Board of Supervisors Regular First Meeting   6/3/2020

Good afternoon, everyone.

I apologize for the delay.

We still are having some experiences of some mic issues with some participants, so you may see people log in to participate.

Or you may see some folks log out, re-log in to correct an issue if it arises during the meeting.

I'd like to call the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors to order for our June 3, 2020 meeting.

The meeting is being held pursuant to and in compliance with Ordinance No.

20-A6, an ordinance to ensure the continuity of government during the COVID-19 disaster.

The supervisors who are electronically present at this meeting are Supervisor Diantha McKeel of the Jack Jouett District, Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District, Supervisor Liz Palmer, Samuel Miller District, Supervisor Ann Mallek of the White Hall District, myself, Supervisor Ned Gallaway of the Rio District,

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District is participating and we will be working on some audio issues as we continue.

The persons responsible for receiving public comment are the Board of Supervisors of Albemarle County.

The opportunities for the public to access and participate in the electronic meeting are posted on the Albemarle County website, on the Board of Supervisors homepage, and on the Albemarle County calendar.

Among other staff who are typically with us at the dais, we have our County Executive, Mr. Jeff Richardson, our County Attorney, Mr. Greg Campner, our Clerk, Claudette Bergeson, our Senior Deputy Clerk, Mr. Travis Morris.

Okay.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

This is the portion of our agenda where we ask for a moment of silence.

I'd ask that those reflect on the life of George Floyd and what his family is enduring.

George Floyd was murdered.

The nation again is in turmoil, reacting to the realities of our failures to overcome matters of racial injustices.

So that's what's at the end of this moment of silence.

Thank you everyone.

We have to adopt our final agenda.

We do have a few items here I know we need to work out into the agenda.

The first is item that was previously stated as 5A.

The motion speaks for itself.

This is a follow-up to the board's discussion on May 20th, expressing a desire to consider lifting the suspension of matters from the public.

They can't.

Supervisor Price, you want to go ahead with the motion?

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

I move that the Board repeal its temporary suspension of receiving comments from the public on matters not listed for the public hearing on the agenda and that it adopt an interim rule that allows public comments on matters previously considered by the Board or matters that are pending before the Board.

Right, the motion was made by Supervisor Price.

Supervisor Palmer made the second.

Board, is there any additional comment or questions needed at this time?

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

Episto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

Very good.

And with the passing of that, we will have matters from the public as stated at six o'clock this evening.

And then in future meetings, they will be scheduled the typical times of one and six moving forward.

Yes, I just would like to list the topics so people are not surprised when we get back to matters from the board this evening.

One is to discuss and decide if we wish to adopt the proclamation which was circulated about gun violence.

Second is I have a request for update about our process ongoing for fill and waste.

and then a quick announcement about new program at LEAP.

Are there any other changes to the agenda and or items to be removed from consent that we should address at this time?

So moved.

The motion was made by Supervisor Malek, seconded by Supervisor Price.

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Malek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

Good, thank you board.

The next item on the agenda, brief announcements by board members.

I'll go around to allow each supervisor to make a statement if they wish and then we will do a second round to handle general announcements.

We'll follow the order that was pre-established.

No, I'm still dealing with audio issues and I'm actually on my laptop.

or laptop tablet because I can't get the computer to work, but at least I'm able to communicate.

So, but nothing at this time.

Thank you, Supervisor.

Understood.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

And let me also thank you for your remarks during our moment of silence.

They were very timely, very poignant, and very important.

I am reminded of two quotes from two leaders in my past.

One is JFK, President Kennedy, who stated that those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.

The other is from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

who stated that riot is the language of the unheard.

We as white Americans have a moral duty and a legal obligation to take a knee to stand up with our black brothers and sisters to end the systemic and institutionalized racism in America.

It is the only way that our country can move forward and it's important to note that black lives matter.

I'll just make a quick comment and thank you, Supervisor Price, for those words.

They're very, very important.

In addition, I'd like to thank our community for sharing their thoughts, concerns expressed in emails, phone calls, and the peaceful demonstrations.

Our community has remained dedicated to the core goal of equal treatment for all, and I'm grateful for all the efforts that have been made to date

obviously we still need to do more.

And I know we're still in the midst of, we all know we're still in the midst of a pandemic which disproportionately affects minority communities, which is compounding the community's grief.

So it's just a thank you to all who in the community that have worked hard on these issues and also for our staff who have been

also working very, very hard on these issues for some time and with the pandemic.

And so that's it.

Thank you.

I just would like to thank Donna for the quotes from two wonderful Americans.

And I agree absolutely with what others have said.

I just would like to remind people that peaceful protest is enshrined in our Constitution.

And when we say the Pledge of Allegiance, we pledge justice for all.

We have to create a justice system that is truly just.

And I would only add that I am really pleased and have been pleased to see all the white faces

in the crowds on TV and really appreciate our community's peaceful protest.

Thank you, Chair.

Are we finally at the turning point when no one can look away and pretend that everything is fine?

How is it that my grandson can assume his safety when he leaves the house, but the sons and grandsons of my neighbor across the street cannot?

All parents teach their children the rules of behavior and respect.

That is the basis of our civil society.

But some of my grandson's friends of color are taught very specific rules of engagement for interaction with law enforcement, not just for respect, but for their very survival.

The daily dangers visited upon children and adults and inequities across medical care, educational services, and so many other programs are truly issues on which our community and our county government can make change right here locally for all of our residents.

Preserving and strengthening personal relationships in our community binds us together better than headlines.

Every one of us has a role to play to make the future better.

All humans are created equal and we must make sure that everyone has the same access to opportunity and to justice.

Let us all listen with open ears and learn.

Then we must all work together for a safer, better future for all people.

Thank you, Supervisor Mallek.

I'd like to state that I'm very proud of our community.

In the face of a pandemic, the anger and frustration of Mr. Floyd's murder,

Frustration with failed national leadership, yet they still have the endurance to go out into our community and protest in a profound, impactful, and very peaceful way.

I'm especially proud of our Albemarle high school students.

Our young people are showing us how to lead.

I thank them and I want them to know that I am committed to their ideals.

I hope they will accept my invitation to learn from them and learn how we can all contribute

can contribute and continue to do things better in Albemarle County.

If you didn't have an opportunity one of the students was invited by the governor to make remarks yesterday from one of our high schools and I appreciate the governor giving one of those our Albemarle students a chance to speak.

Yes, thank you very much Chair Galloway.

I'm obviously having audio difficulty, but what we're talking about is so very important to our community.

I too am hoping that the adults learn from our children.

I think they're the ones that are going to lead us into a better future.

I have hope for them and I applaud the people that are having the peaceful protests.

