day after Labor Day.

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 978 cases of COVID-19 this morning, for a cumulative total of 110,860 to date. There are another nine deaths for a cumulative total of 2,436. There are another 29 new cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District with 13 from Albemarle, five from Charlottesville, three from Greene, three from Fluvanna, two from Louisa and three from Nelson. The seven day positive test average in the district is at 6.1 percent, down from 6.4 percent on Wednesday.

The same localities in the Thomas Jefferson Health District are also in the Thomas Jefferson Planning District, and the Board of Commissioners that oversees the latter met last night. They got more information on the Rental and Mortgage Relief Program being administered by the TJPDC. So far, the agency has received $450,000 in funding from the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development to disburse to those who qualify. When administrative and staff funding is subtracted, that leaves $382,461.75. TJPDC housing coordinator Christine Jacobs gave an update on how that money has been used so far.

“Of the $382,461, we’ve gone through about 45 percent of our funds, which is good progress, about two weeks ago we were significantly below that so we are being an increase in the number of people who are being approved,” Jacobs said. Here is a link to the report.

As of August 19, there have been 497 applicants with 91 percent seeking rent assistance and nine percent are for mortgage relief. Jacobs said most of that is going to to households who need it the most. AMI stands for area median income.

“And so we are seeing 61 percent of the households are below 30 percent AMI and that we’ve seen receive rental and mortgage relief to date,” Jacobs said. “The relief goes anywhere from $100 to $10,000 per household. That $10,000 seems high but it could be that they were four months in arrears, it could be that they had a loss of income that made them eligible.”

The TJPDC Board approved the funding agreement as well as a grievance policy. On Monday, Charlottesville Council had been told that there were long delays in getting through to the community helpline, but a spokeswoman for the city said they are caught up on calls seeking assistance with the program.

The TJPDC also approved a framework for a regional initiative to expand broadband in the rural area. Chip Boyles is the executive director of the TJPDC.

“We would be acting as a facilitator bringing together the public sector and the private sector folks as well as businesses and citizens and the education sector,” Boyles said.

Jesse Rutherford is the chair of the TJPDC and a member of the Nelson County Board of Supervisors.

“Broadband is the biggest topic we have in our region,” Rutherford said. “I’m sure everyone can concur with that, with schools going virtual and parents working from home and what not. I do think it is appropriate we look at this from a regional perspective. Essentially we are all connected and when crises like this happen we realize how much more important this new method of transportation is.”

One outcome could be the creation of a regional broadband authority. Albemarle County has such a group and that body’s board of directors will have an annual meeting on Wednesday.

We are now approaching the half-year mark for this pandemic, and with continued community spread, many in our area are seeking to better understand how the community might change after such a prolonged time of uncertainty. The Center for Nonprofit Excellence has been conducting a series of interviews with nonprofit leaders on the Hope and Resilience, and the latest installment has been posted. Mary Coleman is the executive director of the City of Promise.

“We have to believe that things can get better so that we can put one foot in front of the other and keep going,” Coleman said. “You know, the sun rises every single morning and every morning is an opportunity for us to realize our dreams but it takes hard work and it takes hope, we have to believe in ourselves.”

That interview was produced by Town Crier Productions. Previous installments are with:

Ella Jordan of the United Way

Frank Dukes of the Institute for Engagement and Negotiation

Marta Keene of JABA

Cynthia Hurst of the Foothills Child Advocacy Center

*And that brings us to the end of a sixth week of this community service. I rely on contributions from the audience, and for basic support of the research I do, please consider becoming a supporter on Patreon. Your support keeps this daily newsletter free, and helps me look for other opportunities to bring information to the public. Take a look!

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from an anonymous supporter who wants to say - "We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

There are another 863 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth reported by the Virginia Department of Health this morning and another 17 deaths for a total of 2,427 to date. The seven-day average for positive tests is at 6.5 percent, down from 6.7 percent posted yesterday. The Thomas Jefferson Health District added another 21 cases and still reports 43 deaths. Yesterday that was downgraded from 44. Kathryn Goodman, spokeswoman for the Thomas Jefferson Health District, told me that ”after further investigation of the fatality, the case was moved to another health district. “

Classes at the University of Lynchburg will move to on-line only for the next week following the news that there are at least five COVID-19 cases among its student population. The school began its fall semester with in-person classes on August 12 but will meet virtually through next Thursday. Twenty-one students are in quarantine and another ten are in isolation.

“Some of these recent positives and suspected cases have occurred between roommates,” wrote President Alison Morrison-Shetlar in a release. “Still others have come about when students let down their guard in small gatherings in individual rooms and apartments. If we are to stay ahead of the virus and return to in-person classes next week, this is where you can make a difference.”

Eastern Mennonite University announced yesterday that they are delaying plans to open to in-person classes on August 25 after four student leaders tested positive for COVID-19.

“All other student leaders and Residence Life staff who were in sustained contact with them are now in quarantine,” reads an email to students. “We have since learned from our contact tracing that there is a wider group of Student Life staff personnel that we need to quarantine out of an abundance of caution.”

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has endorsed the idea of building a roundabout at the intersection of the John Warner Parkway and East Rio Road, and agreed to apply for funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation through their Smart Scale program. In June, the Board deadlocked on a proposal for over 300 apartment buildings in part because of stated concerns about additional traffic. Albemarle transportation planner Kevin McDermott said a study of the whole Rio Road corridor is underway to accommodate those concerns.

“That corridor study is really going to be evaluating these intersections along with many others in the corridor and in reviewing this with our selected consultant on that project, we really looked at that John Warner Parkway roundabout as the only real option we had there to address the traffic problem,” McDermott said. The intersection is the #14 transportation priority in Albemarle and the project is estimated to cost $7.8 million.

McDermott is also suggesting spending $2 million in local tax money to get design for the roundabout underway. Smart Scale projects will be ranked according to a series of metrics and those scores will be released in January.

The Board of Supervisors also voted to approve a special use permit to allow Scott’s Ivy Exxon to expand from three service bays to seven.

The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission (TJPDC) will try again this evening to hold a meeting in August. Their first attempt two weeks ago failed to meet a quorum in part because of large storms that hit the region. Among the items on the agenda is a discussion of the Rental and Mortgage Relief program that the TJPDC is administering. On Monday, one person told Charlottesville City Council of their concern over the way the project is being handled in Charlottesville and Albemarle, where a hotline goes to the United Way.

“Myself and other volunteers in the community have been outside talking to people that are heading into court and they have all said that they are unable to get through to that hotline and that the only way to make contact is to basically spend a day just calling and calling,” said Elizabeth Stark, adding that people who are about to be evicted do not have that time.

TJPDC executive director Chip Boyles said the situation is known to him and that the problem is happening across the state.

“We are very much aware of the delays and we are working not just with our local governments but also with the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development where the funding came from is also working to help all of the localities with this problem,” Boyles said.

The TJPDC will also discuss regional efforts to bring more broadband to rural communities.

In other meetings today, the Albemarle Natural Heritage Committee meets at 5 p.m. and will discuss the county’s stream health initiative among other items. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Human Rights Commission will meet at 6 p.m. Among the items on the agenda are a discussion of the return of University of Virginia students and the effect on community health. They will also prepare for their joint meeting with City Council which is scheduled for Tuesday at 3 p.m. (agenda)

The Fifth and Avon Community Advisory Committee will meet virtually at 7 p.m. and will get an update on greenway planning as well as the future Biscuit Run county park. (meeting info)

Thank you for reading or listening! Please forward this on to someone you think might be interested. And please let me know what you think. Feedback is key to the future of this community service.

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Today’s episode is in honor of the Charlottesville Podcasting Network, a community service website that’s been around since 2005, and gearing up to be for another 15 years. Visit the archives at cvillepodcast.com to see what you can learn!

There are another 737 cases of COVID-19 reported in Virginia today for a cumulative total of 109,019. There are another 14 fatalities recorded for a total of 2,410 to date. The seven-day rate for positive tests rate dropped to 6.7 percent, down from 6.8 percent yesterday.

In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, there are another 14 cases, with five each from Albemarle and Charlottesville and four in Louisa County. The positive rate remains at 6.4 percent for the second straight day. The number of fatalities has been reduced to 43.

Today is the first day of in-person classes at the University of Virginia School of Law and earlier this week their communications department put together a video describing to students how things will be different.

We’ve been masked and distanced when I’ve seen you in the building, and some of you I’ve met for the first time since on Zoom,” said Dean Risa Goluboff in the video.

Golubuff described physical changes that will be made at the law school, as well as a requirement that everyone leave the building by 9 p.m. so cleaning crews can get to work. Students are also being asked to stay home whenever possible.

The University of Virginia recently delayed the in-person start of the school year to September 8, the day after Labor Day. Undergraduate classes begin online starting on August 25. Earlier this week, the University of North Carolina announced they would suspend in-person classes following a series of COVID clusters forming in dormitories there.

The General Assembly’s COVID and justice reform special session began yesterday, with the House of Delegates spending most of the afternoon debating rules that would allow them to meet remotely for the rest of the session. Here’s Speaker of the House Eileen Filler-Corn shortly after roll call was taken.

“Members of the House, we are gathering today at this unprecedented time in our Commonwealth’s history,” said Speaker of the House Eileen Filler-Corn. “Virginians are hurting. Students, workers, families, businesses have all been hit hard by the coronavirus whose impact none of us in this room none of could have ever imagined.”

Visit the General Assembly’s website for a full list of meeting times and links to the proceedings.

The Virginia Department of Health has issued a harmful algae bloom advisory for tributaries that feed into Lake Anna, as well as parts of the lake itself. These are the Middle Pamunkey Branch of Lake Anna, now in addition to the Upper Pamunkey Branch, Terry’s Run, and the Upper North Anna Branch of Lake Anna in Orange, Louisa and Spotsylvania counties are experiencing a bloom of cyanobacteria, which can cause skin irritations.

According to a release, “the public is advised to avoid contact with the lake in these areas until algae concentrations return to acceptable levels.” Visit swimhealthyva.com to learn more.

There are new officers for the Albemarle Economic Development Authority following the resignation of the former chair, vice chair and secretary-treasurer at the end of their meeting in July. Donald Long volunteered to take on the role through the end of the year. Stuart Munson will serve as vice chair. David Shreve will serve as the new secretary-treasurer.

There are three vacancies on the EDA, which oversees grantmaking opportunities and other initiatives for local and new businesses. The EDA was also briefed on the possibility of an agricultural company that wants to open up a facility in Scottsville.

The Albemarle Planning Commission has voted unanimously to recommend approval of a rezoning for about 13 and a half acres on Old Lynchburg Road to make way for a project known as the Albemarle Business Campus. Developer Kyle Redinger altered his proposal for the land after a different project was rejected by the commission last October. However, the commission did not recommend a special exception that would allow Redinger to build only one kind of housing. Here’s at-large member Tim Keller.

“I think the applicant has come a long ways on this and I am supportive of the overall project but I am not supportive of the special exception,” Keller said.

The Board of Supervisors is expected to hear the item on October 7.

Speaking of the Board of Supervisors, they will meet at 2 p.m. today for a meeting that includes a review of a possible roundabout to replace the signalized intersection of Rio Road and the John Warner Parkway. There will also be a public hearing on the expansion of an existing service station in Ivy Road, an area not designated for commercial growth. Today’s meeting of the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee was canceled. That meeting will be held now on Tuesday, August 25 at 1 p.m.

The Piedmont Environmental Council and the Local Energy Alliance Program (LEAP) are looking for people to sign up for free assessments of what it would take to get solar panels installed on their rooftops. The Solarize Piedmont program runs through August 31. Bri West is the Communications Director for PEC.

“It’s all about demystifying the process of going solar,” said Bri West, communications director at PEC. “Over the years a lot what we’ve heard from people is a readiness and interest in going solar and then there’s this apprehension of whether I’m going to get the right installer, or get the right price.”

Ryan Patten with LEAP explains what happens after you sign up for the program.

“Once you sign up we’ll email you within a few business days and we’ll let you know what we see through various satellite images, whether your home or property looks good for solar or not,” Patten said. “Things we are looking for include shading concerns, large trees, other buildings nearby and also the angle of the roof may come into play as well. We’ll take a look at all that information and follow up with an email with you.”

You can watch the whole video on the PEC YouTube channel.

One correction is required. On the August 18, 2020 edition of the show, I incorrectly reported the cost share between Albemarle and Charlottesville. Ratepayers in Albemarle are responsible for 80 percent of future costs of the waterline to connect the Ragged Mountain and South Fork Rivanna reservoirs. You can read the January 2012 agreement here.

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Today’s Patreon-fueled shout-out comes from an anonymous supporter who wants to say - "We keep each other safe. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance."

There are another 861 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia reported today by the Department of Health, and another 11 deaths for a total of 2,396 people dead since the pandemic began. The seven day average for positive tests dropped to 6.8 percent. There are another 19 new cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District. The test rate here is at 6.4 percent, up from 6.1 percent on Monday.

The Virginia General Assembly convenes today for a special session expected to cover the impacts of COVID-19, criminal justice and police reform, and whatever else might come up. A joint meeting of the House Appropriations, House Finance and Senate Finance committees kicked off the session at 9:30 a.m. beginning with remarks and budget amendments from Governor Ralph Northam.

“Virginia ended the 2020 fiscal year on June 30 with a $234 million shortfall in general revenue collection,” Northam said. “We now project that we will have $2.7 billion less than we expected in general revenue for the coming biennium. We feared worse. But this still requires serious and thoughtful budgeting and planning.”

The full House of Delegates convenes at 1 p.m. at the Siegel Center in Richmond, and the full Senate will also convene at 1 p.m. (full schedule) (legislation list)

Charlottesville City Council held a public hearing last night on giving permission to the regional water authority for a pipeline to connect the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir with the Ragged Mountain Reservoir. The project has an $80 million cost estimate and is the second phase of the community’s long-term water supply plan.

“This waterline will replace the existing Upper Sugar Hollow pipeline which is very old and increase raw water transfer to the urban water system,” said Lauren Hildebrand, the city’s utilities director. “The waterline is anticipated to be constructed between 2027 and 2040.”

At the public hearing, former City Councilor Dede Smith continued her opposition to the plan, which she voted against in January 2012. She claimed there were cheaper alternatives.

“This $80 million pipeline that may I add was not in the original plan and was added very late in the game doubles the cost of the community water plan and that is going straight into our water bill,” Smith said.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority submitted its application for the water supply plan in June 2006.

“The project involves expansion of the existing Ragged Mountain Reservoir (RMR) and construction of a new raw water intake and pipeline from the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir (SFRR) to RMR,” reads the permit application to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The application goes on to say that timing of construction would be dependent on funding. The first phase of the plan was completed in 2014 when a new earthen dam was built at Ragged Mountain Reservoir, expanding capacity.

The second phase is not yet programmed in the RWSA’s Capital Improvement Program, which lays out how ratepayer money is reinvested back into the water and wastewater system. One of the next steps is an analysis of current water usage rates which was presented to the RWSA in June.

Capital projects such as the waterline are paid for through bonds floated by the RWSA and paid by ratepayers in the form of debt service. The cost share agreement adopted in January 2020 states that Albemarle ratepayers are responsible for 80 percent of the costs of the waterline.

Council asked for a full briefing on what the impacts that other 15 percent might have on Charlottesville ratepayers in the future.

Council also passed a resolution in support of three Smart Scale applications, one of which would include a pedestrian bridge to connect the city’s side of U.S. 29 with Stonefield.

“We definitely need some way for people that aren’t in vehicles to get across that road because it is not an option right now at all,” said City Councilor Heather Hill.

New apartment units are coming to the Stonefield mixed-use development in Albemarle County, according to information told to the Places-29 Hydraulic Community Advisory Council Monday evening. Stonefield was originally rezoned by the Board of Supervisors in 2003, but the project did not break ground until the spring of 2011.

“The original vision was for a very vertically mixed-use development and it remained unbuilt for a number of years and what we’ve all seen built out has been more single-use and shorter buildings due to economic factors,” said county planner Micheala Ac cardi. “For the past two years we’ve seen developers come in submitting some plans that are more consistent with that more vertical mixed-use development.”

Accardi said these include 220 apartments planned for a new building on an empty parking lot between Hydraulic and the Hyatt Hotel, which will also include commercial space. Close by there are 49 town homes under construction as well as another 160 unit apartment building.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel said these new projects will get the built environment closer to what had been planned.

“If you think about the main street where all those stores are, those stores were planned to have residential living above them,” McKeel said. “When the economics and recession hit, those residential units were taken away. It would have been more like a, if you think about downtown Charlottesville where you have stores on the mall and then residences above, that’s what Stonefield was originally planned to look, we’re making up for that now.”

