Today is the first day of the year that many readers and listeners to Charlottesville Community Engagement will not have a vacation day and some may be in withdrawal. If this description fits you, we turn now to a website for fake holidays to help get you through. Though, I’m not sure Humiliation Day will cheer anyone up. It seems like really bad timing for Festival of Sleep Day. Fruitcake Toss Day? Perhaps it is time to see that website’s manager. Either way, I’m Sean Tubbs, and I believe there’s something to celebrate every day.
On today’s program:
A quick review of the latest report from interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers, including the naming of an interim City Attorney
Another dozen or so bills have been filed for the 2023 General Assembly including two from Republicans that seek to repeal Democratic legislation on marijuana arrests and voter-ID requirements
An update on the city’s future Meadow Creek Trail and other Parks and Recreation matters
Charlottesville City Council is set to vote on a critical slopes waiver tonight for a development in Fry’s Spring, but will likely not talk about it
First shout-out: Charlottesville Jazz Society
In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out, the Charlottesville Jazz Society wants you to keep three dates in mind for live music in the first few months of 2023. On February 11, Charlottesville Jazz Society will have an event with the Allison Miller and Carmen Staaf duo. On March 22, it will be time for the Charlie Ballantine Trio. Then on April 20, there’s Monika Herzig’s Joni Mitchell Project. For details on all of the live music, do check out the Charlottesville Jazz Society’s website at cvillejazz.org.
Charlottesville City manager report: Interim City Attorney in place
Later on this evening, the Charlottesville City Council will have their first meeting of the year. One of the items is a report from interim City Manager Michael C. Rogers who will celebrate his one year anniversary on January 31. These written reports provide a glimpse into the operations of the city government and here are some of the highlights. (read the report)
Allyson Davies is serving as the city’s interim City Attorney following the sudden resignation of Lisa Robertson late last month. Davies has been with the office for many years. The position has been advertised. Rogers writes that he wants the position filled in three months.
The city has hired a labor relations manager to manage the new collective bargaining ordinance which went into effect on January 1. Petitions and elections will be conducted in February with the first bargaining period set to begin in March.
Seven firms have responded to a request for a firm to conduct the city’s next strategic plan. A selection will be made by the end of the month with the work set to begin in February. Strategic plans help local governments prioritize what staff members should be doing.
The pedestrian tunnel under the Belmont Bridge has reopened. A mid-block crossing at Graves Street will be permanently closed once a sidewalk between Graves and Levy is completed.
A temporary bus stop has opened on East High Street as a sidewalk is built in front of the AT&T building. The stop was recently moved to prevent impatient and potentially unstable motorists from using parking lots to pass stopped buses.
More tonight when this goes before Council. What’s on the agenda? Take a look at the details in yesterday’s Week Ahead or review the agenda. What would you want to cover? Leave a comment in the comment section below.
Legislative report: Statewide list of transient occupancy charges?
There are now eight days until the General Assembly convenes for the 2023 session, which will be 45 days long. Another number to keep in mind is 308, which is how many days there are until the November election, in which all 40 seats in the Senate and all 100 seats in the House of Delegates are up for a vote. So let’s take some time now to see what’s been filed.
Delegate John McGuire has filed a bill that would eliminate an age requirement for veterans to be able to file an income tax subtraction. (HB1436)
Delegate Bill Wiley has legislation that would require the Commonwealth Transportation Board to develop a policy to delete and purge collected data and video of users of highways after 30 days. (HB1437)
Delegate Tim Anderson filed a bill to create a nonrefundable tax credit for the donation of oyster shells for restoration projects. (HB1438)
Community colleges would be required to create a process for certain eligible students to have their loans for tuition, fees, and textbooks covered. That’s also from Anderson. (HB1439)
Delegate Joseph McNamara has a bill that would require the Virginia Department of Taxation to publish a list of current transient occupancy rates across the Commonwealth as well as specifying filing requirements for “accommodations intermediaries.” (HB1442)
Delegate Lee Ware has filed legislation that would require photo ID in order to vote, but would allow people who don’t bring one to the polls to cast a provisional ballot. (HB1444)
Public schools would be required to teach mental health education to students if SB818 from Senator Lionell Spruill Sr. becomes law. (SB818)
Another bill from Spruill would prohibit the State Corporation Commission from approving premiums for long-term care insurance to exceed six percent over the current rate. (SB828)
Senator Barbara Favola has a bill that would allow school systems to use alternative methods of determining if students are in need of extra help with reading and mathematics. (SB819)
Another bill from Favola would direct the Virginia Board of Health to require security guards in emergency rooms. (SB827)
Senator Scott Surovell would require law enforcement officers to report the arrest of teachers to superintendents within 48 hours. Current law says the report has to be “as soon as practicable.”
HB1445 from Delegate Scott Wyatt would restore the ability of law enforcement officers to pull motorists over for detecting the odor of marijuana.
Delegate Robert Orrock Sr. has filed a bill that would impose administrative sanctions on certified nursing facilities that do not comply with staffing requirements. (HB1446)
Orrock also filed HB1448 which would require the Department of Education to come up with a model policy for removing books and other items that some deem offensive from school libraries.