Albemarle County is a very special place.

We have to hold on to it.

We have to make sure that it works for everybody.

Not just a few, but everybody.

This is our time to shine, to show the world what compassion means, what inclusivity means, what equality means.

And I just wish that previous generations had done this.

We have to do it, and especially our youngsters have to do it.

Thank you.

Board, I'd like to go around to see if you have general announcements or brief announcements that you would like to make.

Supervisor Price, any brief announcements?

No, thank you Chair Galloway.

No, thanks.

Yes, thank you.

Two quick things.

First of all, I don't know who does the work

to establish the software, everything for the application process for boards and commissions.

But I've received reports from citizens about a really good experience when they sign up.

And automatic saving features and the notification when their applications have been received has been really gratifying.

So I wanted to pass along that really good news.

Secondly, last Friday was the first virtual for Vanderbilt-Lacombe with 35 organizations and lots of others listening

who are a working group of dozens of individuals and groups who work with veterans who are retired in transition to retirement and active duty also.

Especially early focus is on the homelessness of veterans and really retired at this point.

The MITRE team discussed their consultancy and their design inquiry process, learning to work with citizens expected to benefit from the work rather than to have them develop the plans and actions underway.

Like the appreciative inquiry process used by Habitat to plan Southwood, they are very hopeful that this will achieve far better results all across government and agency actions for whom they work.

Walt Key is the transition coordinator at Rivanna Station, and he presented a PowerPoint with lots of different information and services, which I will be circulating as soon as I get my hands on it.

But I wanted to update everyone on those events.

And that's finished to the next item is Proclamations and Recognitions.

Then I will read this now.

This is brought to us by citizens locally declaring the first Friday in June 2020 to be National Gun Violence Awareness Day.

This proclamation declares the first Friday in June to be National Gun Violence Awareness Day in the County of Albemarle to honor and remember all victims and survivors of gun violence and to declare that we as a country must do more to reduce gun violence.

Whereas every day more than 100 Americans are killed by gun violence and on average there are more than 13,000 homicides every year.

Whereas Americans are 25 times more likely to die by gun homicide than people in other high income countries.

Whereas Virginia has 992 gun deaths at least every year with a rate of 11.4 deaths per 100,000 people.

Virginia has the 34th highest rate

of Dundas in the United States.

Whereas communities across the nation, including Albemarle County, are working to end the senseless violence with evidence-based solutions.

Whereas protecting public safety in the communities they serve is local government's highest responsibility.

Whereas support for the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens goes hand in hand with keeping guns away from people with dangerous histories.

Whereas local officials and law enforcement officers know their communities best, are the most familiar with local criminal activity and how to address it, and are best positioned to understand how to keep their citizens safe.

Whereas the pandemic facing America has drastically impacted communities and individuals sheltering in place, which may result in situations where access to firearms results in increased risk and intimate partner violence, gun deaths, suicide by gun, and unintentional shooting.

Whereas anyone can join this campaign by pledging to wear orange on June 5, the first Friday in June in 2020, to help raise awareness about gun violence.

And whereas by wearing orange on June 5, Americans will raise awareness about gun violence and honor the lives of gun violence victims and survivors.

And whereas we renew our commitment to reduce gun violence and pledge to do all we can to keep firearms out of the wrong hands and encourage responsible gun ownership to keep our children safe.

Now therefore be it resolved that Chairman Ned Gallaway of the County of Albemarle declares the first Friday in June, June 5, 2020, to be National Gun Violence Awareness Day.

I encourage all citizens to support their local community's efforts to prevent tragic effects of gun violence and to honor and value human lives.

Second.

Thank you.

And the second was supervised.

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

The next item on the agenda is our consent agenda.

So moved.

All right, Supervisor McKeel made the motion.

Supervisor Mallek with the second.

And we'll go ahead with the vote.

Ms.

Aye.

Mr. Gallaway?

Yes.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

All right, very good.

Our consent agenda is approved.

Thank you.

And before we move on to our action items, I know that we have

for some remarks through the board.

Chief Ron Lance is joining us this afternoon.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, members of the board, I just want to take this opportunity to personally thank you all for your comments.

I was listening to each one of you speak so eloquently and I really appreciate what was said.

Most of y'all are aware of over this weekend.

Basically I've never seen in my 32 years in law enforcement something so horrendous and my department and I stand fast to condemn those actions and with that being said I wanted to talk a little bit about what we do in Albemarle County because I'm getting like you so many questions from our community

What are we doing in Albemarle County to make sure something like this doesn't happen?

We're getting questions about our training.

We're getting questions about our internal affairs investigations and things like that.

So I just really wanted to be able to tell you, the community and organization as a whole, that I have been responding to every single email that we get.

Some of them are from out of the area, some of them are from the community.

We've been in contact with our local faith community.

We've been in contact with community partners throughout Albemarle County, setting up meetings that are coming up in the next two weeks.

I have two set up for some open dialogue next week to discuss what's going on.

And one of the things that a lot of people understand, because we have it on our website, is when we went to the geo-policing in 2012.

So we really highlight

What we started in 2012 was three years before the 21st century on policing the president's drive to have those pillars come out.

So we were doing that before then and that shows that we were on the right track.

Can everybody improve?

Absolutely.

And that's what our goal was to continue to improve.

That's why we take part with the Citizens Advisory Council, not just with the county and citizens to ask me questions, to help me do my job better, help the department do their job better, but we also have the community groups that we meet with on a regular basis to make sure that we're

Hearing from our community and making sure that we're doing the right things.

Geo policing is just being in the neighborhood and taking care of our community.

And I said it once and you've heard me more than once.

We are your community.

We're not just your police department.

We are your community.

I live and work here.

and I want the community to trust this police department and have the confidence that we're going to do the right thing.

And these questions I've been getting from our community have been fantastic.

Absolutely fantastic questions I've been getting about our training and I've been talking about the crisis intervention training the board got provided with some of those earlier yesterday I believe it was with the implicit bias training that we attend.

And then I only hire about three percent of those that apply for this police department

and they don't all make it through training so it's less than three percent that we put on the street because my expectation is communities expectations are so high.

that we perform at the level they expect from us, and that's without bias.

And I'll say it again, that's without bias, that everybody's treated equally in this county with this police department.

And that's my drive and my goal with my police department, and to make sure I have the best trained, equipped officers that know how to talk to community members.

And unfortunately, we've had some come through in the last six months that made through field training, and they just weren't able to make it all the way through because they didn't have that ability

to talk to the community, not talk down or talk at, but listen to the community members and what their concerns are.

And that's what I, as your chief, am looking for in our police department.

I just want to leave you with the six pillars.