Another common link between the downtown Mall and Stonefield is the presence of a movie theater, and those were all closed at the beginning of the pandemic. Victoria Tremaglio is the general manager of the Shops at Stonefield, which she said is holding its own despite the loss of a few tenants. She said the Regal Theater will reopen this Friday for limited service.

“They’re going to have 50 people per theater to start, I think with $5 movies at Regal which should help with some foot traffic,” Tremaglio said.

As for Stonefield, Tremaglio said more people are coming back.

“People have been super respectful, super safe, lots of outdoor dining. You’ve probably seen Champion Grill is on the green and they’re going to be adding a tent. We’ve added other tables and chairs outside for people to sit.”

The Violet Crown on the Downtown Mall remains closed.

Coming up in government meetings today, the Albemarle County Economic Development Authority and the Albemarle Planning Commission meet, but not at the same time. The EDA meets at 4 p.m. for the first time since three members resigned last month in protest of new conflict of interest forms they had to sign. (meeting info)

The Planning Commission has a public hearing at 6 p.n. on a rezoning for the proposed Albemarle Business Campus on Old Lynchburg Road across from the county’s office building. (meeting info)

The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review will meet at 5:30 p.m. Items include lighting and interpretive signage of the historically protected Coal Tower on Water Street, an update on the Belmont Bridge project, and a letter of support to apply for the Burley School to be on the National Register of Historic Places. (agenda) (meeting registration)

Correction: This article originally stated an incorrect figure for the cost share for the future waterline. It has since been corrected. I regret the error.

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Monday, August 17, 2020

Today’s installment has a final shout-out to the CVille STEM fundraiser to pay for boxes for scientific school supplies. We’re pleased to announce they have met their $30,000 goal! Thank you for your support.

Another day, another new set of numbers. The Virginia Department of Health reports another 734 cases of COVID-19 today, and another 4 deaths for a total of 2,385 fatalities to date. The statewide seven-day average for positive tests has dropped to 7 percent, a figure that was last reported on July 15. That’s when caseloads were in the middle of an increase in the Commonwealth. This average hit a high of 8.2 percent on July 21.

There are another 18 cases reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District, with seven from Albemarle, two from Greene, one in Fluvanna, five in Louisa, and three in Nelson. There were no new cases reported from Charlottesville and no new deaths in the district.

The COVID-19 reproduction rate in Virginia has increased but only slightly, according to the latest model from the University of Virginia Biocomplexity Institute. The reproduction rate listed in the August 14 report is at 0.917 statewide, up from 0.909 on August 7. Numbers higher than 1 indicate higher levels of community spread.

Sixteen health districts in the Commonwealth are experiencing surges, including three in the southwest and one in the central region. The far southwest region has a reproduction rate of 1.139. In all, the model suggests that Virginia has avoided 922,941 cases since May 15 through various interventions.

The model itself has been updated this week to take into account past and current trends, and to factor in possible increases due to school reopenings and changing weather patterns. As of right now, the model is expecting a ten to twenty percent increase in transmissibility.

“With the new modeling approach, the current course predicts a peak the week of September 27th with 14,743 weekly cases,” reads the model. “With a 10 percent increase in transmissibility beginning on Labor Day, we would expect to see cases peak at 18,000 the week of October 11th. A 20 percent increase in transmissibility leads to a slightly later peak the week of October 18th with over 23,000 weekly cases.”

So far there have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19 in meat and poultry processing facilities in Virginia this month, continuing a downward trend of infections from highs of 604 cases in April and 552 in June. The Virginia Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control worked with plant operators to put in interventions including requiring face coverings, and adding physical barriers between workers where physical distancing is not possible. In all, there were ten COVID-19 deaths related to these facilities.

Earlier in the pandemic, a couple of physicians at the University of Virginia wrote a children’s book to explain COVID-19 to children of color. “We’re Going to Be Okay” by Dr. Ebony Jade Hilton and Dr. Leigh-Ann Webb is intended to simplify the language of this time. The book is co-created by illustrator Ashleigh Corrin Webb. They spoke about their work on a Virginia Festival of the Book webinar last week. Here’s Dr. Leigh-Ann Webb, who had never written a book before.

“This is the first time that I’ve really seen the power of that intersection of health, art, creativity and how you use those two things to connect with an audience,” said Dr. Webb.

Ashleigh Corrin Webb had ten days to draw the book.

“It was exciting, an exciting challenge and I think it was exciting because the purpose was to serve and that’s what drives me and what I do and why I do what I do,” said Corrin Webb, likening the collaboration to a dance. “I need the information. I obviously don’t have the knowledge that Ebony and Leigh-Ann have so I need that and then I’m like that give that to me and I’ll figure out how to present it in a way to hopefully make it resonate with people.”

The book is available for download.

***There are lots of government meetings today. Charlottesville City Council will meet at 6:30 p.m. and has five public hearings. The first regards a request from the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA) for an easement for the waterline to connect the Ragged Mountain Reservoir and South Fork Rivanna Reservoir. The project is the second phase of a community water supply plan adopted by Albemarle and Charlottesville in January 2012. (staff report)

“This water line will replace the existing Upper Sugar Hollow Pipeline and increase raw water transfer in the urban water system,” reads the staff report for the item. “The water line is anticipated to be constructed between 2027 and 2040 for an estimated cost of $80 million.”

The next four are for:

A request for Dominion Energy for an easement for electrical lines at the Ragged Mountain Natural Area and the Heyward Community Forest (staff report)

A request from the International School of Charlottesville for a drainage easement for their new facility near Rives Parks (staff report)

A request from a landowner to purchase 0.13 acres of city property adjacent to Northeast Park (staff report)

A request to support the three Smart Scale applications being submitted by the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization. They are:

Hydraulic/29 Intersection Improvements ($24.6 million)

Hillsdale Avenue South Extension ($29.7 million)

Fifth Street Trail Hub ($3.7 million) (staff report).

Council will also hold a second reading on changing the ordinance to prohibit firearms on city property. (staff report)

Also meeting today are the Albemarle Architectural Review Board at 1 p.m. and the Places29-Hydraulic Community Advisory Committee at 530 p.m. They will get an update on the ambassadors at county parks who are there to enforce physical distancing guidelines. There will also be an update on the renovation of Charlotte Humphris Park and an update on development projects underway in the area. (meeting info)

The Louisa Board of Supervisors meets in person at 5 p.m. for a meeting that includes a report on the state of Lake Anna, an update on the Shannon Hill Regional Business Park, a discussion on an application for a solar field, and a conversation on the Trevilian Battlefield’s request for a tax exemption. (agenda)

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Today’s installment has a shout-out for a fundraiser called C'ville STEM: Support Schools in COVID times. UVA doctors have teamed up with schools and want your financial support for school scientific supplies for up to 2,100 children in City Schools who might not otherwise have access. They are very close to meeting their goal.

There are another 1,216 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth as reported by the Virginia Department of Health, and another eight deaths bringing the total to 2,370. The statewide seven-day positive testing rate has dropped to 7.2 percent. Another 20 cases have been reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District for a total to date of 2,067. No fatalities have been reported in the district in over a week, with the total at 44 since August 6.

The Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board (PCRB) met last night and heard from a couple members of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus in advance of the General Assembly’s special session, which begins on August 18. PCRB Chair James Watson invited the elected officials to the virtual meeting to explain legislation to increase civilian oversight of police in Virginia localities.

“Right now we are a pretty big state and we only got three CRBs in the entire state so that legislation will empower localities to create CRBs and avert the various challenges they may face once they are established,” Watson said.

Charlottesville City Council authorized creation of a CRB in late 2017, and one formed but its members expressed concern about a lack of authorized oversight. A new board has formed and many of the same concerns are present, such as a lack of subpoena power and access to records. Senator Jennifer McClellan (D-9) is the vice chair of the Legislative Black Caucus.

“We are going to be putting on both the House and the Senate side bills to give localities the authority to have civilian review boards that have much more teeth than what you have now,” McClellan said.

McClellan said the special session will begin the process of “de-criminalizing poverty” and making punishments for crimes more proportionate.

“We are making it so that access to justice does not depend on how good of a lawyer you have or can afford,” McClellan said. “And then if you are sentenced that the Department of Corrections process focuses on rehabilitation and reentry.”

Delegate Don Scott (D-80) said he believed it is important for civilian review boards to have more oversight on what he refers to as the “criminal punishment” system.

“We’re going to have a higher expectation for those who we entrust to protect and serve our community,” Scott said.

The General Assembly special session begins on August 18. Last night’s meeting is available for viewing on the city’s website. (watch the meeting)

The new director of Charlottesville’s public housing authority introduced himself to his Board of Commissioners last night. John Sales has been the executive director of the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority since August 3rd.

“I came from the city [where] I was the housing program coordinator,” Sales said. “Before that I was at the Chesapeake Redevelopment and Housing Authority where I was the director of development and capital projects.”

Sales said the CRHA is poised to move forward with redevelopment and rehabilitation of public housing.

“It’s going to take off like a rocket,” Sales said. “We have a lot of stuff working on with redevelopment, working with increasing our volunteer slots, and just improving affordable housing in the community, something the community has been asking for for a very long time and I think we are at the position where we can give them that and be the leader of affordable housing in the city of Charlottesville.”

The two new Commissioners also introduced themselves. A’Lelia Henry is a public housing resident who has attended many meetings on the topic over the years.

“For the time that I have been involved in housing it seems to be that we have the least input into what comes out of public housing,” Henry said. “I guess I’m here to make good trouble.”

The other new member of the board is Lisa Green who is ending her ten-year stint on the Planning Commission. In March, the Planning Commission approved the site plan for a phase of development at South First Street, which had been created with input from residents.

“Working with the South First Street project, I got more energized and I felt more excited about projects than I have a long time in the city,” Green said. “I think sometimes the city gives away the farm so to speak instead of actually making sure we’re doing by our residents and the folks who live here now.”

Later in the meeting, the CRHA Board discussed ways to encourage more property owners to rent out to people and families with federal housing vouchers.

The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority (RSWA) is in the early stages of testing a new app that could keep more discarded material out of landfills. If it passes out of a beta test, the Better Bin app would allow people to scan barcodes on products and be informed about where the material could be recycled or where they could get guidance on composting. Philip McKalips is the Director of Solid Waste for the RSWA and he updated the Solid Waste Alternatives Advisory Committee on the app.

“What this thing does is you go into the store, hopefully, or at least with the recycling bin after you’ve already bought a product, and you open the app, and when it accesses the camera you’ll see that it’s got this image of a barcode there,” McKalips said. “When you shine that on to the bar code of the product, it will either know it or it won’t know it and if it knows it, it will tell you how how to recycle that product and its packaging, and if it doesn’t know it, it will give you a chance to fairly easily send that information back to Better Bin in which case they are going to look for that information so that the database gets smarter.”

The Wisconsin company that built the app will conduct a second round of beta testing. The SWAAC committee also discussed legislation that passed the General Assembly such as the enabling authority to levy taxes on plastic bags. The legislation authorizes that to happen as of January 1, and the Board of Supervisors was briefed on the possibility on July 15.

“The revenue accruing to the county or city must be used for certain purposes including environmental cleanup and the provision of reusable bags,” wrote county attorney Greg Kamptner in his briefing for that discussion. The SWAAC members discussed a desire to move forward with the City of Charlottesville if the local officials decide to eventually levy the tax.

Thanks for listening and reading! This venture is being supported by community members through a Patreon account. I know these are tough times for so many, but if you can support this venture, it will help me hire people to help with community engagement. And pay a copy editor!

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There were no major incidents marking the third anniversary of the Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, but there were several peaceful commemorations, including a six-hour takeover of Market Street Market in an event known as #ReclaimCville. More than thirty faith leaders held a virtual interfaith service that reflected on the push to remove Confederate statues that lead to violent clashes three years ago yesterday. Here’s the preface of the Michael Cheuk of the Charlottesville Clergy Collective. The full 40 minute video of the Charlottesville Clergy Collective service is available on YouTube.

The University of Virginia will hold another town hall about reopening on Friday, and this time it will be for parents and family of returning students. Similar meetings were held this past week for staff and for the community at large. For an audio summary of the community town hall held Monday, listen to the most recent episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. One thing you’ll hear on the program is Dr. Mitch Rosner explaining one way that UVA officials will monitor the student population for COVID.

“For the dorm buildings, we will be testing the wastewater effluent,” Rosner said. “The wastewater of buildings contains viral genetic material that can be detected by these PCR tests at a very high sensitivity. If we detect that a building’s wastewater tests positive, we will go in and test all the students.”

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners will welcome newcomers to the governance structure of the agency that owns and operates public housing in the city. The CRHA Board of Commissioners will hold a virtual work session beginning at 5 p.m. to be introduced to new executive director John Sales as well as two new commissioners. Sales started the job earlier this month after serving as the city’s housing coordinator. Also being introduced are Lisa Green and A’Lelia Henry as the new commissioners. Green is at the end of ten years of service as a City Planning Commission. They’re all joining the CRHA at a time when the first new public housing units are being constructed in a generation with the expansion of South First Street. (register for the meeting)

Do you know how decisions are made about transportation projects in our area, and how you can have your say? A good place to start is the Public Participation Plan (PPP) of the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization, a 13-page document that seeks to explain the process that decides what gets built and where. The MPO is seeking public comment on the draft through September 10. The MPO Policy Board will vote on the updated plan on September 23. If you have any questions about the process, I’d like to hear them potentially for a future story. (more info)

One recent transportation decision was made by the Charlottesville City Council when they decided to move forward with a Smart Scale application to pay for changes to the intersection of Preston Avenue, Grady Avenue and 10th Street. The city’s PLACE Design Task Force will discuss the area at their first meeting since the pandemic began. Chair Mike Stoneking has sought a broader discussion of the Preston Avenue Corridor, which has been redeveloping slowly. I produced a written report and podcast about Council’s vote that may be of interest to anyone before the meeting begins. (PLACE agenda)

The Charlottesville Police Civilian Review Board (PCRB) will meet virtually at 6:30 p.m. and will begin by speaking with two members of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus. The General Assembly will convene on August 18 for a special session that will include criminal justice reform. They will also discuss the board’s status, hiring an independent counsel, and the executive director position that will be filled in the near future. (agenda)

Albemarle’s Solid Waste Alternatives Advisory Committee will meet virtually at 4 p.m. One of the items on the agenda is a presentation from the president of the Glass Packaging Institute on the organization’s circular glass initiative in Virginia. (register)

Live Arts begins a four-night virtual run tonight of a presentation of In the Heights by the Live Arts Teen Theater Ensemble. In the Heights is by Lin-Manuel Miranda, also the person behind Hamilton. Jessica Harris is the assistant director of the production.

“Our performances will be presented in webinar style which means you and hundreds of other audience members can watch the show live from your home without being seen or heard yourselves,” Harris said. (buy tickets)

Before we close the show today, we have a small correction. In yesterday’s edition, we incorrectly reported the organizers of a panel discussion on the Memorial to Enslaved Workers. The event was put on by the Virginia chapter of the American Institute of Architects.

We conclude by stating that as of publication, the C-VILLE STEM Fundraiser is at $29,555 dollars, or very close to its goal of $30,000 to build boxes of scientific supplies for up to 2,100 students in Charlottesville city schools who would otherwise not have them at home.

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Today is the third anniversary of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville which resulted in a vehicle being deliberately driven down 4th Street into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing Heather Heyer and severely injuring dozens of others. Charlottesville City Hall will be closed for a “time of reflection and remembrance.” So will the vehicular crossings of the Downtown Mall.

A coalition of groups including the Charlottesville Democratic Socialists of America and Showing Up for Racial Justice Charlottesville plan to hold an event beginning at 1 p.m. at Market Street Park where the statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee stands.

However, city manager Tarron Richardson issued a statement warning that his pandemic-related decision to stop issuing permits for events city parks still stands.

“We ask that the community continue to follow all aspects of the local COVID-19 ordinance, specifically the wearing of face coverings and adherence to the gathering limits,” Richardson wrote in a statement. “No special event permits have been approved for the use of downtown parks or other public property for August 11 or 12, 2020.”

Dr. Richardson went on to state it was important that roads not be blocked in protests.

“Unauthorized closures of City streets can delay responses for emergency vehicles and require rerouting to an emergency incident, the hospital, or other critical infrastructure when seconds matter,” Richardson wrote. “Additionally positioning one’s self in a lane of travel/traffic without proper protection is putting oneself potentially in grave danger.”