Another bill from Orrock would charge a civil penalty of $1,000 for pet stores for not having all of the required documentation for dogs that are sold. (HB1451)
Senator John Bell has two bills related to the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind in Staunton. One would require background checks for Board of Visitors’ members and the other would allow the school to create a police department. (SB825 and SB826)
Parks and Recreation update: Meadow Creek Trail could be completed by summer 2024
Before 2023 can really get underway, there are still some meetings from late 2022 I want to go through. One of them is the December 15 meeting of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee. There were no action items but there were many updates on projects.
The first was a progress update on an effort to complete the Meadow Creek Trail which is intended to span from Michie Drive up northeast to the Virginia Institute for Autism followed by an eastern spur to Greenbrier Park. That’s the number one priority for the parks department, according to planner Chris Gensic.
“We have [Virginia Department of Transportation] grants and then City Council allocated about $1.2 million to add to that pile because we did not get the second round VDOTgrant that we applied for,” Gensic said. “Then we were informed a couple of weeks ago that another city had backed out of a project and if we wanted the extra $800,000 we could have it and we are going full forward with that with [Deputy City Manager] Sam Sanders’ full support.”
Council already allocated the required match. Gensic said that means all three sections of the trail can be completed so that construction can begin. Tonight, Council will finalize allocation of $700,000 from the American Rescue Plan Act.
Work continues on a master plan upgrade for Tonsler Park as well as recent actual upgrades.
“We put new backboards,” said Riann Anthony, the deputy director of the parks and recreation department. “We actually put new bleachers in there per the input session.”
Anthony said there are construction drawings for expansion of the parking lot and that project will go to bid. New lighting has also been installed.
The draft capital improvement program for FY2024 has $175,000 to address drainage issues at the city-owned Oakwood Cemetery on Elliott Avenue.
“Basically if you look at Oakwood Cemetery way at the bottom there are grave spots down there and basically we don’t know why this part is always under water,” Anthony said.
Anthony added that this section of the cemetery was where Black residents were buried during segregation. Some of the work will be to reconstruct the history of that period as well as changing the hydrology.
There was also discussion of several projects that involve collaboration with other entities, such as the proposed site upgrades for the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial in McIntire Park or the future Van Yahres Memorial Grove planned for elsewhere in that location. Anthony said there is a lot of interest in the use of the parks by private groups and there is now a policy in place to govern that kind of work.
A request for proposals for a firm to conduct a master plan will be issued later this year.
Sponsored message: Buy Local
Charlottesville Community Engagement’s continued existence means that many of you support local information. Want to also support some local businesses as this holiday season continues toward the New Year? The Buy Local campaign is in full swing, and both the Albemarle and Charlottesville Offices of Economic Development want people to consider spending locally as they shop this year.
The Buy Local campaign highlights small businesses within Charlottesville and Albemarle County through a multi-channel, multimedia promotional and educational campaign designed to reinforce how important supporting area small businesses is to the local economy.
The campaign will continue long after the holidays. Locally-owned, independent businesses with a brick-and-mortar presence in the City or County interested in being featured in the campaign should visit www.showlocallove.org or contact info@showlocallove.org.
For more information on the Buy Local campaign, visit www.ShowLocalLove.org or follow us on Facebook and Instagram @BuyLocalCvilleAlbemarle or on Twitter @BuyLocalCville.
Council to sign off on Planning Commission recommendation for waiver for 45-unit Fry’s Spring development
Tonight, the Charlottesville City Council will have an item on their consent agenda for approval. Stanley Martin Homes needs a critical slopes waiver to build 45 single-family homes on land in the Fry’s Spring neighborhood between Monte Vista Avenue and Azelia Drive.
“These provisions are intended to direct building locations to terrain more suitable to development and to discourage development on critical slopes,” reads the definition in the city’s zoning code.
The project is opposed by the city’s Tree Commission.
“We are also dismayed about possibly losing one of the few remaining large mature forests in the city when our tree canopy is rapidly declining,” said Peggy Van Yahres, the chair of the Tree Commission. “It has declined to now 40 percent over just four years.”
That data is based on a 2019 study and Van Yahres said the Commission believes it has further declined. (Charlottesville Tree canopy continues to decline, December 9, 2021)
“We feel the public benefits of denying this far outweigh what the developer has proposed,” Van Yahres said. “The developer has proposed a manmade stormwater management system that will have to be maintained by the homeowners when we have a natural forest and natural system that doesn’t need to be maintained.”
Van Yahres made her comments at the general citizen input period at the beginning of the meeting. It would be another five hours before the Planning Commission took up the matter after long public hearings on the Capital Improvement Program and the Comprehensive Plan.
Missy Creasy, the city’s Deputy Director of Neighborhood Development Services, said that this application for a critical slopes waiver is different from others that the Planning Commission has seen throughout the years.
“The development site already has been platted and the lots are non-conforming legal lots of record from around the 1920’s,” Creasy said.