You may or may not be familiar with these, but I think it really, more important than ever, these came out in 2015, and this was President Obama's 21st Century Policing Committee.

He put together some of the most brilliant minds in law enforcement.

came together and they did these six pillars.

If you'll indulge me, Mr. Chair, I'd like to read those out really quick.

The first one is building trust and legitimacy in your community.

That's number one.

That's what we strive to do.

Number two is having policy and oversight over your police department, over your officers, over their actions that govern what they do.

we have that here as you are well aware.

Technology and using social media to be able to communicate with our community when they have concerns and it's two ways.

It's not one post we reply and engage our community.

The fourth one that really resonates is community policing and crime reduction which we've seen geo neighborhood policing do in the last six years significantly reduction in building and confidence.

Number five is training and education of your police officers and that could not be more relevant than today

and I touched on a few of those things.

I know we're limited on time, but that's critical that we're hitting those things.

And number six is officer safety and wellness.

And that means that you have officers that are doing this job that is a very stressful profession that do need some type of assistance.

And we have that in place for them as well.

We have an early warning system in place that we can not just flag complaints on officers, but officers that have responded to stressful situations that may need some additional services.

and be able to talk to people about what they've been experiencing.

So I just want to leave you with those few thoughts.

Leave it open for any questions you may have for me but I just want to let you know that I've been working non-stop.

My staff's working non-stop.

We have meetings set up coming up in the next few weeks where we can engage our community and if and I will say this if any police department is now doing this as a knee-jerk and they weren't starting this eight years ago

They're in trouble behind the curve and Albemarle County Police Department is not.

We have been doing this for some time, but as I mentioned earlier, we can always do better and that's our goal.

Thank you, Chief Lance.

We appreciate you taking the time.

Board, just with the nature of the time and where we're at with this agenda today, I know Chief Lance will be available by phone or email if we have follow-up questions that we want to ask as the conversation continues.

But again, Chief Lance, thank you for the statement here today and for giving us that information.

Thank you.

Board, the next item on our agenda today is number eight, fiscal year 21 resolution of appropriations.

Lori, Andy, I see you guys joined.

Okay, first question, can you see those slides?

Yes.

Great.

Hello, I'm Lori Allshouse.

I'm the director of the Office of Management and Budget.

I just have a few slides today to go over some information about the fiscal year 21 resolution of appropriations.

Our budget manager Andy Bowman is here and he'll be addressing one of the slides.

So first the desired outcome today is for some adoptions by the board.

The first is to adopt the fiscal year 21 resolution of appropriations.

You're going to have two options and we'll go over that in just a moment.

The second part is to adopt the fiscal year 21 resolution of intent to reimburse

the expenditure and with proceeds of a borrowing which is your attachment C. And I just wanted to bring to your attention you've seen me quite frequently in the last month or so on the fiscal year 21 budget this is a starting point we will continue to monitor the budget and the economy and we'll be bringing updates along the way.

So in more detail, attachment A provides the board's authority for the spending of the fiscal year 21 budget.

The fiscal year 21 budget adopted by the Board of Supervisors on May 14th is included as well as the school board's budget adopted on May 14th the same day includes minor adjustments to their revenue sources but the total budget did not change.

It also includes the continuation of the county executive's authority to transfer funding for specific purposes and to cover approved carry forward of outstanding grant funding from fiscal year 20 to 21.

Attachment B is exactly like attachment A, but it does include one change.

Attachment B would provide the same authority noted above and includes an additional 60,536 for jaunt from the reserve of contingencies to support requested bus operator salary increases.

This was an item that the board requested we bring back as part of this appropriation discussion today.

Attachment C will provide the official intent to reimburse expenditures with the proceeds of a borrowing.

Thank you, Laurie.

To continue as Lori mentioned on May 14th, there was really twice on May 11th and May 14th during the budget work sessions.

There was additional discussion of transit and specifically there was a follow-up for today's meeting to bring back additional information around bus driver wages between Charlottesville area transit, the Albemarle County Public Schools and Jaunt.

There was a consideration to add $60,000 approximately to Jaunt's contribution in the adopted budget.

This would provide a four percent increase

from the existing full-time starting wage for jaunt drivers.

The data is now on the slide to show how this compares, where currently the highest full-time starting wage is Charlottesville area transit at $16.94.

I should clarify these numbers would be for Charlesville Area Transit in the Albemarle County Public Schools for fiscal year 21.

The public school is at 1538 and there's two numbers.

They are currently at $14.70.

If they force an increase would move to $15.29.

So they would move up closer to the schools and closer to the cap.

It's really not close that cap.

the follow-up at this time was really a question about understanding that relation to the Albemarle County Public Schools and as the board can see in this in these dollar amounts Johnson's not moving ahead further or deep-frogging the current compensation for school bus drivers though there does continue to be a gap with Charlottesville area transit so that concludes my comments on this particular slide we can move to the next and I'll say if there are questions we can certainly go back to that

Brad Sheffield of John Arthur, the executive director is here as well as Albemarle County Human Resources staff if there are more detailed questions around the public schools.

But at this point the next slide will move to the action of the board where the board will, staff would recommend the board adopt either attachment A or attachment B and again attachment B is the version that would provide $60,000 to John.

That funding would be provided from the reserve contingencies

Thank you.

We'll go through for questions.

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley, do you have any questions at this time?

I'll come back to Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley.

I'm just learning how to use the tablet.

But yes, no questions at this time, Chair Galloway.

Supervisor Price.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Could we go back to the previous slide, Mr. Bowman, and thank you for your presentation.

Yours also, Ms.

Alshouse.

In the right column it says the full-time starting wage.

Well, for the specific number of jaunt drivers, I'll need to defer to Mr. Sheffield on that question, though I'd say it's not just a matter of current drivers.

Thank you, Mr. Bowman.

It's about, let's give my numbers here, about 120 drivers that are affected by this.

We have about 67, I'm sorry about 103, I was misreading my small numbers here in front of me.

We have about 67 people who fall within this starting range and as Mr. Bowman indicated that is

More of the issue at hand is the individuals who are trying to recruit and to retain and that entry into the job.

Once we see people who have stayed with the job for five plus years, the wage isn't as much of a challenge for them because of the growth that they've received.

Mr. Sheffield, thank you and please do not take my questions as opposition because one of the things I appreciate is that coming out of this pandemic public transportation is going to be critical and in order to have public transportation you must have the progress that you need.

Thank you all.

Thank you.

Yes, I have two questions.

I'm curious about how many jaunt employees are full time versus part time, and is there a difference with the starting salary for full versus part time?

And I have that same question for the public schools.

I guess I thought that a lot of the bus drivers on the public schools were not

full time.

I could be completely wrong on that one.

And I'm just wondering if they have the same starting salary.