On August 8, the city issued a statement that sought to remind the public that gatherings of fifty people or more were specifically prohibited by Council on July 27 when the city enacted restrictions that are greater than what is allowed under Phase 3 of Governor Ralph Northam’s Forward Virginia program.

There are another 776 cases of COVID-19 in Virginia reported by the state health department this morning, and another eight deaths for a total of 2,352 to date. The seven-day average for positive tests has dropped to 7.3 percent statewide. The Thomas Jefferson Health District has another 23 cases with eight from Albemarle, five from Louisa, four from Charlottesville, two from Greene, two from Fluvanna and two from Nelson.

The James River Water Authority (JRWA) will meet today to discuss delaying the application process for a pump station to bring water to the growth area at Zion Crossroads. In March, authority members from Louisa and Fluvanna counties voted to proceed with a plan to build the pump station at a Monacan site called Rassawek which was a major population center before colonization. That’s prompted over 10,000 signatures on a petition organized by the group Cultural Heritage Partners.

“Although the James River Water Authority is confident that the revised application materials submitted to you in March took a hard look at a broad range of alternatives and identified the only practicable alternative, we have continued to engage in discussions with interested parties on this matter,” reads a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers from D.D. Watson, chair of the JRWA.

The letter goes on to state that the Louisa and Fluvanna needs an expanded water supply and that a short delay will allow for the study of alternatives to the site at Rassawek. Look to coverage on this from Allison Wrabel in a future edition of the Daily Progress and get more information from her preview story.

The pandemic has delayed the public dedication of the Memorial to Enslaved Laborers at the University of Virginia, but the monument has already become a central gathering point in the community as seen during the protests against the killing of George Floyd. There will be a virtual panel discussion about the architecture of the memorial at 4 p.m. held by Arch Daily. Participants include Alice Raucher and Mary Hughes of the UVA Office of the Architect), Mabel Wilson of Studio&) and J. Meejin Yoon of Höweler + Yoon Architects.

At 7 p.m., the University of Virginia’s Religion, Race and Democracy Lab will hold a zoom webinar that reflects on three years ago. The title is “Praying With Our Feet: Religious Activists Remember the Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville.” Speakers include Jalane Schmidt, an activist who helped build community support for removal of Confederate statues, and Don Gathers, a founded of the city’s Black Lives Matter chapter and founding member of the Police Civilian Review Board. (info)

The Charlottesville Planning Commission said an official goodbye to one of its longest-serving members last night. Lisa Green has served on the seven-member body since October 2010 and her term ends at the end of this month.

“I’ve enjoyed every minute of it,” Green said. “I know sometimes it doesn’t seem like it but I am passionate about this city and I see all the potential.”

Green was recently appointed to serve on the Board of Commissioners for the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority. She’s also a 19-year veteran of working for Albemarle County.

“I think I am rooted into public service,” Green added. “I believe in public service. I believe in local government. I believe in all the things we can do better and I truly believe that there are systems we can change to make it more equitable for everyone in the city.”

Charlottesville City Council has not yet appointed a replacement, so Green will continue to serve on the Planning Commission until they do so. Interviews with applicants for the position have not yet been conducted, according to Council Clerk Kyna Thomas.

We’ll have an update on the Charlottesville Planning Commission’s discussion on the Comprehensive Plan and the New Hill Community Vision Plan on a later show.

The Crozet Community Advisory Committee meets at 7 p.m. and begins with a discussion about Old Dominion Village. Developer Katurah Roell is requesting a rezoning of 14.259 acres from rural area to Neighborhood Model District for the creation of a new neighborhood. However, the land is not within the jurisdiction of the Albemarle County Service Authority. Currently only the existing structure on the property is allowed to connect to public water. The applicant will request that connection as well as to public sewer. The Crozet CAC will also discuss the results of community feedback on bike and pedestrian connectivity. (agenda)

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Today’s version is supported by a shout-out for the Kindness Cafe, open for curbside pickup Wednesday through Saturday from 8 am to 11 am at the Brooks Family YMCA in McIntire Park. Visit the Kindness Cafe website to place your order.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Virginia has increased by 996 today, for a cumulative total of 101,745. Seventeen more deaths were reported today for a total of 2,344. The seven-day positive testing rate increased to 7.5 percent. The Thomas Jefferson Health District reports another 21 cases today with seven from Louisa, six from Albemarle, three from Charlottesville, three in Nelson, one in Greene and one in Fluvanna. The testing rate in this community is at 5.2 percent today, up from 5 percent yesterday.

Top officials at the University of Virginia briefed members of the community last night on their plans to reopen in early September. The Zoom Town Hall was a chance for members of greater Charlottesville to ask why UVA is going to open in the first place.

“We’ve believed all along that trying to have students back and to hold classes in person is the right goal, but again, only if we can do so in a reasonably safe way,” said President Jim Ryan, adding that officials will continue to monitor many metrics, including the availability of test kits, the progression of the virus, and the capacity to isolate exposed students. These have already resulted in one decision.

“Last week we announced we are delaying the return of undergraduate students by two weeks because we are concerned about the prevalence of the virus in the region and some recent volatility in the supply chain for testing materials,” Ryan said. “We are hopeful that both will improve over the coming weeks and we’re already seeing some signs of progress that make us optimistic that we’ll be able to bring students back to grounds.”

Dr. Craig Kent, the chief of the medical center, said the UVA system can withstand a surge in cases.

“Currently in the hospital we have about 20 to 30 of our beds filled at any given time with COVID patients,” Kent said. “Our total hospital capacity is about 700 beds. There’s no doubt that we’re very busy now with non-COVID patients. The hospital is full. We’re proud of the fact that we’re able to take care of all of these patients that need our care, but we have a number of levers that we can pull very quickly to change that capacity from non-COVID patients to COVID patients if that were to turn out to be necessary.”

One of the biggest concerns people have in the community is the possibility of large gatherings of UVA students where physical distancing and facial covering protocols are not followed. Patricia Lampkin, the vice president and chief student affairs officer, said there is a tradition of students being held accountable for their actions.

“Through the University Judiciary Committee, there have always been consequences for behavior that harms other people and property, whether on Grounds or in the greater Charlottesville or Albemarle community,” Lampkin said. “This year the stakes are even higher because of each of us, students, everyone, will have a direct impact on the health of others.”

Lampkin said students will be asked in writing to wear masks, keeping gatherings at less than fifteen people, and to remain physically distanced.

“Forgetting to wear a mask to class is a mistake,” Lampkin said. “Having a party with 50 to 100 people is more than a mistake. Such behavior will result in consequences and disciplinary actions.”

Several UVA departments related to the community will move into space at the Albemarle Hotel on West Main Street to consolidate efforts. Kevin McDonald is the vice president for diversity, equity and inclusion.

“Four units across UVA which include the Equity Center, the Office of the Vice Provost for Academic Outreach, the division for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and the Office of Community Partnerships within UVA’s health system have come together to support and strengthen community partnership efforts,” McDonald said./

For a longer version of the town hall, check out the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

This month features a key deadline for the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Smart Scale program, where projects are ranked and scored against a series of criteria. One of Albemarle County’s submissions this year would remove the existing traffic light at the intersection of U.S. 29, Frays Mill Road and Burnley Station Road. The junction would be converted to something called a “signalized restricted crossing u-turn intersection” that is intended to improve through traffic volumes. During a public input process in the spring, 92 of 96 comments about this project were in opposition. This event is being held in response and offers an opportunity for members of the public to learn more. On June 17, Albemarle Supervisors voted 4-2 to support the project anyway, with Supervisors Ann Mallek (White Hall) and Bea LaPisto-Kirtley (Rivanna) voting against it. The meeting begins at 4 p.m and can be accessed by Zoom or by telephone. (project details)

In other government meetings tonight, the Charlottesville Planning Commission meets at 5:30 p.m. will get an update on the city’s Comprehensive Plan update, which is also to include a rewriting of the zoning code and an affordable housing policy. (register for meeting)

At 6 p.m. the Albemarle Planning Commission will get an update on the county’s housing policy, which includes a recommendation that Albemarle needs 11,750 new homes by 2020 to keep up with housing demand. (register for meeting)

The Greene County Board of Supervisors will also meet and will discuss the future of emergency medical services. The University of Virginia Health System recently ended a contract to provide that service for Greene. (agenda)

If a government meeting isn’t what you’re interested in participating in, the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council is holding another in their series of monthly Tech on Tap events for “tech enthusiasts to socialize, collaborate, share ideas and form professional relationships.” The virtual event begins at 5 p.m. and those who attend are eligible for happy hour discounts on delivery from Common House, this month’s virtual host. Registration details are in the newsletter. (register)

And that’s it for today’s installment. Before we go, let’s check in with the Go Fund Me for the C'ville STEM: Support Schools in COVID times. UVA Doctor Sana Syed is raising funds for scientific school supplies for up to 2,100 Charlottesville families for at-home STEM research. They have about $1,000 to go!

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Today’s burst of information begins with a message from a fundraiser called C'ville STEM: Support Schools in COVID times. UVA doctors have teamed up with schools and want your financial support for school scientific supplies for up to 2,100 children in City Schools.

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 663 cases of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth today, the lowest one-day total since in a month. The total is now 100,749. One more death was reported for a total of 2,327. The seven-day average for testing has dropped to 7.4 percent today. There are another 11 cases reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District with four from Albemarle, one from Charlottesville, three from Greene, one in Fluvanna, one in Louisa and one in Nelson.

The latest model results from the UVA Biocomplexity Institute states that fourteen of Virginia’s health districts are experiencing surges of COVID-19 cases, but the surge in the Rapidan-Rappahannock Health District has abated. The statewide reproductive rate for the novel coronavirus is below, but is 1.174 in the Near Southwest area that includes Roanoke. The model estimates that 817,000 cases of COVID-19 have been avoided since May 15.

There are four community testing opportunities this week. First, UVA Health will hold an event from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m at the Church of Incarnation at 1465 Incarnation Drive. No appointment is required. UVA Health will hold another event Tuesday at Mount Zion First African Baptist Church at 105 Lankford Avenue from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Both of those events will be held every week.

On Wednesday, the Thomas Jefferson Health District will hold a testing event from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Grace and Glory Lutheran Church at 683 Thomas Jefferson Parkway in Palmyra. An appointment is necessary and can be obtained by calling 434-972-6261. The TJHD will hold another event on Thursday in Scottsville at the Farmers Market from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. An appointment is also necessary. (testing site info)

University of Virginia officials will hold a town hall on Zoom tonight aimed at members of the community. Last week, UVA President Jim Ryan announced that classes would be delayed for two weeks. He made a promotional video last week that sought to explain why they will proceed.

“We know that this carries some risk, but there are risks regardless of what decision we make, including staying online all semester,” Ryan said. “There are risks for some students for whom UVA is the safest place to be, or who may face challenges learning online at home. There are risks for our employees whose jobs depend on having students on Grounds. We also know that roughly two-thirds of our students live off Grounds and outside of University housing which means thousands of students are going to be living in Charlottesville regardless of whether classes are held or not.”

The Zoom Town Hall meeting will be held at 5 p.m. and has a maximum of 3,000 attendees. Register here.

Albemarle County will launch a new website today, replacing one that is nearly twenty years old. A promotional video was released last week to help people navigate the new site. The old site will be archived and made available for public use.

All year, events that celebrate parts of our community have had to be cancelled, including the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council’s annual gala in May. However, the organization plans to hold a virtual gala one month from now on September 10. They’ll hand out awards such as Startup of the Year, Innovator of the Year and Job Creator of the year.

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This version of what’s happened and what’s scheduled comes to you with support from the Charlottesville Podcasting Network. Bringing you sounds of the community since 2005, and hoping to bring more voices forward in the next 15 years. Visit cvillepodcast.com.

The Virginia Department of Health has reported another 2,015 new cases of COVID-19 this morning. That’s the highest one-day total since the pandemic began but VDH officials said this is the result of a technical error.

“This figure includes information that should have been reported on Wednesday and Thursday of this week as well as the regular numbers for Friday,” VDH communications director Maria Reppas wrote in a release. “Late Thursday, VDH’s Office of Information Management, which helps manage VDH’s COVID-19 databases, identified and rectified the technical issue, which was a system performance configuration.”

There are another 18 deaths statewide for a total of 2,317 to date. The seven day average for positive PCR tests remains at 7.3 percent for a second straight day.

The Thomas Jefferson Health District reports another 49 cases today for a total of 1,894 cases to date. That consists of 19 from Albemarle, 15 from Charlottesville, five from Fluvanna, seven from Louisa, and three from Nelson. No new deaths are reported today. The seven-day average for positive tests is at 5.6 percent today.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has voted unanimously to remove Confederate monuments and markers from the county courthouse grounds. The county will take proposals from groups who want to take possession of the statue, cannon and stack of cannonballs. Ten people asked for the items to be removed at a public hearing. Alex Taurel with the League of Conservation Voters called them monuments to racism.

“The League of Conservation Voters works to protect public lands and parks and make nature accessible for more people in this country, but recent events have highlighted that while parks and public spaces may be accessible for many folks, it doesn’t mean those spaces are safe and inclusive for all,” Taurel said.

The removal was supported by several groups, such as the Charlottesville-Albemarle BAR Association. The General Assembly passed legislation this year allowing localities to remove or contextualize war memorials, paving the way for Confederate statues to be removed across Virginia. Albemarle Resident Ramona Martinez thanked the county for moving fast.

“Removing these statues is not removing history or Southern culture,” Martinez said. “It is an acknowledgment that one group of people does not have claim on land that was never theirs to begin with.”

Supervisor Diantha McKeel voted to remove the statue.

“The at-ready Confederate statue symbolizing the effort to maintain a plantation society, slavery, white supremacy, and the tools of a war fought against the United States should not be co-located with our court facilities,” McKeel said.

McKeel said that after the materials are removed, the community must still work to combat system racism.

Supervisor Ned Gallaway said that many people who wrote him to support keeping the statues accused him of being “politically correct.” However, he said the ability of Albemarle to remove the statue came because people voted and the make-up of the General Assembly changed to one that no longer wanted to defend the statues as war memorials.

“That is something that I see as not politically correct, but democracy in action and the way it’s supposed to work. If you want change, you go to the ballot box, you vote, and you put the folks in who are going to make the changes,” Gallaway said.

Proposals for museums and historical organizations to assume possession of the materials will be accepted through September 5.

The county also announced the hiring of Fentress Architects to design the $45.2 million expansion and consolidation of the city and county’s General District courts in Court Square. That construction is expected to get underway in the spring of 2022.

The city of Charlottesville is seeking proposals for honorary names for city streets. According to a release, there is a deadline of August 31 to submit applications to honor a roadway after an individual, an organization or entity, or an “event of local significance to Charlottesville.”

“The City Council believes honorary street names further the City’s commitment to create ‘a community of mutual respect’ especially when they recognize the important contributions of African-American community members both past and present in the development of the City of Charlottesville,” reads the release.

Several proposals have been made this summer to honor the Black Lives Matter movement with a street designation. City Council discussed the matter at its meeting Monday night.

“It’s looking like we might want to get a little bit more input since we are getting so many street naming requests at this time to do this correctly and to do this with the most transparency,” said Vice Mayor Sena Magill.

Eleven streets have been given an honorary designation since 2011. A committee will sift through potential additions and make recommendations to Council at its meeting on October 19.

Today is the first day that a new intrastate bus route will come through Charlottesville on its way between Danville and D.C. The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Department is funding the daily service which is called the Piedmont Express. The service follows what the DRPT considers a successful launch of the Virginia Breeze, a route between Blacksburg and DC which is now being called the Valley Flyer. The Piedmont Express will also stop in Altavista, Lynchburg, Amherst, Culpeper, Warrenton, Gainesville, and Dulles Airport. (Virginia Breeze website)

Long lines for library curbside pick-ups may soon abate. The Jefferson Madison Regional Library will extend hours for the service to serve more patrons.

Monday: 1pm-7pm at all branch locations

Tuesday-Saturday: 10am-4pm at Central Library, Crozet Library, Gordon Avenue Library, Northside Library, Nelson Memorial and Louisa County

Tuesday-Saturday: 10am-2pm at Scottsville Library and Greene County Library

Sunday: All branch locations closed

“Library staff are working very hard to provide curbside and drive-up service, and are thrilled to be able to expand that service,” said JMRL Director David Plunkett in a release. “All returned items are quarantined for 72 hours before being put back into circulation, for the safety of staff and the public.”

A group called Come As You Are Cville will hold a clothes drive Saturday at Forest Hills Park. Anything collected will be donated to homeless members of the community. The event will be held from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. (info on Facebook)

There are no government meetings that I know about today, but please let me know if I’m incorrect. I can report that the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission meeting last night did not meet due to a lack of a quorum. Many parts of the region were hit by a massive storm earlier in the evening. The meeting will be rescheduled for later this month.