That means that Stanley Martin or any other developer has the right to build the units. Or at least some of them. There are 88 lots and the proposal is to replat them into 45 lots.
“In the current configuration of the site, there are 22 lots currently that are affected by critical slopes,” Creasy said. “However, because they are lots of record and if they are moving forward with single-family, they would be exempt from the critical slopes ordinance.”
Creasy said that because Stanley Martin wants to adjust the boundaries of the lots, the ordinance comes into play. The developer could go completely by-right without the waiver, but Creasy said that would result in more tree loss in order to conform to technical requirements for stormwater and site access.
“The request that they’ve put forward includes preservation of an area that includes 77 trees,” Creasy said. “If they went out there by-right, there are areas of that open space that they are proposing to conserve that would be open to being demolished.”
Scott Collins is the civil engineer hired by Stanley Martin Homes for the project. The company paid $2,423,500 for the properties on August 5, 2019.
“What we did was come forward with the best development that we think fits in well with the neighborhood,” Collins said.
Collins said the land itself is in a valley and currently serves as drainage for property on Azalea and Monte Vista. The plan is to use 0.6 acres of open space to help treat stormwater and slow it down without resorting to purchasing nutrient credits.
Collins said the property will be developed with or without the critical slopes waiver.
Two Commissioners said they would like to see the site developed with smaller lots with more residential density. Collins responded to both of them.
“This is about the right size that fits within the neighborhood and this size of house is pretty comparable to the other houses,” Collins said. “This is the best project that fits in with the existing neighborhood. To come in with something smaller and denser has the feeling that it doesn’t quite fit in with the character.”
Three members of City Council were present and had no questions for staff or the applicant. A public hearing was not required.
Commissioner Hosea Mitchell said he had been concerned about the development before the meeting.
“Water management is not as problematic as I thought it might be,” Mitchell said. “It breaks my heart to see all those trees taken down but this site is going to be developed one way or the other. I’m not sure we ought to stand in front of that bulldozer. It’s coming.”
Commissioner Karim Habbab also said he would support the waiver with a bit of a lament about the forest going away.
“There’s no care at all given to the existing asset and it’s just treated like empty land with nothing there,” Habbab said. “We have a great asset there but it’s the lesser of two evils I guess.”
Commissioner Rory Stolzenberg had been one of the ones who wanted more density.
“It’s just a little bit painful to see this plan,” Stolzenberg said. “This is the sort of site that is crying out for a [Planned Unit Development]. All the stuff about neighborhood character doesn’t really resonate with me.”
Stolzenberg said he would prefer to see a townhouse development built into the hillside. But that would take a rezoning, so he would support the waiver.
The current idea is to eliminate the Planned Unit Development aspect of zoning, as well as the Planning Commission’ and City Council’s role in critical slopes waivers.
Stolzenberg also said he wasn’t upset about the trees.
“We’ve heard a lot about carbon sequestration of trees,” Stolzenberg said. “A mature tree will sequester about 22 kilograms of carbon a year. An average Charlottesvilliean emits about eight tons of carbon per year.”
Stolzenberg said he would “beg” Stanley Martin to place more homes on the land. He and five other Commissioners voted to recommend Council’s approval. The item is on the consent agenda, which means there will be no discussion of the item unless a member wants to remove it.
This is not the last you’ll hear or read from the December 13, 2022 Planning Commission. I am going to write up the Capital Improvement Program discussion hopefully sometime before the end of the week. I’ve previously written about an update on the zoning code from that meeting, and you can read that story here.
(image) The site plan for what is now being called Azalea Springs (Credit: Collins Engineering)
Reading material:
Crowded out - Elections overshadow 2023 state legislative agenda, Kate Andrews, Virginia Business, December 29, 2022
UVA responds to graduate student workers, says it's a processing error, Felicity Taylor, CBS19 News, December 30, 2022
Charlottesville searching for year-round shelter options, Isabel Cleary, January 2, 2023
A look back at 2022 in Nelson County, Justin Faulconer, Nelson County Times, January 2, 2023
Concluding notes for Edition #478
Welcome to the first regular newsletter of 2023, but the fourth overall for Town Crier Productions so far. Things are going to get busy quickly and I’m hopeful to report on as much of it as possible. Happy New Year to everyone, and thanks to the two dozen people who signed up for new paid subscriptions in December. This really helps, and I think I got a personalized thank you to each of you.
Each of those paid subscriptions was matched by Ting, an Internet company that wants to make a difference in our community. I am grateful for their support which comes in the form of a match for each initial payment. This makes a difference in my ability to do the work!
If your New Year’s resolution is to have faster broadband, Ting can help! If you sign up at this link and enter the promo code COMMUNITY, you’ll get:
Free installation
A second month for free
A $75 gift card to the Downtown Mall
Thanks to Wraki for making some new music which hasn’t yet made it into my stable of audio files. And thanks to you for getting to this spot in the newsletter when I can say - goodbye for now!
January 3, 2023: City parks panel gets update on Meadow Creek Trail; Interim City Attorney named