I can address the John side of that question, Chair Galloway and Supervisor Liz.

I think I'm going back to my olden days there.

John only tries to recruit full time positions.

We do have part time drivers, but that's by their choice, not by the recruitment.

It's that they have either taken on a different job, or they're just choosing to scale back their hours.

So we try to focus on that full time employment.

But yes, we do have part time drivers.

But they have the same starting salary?

Yes, ma'am.

Yeah, absolutely they have the same.

Great.

Do we know that for the county public schools?

I don't necessarily need that to vote but I'm curious as to what the situation if they have the same starting salary.

That's fine.

Hi, this is Dana Robb with HR, Program Manager of Compensation and Rewards.

And I do have that information, Chairman Palmer.

Currently we have 124 bus drivers that are considered BRS eligible and 14 of those are starting at the $15.38.

The remaining are above the $15.38 minimum.

And are the part-time starting at that $15.38 or above?

We have, those are the VRS eligible.

The non-VRS eligible actually start a little bit lower.

Good afternoon.

I would really like to thank everyone for this information.

I think this is the first time we've really been able to wrap our head around the wages and the comparison between our transit operators.

So this is really great information.

I have one question.

Charlottesville area transit, CAT, also operates their public school system transportation.

So when we're looking at Albemarle County public schools, I'm seeing the number here.

Does the Charlottesville city public school transit system, Miro, the CAT full-time starting wages, or are they different?

because when you have CAT, you have both.

Just trying to figure out.

We looked at Almore County Public Schools.

Yeah, sure.

Dana may have this question, but I would need to look through my notes.

As part of this analysis, we had reached out to the organization in addition to requesting the structure of their salaries, requested the job descriptions, all that information too.

Yes, I do have that information from the information that the city of Charlottesville provided to us.

Okay, all right, and I didn't mean to throw a ringer at you Randy because I know we typically ask that, but it did occur to me when I saw public schools, I always think about counties including their public school transportation system.

So that's good information to have.

Could you help me a little bit with how you landed on the 4% on this particular, I think Andy you alluded to it, but I'd like a little bit more.

Sure.

This is actually what John had requested going back in time actually good to go back further in the fiscal year 21.

In the fiscal year 20 budget John had a two percent increase for their drivers.

The city of Charlottesville had a four percent increase for their drivers and so at the end of fiscal year 20 whatever gap was had increased by two percent.

So Jaunt's approach in the fiscal year 21 budget was to request 2% beyond what the city had to help close that gap.

So at the time of their request, it's kind of the thinking at the time was the city would have a 2% increase.

So to play catch up, Jaunt would request a 4% increase.

And so that's sort of where the 4% came from.

The city has since not provided an increase, but there still will be a gap for next year.

So that's helpful information.

And I think with that, I'm all right for now.

Good.

Thank you.

I understand the presentation, and I also wanted to thank Brad for his comments by email about how we really need to be continuing and strengthening our regional effort and discussion all along, way beyond this vote today.

But I'm definitely in favor of this expenditure.

I just wanted to point out so or somebody correct me if I'm wrong but our lowest paid bus drivers are now our Albemarle County Schools part-time drivers is that correct?

Chairman Palmer, that is correct for the non-VRS bus drivers.

Okay, thank you.

Just a comment to piggyback on Ann's statement about the regional, working regionally.

Through the Regional Transit Partnership, we have a subcommittee made up of Brad and Garland Williams and some other folks that are looking at driver compensation.

So, and they took a break

over the last few months.

But at the last meeting, we're talking about bringing that group back together and getting that work going again.

And I think, Ann, that's what you were alluding to.

So you're exactly right.

I'm hopeful for that work.

All right.

Very good.

So at this point, if there aren't any further questions or comments, we would need

Oh, got it.

The motion was made by Supervisor Price, seconded by Supervisor McKeel.

Yes.

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

All right, very good.

That motion carries.

Right, the motion was made by Supervisor Mallek, seconded by Supervisor Price.

Is there any further discussion on that item?

Mr. Price?

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

All right, very good.

That motion carries.

Thank you Lori and Andy.

The next item on our agenda is number nine Albemarle County Capital Line of Credit.

I hope.

I am, thank you.

Chairman Galloway, members of the board.

Good afternoon.

It's good to see you.

I do know we have a slide presentation.

I think we'll be coming up in just a moment.

But while we're waiting on that, let me make a few introductions.

First of all, I want to introduce two folks that are going to be joining the team discussion this morning.

The first is Courtney Rogers.

Courtney is, as you know, our financial advisor, has been for some time.

Courtney will assist me with the presentation, at least for the second half.

I also want to acknowledge that we have Chris Culp on the line with us as well.

Chris is our bond counsel with the firm of Hutton, Andrews, and Kirtley.

And we're pleased that he was able to join us this morning.

He will not be formally presenting, but he will be available to you all this afternoon to the extent that there are questions.

So our purpose this afternoon is to ask the board to adopt a resolution approving a plan of finance for a capital program.

I'm going to spend a few minutes highlighting the nature of that and sort of give you some context and then I'm going to turn it over to Courtney who will talk more specifically about the terms of the financing itself.

This financing will be accomplished through the issuance by the Economic Development Authority of what we call a drawdown revenue note or some referred to as a line of credit.

Again, I will talk about the history on this a little bit now.

So for our capital improvements program projects, we use both a combination of cash and borrowed proceeds to fund the programs.

We, of course, try to maintain a very healthy ratio of equity to debt.

And those ratios are in line with policies that the board has adopted.

Because we've had a relatively strong economy in the last three years and strong reserve balances, we have not borrowed for over three years now for the capital program.

Our last issue was in March of 2017.

At that time, we issued a combination of general obligation bonds through referendum and lease revenue bonds, totaling an aggregate about $60 million.

But again, because we haven't barred in this timeframe, we believe now is an appropriate time to do so to both reinstate or restore our balances and also provide necessary resources for the projects ongoing.

One of the things we've recognized over the years is that by moving immediately to a permanent financing position, sometimes the pace at which these projects are executed and the spending patterns don't mirror our timing always on the borrowing.

So one of the things that Davenport as our financial advisors has brought to us and we've been talking about for some time is this concept of a line of credit.

and then it would be followed by permanent financing.

But this methodology or strategy, if you will, enables us to do just-in-time borrowing to minimize interest cost and debt service.

I do want to emphasize that this strategy is not a reaction to the COVID-19 pandemic situation.

It is a concept or a strategy that Davenport and I have been talking about

as I say back three years and more recently in the February-March timeframe.

We would probably have proceeded earlier this year had it not been for the pandemic.

I think the pandemic, as you may know, has triggered some volatility and uncertainty in the bond market.