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Today’s installment materializes courtesy of the French Press, open every day from 7 to 7 in Waynesboro for delicious coffee and light treats. Cool snacks, and cold and frozen bevvies. Order in advance on the @cloosiv app or call ahead 540.221.6568. See you there at the French Press!

Virginia has become the first state in the nation to roll out a mobile app intended to track COVID-19 cases and alert users if they have been close to any positive cases. Governor Ralph Northam made the announcement yesterday.

"I want to be clear that this app, COVIDWISE, does not track or store your personal information," Northam said. "It does not track you at all. It does not rely on GPS or your personal information. And while we want everyone to download it, it is voluntary."

Northam said people who are alerted are advised to get tested as soon as possible and to quarantine.

"You are in control,” Northam said. “All of this is your choice, to download the free app and use it. But I hope Virginians across the state will use this."

Northam also said rapid COVID-19 testing will come to Virginia thanks to an interstate compact entered into with several other states. The antigen tests have already been approved for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

“Antigen tests are different from the PCR test which is primarily what Virginia and other states use,” Northam said. “As we are seeing days [for] test results on PCR tests, we believe this compact is a way to get faster testing.”

Each state hopes to purchase 500,000 antigen tests and Northam said it is intended to signal to the pharmaceutical companies that there is a demand for the tests. He said efforts to conduct contact tracing have been hampered by long delays for testing. The new test results are expected to come back within twenty minutes.

“We want everyone to get tested if you think you need to,” Northam said.

Dr. Keith Jones is the pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church in Norfolk. He is involved in efforts to get more people tested in Black communities and said the COVID era is shining a light on fractures in society.

“It’s shown us the need to have people who sit on boards of caring agencies who actually know something about the communities that they advocate for,” Jones said. “This pandemic fixes the glaring beam on all types of racial, policing and most of all health care disparities.”

Dr. Jones said more genuine efforts need to be make sure people have access to information, including boosting broadband and wi-fi efforts. He and other pastors in the Hampton Roads made a video of themselves getting tested, and are holding testing events in their churches.

Governor Northam will attend a virtual town hall on the future of policing in Virginia beginning at 6 p.m. (register)

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 818 cases of COVID-19 this morning for a cumulative total of 95,867. Another 25 deaths have been counted for a total of 2,299. The seven day average for PCR tests has risen to 7.3 percent. The Thomas Jefferson Health District reports another 17 cases today for a total of 1,845. There’s another seven cases from Albemarle, one in Charlottesville, one in Greene, three in Fluvanna, and two in Nelson. There are three more deaths reported for a total of 44.

The City of Charlottesville’s Economic Development Department has announced an initiative to promote the city’s “key commercial districts.” The city will use funding from its CARES Act allocation to install signage with reminders on physical distancing, hand sanitizer stations, and to provide 5,000 facial coverings directly to businesses. On-street parking spaces that have been set aside for curbside pick-up will be made permanent, and there will be free parking in the Water and Market Street parking garages on Saturdays and Sundays through the end of the year.

“Consumer driven tax revenues, such as sales, meals and lodging taxes, which are largely derived from these key corridors, comprise approximately 20% of the City’s annual revenues; making restoration of these revenues critically important,” reads a release on the initiative.

The Madison County Board of Supervisors voted just before 2 a.m. this morning to approve a special use permit for an agri-tourism resort, according to the Madison County Eagle’s Facebook page. Orange County resident Barbara Miller had filed an application for an event center attached to a hemp farm on Route 231. Opponents said the proposed Crescere project is out of scale with the community. According to the MThe master plan for the project includes a 12,000 square foot event center, a 7,000 square foot welcome center and restaurant, and space for up to 230 overnight guests.

The Jefferson Madison Regional Library (JMRL) will consider changing its name, as well as the name of the main meeting room in its downtown Charlottesville branch. Director David Plunkett said JMRL’s mission statement was updated to reflect an awareness of the system’s problematic past.

The first library in Charlottesville opened in 1921, but a segregated library for Black people did not open until 1934 and closed in 1948. Plunkett said the library is working with filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson on a documentary. He said a working group will consider the library’s naming convention and whether the current name is a barrier to access for people.

Plunkett said the entire staff of the library has gone through racial awareness training using something called the Groundwater approach.

“It was really eye-opening for a lot of staff to just see number after number after number that really showed a disparity in equity in this country and that opened up a conversation for us about where libraries fit into that and not only where have libraries participated in systemic inequalities in the past but also what we can to knit those together in the future,” Plunkett said.

Plunkett’s comments came during a panel discussion held last night on race and representation in library collections. Meredith Dickens is JMRL’s collection manager. \

“We want to make sure that everyone who walks into the library sees material that fits their needs, maybe it mirrors them, allows them to see their voice in the collection and their story, but also allows them to learn about other voices and stories,” said Meredith Dickens, JMRL’s collection manager. “So even when you are a white library patron, you need to be able to learn more than about white people, so we need to make sure there is as broad a range of materials as possible.”

In government meetings today, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors will hold a public hearing at 6 p.m. on the future of Confederate representations in Court Square, the county seat and location of the general and district courts. The county has been holding a series of community engagement efforts on the topic. One of those was on July 20. Here’s UVA Historian Kirt von Daacke with some context about how the Jim Crow era got started.

“The Confederacy fails after a four year attempt to create a slave-holding empire and Virginians and the locals return and support that effort,” von Daacke said. “They are unwilling to accept the social, economic, and political realities of defeat and this includes in 1865 more than 14,000 freed people. By the 1880’s they are steadfastly committed to re-imagining the war and the past

The Board of Directors for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission meets virtually tonight at 7 p.m. Among the items are the funding agreement for the rent and mortgage relief program the TJPDC is administering, as well as a framework for how the agency will support broadband expansion in its member counties. They’ll also consider a proposal to purchase property. (agenda)

The Charlottesville school board will meet at 5 p.m. and among the items on the agenda is a discussion of childcare, special education, preschool and nutrition will be handled as the school system begins the academic year online only. (agenda)

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Governor Ralph Northam and the leaders of five other states have written to the Rockefeller Foundation to announce their intent to work together to purchase rapid COVID-19 testing technology consistent with a plan put together by the foundation last month.

“Testing is the only way out of our present disaster, and it will remain the case until a vaccine or effective therapeutics are widely available,” reads the Foundation’s website, which contains a 51-page report with a strategy to get national testing capacity to 30 million tests a week.

Northam and the governors of Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan and Ohio announced an intent to enter into a compact to negotiate with two manufacturers of antigen tests to order 500,000 kits which promise test results within 15 to 20 minutes. The Rockefeller Foundation will provide support with logistics.

“The states are leading America’s national response to COVID-19,” Northam said in a press release. “We are bringing together this bipartisan, multi-state coalition to combine our purchasing power and get rapid testing supplies to our communities as quickly as possible. The people in our six states want to see action, and together, we’re delivering.”

North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper announced later in the day that his state would also join the compact.

Northam is expected to hold a press conference at 2 p.m. today.

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 798 new cases of COVID-19 today, the lowest one-day total since July 9, when 613 cases were reported. Another 30 deaths were counted for a total of 2,274 to date. The seven-day average for positive PCR tests remains at 7.2 percent.

The Charlottesville City Council spent three hours yesterday on a “listening session” on policing in Charlottesville. City Manager Tarron Richardson said the event was arranged after a Minneapolis police officer kneeled on George Floyd’s neck for eight minutes, killing him. Dr. Richardson said many in the community have contacted him and Council.

“We received a lot of emails, phone calls, and a lot of one-on-one conversations with many residents in our community pertaining to defunding the police department,” Dr. Richardson said. “What can we do to improve our overall relationship with the community through our working with the police and the community as a whole?”

Dr. Richardson said he and Council wanted to hear from people about how they would define “defunding the police.”

Elizabeth Stark said she would rather use the term “reinvesting.”

“Right now we spend $18 million so that police can respond to mental health calls, substance use disorder calls, chronic homeless, and domestic and sexual assaults,” Stark said. “These are not activities that are well-suited to police responses so the defund movement is asking that we shift funds away from paying the police to respond to these kinds of calls… and support the community by putting into place a robust network that is trained and capable to answer these calls with the kind of sensitivity can warrant.”

Don Gathers, a former member of the Police Civilian Review Board, asked Councilors to support a more robust CRB with the power to subpoena officers.

“If we could take some steps to try to put some things in place so that when things do occur, we have a means, a method, and a vehicle in order to check those things before they balloon out of control, we certainly need to do so,” Gathers said.

In all, 42 people spoke and 1,200 people watched the event live, according to city communications director Brian Wheeler. The session can be seen on the city’s website. Dr. Richardson said Council will return to the topic in the near future. The General Assembly will convene for a special session on August 18. Pre-filed bills include one from Senator Thomas Norment that would ban the police from using neck restraints.

In government meetings today, the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at 2 p.m. and will hold four public hearings in the evening. In one, Verizon is seeking permission to build a 116.7 foot tall cell tower at the intersection of Wild Turkey Lane and Route 250 West. The county’s wireless policy requires a public hearing before the Board because this location is within 200 feet of a Scenic Byway. (staff report)

In another, a developer is seeking a rezoning for 32.52 acres at the northern edge of Albemarle’s Places29 designated growth area from rural areas (RA) to Planned Residential Development (PRD) for a maximum of 100 residential units. This project is along the North Fork of the Rivanna River. The Planning Commission first heard the item on March 10 and voted 5-1 to recommend approval on May 19. (staff report)

The Fluvanna Board of Supervisors meets in person today beginning at 4 p.m. with a meeting with several items related to how that county will use federal CARES Acts funding. That ranges from an agreement with the Community Investment Collaborative to budget transfers for the current and previous fiscal year. They’ll also take action on a fire and rescue fleet study. (agenda)

And the Jefferson Madison Regional Library will hold a virtual panel discussion on the racial diversity in the library system’s collections. The event will be moderated by Siri Russell, Albemarle County’s director of Equity and Inclusion. (register)

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Health officials in the Lynchburg area called a press conference yesterday to implore people to take the COVID-19 pandemic seriously. Dr. Christopher W. Lewis is the Vice President of Medical Affairs of Centra Health, which operates hospitals and health care facilities.

“I wish I could bring you good news, but I can’t,” Lewis said. “We have seen increasing numbers of individuals in the community testing positive for COVID. In the beginning of the pandemic, we were seeing at Centra on the order of single digits, one, two, or three patients or individuals testing positive per day. That number has recently drastically increased. We are seeing on the order of 30 plus individuals testing positive for COVID and that number continues to increase.”

Dr. Lewis said there were 36 hospitalized patients in Centra facilities yesterday, straining resources in the hospitals in part because COVID patients there spend an average of 20 days. He said people must wear facial coverings to stop the spread.

“If you leave your place of dwelling, you need to consider potentially everyone you come into contact with as possibly having COVID,” Dr. Lewis said. “It is that widespread in our community.”

There are another 1,145 new cases of COVID-19 across the Commonwealth as reported by the Virginia Department of Health this morning. Another 26 deaths have been reported for a total of 2,244 to date. The seven day average for positive tests has risen back to 7.2 percent, up from 7.1 percent on Monday. Today’s figures for the Thomas Jefferson Health District were not available at publication time.

The Charlottesville City Council held the first reading of an appropriation for $15.26 million in state and federal funding for the $31 million Belmont Bridge replacement, a project that is expected to be advertised for construction bids in the fall.

“We still have a few activities left to do,” said Jeanette Janiczek, manager of the city’s Urban Construction Initiative. “We are finalizing the plans with the Federal Highway Administration as well as the Virginia Department of Transportation. I’m working on updating the Board of Architectural Review based on their Certificate of Appropriateness that we received last year. We have completed the right of way acquisition.”

Construction could get underway next spring if there is a successful bidder. The original bridge opened in 1962 and the city has been planning for a replacement for several years. At one point, Council took a year to determine whether the project should be a tunnel under the railroad tracks rather than a bridge. A final vote will be held on August 17 as part of the Council’s consent agenda.

***Charlottesville City Council will meet again today at 4 p.m. for a listening session on the police department. Several members of the public told Councilors last night they were suspicious of the event because another body will not be involved.

“You are having a listening session Tuesday regarding a topical matter that is most definitely in the wheelhouse of the [Police Civilian Review Board] yet not one invitation was forwarded for a PCRB rep to be part of the panel,” said Nancy Carpenter, is the social justice representative on the PCRB. “When an inquiry was made from the board chair to the Mayor the reply was that this was not a joint session, case closed.”

City Councilor Michael Payne said the event was intended to be a chance for elected officials to have a broader conversation about policing in Charlottesville.

“It sprung up less from the CRB and more from the conversations in Charlottesville and the rest of the country around de-funding police, re-examining policing, and trying to think through and hear from the community in specifics what does that mean,” Payne said. “What does it mean to think about next steps and concrete policy steps that can get us there. And [this is] a very basic entry point to begin the community conversation around these topics.”

Vice Mayor Sena Magill said the event is a chance to hear from the entire community on the topic. The event begins at 4 p.m.

The executive director of Jaunt continued a series of community engagement efforts to promote a new pilot project that will integrate on-demand service into existing transit services. Brad Sheffield spoke to City Council last night.

“We see sometimes in the urban area that there are some inefficient or hard-to-serve area, those gaps that exist,” Sheffield said. “Sometimes we call them the first and last mile of services. It’s really hard to try to serve everybody with transit services, especially fixed route services. We’re able to look at implementing something like on-demand that would help connect those hard to reach areas with those backbone fixed-route services.”

One of those hard to reach areas is the Loaves and Fishes food pantry on Lambs Road in Albemarle County. Jaunt’s pilot project will serve that area. Sheffield said he is working with Charlottesville Area Transit and the University Transit System to integrate the on demand service with their fixed routes. Currently all services are running adjusted services due to COVID-19, but Sheffield said the hope is to build a system that can make it more possible for people to get around the community without an automobile.

Heavy rains and storms overnight knocked out power in many places across the community. In Greene County, more than six thousand customers of the Rappahannock Electric Cooperative were without power as of seven this morning.

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The governing body of the University of Virginia met Friday to discuss the upcoming academic year, which is set to begin on August 25. The Board of Visitors (BOV) met virtually in an open session before going into closed session. James Murray, the rector of the BOV, said teams at UVA have been working on the reopening plan for several months.

“I think we have as well-conceived a plan as any university in America,” Murray said. “But we have to be clear… this boils down to whether or not we have compliance. This epidemic is going to be the ultimate test of our students and a test of what makes UVA a special place.”

The protocol for students returning to Grounds requires a 14-day self-quarantine and states students “should not attend any large social events or interact with more than a few people (3-5) at a time.” Students must be tested for COVID-19 and those who do not comply cannot return. When classes begin, daily health checks are required as are face coverings.

On Friday, Murray asked how many students might already be in Charlottesville. Provost Liz Magill. There is no clear answer.

“Nearly 20,000 of our 25,000 students live in some off-campus arrangement,” said Liz Magill. “Most of the leases in Charlottesville start for August 1 or August 15. We will ask students to tell us where they are as part of the on-boarding process for students which requires them to demonstrate a negative test, comply for the contract we are writing for them to comply with.”

Magill said Grounds itself is slowly “repopulating” with research activities, medical education, some graduate work, as well as athletic activity.

J.J. Davis, executive vice president and chief operating officer, said plans are in place if someone contracts COVID-19.

“Unfortunately we know how this virus works and some people may unfortunately get sick and in that result our highest duty of care is to those students living in our dormitories so we have successfully procured isolation and quarantine spaces for those individuals,” Davis said. “We are continuing to work on this question of if there is an off-Grounds student who has no options to safely isolate and quarantine, we are working on that issue as we speak.”

Davis said UVA is working with the Virginia Department of Health on a protocol for contact tracing, but arrangements are a “work in progress.” A contract tracing mobile app put together by Google and VDH is expected to go live on August 5. A UVA specific app is expected to be ready by August 10.

“We are going to be using an exposure native app that will be on every student’s phone,” Murray said. “It is one provided by Google and Apple. It could well be the most important thing that we do technologically. There is no way we are going to catch cases quickly and more comprehensively than this software is going to enable. I would love to see it in the hands of merchants, people that work around and in close contact with UVA students and faculty. We’re not there yet but it’s possible. It’s not that difficult to do. If we can actually get it in the hands of several thousand people that are those most in close contact like bartenders, those kinds of people, grocery store clerks, we can go a long way, not to prevent the disease but to catching it very quickly and catching everybody that is exposed.”