So with the advice of our advisors, we have delayed that, which turned out to be fortuitous.

Go to the next slide.

A couple of other things I want to emphasize.

One is that in spite of not having borrowed in this timeframe,

The county is in a very strong financial position, has been and remains.

A couple of the guides or policy thresholds that we look at are outstanding debt to total assessed property values.

In this case, the board has established that total outstanding debt should never exceed 2% of assessed property values.

and I'm pleased to say that we are well within that threshold.

A second threshold or guide provided by the board is total debt service to revenues.

In this case, total principal and interest payments on an annual basis as compared to what we project to be total revenues.

And this ratio is established at 10%.

And likewise, at this time, we are well within that parameter.

I would say that these guides or policies are very much in keeping with AAA counties, which you know we are.

It's a prestigious honor that we share with only very few counties in the state and around the country.

And I want to pause here to say how critically important

having a triple AAA is to the county.

And it's important and critical both for financial reasons, but other reasons as well.

Financially, the difference between being a triple AAA and say a AA plus is what they call a notch or about 25 basis points that is in this particular interest rate environment.

25 basis points is a quarter of a percent.

and it may not sound like a lot, but when you apply a quarter percent to large debt issues, $75 million, for example, it makes a significant difference in how much interest we pay both annually on the term of the loan.

I've asked Courtney to do a quick calculation and he estimates that the savings for us on the $75 million, should we draw all that out,

would be about $150,000 a year or almost $2 million over the course of a while, so very significant.

And then, of course, you apply that difference to the total amount of debt that's outstanding, and those numbers become quite significant.

The other perhaps less financial but important issues is that AAA signals to our citizens that we are an extremely well managed organization financially.

It also signals to our existing and prospective businesses that Albemarle County is a strong economic environment.

And again, its government is extremely well run financially.

And then thirdly, another factor is recruitment.

As we entertain senior leaders to the county, having a triple AAA influences some of those decisions to join us.

So again, for all those reasons, we applaud the board's consistent effort to maintain the AAA rating for the county.

Back to the thresholds, I did want to clarify that even if we were to draw down the full $75 million on this credit line immediately and then go to permanent financing, we would still be solidly within our debt ratios going forward and still have capacity within our capital fund, barring limits to do more.

As I've mentioned, the advantage of a drawdown loan is that it enables the county to pay interest only on that which is outstanding as opposed to the full amount.

Certainly helps to minimize our debt service burden.

And this is particularly true early on in projects when you're funding the design phases so that you don't have to borrow all of that heavy lifting for construction too early.

On or prior to maturity of this drawdown loan, which is two years, the county will permanently finance any outstanding balances into a long term position.

So again, it replaces entirely this drawdown loan into a permanent

The flexibility in the terms that we provided enables the county to permanently finance anytime between now and the two-year maturity.

This is important because we don't know what bond market is going to do and it's helpful for us to be able to monitor that closely and take advantage perhaps if we need to to move quickly on the permanent financing.

As required by law, the drawdown loan will be issued as a revenue note through the county's Economic Development Authority.

So those are my initial comments.

Very well.

Great.

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, members of the board.

A couple of things that I'll say just to start out.

First of all, I thought it was ironic that timing-wise, we came right after Lori and her presentation, which basically set your bond parameters for borrowing out into the future.

So it's kind of interesting that here we are right behind that.

And one other thing I'll add to Bill's comment, and that is we are

The county is one of 49 counties in the country, we just did this calculation for someone else, so I know this for a fact, that has AAA ratings from all three rating agencies, so you are one of 50, so there aren't very many out there.

So following with Bill, in terms of the RFP that we sent out back in late April, we sent it out to all of the

and the banks that cover the municipal world, if you will.

I'm not really surprised based on the market and what's been going on.

We received two bids, very strong bids from both Bank of America and JP Morgan.

We asked for up to $75 million line, which is quite a bit, so we were not surprised that some of the smaller banks couldn't play in this arena just because of the sheer size of it.

But we got good bids, and to summarize,

The bid that really stood out to us was the JP Morgan variable rate bid up to the $75 million line.

While they gave us a fixed rate, there were too many constraints and flexibility wasn't there that we were looking for.

This bid gave us that flexibility.

It's based on a variable rate, which is 80% of LIBOR, plus a spread of 56 basis points, which currently would be 70 basis points, so under 1%.

One of the key elements that set J.P.

Morgan apart from the other bid was there was no unused fee, meaning if we drew no dollars, we basically pay no fee.

If we were to go with the other bid, we'd actually be paying a fee on dollars not drawn.

And so this was very attractive from the J.P.

Morgan standpoint for us.

It's prepayable basically once a month on the LIBOR reset date, so that gives us flexibility to be able to

Again, as Bill said, take it out whenever we see the market.

If there are rates that are attractive to us, we can go ahead and permanently fix whatever we borrowed at that time.

There's draw constraints for basically once a month and $100,000 increments.

And we know we've got good cash flow, so that's not going to be an issue in terms of our reserves.

So that is very acceptable to us.

So with that, I just wanted to give you a sense.

You might say, well, what has LIBOR been doing?

This gives you a sense back through January of 2017.

It really has tracked what the Federal Reserve has done on short-term rates.

As the Fed was raising rates coming out of the 2008 credit crisis, it was following it along as it kind of went up the hill, if you will.

And then the stars kind of show you where they were decreased

as the Fed had to decrease rates due to the last several months of the market as well as the pandemic where we really hit a black diamond ski slope going straight down if you will.

So our recommendation is to move forward JP Morgan Chase Bank.

The puzzle offered the lowest bearable rate in terms of the spread.

The fixed rate option just wasn't attractive enough for us so we're looking

at the variable rate side allows us to prepay it at any time and has no penalty to prepay that.

So our next steps would be having you all adopt the resolution today which approves the resolution as well as the documents and then the EDA would we have them scheduled to meet on June 9th to do the same adoption of documents and resolution and then we would basically move to close by the end of March.

Thank you, Courtney.

Supervisor Price?

Thank you, Chair Galloway, Mr. Latire, and Mr. Rogers.

Thank you for your presentations.

I have a couple of questions.

Mr. Rogers, if you could go back to slide six, and then I'm going to point something out and then go to slide four.

The second bullet says the variable rate option allows the county to permanently fix amounts on the county's option at least once a month.

If you go to slide four, it says under draw constraints, draws must be made once a month in $100,000

increments, you say denominations.

They must be made once a month or that they cannot be made more than once a month?

Got it.

Yes, ma'am.

So the draws in their proposal, they said that they were going to only allow us to draw once a month.

We've actually had subsequent discussions with them that they said that we could draw two or three times if we needed to.