Davis said there are multiple contingency plans in place if there are outbreaks. The BOV next meets on August 17. (UVA Public Health Measures page)

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting an additional 1,324 cases of COVID-19 this morning, but reports no new fatalities. The seven day average for positive tests is at 7.1 percent, down from 7.2 percent. There are 44 news cases reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District today for a total of 1,793 to date. Of those, 17 are from Albemarle, 16 are from Charlottesville, nine are from Greene, one is from Fluvanna County and one is from Louisa.

The latest COVID-19 forecast model from the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute states that the surge of cases in the Thomas Jefferson Health District has abated, but warns that the Commonwealth is on track to have 13,000 new cases a week by early September. The statewide reproduction rate for the novel coronavirus is below the figure of 1, but is above 1 in far and near southwest Virginia. The model estimates that 827,377 cases of COVID-19 have been avoided since May 15.

“While cases are surging in Hampton Roads, the model does not project that hospital capacity will be overwhelmed during the projection window,” reads the model. The update comes out every Friday. (model)

The Thomas Jefferson Health District is holding two COVID-19 testing events this week. One will take place on Wednesday at the Nelson Heritage Center in Arrington from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. The other happens Saturday from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Innovage Virginia PACE at 1335 Carlton Avenue in Charlottesville. Both events require appointments and those can be booked at 434-972-6261.

The Board of Trustees of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library has voted to keep their facilities closed to the public for now, but will consider adding more curbside pickup hours. The Board met Friday in a virtual meeting and made the move to remain within Tier 4 of the library’s COVID-19 response.

In government meetings today, the owners of a shopping center near Forest Lakes on U.S. 29 are seeking a rezoning to allow for an expansion onto property not currently developed. The Albemarle Community Development will hold the required information meeting for the application. The property was rezoned from residential in 1989 and the current project seeks to increase the maximum building size allowed to 110,000 square feet. Currently a maximum of 71,800 is allowed and there is only 14,778 square feet left. (rezoning narrative)

“This rezoning application seeks to increase the allowable square footage on this property and to amend the application to allow for something that is different from suburban strip mall design,” reads the narrative for the proposal. The Albemarle Comprehensive Plan designated the land as “urban mixed-use community center.” (meeting access information)

The virtual meeting begins at 6 p.m. The land is within the coverage area of the Places29-North Community Advisory Committee.

Charlottesville City Council meets at 6:30 p.m. for what should be a shorter meeting than the July 20 meeting, which lasted until 2:30 in the morning.

The main item on the agenda is an appropriation of $15,263,257.41 for the Belmont Bridge replacement, a project that has been in the planning stages for at least ten years. The entire Belmont Bridge project now has a cost of $31.1 million, and $13 million of that is expected from the city. That includes a $5 million payment in the current year’s capital improvement program (CIP), $2.5 million in next year’s CIP and $4.8 million in other funds the city has saved for the project. The city is currently negotiating right of way for the project and construction could begin next spring. (July 20 update)

Following that item, the CEO of Jaunt will present Council with an update on his agency’s pilot project to deliver on-demand transit within the region. Brad Sheffield presented that information to the Board of Supervisors on July 15.

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The school boards in Albemarle and Charlottesville have both voted to proceed with virtual instruction for the first nine weeks of school year, though some Albemarle students will attend in-person if they have either special needs, are learning English, or do not have any access to the Internet. This is known as Stage 2 of the county’s reopening plan and was recommended in part out of a concern that there is not enough testing capacity.

“This is of concern,” said Rosalyn Schmitt, chief operating officer for Albemarle County Public Schools. “Access to testing remains limited and those that are tested are seeing much longer delays in the results and we know a key strategy of keeping our students and staff safe will be able to identify cases quickly and isolate them and quarantine them quickly, and our testing will not allow that.”

Two-thirds of staff who responded to a survey said they did not feel comfortable with returning to school. However, two-thirds of parents surveyed said they wanted schools to open.

Superintendent Matt Haas recommended Stage 2 at this time, and any returning staff and teachers would be volunteers. After being presented with the options, School Board Member Katrina Callsen made the motion to move forward with Stage 2.

“I move that the Albemarle County Public School institute Stage 2 to begin the 2020/2021 school year encompassing the first nine week marking period and further that four and a half weeks prior to the end of the marking period the superintendent shall make a recommendation to either continue stage 2 or initiate the educational program of another stage for the following marking period,” Callsen said.

School Board Member Ellen Osborne said she could not support Stage 2.

“I just don’t feel like I can put our most vulnerable students into the middle of a grand experiment and then have them take that home to their communities which are already being disproportionately affected,” Osborn said.

The motion passed four to three, with School Board Member Dave Oberg changing his vote from initially voting against it.

In Charlottesville, the School Board voted unanimously to proceed with an online option. They did so after a long public comment period. Both communities will begin online learning on September 8.

There are another 984 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today, for a cumulative total of 89,988. The death toll rose by another 33 fatalities today for a cumulative total of 2,174. The seven day positive testing rate remains at 7.2 percent for a second day. The numbers for the Thomas Jefferson Health District were not available at recording time.

The organization that encourages and promotes the humanities in the Commonwealth will move its headquarters to the redeveloped Dairy Central building at the corner of Preston Avenue and 10th Street. Virginia Humanities is moving to the location in part because it is more centrally located and will allow more space for public discussions. Dairy Central a redevelopment of the old Monticello Dairy building, itself a protected historic building whose facade was required to remain intact. The property in the 10th and Page neighborhood is being redeveloped by Stony Point Design Build. During the review process, some in the neighborhood noted the potential for gentrification.

“We’re conscious of this history and we are also aware of the positive and negative impacts that a development like Dairy Central can have on a neighborhood,” said Virginia Humanities Executive Director Matthew Gibson. “We want to be an asset to the community and be good and collaborative neighbors.”

The $1.7 million move will take place early next year, and has been delayed due to COVID-19. (release)

When students return to Grounds for classes at the University of Virginia, they will be asked to use public transit only when necessary. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, buses on the University Transit System are restricted to no more than 20 passengers who must also use the rear doors.

On August 3, routes will also change and buses will not run down McCormick Road, the main roadway through central Grounds. There will also be changes to parking, with some annual spaces being converted into hourly, weekly or monthly permits.

“For those who want to park by the day or the week, we will have new online options for people to purchase these virtual permits with their credit cards,” said Parking and Transportation Director Becca White in an interview with UVA Today. “The customers supply their license plate numbers online, which will be fed into the license plate recognition system on our enforcement vehicles. People who use the meters and the Parkmobile application are already doing this.”

Employees are also being encouraged to telework if they can. That strategy was already being implemented as part of a transportation demand management plan adopted in 2019. (transit routes)

The Board of Trustees for the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library will hold a special session today to conclude their discussion about when they can move to a new tier in their COVID-19 response. Currently some libraries are open for curbside pick-up under Tier 4, but the Board will continue a conversation about moving to Tier 3, which would allow people to come into the library under appointment. The meeting begins at 3 p.m. (agenda)

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The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 911 cases of COVID-19 this morning, with another 16 fatalities. That brings the total number of deaths to 2,141. The seven day average of positive tests is at 7.2 percent today. The latest numbers for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District were not available at recording time, but there were six new cases reported yesterday for a total to date of 1,669.

Charlottesville’s School Superintendent will recommend that city schools remain online-only for the first nine weeks of the academic year. Rosa Atkins sent a message to school parents and staff Wednesday announcing she will ask the School Board to consider that option and to reevaluate halfway through the quarter, which will begin on September 8.

“With cases rising in our nation and area, with a higher-than-recommended positivity rate in our area, and with many unanswered questions about how best to protect our staff and students, we have decided to put our efforts into online learning so we can make this first nine weeks rewarding and productive,” Atkins wrote.

The School Board will meet at 5 p.m. to vote on the path forward. Atkins acknowledged that keeping schools online raises challenges for many, such as child care and those who did not learn well in a remote setting. There’s also concern about student isolation.

“For those who are worried about the mental wellness of your students, our fall plans incorporate social-emotional learning, community building, peer-to-peer engagement, and more,” Atkins wrote. “Our teachers are already working on ways to make connections and build relationships with you and your students.”

The Albemarle School Board will meet at 2 p.m. to vote on whether it will begin the school year online, or go with a hybrid model that includes face to face learning. The Greene County School Board voted last night to begin classes in person beginning September 8, according to Terry Beigie of the Greene County Record. Elementary schools will be in session five days a week while older students will be in school two days a week.

Radio station WTJU and the Ix Park have canceled their annual Freefall concert series. The weekly events were scheduled to begin on August 29 and run through October 3.

“Freefall concerts draw thousands of attendees to these free concerts, and there’s simply no safe way to do that during this pandemic,” reads a press release sent out by the station. “We hope to return with a full slate of Freefall concerts in 2021.”

However, the Charlottesville-Albemarle Black Business Expo will still be held on September 26 in a virtual format. That event is part of the festival.

A group that studies the effects of climate change and recommends policies has published a new report that concludes that low-income households pay a disproportionate amount toward energy costs. Susan Kruse is the executive director of the Community Climate Collaborative (C3). She said C3 wanted to do the work after attending a community event at the Southwood Mobile Home Park. (study)

“Residents in that trailer park were paying $300 and more on energy per month for a trailer,” Kruse said. “Unfortunately we gave the survey an artificial ceiling at $500 and there were actually many residents who were actually paying more than on a monthly basis for energy costs.”

Kruse said the Uncovering Energy Inequity report analyzed U.S. Census tracts in Charlottesville and found that those with lower incomes have higher energy burdens. C3 will hold webinars on their Uncovering Energy Inequity study today at noon and 5 p.m. One of the speakers will be Caetano de Campos Lopes, their Director of Climate Policy.

“Our first key finding after looking at more granular data was that nearly 5,000 households, or 27 percent of the city’s population, face high energy burden levels,” de Campos Lopes said. “More than 4,000 of them face very high energy burden levels. And more than 1,000 pay more than 20 or more of their income to home energy expenditures.”

Other speakers on the webinar include representatives from groups that lobby for more affordable housing options. Check the C3 Facebook page to register.

Charlottesville’s former fire chief has been hired as the new chief operating officer for Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville. Andrew Baxter resigned his position on June 11 after disagreements with City Manager Tarron Richardson. In a release, Habitat said Baxter’s experience would help the organization double its home construction program to more than forty a year.

“Probably the single most important foundational element to a safe, healthy, resilient person, family, or community is safe, stable, and affordable housing,” Baxter is quoted in the release. “For much of my career, my focus was on response. After a while you figure out that many of those responses could be avoided by addressing the root causes of those emergencies.

Tomorrow is the last day of work for the city's housing coordinator. John Sales has been in the position for about a year, and he won't be going far.

"I'll be going over to the Housing Authority to serve as their executive director,” Sales said at the July 15 meeting of the Housing Advisory Committee. That group has been reviewing potential changes to the zoning ordinance to increase the number of houses in the city.

Charlottesville is in the fourth year of review for the city's Comprehensive Plan, which is to also include review of the zoning code and a new affordable housing policy. Alexander Ikefuna, the deputy director of the city's Neighborhood Development Services department, said a draft of the zoning rewrite should be completed next summer. (Cville Plans Together page)

And finally, the magazine Fast Company has named WillowTree as one of its top 100 Workplaces for Innovators. The company was recognized for development of an app called Vocable AAC that helps those with speech impairments communicate. WillowTree is set to move from its offices in downtown Charlottesville to the redeveloped WoolenMills, despite the pandemic. In May, CEO Tobias Dengel told the Albemarle Board of Supervisors that the company had lost a quarter of its revenues due to the economic slowdown. (press release)

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There are another 999 new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia today for a total of 87,993. Yesterday the number of new cases was 922 and on Sunday it was 1,505. The seven-day positive testing rate is at 7.1 percent. The numbers for the Thomas Jefferson Health District were not available at recording time.

Governor Ralph Northam has announced he is imposing further restrictions on the Hampton Roads area to stop increases of new cases there. Virginia’s seven-day positive testing rate is stable in four out of five regions.

“Overall the rate is 10.8 percent positive,” Northam said. “As of yesterday, test positivity rates in Chesapeake, Norfolk, Suffolk, Portsmouth and Hampton ranged from 9.9 percent to 18.6 percent.”

To combat the trend, Northam has issued an executive order that will take effect July 31 at midnight that would stop alcohol sales on-site after ten p.m. and all restaurants must close at midnight.

“This effectively closes all bars,” Northam said.

Indoor dining will be restricted to 50 percent of capacity and gatherings are capped at 50 people, or what was in place during Phase 2 of the Forward Virginia plan. On Monday, Albemarle and Charlottesville took that step for themselves due to local concerns.

“This is about stopping the spread of COVID-19 in Hampton Roads,” Northam said. “It happens when too many people gather, when too many people are non compliant, and as I’ve said before, when too many people are selfish.”

More from Governor Northam can be heard in the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

Delegate Sam Rasoul of Roanoke announced over the weekend that he and his wife have tested positive for COVID-19. He said his family likely contracted the disease after meeting with a relative on a family trip.

“I’m on day 13,” Rasoul said on July 28. “I started feeling symptoms that included fatigue, fever, and most concerning was the kind of chest pressure as you’re not sure what direction it’s going to head in.”

Rasoul said he believes he is on the mend. He is calling for more rapid testing to help people know if they are asymptomatic and spreading the disease. The delegate said it’s important for people to remain careful.

“We let our guard down around an asymptomatic family member who subsequently tested positive and that’s unfortunately how we got it,” Rasoul said.

That family member had tested at a pharmacy, but those results do not usually come back for ten to fourteen days. Delegate Rasoul said he is preparing for the August 18 special session of the General Assembly, and he said police reform will be a major issue. More from this interview will be in an upcoming episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

The Greene Board of Supervisors has voted to withdraw from the Rapidan Service Authority, paving the way for the county to take over planning and implementation for a new reservoir. Last week, the RSA Board voted 4 to 2 to end the collection of facility fees to pay for the project, which has a cost estimate between $45 million and $60 million. Mark B. Taylor is the Greene County administrator.

“Greene County’s water supply project must proceed for existing customers and for future growth alike,” said county administrator Mark B. Taylor. “We must get this water supply project done. The problem on July 16 was that the RSA Board did not apply its usual rule of deference in dealing with Greene County.”

Greene is in the RSA with Madison and Orange counties,.

In a press release issued on July 16, RSA said the project was supposed to have been built by 2008, so the facilities fee should not be collected. Taylor said that was false.

“RSA’s website doesn’t quite fully describe reality,” Taylor said. “The RSA doesn’t really work like a partnership, advancing one shared purpose. RSA is really more like a confederation of three counties using the water and waste authorities act to serve the needs of their communities. RSA keeps separate books for each county that it serves. It even keeps separate books for each system that it operates in each of the member localities.”

The Board of Supervisors voted unanimously on a resolution to begin the process of leaving the RSA. Read the story on the Greene County Record for all of the details on this action.

Even in the middle of summer, development continues. Albemarle County Community Development will host a community meeting for a rezoning proposed for 5258 Three Notch’d Road. Developer Katurah Roell is requesting a rezoning of 14.259 acres from rural area to Neighborhood Model District for the creation of a new neighborhood. However, the land is not within the jurisdiction of the Albemarle County Service Authority. Currently only the existing structure on the property is allowed to connect to public water. The applicant will request that connection as well as to public sewer. (meeting info)

Later this afternoon, the Albemarle Charlottesville Historical Society will present two showings of the 1930 version of the World War I classic All Quiet on the Western Front at the Paramount with showtimes at 3 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. In between, the Charlottesville Municipal Band Brass Quintet will play on the society’s front lawn beginning at 4:30 p.m. until 6 p.m. Details on the society’s web page.

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The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and the Charlottesville City Council have both voted to limit occupancy in indoor restaurants and to require facial coverings in indoor spaces. The two resolutions were also endorsed by University of Virginia President Jim Ryan, even though the new rules are not binding on Grounds.

Deputy County Attorney Andy Herrick told Supervisors Monday that Albemarle’s ordinance change has three main components.

“The first is a limit on indoor occupants at food establishments, wineries, breweries and distilleries,” Herrick said. “It would provide for a limit of 50 percent of occupancy. The second provision is a limitation on gatherings. While phase 3 statewide limits gatherings to 250 people, the proposed ordinance would limit gatherings to 50 people with certain exceptions.”

Herrick said those exceptions are for outdoor food establishments, farm wineries, farm breweries, religious exercises, weddings, and for public demonstrations.

“Finally section 6 of the proposed ordinance would have a face covering requirement which would require face coverings at indoor public places and outdoor public places at which six foot physical distancing is not possible,” Herrick said.

Exceptions include residences, gyms, schools, religious institutions, and the county courthouse building. The ordinance had been modified since the Board last took it up last week with input from Albemarle’s Commonwealth’s Attorney Jim Hingeley.

Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District likened the ordinance before the Board as a high-wire act.

“I believe as Supervisors that we have a responsibility for health and welfare as well as looking at the economic impact and that we are walking a bit of tight-rope here in trying to ensure that we take enough action without taking too much action,” Price said. “If we won’t take too enough action then we run the risk of our residents being infected and having spikes here that the rest of the country has seen. If we go too far then we have the potential of too much economic adverse impact.”

Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District urged anyone opposed to the ordinance to read it carefully before it goes into effect at midnight on August 1.

“And I won’t want folks to either think we’re being overly restrictive or not restrictive, Gallaway said. “Whether you’re for this ordinance or against this ordinance, I hope everybody will be mindful to read exactly what it is and isn’t doing.”

Supervisors voted unanimously to support the ordinance, which goes into effect at midnight on August 1 it will last for a period of sixty days. Herrick said the county is still looking into a policy to allow for restaurants to open more temporary outdoor seating.

The ordinance does not affect the school system, who held the third in a series of town hall meetings to discuss potential options for the upcoming school year. The School Board will hold a meeting on July 30 to make a final decision, as will their counterparts in Charlottesville.

University of Virginia President Jim Ryan sent an email to the Board and Council stating support for the ordinances.

“Now more than ever, we see ourselves as partners with all of you and with our neighbors in Charlottesville and the surrounding counties,” Ryan wrote. “It has become a cliché to say that we are in this together, but in our case, the actions of a few people on Grounds or in the community really can affect everyone else. That’s why we continue to monitor the situation on a daily basis, and why we are working to make the best possible decisions under ever-shifting conditions—as I know all of you are.”

Less than an hour later after the Albemarle meeting, four of the five City Councilors met to discuss a similar ordinance. City attorney John Blair described their draft as having stricter guidelines than those put forward by Governor Ralph Northam in Phase 3, which Virginia entered on July 1. Like Albemarle’s ordinance, the city’s will also limit in-person gatherings to fifty or less.

“What this local ordinance would do would be to capture all indoor public spaces and it’s important to note that the ordinance itself,” Blair said.

The city’s ordinance has language that covers Councilor’s desire to make sure that not wearing a mask would not be an offense that would result in incarceration.

Blair said Albemarle’s ordinance states that a violation would be a Class 1 misdemeanor, which could lead up to a year of jail time. Instead it would be a Class 3 misdemeanor.

Councilor Lloyd Snook said he had been contacted by restaurant owners about the ordinance, which he supported because physical distancing rules also limit capacity by reducing available space.

“My suspicion is that it’s not going to hurt them, and number two, it’s going to hurt them, if they’re truly trying to enforce what the law would require it,” Snook said.

Charlottesville Mayor Nikuyah Walker was absent. The city’s ordinance also goes into effect on August 1. For more on the two meetings, listen to the latest episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

The University of Virginia will reopen its Aquatics and Fitness Center (AFC) and other athletic facilities on August 3, according to a report on the Cavalier Daily. Members of the AFC will need to reserve a space and space will be limited. Other areas that will reopen are the Snyder Tennis Courts and the Artificial Turf Fields at the Park. (UVA rec website)

Governor Northam will speak at 2 p.m. today at a press conference to give updates on Virginia’s response to COVID-19. He last held such an event on July 14. Northam was in Hampton yesterday to unveil a $70 million grant package for small business that comes from the federal CARES Act. The Rebuild VA program will help up to 7,000 applicants to cover costs associated with the pandemic.

“This grant program will provide up to $10,000 for small businesses and nonprofits to help them meet existing or unpaid expenses such as back due rent or utility payments,” Northam said. ”The funding can also be used to prepare for and respond to this this new environment, whether that means purchasing PPE or hand sanitizers for employees or pivoting to a new business model to better serve their customers.”

To be eligible, businesses must not have received federal loans from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) or other such initiatives. (press release)

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority will meet today at 2:15 p.m. for a virtual meeting. In a report to the Board of Directors, executive director Bill Mawyer said two groups at the University of Virginia are planning to study wastewater before and after students come back to trace "the prevalence of SARS COV 2 in wastewater as an indicator of community health and infection rate." (agenda)

In Greene County, the Board of Supervisors there will meet and get an update on their water supply plan. Last week, the Rapidan Service Authority voted 4 to 2 to stop the collection of monthly facilities fees that were intended to help cover the capital costs of a new reservoir. They meet in an open session beginning at 7:30 p.m. They’ll also get an update on COVID-19 from Greene’s emergency management director. (agenda)

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Both the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and Charlottesville City Council will convene today in special meetings to discuss moving each jurisdiction back into Phase 2 of the Forward Virginia plan. Supervisors go first at 3 p.m. with consideration of a new emergency ordinance to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus. The Board met last Wednesday and discussed the matter for several hours, before delaying the vote. Now they’ll vote on an emergency ordinance that would require facial covering in all indoor public places and limit the number of people at outdoor gatherings to 50, with some exceptions. That’s what the restrictions were when Virginia was in Phase 2 in mid-June.

The exceptions include churches, weddings, restaurants and wineries, as well as “expressive activity on a public street, public sidewalk, in a public park subject to park rules, and on other public property expressly designated for expressive activity by its governmental owner or occupant.”

The Albemarle ordinance if adopted would be in effect from August 1 to September 30. (ordinance)

Charlottesville City Council will convene at 4 p.m. for its special meeting on an emergency ordinance. Albemarle Supervisors had discussed wanting to know if the city planned to impose more stringent restrictions than the state. The city’s ordinance mirrors the county’s with some differences. (city ordinance)

The Louisa County Board of Supervisors also has a special meeting called for 3 p.m. today, but no agenda is available. The Jefferson Madison Regional Library Board of Trustees also meets at 3 p.m. for a regular meeting. All library spaces have been closed to the public since March.

Over the weekend, Virginia added another 2,203 new COVID-19 cases according to the Virginia Department of Health. The number of fatalities rose to 2,078 and the seven-day positive testing rate remained steady for three days at 7.5 percent. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, another 49 cases were reported for a total of 1,600. On Sunday, the 7-day positive rate was at 6.7 percent.

An epidemiological model put together by the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute projects that will have around 15,000 new COVID-19 cases each week by early September. This week the number of new cases was 7,137 between Monday and Sunday, up from 6,760 the week before. The latest weekly report from the Biocomplexity Institute states that 12 of Virginia’s Health Districts are experiencing a surge in cases, including the Rapphannock-Rapidan District. The report states that 752,188 cases of COVID-19 have been avoided in Virginia so far but that could change is physical distancing continues to wane.

"Cell phone data indicates that Virginians are increasingly returning to work and visiting local businesses, almost at prepandemic levels," reads the July 24 report. "This is good news, if residents and businesses follow the guidance in the Forward Virginia plan." (UVA Model)

A fourth year football player at the University of Virginia has tested positive for COVID-19, reports the Daily Progress. T.J. Kitts of Tazewell had posted his result on Twitter but has since deleted the post. (Daily Progress article)

The Albemarle School Board will hold another virtual town hall meeting at 6 p.m. this evening to take comment and provide information about different options for the upcoming school year. Two previous sessions are recorded on the county’s website. (register here) On Wednesday, the Greene County School Board will hold a special meeting to vote on pushing back the beginning of the school year to September 8. The Greene County Record and Daily Progress report that more than a hundred teachers and parents have sent a letter to the school board requesting an online only option.

Albemarle County will hold a webinar at noon on the Lift Grant program which is expected to provide funding to up to 100 small businesses in the community. The initiative is part of how the county is using its allocation of the federal CARES Act. (register)

Thanks for reading. This begins the third week of a daily newsletter I’m putting together to try to make sense of a lot of information in these changing times. If you have information you’d like to share, or would like to support the programming, please contact me. Please send this on to anyone you think would be interested.

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This burst of words and soundbites comes to you courtesy of Rapture, open outside only on the Downtown Mall for lunch, drinks and dinner, with brunch served Friday through Sunday. But only if you feel safe. Take-out options available.

The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 1,127 cases of COVID-19 today, the highest such number in the past month. However, the seven-day positive rate declined to 7.5 percent, down from 7.7 percent yesterday. The number of deaths has increased by 13 to a total of 2,067. Of those, nearly 50 percent of the deceased were over the age of 80, a quarter were between 70 and 79, 15 percent between 60 and 69, 6.2 percent between 50 and 59 and 2.7 percent between 40 and 49. The numbers for the Thomas Jefferson Health District were not available at recording time. (VDH dashboard)

There have now been over 4 million cases in the United States and at over 143,000 deaths. According to a report on CNN, Johns-Hopkins University reported its first case six months ago on January 21, and it took 99 days to reach a million cases. The nation reached two million cases on June 10, three million cases on July 8, and now…. Four million. How long until we reach five million as a nation?

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors will hold a special meeting on Monday at 3:00 p.m. to take up an ordinance that would allow the county to return to Phase 2 of the Forward Virginia Plan. Supervisors discussed the matter at length on Wednesday and will provide a summary of that meeting by Monday morning. Subscribe to the Charlottesville Quarantine Report podcast for more. (agenda)

The Albemarle School Board held the first of three town hall meetings yesterday on the reopening plan for the upcoming academic year. At the beginning of the meeting, Dr. Denise Bonds of the Thomas Jefferson Health District said she was concerned about the future availability of COVID-19 testing.

“Test resulting is delayed,” Bonds said. “It is now taking somewhere between five and 14 days to get rest results back from commercial labs because of the increased demand that’s being caused in the southern half of our nation and the large outbreaks that we’re seeing there.”

On Wednesday, Bonds told the Albemarle Board of Supervisors that the University of Virginia Health System appeared to be backing out of a commitment to help cover the costs of community testing. However, she had this news on Thursday.

“UVA continues to assist us,” Dr. Bonds said. “I think we’ve got a workaround. If you listened to the Board meeting yesterday there were some concern because the state will not pay for the test that UVA does so I think we’ve come up with a non-ideal but a functional work-around to move forward so that we can continue to use that valuable asset as we refer to it as having people from UVA out and testing in the community.”

Sentara Martha Jefferson has confirmed they will “temporarily discontinue” testing events in the community. Yesterday they held such an event at Washington Park but no others are scheduled. In a release, the company stated that it is making the move to preserve resources.

“The number of hospitalized and emergency room patients requiring testing is increasing and our laboratories daily capacity, due to restrictions on the supply of tests, are not able to meet the community testing needs at this time,” reads the July 23 release.

The release goes on to state that Sentara Martha Jefferson has provided more than 650 tests to the community, with 35 positives. More tests are currently being processed by the hospital. The Thomas Jefferson Health District currently has three testing events scheduled for next week. On Monday morning they will be at Agnor-Hurt Elementary in Albemarle. On Wednesday morning, they will be at Louisa County High School, and on Thursday morning they will be at the Earlysville Fire Department. You’ll need to call 434-972-6261 to schedule an appointment. (VDH page on testing sites)

As for Albemarle County schools, the second of three town halls will be held this afternoon at 2 p.m. and will be hosted by School Board members Katrina Callsen and Ellen Osborne. Monday’s meeting at 6 p.m. will be hosted by Judy Le and Katrina Callsen. (meeting information)

Across the Commonwealth, more school systems are considering a pathway of online only for at least the beginning of the school year. Loudoun County voted earlier this week to not hold classes in person. York County’s superintendent is recommending the division go with remote learning for the first nine weeks, according to the Daily Press. That county’s school board will vote on July 30.

Dr. Bonds did not offer a recommendation on what Albemarle should do, but said that if classes are held in-person, facial covering must be normalized and contact between students must be limited. She gave this advice.

“If school is to be held in season, to really work on cohorting kids in small groups and limit the use of shared spaces. So small groups of students that stay in their classroom, go out to the playground together, and try and bring resources to the students. Can meals be brought to the student classroom. With library time, is there a way to bring those books be brought to the student classroom? And then if you are in a situation where normally students would rotate to different classrooms, can you instead in the same classroom, rotate faculty between?”

Last night, the three Places29 Community Advisory Council met virtually and got an update on development in Albemarle County’urban area. For instance, County planner said there are currently 365 units in the site plan review process for North Pointe. North Pointe was originally rezoned in 2006 but has not been under construction until recently.

Other topics included the status of a new Autozone slated for U.S. 29 north of Greenbrier Drive, what’s going on with an office complex at the corner of Georgetown Road and Hydraulic Road, and a full update on transportation projects in the area. One of them will eventually connect the UVA Research Park directly to Hollymead Town Center by extending Berkmar Drive northward. Transportation planner Kevin McDermott explains.

“We have the Lewis and Clark Extension that brings you down to Airport Road but as those folks that go up there know, currently Berkmar doesn’t make it all the way up to Airport Road,” McDermott said. “What we’re trying to do with that project is continue that all the way up to Airport Road where it will be at an intersection with what has been known as Innovation Drive and construct a roundabout there.”

This project is called for in the Places29 Master Plan and is the county’s fifth transportation priority. McDermott said the Virginia Department of Transportation will reveal soon whether the Berkmar project will be funded. (Albemarle County Transportation Priorities 2019 update)

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Today’s edition materializes thanks to the French Press, open every day from 7 to 7 in Waynesboro for delicious coffee and light treats. Cool snacks, and cold and frozen bevvies. Order in advance on the @cloosiv app or call ahead 540.221.6568. See you there at the French Press?

The number of new cases of COVID-19 in Virginia reported today is 844, a lower number than in recent days. There are another three deaths for a total of 2,054. The rolling seven-day average of positive PCR tests had dropped two tenths of a percentage point to 7.7 percent. All localities in the Thomas Jefferson Health District reported COVID-19 cases today for a total of 47. That breaks down to 24 new cases in Albemarle, 14 in Charlottesville, three in Greene, three in Fluvanna, two in Louisa and one in Nelson. The 7-day positive testing rate in the TJHD is 6.5 percent today, up one from yesterday. The VDH has also began releasing more historical records in the online data portal. Until now, the VDH has only been presenting each day’s information as a snapshot.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors on Wednesday discussed measures to help stop further spread of COVID-19 but stopped short of adopting an emergency measure to adopt “necessary regulations to prevent the spread of contagious diseases” which would go beyond what has been authorized by Governor Ralph Northam. Virginia entered into phase 3 of the Forward Virginia plan on July 1, which allowed for indoor restaurant dining and gathering of up to 250 people. Phase 2 places that at 50, and Phase 1 capped it at ten. Some Supervisors have expressed concern that staying in phase 3 will lead to more spread, especially as more University of Virginia students return to the community. After a lengthy discussion, they opted not to adopt the ordinance yet but to further refine some of the potential restrictions. Jeff Richardson is the Albemarle County Executive. (proposed emergency ordinance)

“So there is consensus with this board to move forward and unless there is a special meeting of this board, we will come back on August 5 and you will take a formal note at your regular meeting on August 5 to adopt this local emergency ordinance,” Richardson said.

Supervisor Donna Price said the pause will allow more time to make sure the ordinance is correct and that similar measures can be put in place by the city of Charlottesville and UVA.

“And while I don’t believe that we’re waiting on permission from anyone else I think it’s very helpful to coordinate as much as we can with the city of Charlottesville and UVA,” Price said.

For full coverage of the emergency ordinance, read Allison Wrabel’s story in the Daily Progress.

Sentara Martha Jefferson will hold a free testing event at Washington Park from 5 to 7 p.m. This event is intended for “communities of color” and registration is not required. Dr. Denise Bonds of the Thomas Jefferson Health District told the Board of Supevrisors said both Sentara Martha Jefferson and UVA have helped with testing so far, but the future is not clear.

“I had hoped that UVA would be stepping into the role starting in the next week or so where they would do regular testing events in our community on our behalf,” Bonds said. “They had a plan set up… I got an email last night from the executive vice president of health affair that I think is going to put this in jeopardy.”

Dr. Bonds said the plan had been for UVA to pick up the cost of their own staff time and material costs, but that may no longer be the case. The health director also said that Sentara Martha Hospital has notified her they will not be able to do community testing events after this week.

“So what went from really widespread testing availability for our community members has now dropped down to our testing team and the CVS commercial sites. And while I think it’s very great that CVS is willing to do it. I will just say that they send it to Quest Labs and you won’t get your result back for ten days. And that is useless. That doesn’t help me if it takes ten days to get a test result back.”