And I understand.

I mean, when you're dealing with things like this, you don't want it to be treated like a daily checking account.

You want it to be digital transactions.

I have no further questions.

I want to thank you and also want to appreciate both of you for the information specifically that addresses the impact of having the benefit, the financial benefit impact of having a AAA bond rating, one of only 49 in the country, as you indicated.

and the amount that that actually ends up saving us in interest rates were we to drop that to a AA+.

Yes, ma'am.

And that data came from very recent bond sales that we had literally in the month of May.

We had Loudoun County in the market that's triple-triple like you are, as well as a AA plus credit in Virginia.

Thank you.

I have no further questions.

I thank you both.

Thank you, Chuck Galloway.

I have one question.

Why now?

And this is wonderful and thank you all.

I'm just curious as to why we weren't doing this a couple years ago.

Was there some change in the process available?

Just trying to understand that part of it.

Bill, if I could, I may take a first shot at it and if you want to add some from the staff side.

Supervisor Palmer, I'll say this is actually the third time we've done this recently for local governments in Virginia.

There seems to be a shift where what's happening is projects aren't getting done as fast as we thought they were going to get done and so our clients had gone out and would borrow a big lump of money and then not spend it for a long period of time and that happened.

The last bond deal we did for the county here was in 2017

and we literally still have bond proceeds that are going to be spent here in the next month or so to basically pay the rest of those off.

And so Bill and I have been talking about this since that bond issue as we started seeing that the the proceeds were not going out as fast as we thought.

And so we agreed to kind of monitor things over the last several years and we've been talking about really last fall we started talking you know okay what's the right time to do this.

As Bill mentioned in January we were talking about it even more

I guess serious about it and timing and looking at calendars and then February rolled around and all of a sudden the pandemic did.

So part of it is your timing of your projects.

You basically spent all the 17 proceeds and you've got other projects that while some have slowed down because of the pandemic, you still have projects on the books that are planning to go forward.

And so that's a combination of many, many reasons.

Thank you, Ned.

My one comment is that I think we need to add our position of being one of 49 in the country to our brag sheet, because that is really incredible.

I knew we were one of a few, but I didn't know really the number.

So that's great news.

And I would like to thank Mr. Rogers for this great information and very clear presentation.

And Bill, you as well with your staff.

And with that, I don't have any questions.

Just a point of clarification or context.

As the last I understood, there were about 3,500 counties in the country.

Wow.

So we are one of 49 out of 3,500.

Yes.

Yeah.

And that's at Have All Three.

There's a lot that have maybe one, I have one client, just one for instance, but Have All Three, and it hadn't grown by much.

I can't remember how many years ago it was that we started tracking this, but it was around 40.

So it really hasn't grown a whole lot.

And I actually remember previous discussions, and Ann probably will too, among supervisors, not our board, but a previous board, about why to worry about it because we had it, but what difference did it really make?

So we can see clearly the difference that it makes.

That's true.

There is a cost to it, obviously.

You have to pay for—each time you go out for a bond rating, you pay for a second or a third.

But I will say that most that have—a good many of them, I'll say—have two do go after the third for that prestige.

Right.

That's great.

Thank you.

No questions.

I think this is a terrific idea because we shouldn't be paying money interest on things we're not needing to spend.

All right, Board, I don't have any comments or questions at this time.

I'm glad to make the motion that we go ahead with the credit line, the line of credit.

Wherever it is.

Second.

The adoption of the previous resolution, which I can't see right now.

Great.

Supervisor Mallek made the motion.

Any further discussion?

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Ms.

All right, the motion carries.

Very good.

Thank you, Mr. Lateri.

Thank you, Courtney, for being here this afternoon.

Hope you guys have a good afternoon.

You're welcome.

Thanks, everyone.

This is a Homestay special exception

Sam Rose.

And Rebecca, are you with us this afternoon?

Thank you.

Thank you.

I will go ahead and jump into my presentation now.

You can bear with me just a second.

Can everyone see the presentation okay?

Thank you all.

Good afternoon, Rebecca Ragsdale here, Community Development Principal Planner, and this is a Homestay special exception for your action today.

And this is a homestay that is located on a parcel less than five acres in size.

We always give you a refresher every time you see one of these about which regulations apply because we do have the two different tiers now.

So on parcels less than five acres, they're limited to two guest rooms, no use of an accessory structure, only one homestay use on the property, no whole house rental, and that's rental where the owner is not present on the property.

And then there are the 125 foot applicable setbacks.

And of course, all homestays must be owner occupied and obtain a zoning clearance.

which is the final check off of all the regulations and verification of things like parking and safety inspections and then that they provided their adjoining properties a contact information in case anything comes up.

So in this particular case, there is one special exception requested and that's to reduce setbacks.

There are no other special exceptions that are requested.

The criteria found in the ordinance that we primarily analyze these requests against is that there's no detriment to abutting lots and that there's no harm to public health, safety or welfare.

But based on the special exceptions section of the ordinance, the board is not required to make specific findings in support of your action and you may approve with conditions, deny or defer the item.

So jumping into the particulars of this property and request, the properties are highlighted on your screen.

And I know you've seen many of, you know, probably 10 of these by now, special exception requests for 125 foot setback reduction.

This property is located on Old Sand Road.

between Esmond and Schuyler off Irish Road.

And in this case, there is one aspect you haven't seen before.

They are proceeding with their special exception request so that they can then move forward with requesting a homestay zoning clearance.

and applying for a boundary line adjustment so the homestay uses must be located on the same property where the owner or manager resides so in this case we have two separate properties that will need to be combined if

This special exception is approved.

But the special exception is the first step, much like if we had a rezoning, we wouldn't have someone get a site plan approval before they get their legislative action.

So just want to let you know where this one was in the process and why.

And then of course, this map shows all of the adjoining properties that were notified surrounding the applicant's two properties.

And we did not receive any questions, concerns, or comments about this one.

So this map here is just showing you the context of the property and surrounding properties off Old Sand Road.

and then this is a close-up of the property that shows you that they have less than 125 feet to Old Sand Road and a less than 125 feet to their Northeastern property line and then their parking is loaded located between the two residences and we verified that and then the applicant's residence is the side and very close to the home where they would like to rent up to two guest rooms.

So in this case, we have recommended approval and not found any detriment to abutting parcels with just the two guest rooms that would be rented.

And we have recommended approval with three conditions.

The buffer along the Eastern, Northeastern property line being one of those.

We had to make a correction for the resolution that's before you.

We had incorrectly said the Northwestern property line and really it's just the Northeastern property line.

So just wanted to point that out for y'all.

Thank you.

Yes, I do.

I understand that they want to make a property line adjustment and make the two parcels into one parcel.