We have asked for comment from both the University of Virginia Health System as well as Sentara Martha Jefferson and will bring you more in a future installment. More on this topic on the next episode of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

The director of Science, Engineering and STEM for Charlottesville City Schools has teamed up with a pediatrics professor at the University of Virginia to raise money for education supplies for families who may not have the resources. Nigel Standish and Sana Syed are seeking to raise $30,000 to build boxes with measuring tape, scissors, thermometers, and other scientific tools. According to their Go Fund Me page, this would help provide a full year’s materials for families in need whose children attend the city’s six elementary schools. (Go Fund Me page)

Today is a quiet day in government meetings. Three separate groups that make up the Places29 Community Advisory Committee will hold a virtual meeting at 630 p.m. to be introduced to Albemarle’s new planning director. Charles Rapp recently took over the position after serving in a similar role for the town of Culpeper. In an email sent to Community Engagement yesterday, he said the county is getting ready for a transportation study of the Rio Road area. Several developments have been opposed by nearby residents who have concerns about traffic issues. Some of them will have the chance to raise questions at this meeting. There will also be updates on the county’s development dashboards, which are intended to give people a sense of how many more new buildings are on the way. (agenda)

Tomorrow, Preservation Virginia will hold a free webinar on “The Role of Historic Preservation in Recovering from the COVID-19 Pandemic.” The event begins at 10 a.m. and registration is required. (register)

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Today’s assemblage of pertinent information is brought to you by the College Inn, a place that is ready to bring you a variety of food and beverages throughout Charlottesville via delivery. That includes ice cream! Place your order online at thecollegeinn.com or phone 977-2710.

The governors of both New York and New Jersey have placed Virginia on a list of states from where travelers are expected to self isolate for 14 days if they plan to travel there. According to a press release from Governor Phil Murphy, this travel advisory applies to states where the seven day positive testing rate is higher than ten or where the positive rate is higher than 10 per 10,000 residents. In New Jersey, that applies to 31 states as of yesterday. That applies to New Jersey residents who have traveled to Virginia or those other places. Travelers to New York arriving by airplane are now required to fill out a form with information about where the 14-day quarantine will take place.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors will meet at 1 p.m. to discuss a potential return to Phase 2 restrictions in the county. The six-member body discussed the matter last week and asked staff to come back with information about how the county might enforce guidelines intended to prevent further spread of the novel coronavirus.

The school year is fast approaching and the conversation over whether in-person classes should be held continues. The athletic director for the City of Charlottesville has “decided to suspend upcoming athletic conditioning and workout sessions” until it is more clear whether sporting events will take place this fall. Rodney Redd sent an email to city school parents Tuesday announcing a decision about to proceed locally will come after the Virginia High School announces their plans for the upcoming school year. That’s expected to take place on Monday, July 27.

The City School Board will meet on Thursday July 30 to determine their path forward. City Schools Superintendent Rosa Atkins has proposed starting school on September 8, the same as Albemarle County. Right now both jurisdictions are preparing a series of options to proceed, including online-only options, and a final decision for both is fast approaching. Albemarle County will hold three town halls to gather input on how to proceed, with the first happening on Thursday at 12:30 p.m. The other two dates are Friday, July 24 at 2 p.m. and Monday, July 27 at 6 p.m. Until then, both systems are continuing to provide meal deliveries. Charlottesville City Schools are still doing meal deliveries on Mondays and Wednesdays. Albemarle has a series of events on different days. (Albemarle Return to School page) (Charlottesville schools page)

The Greene County Board of Supervisors held an emergency meeting last night to discuss their next steps now that the Rapidan Service Authority has taken an action that puts the creation of a new reservoir in jeopardy. On July 14, Greene Supervisors voted to increase monthly facility fees to help fund the White Run Reservoir project. The Rapidan Service Authority's Board of Directors consists of two representatives each from Greene, Orange and Madison Counties. They met on July 16 and Greene County Administrator Mark B. Taylor said there was no indication that the RSA would take a vote that could end the reservoir project.

"The RSA agenda makes no mention and gives no indication of what turned out to be an obviously prearranged action that was taken by the RSA Board and that is an item to consider termination of facility fees," Taylor said.

Taylor said the RSA hid the item from Greene County's view and the public's view. The four representatives from Madison and Orange voted to terminate the fees, while Greene's voted against that idea.

A press release sent out on July 16 by the RSA that “as of July 17, the RSA Board of Directors will require that all water availability fees in Greene County be paid directly to the Rapidan Service Authority” and that the RSA “will no longer bill or collect water facility fees or sewer facility fees.”

"It should be pointed out that that is contrary to agreements signed by both the RSA and Greene County," Taylor said.

The expansion of the water supply for Greene County's designated growth area has a cost estimate of between $45 million and $60 million. Taylor said RSA has been made aware of the plans to date.

Greene Supervisor Chair Bill Martin, and RSA member, said the county has anticipated that its future growth depends on a new reservoir for water storage rather than relying on taking in water from the Rapidan River. He said he objected to the motion.

"I also followed that up by saying that 'Am I now hearing that water service can't proceed with the run of the river philosophy, even after these years of knowing we needed more than what was coming down out of the mountains down under the bridge at 29 where the water intake pipe is," Martin said.

The Greene Board of Supervisors took no action. Look for extended coverage in the Greene County Record. (RSA July 16, 2020 agenda)

A Charlottesville-based firm that arranges educational trips for school children across the country has declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy, according to an article in the Daily Progress. Worldstrides was sold to a European private equity firm in 2016, and the filing in the Southern District of New York offers a path for the original owners to buy the company back. A press release quotes president Robert Gogel as saying the pandemic brought the tourism industry to a standstill, but “our owners and our lenders continue to believe in the long-term opportunity for WorldStrides.” The company is the 6th largest employer in the city of Charlottesville according to the Virginia Employment Commission. (press release)

In other meetings today, The Metropolitan Planning Organization Policy Board (MPO) meets at 4 p.m. The two Charlottesville City Councilors and two Albemarle Supervisors will review the area’s Smart Scale submissions. They will also discuss an update to the federally-required Public Participation Plan, consider support for the INVEST in America Act and the Long Bridge Act,

The Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee will hold a virtual meeting at 12 p.m. (agenda)

The Albemarle Broadband Authority (ABBA) meets at 5 p.m. for a virtual meeting. (access information) (previous agendas and video)

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Today’s edition of the program is sponsored by Mead Oriental Rugs, located on 4th Street NE. Open by appointment, call 971-8077 to set up your visit. Learn more at the Instagram account Rug Merchants Daughter.

The Virginia Department of Health has posted another 996 new COVID-19 cases this morning, and the seven-day positive rate for all testing encounters has risen to 8.2 percent statewide, up from 7.7 on Monday. VDH reports another 17 deaths for a cumulative total of 2,048. Another death has been reported in the Thomas Jefferson Health District for a cumulative total of 30. The TJHD reports 26 new COVID cases with ten in Albemarle, six in Charlottesville, four in Greene, five in Fluvanna, and one in Nelson. The positive test percentage for all testing encounters is 6.7 percent, down one tenth of a percentage point from yesterday.

There are no scheduled public COVID-19 mass-testing events today, but several are coming up in the days to come. Free drive-through tests will be offered on Wednesday in Nelson County at the Rockfish River Elementary School from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. Appointments are required and you can call 434-972-6261 today. Drive-through tests will be conducted in Fluvanna County at the Kents Store ARC Community Center. Also call 434-972-6261 to sign up. Sentara Martha Jefferson will hold a free event at Washington Park on Thursday from 5 to 7 p.m. This event is intended for “communities of color” and registration is not required.

Charlottesville City Council concluded their meeting last night at around 2:30 a.m. after a full meeting that will take another day to get through. Earlier in the evening, Council agreed to proceed with a funding request to redevelop the intersection of Preston and Grady, along with three other transportation projects. Council voted 3-2 on a motion to proceed with Smart Scale applications that are due in early August. Several nearby residents had asked for the Preston/Grady project to be put on hold. Vizena Howard is the president of the 10th and Page Neighborhood and she said that nearly 300 signatures were collected opposing the project.

"I believe that rerouting the traffic through Grady Avenue is an error with which a high volume of traffic would create additional congestion issues for residents on the adjacent side of the street," Howard said. "And I believe it's important more than ever that those in positions of power to be listening to residents who have long lived in this neighborhood," Howard said.

City traffic engineer Brennan Duncan explained he did not think vehicles would be pushed onto Grady Avenue because many want to get elsewhere. He said future development on Preston Avenue as well as the redeveloped Dairy Central require the intersection to be reconfigured. He said the current configuration is flawed.

"We know the history of it and we know that when Preston happened it did separate the historically African American community of 10th and Page from Washington Park," Duncan said. "Reducing this back down to one intersection and one light where we can control pedestrian crossings I think is a huge benefit for trying to reconnect that community to the park that was historically theirs."

The Preston project was supported by Mayor Nikuyah Walker and Councilors Lloyd Snook and Heather Hill. Vice Mayor Sena Magill and Councilor Michael Payne opposed it. Payne said the Smart Scale process itself needs to be reviewed.

"I think it tends to promote urban sprawl, it is a flawed process, granted its out of our control, and this is the kind of thing where if we were to approve it tonight it's still ten years until anything even begins to happen and if we didn't approve it that could be fourteen or fifteen years maybe even longer than that," Payne said. "My concern is about what happens with the institutional inertia of this process and outside out of our intentions about the future of the corridor, what will actually happen."

The Smart Scale applications next go before the Metropolitan Planning Organization’s Policy Board at their meeting on Wednesday.

In other city infrastructure news, the construction on the Belmont Bridge is now expected to begin in spring of 2021. City transportation staffer Jeannete Janiczek sent an email that stated Council will be briefed on funding for the project. There are $5 million in the current year’s Capital Improvement Program to pay for previous design work, which has been in process since 2010. There is also a plan in the works to create sixty temporary parking spaces to replace that will be lost under the bridge. (update)

The developer of a proposed 370-unit apartment and townhouse complex near Forest Lakes on U.S. 29 had the chance Monday to share details of the plan in a public community meeting. RST Development of Virginia Beach purchased the Ridgewood Mobile Home Park and a former motel last fall for around $6 million and are seeking a rezoning for more residential density. Valerie Long of the firm Williams Mullen represents RST Development.

“We’re proposing a maximum of 370 units which is comprised of 254 apartments and 108 townhome units,” Long said.

One member of the public asked what would happen to the residents of the mobile home park. Long said there are plans to address their future housing needs.

“Our project team has been working very closely with them since they purchased the property in November,” Long said. “Some may know that it was under common ownership and management by a prior owner for over thirty years and he was managing it for over 30 years all along to our understanding and Scott and Todd at RST Development started meeting with him. One of the first things he cared about the most was that the residents in the community had plenty of time to make another arrangements and not be displaced on short notice.”

Long said residents have until November to find a place, but RST Development is willing to grant an extension. The rezoning will now move on to the Planning Commission for a public hearing in the near future.

In today’s meetings, the Greene County Board of Supervisors will have an emergency meeting tonight at 6:30 p.m. to discuss the decision last week by the Rapidan Service Authority to take away Greene’s administration of a plan to create a reservoir. The Albemarle Economic Development Authority meets at 4 p.m. for a virtual meeting. There will be a presentation on the CvilleBioHub from executive director Nikki Hastings, an update on business relief funding through the CARES Act, and a resolution to transfer grant money to WillowTree related to their move to the redeveloped Woolen Mills. There will also be a review of the Albemarle Community Survey.

There are two public hearings on the agenda for the Albemarle County Planning Commission. In the first, a change in the zoning ordinance is being reviewed to allow landscape contractors to operate within the rural area. (staff report) In the second, Stanley Martin is seeking changes to the proffers for Spring Hill Village, a planned 100-unit community off of Avon Street Extended. They are seeking changes to the transportation improvements agreed upon at the rezoning in the fall of 2014. (staff report)

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Today is the 51st anniversary of the first people stepping foot on the moon. Today’s installment comes to you from Rapture, now serving lunch and dinner on Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall weather permitting. Open from noon to nine Tuesday through Saturday, visit Rapture on Facebook to learn more.

There have now been nearly a million COVID-19 tests conducted in the Commonwealth, according to data from the Virginia Department of Health. On Saturday and Sunday the number of new cases increased by around a thousand each day, and the 7-day positive percentage rate for all testing encounters rose to 7.6 percent as of Sunday, up from 6.6 percent on July 12. The Thomas Jefferson Health District added another 41 cases and the positive percentage rate for all tests is at 7.1 percent as of Sunday.

According to the latest COVID-19 model run by the University of Virginia Biocomplexity Institute, the Thomas Jefferson Health District is experiencing a “surge in cases.” That’s the same case with the Pittsylvania-Danville District and eight health districts in the Hampton Roads area. The reproduction rate for the novel coronavirus statewide is at 1.137. Numbers higher than 1 represent the possibility for community spread. The model, which was released Friday, estimates that 656,034 cases of COVID-19 have been avoided since May 15 due to physical distancing and facial covering protocols. (July 17 report)

The expansion of Greene County’s water supply appeared to be heading toward construction but an action taken Thursday by a regional body with jurisdiction over the matter calls that future into question. According to the Greene County Record, the Rapidan Service Authority voted 4-2 to “assume leadership” of the process to determine the future of the water supply plan mandated by Virginia law. They also effectively overturned a decision last week by the Greene County Board of Supervisors to increase facility fees to help pay for the White Run Reservoir project which has an estimated total cost of between $45 million and $60 million. The five-member Greene BOS will hold a special emergency meeting Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. to receive information about the project. (agenda) (Greene County record story)

A thirty-year old Albemarle County man is dead following a crash Saturday evening at the intersection of 5th Street Extended and Harris Road. Charlottesville police have identified Dustin Ryan Parr as the deceased. According to a press release, Albemarle Police were called to a crash at U.S. 250 and Hunter’s Way where a Toyota pickup truck had fled the scene. Several people called 911 to report the vehicle “driving erratically at numerous locations.” At ten to seven, the truck collided with a sedan at the 5th Street and Harris intersection and the driver of the truck died.

Albemarle County will hand out free masks and facial coverings this week at several locations. If you or someone you know is interested, the procedure is to drive up, roll down the passenger side window, and a member of staff will place the item in the passenger seat. Today’s event is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m at the Greenwood Community Center. Tuesday’s will take place at the same time at the Free Union Country School, Wednesday’s at Barracks West, and Thursday’s at the Covenant School on Hickory Street. On Friday, staff will give out free masks at the Crossroad Country Store from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. and at the Yancey School Community Center from 2 to 6.

Ridership is down on transit vehicles, but the head of the one agency is preparing for a future in which it is easier for people to call buses to pick them up closer to their home. Last week, Jaunt CEO Brad Sheffield began an educational campaign for a new on-demand service he would like to see integrated among Jaunt, Charlottesville Area Transit and the University Transit System. Sheffield shopped the idea around to the Board of Supervisors last week.

“I’m hearing some similar ideas popping up here and there and so as it is the case, we sometimes see duplicate efforts and there’s no cross-communication and that ends up wasting a lot of resources and time,” Sheffield said.

Jaunt has applied for a federal grant to help pursue the idea and a pilot project is under way to help people get to the Loaves and Fishes food pantry on Lambs Road.

“This on-demand initiative looks at shaping schedules around the actual requests that come through so over time we’re able to better response more immediately to those needs,” Sheffield said.

Sheffield will make the same presentation with the Charlottesville City Council on August 3 and the Charlottesville Planning Commission on August 11.

It’s a busy day for virtual government meetings today. There will be a community meeting tonight at 6:30 p.m. in Albemarle County for a proposed rezoning that would replace a mobile home court and motel on U.S. 29 near Forest Lakes with 370 new residents. RST of Virginia Beach purchased the land for about $6 million last October. (site plan) (register for meeting)

City Council has a packed agenda with action on four transportation projects, a rezoning in Fry’s Spring, and allocation of $2.29 million in funding for nonprofit agencies. There are two requests to amend city code. One would ban the “possession, carrying, or transportation of firearms, ammunition, or components or combinations in certain public spaces.” The General Assembly passed enabling legislation to allow such prohibitions earlier this year. In the other, the city would make June 19 an official holiday to mark Juneteenth. Another item on the agenda would request legislation to give more subpoena powers to police civilian review boards. (resolution)

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The number of cases of COVID-19 in Virginia has increased by another 1,002 cases, and the percent positive rate rate for all testing encounters has risen to 7.4 percent. That number was 7.1 percent on Thursday. There have now been 2,013 fatalities. Yesterday the Health District reported another 14 new cases and today reported another 23 cases for a cumulative total of 1,335 cases. Since Wednesday, that’s ten new cases in Albemarle, 15 in Charlottesville, four in Greene, three in Fluvanna, four in Louisa and 1 in Nelson. There have been 29 fatalities but none reported since July 7. The positive percentage rate is 7.4 percent for the PCR test, and 7.2 for all tests.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors will meet sometime next week to discuss what steps the county might take to prevent further spread of COVID-19. The six elected officials brought the matter up at the end of Wednesday’s meeting after getting a briefing from health officials. Here’s Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District.