Is that correct?

Yes, that would be required before we could approve a homestay.

Okay, well, okay, so we're approving the special exception today, then they'll apply for the lot line adjustment, then we can approve the homestay.

Is that it?

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Chair Galloway, and I think I got an email on this as the meeting had already started today.

And it all seems to me, because I just have a simple question.

Yes, that is a pool and I will tell you that the GIS lines are a little bit off in this case so the property line doesn't actually run through there.

Got it.

So the line actually should be between the pool and the blue asterisk home state building, not in the middle of the pool.

Yes.

Thank you so much.

I have no further questions.

I think I understand the process.

And once again, Ms.

Ragsdale, thank you very much for your very professional presentation.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Thank you.

I just want to make absolutely sure I understand this.

If we approve the special exception,

and they decide for whatever reason they don't wanna combine the two properties.

The special exception goes with that smaller 1.1 acre parcel, but nothing can happen with that, right?

Okay.

All right.

I'm fine on this one.

Thank you.

My question is more appropriate when we do the next agenda item, but I know in the past we have had discussions about manager living in one house on an adjacent property even, especially in places where there are four or five or 15 farms all combined into one big one with all these different houses being rented and one manager

of taking care of all of this.

So I guess I'm a little, I think this is the first time where we've had the erasure of a property line that people have had to deal with.

And so I would love a little more explanation for that.

And if it's more appropriate, is it because this lot is so small that it can't do anything by itself and that's why it has to be subverted into the big one?

Or is it a zoning question or is it something that I just didn't understand about the rules

earlier because there seems to be an inconsistency here.

Well, I think it is important to clarify now.

I probably went through too quickly, but at the beginning of the presentation, I wanted to clarify that for you, homestays are only allowed as accessory uses to a single family residence and accessory uses must be located on the same parcel.

as the primary use.

So it is a requirement of the zoning ordinance and it's in the definition for these uses so you can't establish a homestay use on a property where no one resides.

But we will talk about that in a little more detail when we get to the work session because this is something that does come up and the solutions

that the property owners have are to possibly combine the parcels so that all the uses are on the same parcel.

Or in some cases, people decide to discontinue the rental or switch to a longer term rental so that they're not establishing a homestay use.

of one of the lots is one acre, and the other parcel is about 3.10 acres.

So it'll be a 4.10 acre parcel.

It's not becoming more nonconforming, so they would be able to pursue that consolidation of the lots.

Thank you.

So Rebecca, I'm sorry, you said that once the two lots are combined, it would be 4.10?

Yes.

Which is still, okay.

Regulations, okay, thank you.

Yes, thank you.

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

All right, very good.

That motion carries.

Thank you, Rebecca.

We have next item we were scheduled for a short recess so it is about 2.45 so we can reconvene at 3pm and we will be a little ahead of schedule for our next work session.

All right, very good.

And the next item on our agenda is our work session on the homestay program.

And Bart, are you on to lead us?

Oh, there you are.

Hey, Bart.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Yes, sir.

I appreciate it.

Thanks for having me.

This is my first time actually presenting at the board.

I've been a participant, but not actually a presenter before.

Excellent job on catching up on the meeting time, by the way.

Very impressive.

Let me share my screen and we'll get going.

So we're here today to talk about homestays.

This has kind of been a long time coming.

There's three items or areas that we're going to touch on, which is the compliance program updates.

We do have personnel here to answer questions from finance.

We have Jan Lynn and Tim Conrad and also myself from CDD and Rebecca Ragsdale and Lisa Green is also present to answer any specific enforcement questions.

This is sort of where we left off last time.

I'm going to run through the first few slides very quickly.

just to get us caught up because I think the real meat and potatoes is when we get to some of the tax questions and sort of the next steps.

So the ordinance was adopted as most of us know on August 7th through September of 2019 and May 2020.

We did what we call proactive compliance and I'm going to talk about a little more about that later on in the presentation about how that's kind of morphed into more of a program than a one-time thing.

We've done some mailings, 297 letters have gone out to date.

We did hire some temp help, which that position is currently on hold based on our current situation, but it did help us to process those a little bit faster and move into some of the next steps.

We hosted a variety of workshops, we enlisted the help of a third-party vendor, and of course we always have follow-up enforcement actions and

Negotiations, I guess, is a polite way to put it to get folks to come into compliance.

And then June 2020 is where we are now.

So this slide just represents that zoning, finance, building code, the fire official and the fire marshal, intake staff, health department, all contributed in the mailings and the workshops and to get the multiple steps and the multiple agencies kind of in sync

to help the process and our customers move along at a pretty decent pace.

So here we are as we move into the business license and taxing things.

So one of our main questions that we get is what taxes do the home stays pay?

So they pay business license tax, a transient occupancy tax, business tangible, personal property tax, sales tax, and food and beverage tax.

Now the food and beverage tax

really applies more to sort of the traditional B&Bs.

So that one has an if applicable afterwards.

The majority of our home stays I don't believe are doing the food and beverage tax because they're not working in that traditional sense.

Of the TOT tax, most of us know that it's about 5%.

2% of that goes to the general fund and 3% to tourism.

We did send out 297 letters to seek voluntary compliance, and the majority of those were done through the third party helper.

I believe we only had 17 of those that were complaint driven in the traditional sense of our program.

As of May 12th of 2020, about 61% have responded.

We've captured about $96,000 in revenue.

77% of that came from the TOT debt.

We're going to move into compliance next, and then I have the slides available so when we have questions, I can go back and pick out any of these.

So when we look at home stays, operators contacted, that is the 297 number.

The estimated total number of home stays, that number, if you were to go online, you'd see about 800 of those.

Our staff has, with double-checking our vendors' research,

I figured out that there's some postings that are multiple bedrooms.

So I might have three postings at one house.

So this is about addresses, not necessarily rooms for rent.

So that number from the 800 we've talked about earlier in the process, way back when, we are figuring it's more about 630 to 650 based on that info as we call through that information.

Of those 200

95% or 162 of those violations have been abated and that's achieved in a variety of ways.

Folks have removed listings, they've changed rentals from transient to more than 30 days at a time, they've obtained zoning clearance approvals, different options, some of those home stays that you've seen are some of those.

This is a map that kind of gives you an idea of where we see the majority of stuff.

So the red is the high concentration and the green is smaller concentrations.

You can see we're located around Charlottesville and then Crozet and sort of the northern growth area and then Crozet are kind of the hotspots.

The challenges in the compliance program since startup

is just verifying the accuracy of our information from our vendor.

We've had to vet some of that.

We've had some double hits, as we just talked about, where the 800 is really 600 and so on.

So it does take us some effort to work through that information to make sure we're accurate.