“I think there was a fairly strong consensus about concern over moving from phase two to phase three, but the board did not take a formal vote and did not take a formal action,” Price said.

Some supervisors are concerned that the large gathering permitted under Phase Three of the Forward Virginia plan will lead to more infections, and some want to tell Governor Ralph Northam to go back to Phase 2, which limited gatherings to 50 people or fewer. Supervisors aren’t scheduled to meet again until August 5, but Price said there is a need for a special meeting.

“What we’re anticipating is a meeting next week where we will have more information from the Virginia Department of Health,” Price said. “We’re looking to have consultation with the city of Charlottesville, UVA. Obviously from my perspective we’re going to also include the town of Scottsville.”

Price said she is concerned about what the next few months may be like and is concerned many have become fatigued by physical distancing and facial covering guidelines. The supervisor made her comments at the virtual meeting of the 5th and Avon Community Advisory Committee.

A local group that studies public policy in the area reports that tourism activity was down 58 percent in March and April. The Free Enterprise Forum reviewed transient occupancy and meals tax records from Albemarle and Charlottesville in its research. Neil Williamson is the organization’s president.

“The fact that tourism activity is down 58 percent is dramatic,” Williamson said “ You have to remember that the taxes are collected one month after the activity occurs, so when you look at May taxes, it’s really reflecting April activity. In May 2020, the city collected nearly 50 percent less, about a million dollars less, in meals tax revenue compared to 2019 or even 2018.

Williamson said the Free Enterprise Forum will continue to look at the numbers. When asked what steps he would recommend to improve those numbers, he urged people to follow the guidelines to stop the spread of COVID-19. (blog post)

“I think it’s critically important that customers and employees follow the protocols. It is for the safety of everyone to follow the safety protocols,” Williamson said. “Wear the mask.”

This week, Albemarle County launched an initiative to help businesses get through the downturn in the economy. The $1.25 million Lift Grant program will provide some funding for up to 100 small businesses. Roger Johnson is the county’s economic development director.

“We want to provide aid to small businesses, all businesses in Albemarle County, giving a preference to women, minority and veteran owned businesses, as well as the hospitality and tourism industry. As for why we gave preference to the tourism industry, they have a direct economic impact in our community of over $400 million.”

A webinar will be held on the Lift Grant program on July 27 at noon. (press release)

The University of Virginia has released its latest plans for on Grounds opening for the fall semester. Students will be asked to self-quarantine for 14 days before returning, and must have a negative COVID-19 test to attend in-person classes. The plan has details about how UVA will hire a third-party vendor to provide tests for students. All students, faculty and staff will be required to have a daily health check and must wear facial coverings. Everyone on Grounds will be given a touch tool to open doors, and there will be 2,600 free-standing hand sanitizer stations. Dining rooms will be open at 50 percent capacity, but takeout options will be increased. More information can be found in the five-page plan. (the plan)

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Virginia’s COVID-19 death toll is now 2,007 based on new information released this morning. The Virginia Department of Health reports another 904 new cases today, and reported 1,084 new cases on Wednesday. That brings the total number of cases to 74,431. The statewide 7-day positive percentage for all testing encounters has increased to 7.1 percent.

Updated figures from the Thomas Jefferson Health District were unavailable at recording time.

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors is considering sending a letter to Governor Ralph Northam asking for permission for the county to move back to Phase 2 of the Forward Virginia plan, which would reduce the size of allowed public gatherings from 200 people to 50. It would also close indoor dining. Supervisor Ann Mallek is concerned there will be a spike in cases.

“I would encourage everybody to think about whether we really want to be in phase 3,” said Ann Mallek.

Supervisor Diantha McKeel shared that concern and suggested sending a letter to Governor Northam especially with the University of Virginia possibly returning in weeks.

“I am very concerned about 20,000 students coming back,” McKeel said. “We now have our school division that’s saying they’re struggling to even get enough teachers.

County staff said they would need to review whether they could enforce local rules if Governor Northam did not move back to phase two. Supervisors may hold a special meeting to further discuss the letter and next steps for the pandemic response. County Executive Jeffrey Richardson said that county office buildings will remain closed to the public and meetings will continue to be held virtually.

Do you or someone you know need assistance paying your rent or your mortgage due to the pandemic? A local organization has begun coordination of Virginia’s Rent and Mortgage Relief Program. The Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission has a central website for information on how to apply for relief funding in Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, and Nelson Counties, as well as the city of Charlottesville. Details on eligibility are on the website, which can be seen in the show notes and the newsletter version of this newscast. (more info)

The Dean of the Students at the University of Virginia has written a letter to undergraduates warning them that continued public gatherings in violation of COVID-19 restrictions could end plans to return to on Grounds instruction about a month from now. Dean Allen Groves responded to photographs and accounts of students crowding into Corner bars and fraternity houses, with people not wearing masks or staying six feet apart. Groves called such activities “selfish and ignorant” and chided them to follow the rules. He stated – “If such behavior continues, we will not make it long into the fall semester before a significant outbreak occurs and we then need to send students home.” (NBC29 story)

There will be another COVID-19 testing event this evening at Booker T. Washington Park in Charlottesville from 5 to 7 p.m. Sentara Martha Jefferson does not require preregistration for the event, which is being offered at no cost with a focus on “communities of color.” People can either drive through or walk up. There will be another event at the same time and place on Thursday, July 23. The University of Virginia Health System will have a COVID-19 test at Buford Middle School on Saturday from July 18 from 2 to 5 p.m. This event is also offered for free. More details on events in Nelson County and Greene County coming in the days to come, or on the Thomas Jefferson Health District website. (testing information)

In recent years, many people across the world have opened their doors to paying guests who seek short-term rentals. The AirBnB phenomenon has led some to question the impact this may have on the availability of affordable places for people who live here. Phil d’Oronzio is the chair of the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee, or HAC.

“There had been some queries to the HAC about the impact of short-term rentals, AirBnB and their analogues, and its impact on housing stock,” d’Oronzio said.

The HAC reached out to the Center for Civic Innovation at SmartCville to take a look at the underlying data. Nathan Day is one of the fellows who took a look at property records and zoning for an initial report to share with the many members of the HAC. (Smart Cville blog entry)

“This is a data gathering from my standpoint,” said Day. “I’m good at getting data and visualizing it but I rely on experts like you for the interpretation and what the policy changes will make going forward.”

The data was collected prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, and has not been collected since. The study found that about one percent of the city’s total housing stock is being used for transient use, or about 200 units.

“It’s a small fraction of the total number of houses out there and we haven’t begun to dive into what that trend looks like over time because I think that’s the next question,” Day said.

Joy Johnson represents the Public Housing Association of Residents.

“I’m just wondering how many of those AirBnB is actually in the low-income neighborhoods or around the low-income neighborhoods because we know that a lot of houses are being bought up in our neighborhoods,” Johnson said.

Work will continue on the details of the study.

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Today’s edition of the program is sponsored by Mead Oriental Rugs, located on 4th Street NE. Open by appointment, call 971-8077 to set up your visit. Mead Oriental Rugs.

Governor Ralph Northam held his first press conference in three weeks Tuesday and stated there are currently no plans to move on with an additional phase in the Forward Virginia plan. That’s because there is an increasing number of positive COVID cases in eastern Virginia.

“The eastern region’s moving seven day average of new cases was around 60 in early June. Today that average is 346.”

Northam said the percent positive rate in eastern Virginia is 10.1 percent, which is causing concern that there is “substantial community spread.” The percentage in the Thomas Jefferson Health District around Charlottesville is around eight percent. The governor said he is directing the Alcoholic Beverage Control and other agencies to step up enforcement of masks in indoor restaurants

“It’s just like the signs in so many store windows that say no shirt, no shoes, no service. Now it should be no shirt, no shoes, no mask, no service.”

Northam said he is directing alcohol sales to stop at 11 each night. More information from this press conference can be heard in the next installment of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report.

The Greene County Board of Supervisors held a public hearing to get comment on proposed fee increases to help cover the cost of building a new reservoir. Mark B. Taylor is the Greene County administrator.

“The water supply project that Greene County is undertaking is responding to a very real need. Our existing water system works pretty well in wet years, but our customer’s peak demand exceeds the capacity of our water plan. When it’s not wet, Greene County has problems.”

Taylor said Greene’s ability to support a growing population depends on building the White Run Reservoir, a plan approved in 2009 and updated in 2011. The Rapidan Service Authority increased has some fees already. The land for the reservoir has been completed, and now negotiations are underway for easements for water pipeline from the Rapidan River to the reservoir. (meeting presentation)

The Daily Progress is reporting that the Albemarle County School Board is preparing plans to begin the school year entirely online. More than five hundred teachers and school staff signed an open letter asking Superintendent Matt Haas to prepare for online learning given the potential risks of opening schools while positive cases increase locally. Last week, Haas presented a plan that would echo Charlottesville’s plan to have elementary students attend four days a week and middle and high school students. Read Katherine Knott’s story in today’s paper for more details.

Today in government meetings, the Charlottesville Housing Advisory Committee meets virtually at noon, and the Albemarle Board of Supervisors meets at one. The HAC will be presented with the findings of analysis and visualization on how AirBnB and other short-term rentals are affecting the housing market. The presentation was made by a group associated with SmartCville. The Board of Supervisors will talk about how human services agencies are funded, details on a $1.25 million grant program for businesses affected by COVID-19, and how to improve stream health. There will also be a presentation from Jaunt on how on-demand transit could help provide more options for people who don’t have a car, or who choose not to drive. (agenda)

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The Virginia Department of Health is reporting another 801 cases of COVID-19 this morning, bringing the cumulative total to 72,443. Nine more deaths have been reported for a total of 1,977. The 7-day percent positive rate for all testing encounters has risen again to 6.8 percent. That’s the third day in a row that metric has increased by a tenth of a percent. In the Thomas Jefferson Health District, there are 41 new cases reported today for a cumulative total of 1,277. The 7-day positivity rate in the area for all testing encounters is 7.5 percent based on 27,858 tests.

It has now been four months since the State of Emergency was declared in Virginia for the COVID-19 pandemic. Mayor Nikuyah Walker and other city officials held a press conference yesterday to reinforce the need for vigilance.

“After a few months spending trying to figure out how we protect each other, I think we all understand that we at some point have reached a fatigue around this COVID-19 virus. There have been a lot of mixed messages from state, federal and even here at the local level and it’s been a very confusing time to try to figure out how to keep yourself and your family safe.”

Mayor Walker and other speakers warned that the fatigue can be hazardous as people stop using masks and stop keeping physical distance. Dr. Denise Bonds of the Thomas Jefferson Health District said her agency is responsible for enforcement of directives requiring facial coverings.

“To date we’ve had 180 complaints almost all of them related to individuals not wearing masks in restaurants or shops. Our policy right now is to inform and educate for the first few times we get a complaint about a particular organization. If the complaint continues and its an agency that we are responsible for regulating, we do have the authority to issue more serious compliance orders with that.

The full video of the press conference can be seen on the city of Charlottesville’s archive and excerpts will be included in the next edition of the Charlottesville Quarantine Report. Governor Ralph Northam will hold his first press COVID-19 conference in several weeks.

A University of Virginia media studies professor has published an article in the Guardian about whether American schools are ready to reopen in the fall. Siva Vaidhyanathan writes in a July 13 article that Charlottesville schools are not prepared to reopen, and he writes that the pressure from the federal government to resume in-person classes isn’t helping. Albemarle County plans to open on September 8 with students attending school twice a week in two different cohorts, with schools Friday for a teacher workday and deep cleaning. Charlottesville is considering a plan that would see students in kindergarten through 6th grade attend school days four a week, and older students on the same plan as Albemarle. A growing number of faculty and staff are pushing back on the concept as a number of metrics appears to indicate further caution. (Open letter to Albemarle County schools) (Siva Vaidhyanathan article in the Guardian)

In government meetings today, the Charlottesville Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on how to spend nearly an additional $250,000 in federal funding for COVID-19 relief, as well as a rezoning that would allow a car wash located on Long Street to expand onto a nearby property. The Albemarle County Planning Commission will take consider a request to fill in the flood plain for a stream crossing to enable more homes in Crozet. And the Greene County Board of Supervisors will hold a public hearing on raising water connection fees to help raise funds for a proposed reservoir.

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This is the first in a series of newsletters and newscasts about community engagement in the area around Charlottesville. I’ve spent the last thirteen years very close to many different processes, and my goal with this newsletter is to bring you information every single day about what’s going on.

Over the weekend, there were three consecutive days where more than 800 new cases of COVID-19 were reported in Virginia, That brings the cumulative number of cases to 70,670, with a reported 1,966 deaths. The 7-day percent positive metric for all testing encounters has risen from 5.9 percent on July 5 to 6.6 percent on Sunday. Meanwhile the Thomas Jefferson Health District reported 35 new cases on Sunday and 29 new cases on Saturday for a cumulative total of 1,208. There were also reports of outbreaks at two area long-term care facilities. Nationwide, there were 62,918 new cases reported in Virginia, for a total of 3.2 million. (Virginia Department of Health COVID-19 page)

A forecast model produced by the University of Virginia estimates that 495,799 cases of COVID-19 have been avoided since May 15 due to physical distancing and other measures. That comes from the July 10 update produced by the UVA Biocomplexity Institute, which also states that the novel coronavirus now has a reproduction rate of 1.124. That’s an indicator of how the disease spreads, and numbers above 1 raise concern. (July 10 update)

The community of Forest Lakes opted to close their outdoor pools on Friday, July 10 "out of an abundance of caution, due to an indirect exposure of the COVID virus." That's according to an email sent out by the Forest Lakes Community Association. They said the pools would reopen after being sanitized.

Charlottesville City Hall will reopen on a limited basis beginning on July 10 for in-person transactions with either the Commissioner of Revenue's office or Treasurer's office. However, you'll need to make an appointment to do so. (press release)

Moving on to Community Engagement news, Albemarle County has hired a Washington D.C. firm to help conduct a new round of analysis of the future of the area around the Rio Road and U.S. 29 intersection. Smart Growth America will "review and provide comments on a draft, form-based code for the Rio29 area and/or provide hypothetical design scenarios for properties in the study area." Supervisors adopted a master plan for the Rio-29 area in December 2018, and that included a recommendation to update the zoning ordinance to allow for creation of a "vibrant and diverse mixed-use community with interesting character and a human-scale built environment." Supervisors heard an update on the plan earlier this month.

A child care center that failed to get approval from Albemarle Supervisors for a new home on Pantops has purchased land on East Market Street in downtown Charlottesville. An LLC associated with Our Neighborhood Child Development Center has purchased the site of the former ABC Preschool on East Market Street for $1.325 million. That's about 20 percent below the 2020 assessment. ABC Preschool closed its doors last October five years after opening in a new building. In May, Supervisors deadlocked 3-3 on a request to build in the flood plain to allow for the Our Neighborhood center to move to a location on Stony Point Road.

And that’s it for the July 13 edition of the Community Engagement newscast, picking up from our last such event from late January 2019. The world has changed a lot since then, and I’m putting myself in a position to help bring you information to help get you through these times. Please consider supporting my Patreon account with a modest monthly donation so I can keep going and get my eye back on the world around us. I’m Sean Tubbs, and thanks for listening.

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Charlottesville Community Engagement: Recent Episodes

Town Crier Productions

4 is the Department of Defense and the various military installations at Rivanna Station (4.77 miles away)

6 is the Crutchfield Corporation which operates by the Charlottesville Regional Airport (3.5 miles away)

7 is the Northrup Grumman Corporation located in between both sides of Stonefield on U.S. 29 (4.4 miles away)

9 is Wal-Mart located just south of the South Fork of the Rivanna River on US. 29 (2.2 miles away)

18 is Emerson (listed as G.E. Fanuc) on U.S. 29 north of North Pointe (5.2 miles)

29 is Costco in Stonefield on U.S. 29 (4.5 miles away)

32 is Target in Hollymead Town Center (2 miles away)

36 is MicroAire Surgical Instruments in the former U.S. Postal Service building off of Airport Road (2.75 miles away)

38 is Rosewood Village Associates with facilities in Hollymead Town Center (2.4 miles away)