We do not want to waste staff resources or customers' time in sending duplicate letters.

At this time, the trend lines for homestays, they're going up.

So we still are seeing an increase.

We're not sure kind of why on the advertisements, but we're still monitoring that.

And we think once COVID in our emergency state kind of subsides that we may see a bigger increase than what we had suspected.

So we're monitoring that very closely.

The continued use of the third-party helper is critical in this program because we will not have the staff resources to ferret these things out on our own.

We have the resources to cull through the information but not to do the mass gathering right off.

So renewal of that service is going to cost about $75, $72

for a year and what we're looking at now because the previous contract is finished is that would not start until July 1st or next fiscal year.

Again, if funding is available, our understanding is that we are working very hard to find those dollars because we know this is a board priority.

Alternatively, kind of enforcing complaints and doing that internal audit

and Homestay data, again, is very time consuming.

If we go to the traditional method, which would be complaint only, again, out of the 297, we've only got about 17 that were complaint driven.

With the 96,000 as a kind of a marker on our return on investment, we believe that the third party vendor service is not only crucial, but more than pays for itself.

We are going to continue evaluation of the program and adjustments.

As we move through this, we've been able to become a little more nimble on how we do review.

And as we become more practiced in joint review and inspection, we're becoming a little bit quicker.

Our other part of this is we'd like to probably do an annual update with the board right now, because we're in June, we are talking about June, 2021,

through our department we'll probably have some discussions to see if that needs to align more with the budget schedule based on if the revenues hold up.

If we go to where we are with special exceptions, so this is our chart that shows that we've had actually 17 applications and I want to explain it a little bit because we actually have done 21 waivers or 21 waivers have been requested.

So an application may have more than one special exception that's required.

So the 125ers are the most popular, that's the first line.

15 were requested, 10 approved, one denied, and we currently have four pending of just those.

So if we go skip down to the bottom line, I won't cover the whole chart, but the totals are basically 21 special exceptions requested, 13 approved,

One denied and we have seven pending.

So that seven number is important as we move forward because we are going to talk about how we're gonna move off of always scheduling them on the agenda to consent agenda.

So the kind of precursor to that is if we have neighbor concerns, then that would be, it would make it an action item like it is now.

If the neighbor concerns are limited or we don't have any,

and it would be a consent agenda approval with no board discussion unless the board pulls the item.

That being said, we have a criteria that we think is a good guideline to start to put those onto consent agenda, which is looking at those number of guest rooms, the location of the guest rooms and parking, a minimum of the 20 foot buffer screening is gonna be required.

So we know that that has come up in the last few exceptions.

I did wanna add that

There may be additional mitigating circumstances that we might need to do.

It might be lighting.

There might be a stream buffer that we want to stay away from.

There might be some other things that staff may want to condition.

As long as there's no objection from the neighbors and we're mitigating that appropriately, we feel that it could still stay on consent agenda.

The other, and so that's kind of the summary of the program right now.

We have a couple of other

I would call them hot topics, I guess.

The tracking that has come up on a number of occasions for special exceptions.

So in communicating with our GDS folks, currently we have about 22 homestays.

And if we run through this quickly, the staff resources to put the layer together is about 25 to 30 hours.

Once the layer is established, it would take at least three

a 30 days or a month before it can go live.

So one of the things I don't want to go through all the details of the slide but one of the things we want to talk about is and this may be a separate program is our special exceptions we skipped down to the last bullet our special exceptions more special than special permits or other special exceptions that might create other impacts.

So we may use this pending the board's direction on whether we want to just use this for

Homestay special exceptions or whether or not we want to start looking at these other special permits or other special exceptions.

One of the complications is if we group all special exceptions right now on these layers as opposed to kind of vetting which ones we want, certain subdivisions have up to 24 or 30 or 40 all on their own.

We also want to be cautious about the amount of work if we branch out beyond home stays, what it would take for staff to be able to do this.

So I just want to be careful with how we're looking at staff resources, whether it's specifically with home stays or whether it's a more general program.

So the three things I'm kind of looking

For the board from is one I would like some feedback on any questions you may have gotten regarding the taxes or the process or information we have out our handout.

Sometimes the community talks to our board members a little more candidly than staff.

Also, these next set of slides is about some of the things or issues we've run into sort of consistently as we've gone through these special exceptions.

One would be the 125-foot setback.

That is the most popular special exception.

And do we want to consider reducing that to closer to what the building setback is?

For instance, RA primary structure setback is 75 feet.

That may be too close.

We may be comfortable with where it's at as long as we continue with the guidelines we have for the special exceptions.

Should the zoning allow special exception

for owner occupancy regardless of the parcel size in the zoning district.

And also should homestay whole house rentals on adjoining properties with the same owner be permitted.

So this topic or subject came up in the last item on the board agenda.

For us the 125 because we're looking at those quite a bit and we're granting the majority of them except for one

We would request that staff get an opportunity to look at that 125 and reduce it.

If the board feels like we want to ride this out for another year at 125 with just the conditions, that would be up to the board.

We're just looking for some direction there.

Number two, should the zoning ordinance allow a special exception to owner occupy regardless of parcel size in the rural area district?

So what we found

is that only rural area parcels less than five acres in size of residential may seek that special exception requirement.

We believe that that may have been an oversight.

So I just wanna verify with the board today, if that was the case, then we'd like to work on that to correct it, to have that same option on the larger parcels as we do on what I'm referring to as the smaller parcels.

And the last one is should Homestay whole house rental

on adjoining properties with the same owner be permitted.

So we've talked about this quite a bit through the process before the regulations were adopted.

And tracking something like this is cumbersome to near impossible because there's no way for us to identify, say when parcels sell if a home stays available.

Also with the few requests that we have, like the one you saw today, there is remedies to be able to fix

some are less cumbersome than others meaning if I flat out own both parcels and it's not in a trust there's not much to do to that boundary line adjustment if I have to undo some corporate or trust things to combine those parcels then those are different financing things that we might get into so there's a large range of that but what we're afraid of here is that if we open it up too much

Where do we draw that line on adjacent parcels?

How do we know when companies come in and some other concerns that the board had and the public had as we went through the process?

So this particular one is not recommended by staff.

So I know I went through that rather quickly.

Again, we would like to report work program items or items that we may be able to fit in would be to

continue the compliance program, reevaluate with the board in 2021, initiate those focus text amendments, and follow the guidelines for special exceptions with the board.

This would be the kind of the program schedule going forward.

As you see, we got June 2020, which is where we are today, is continue working on the data that we have from the third party, move through August 20,

through May 2021, and then come back to the board in June 2021 with an update if those dates work.

So I'm going to leave it to the board for questions, and I will go back to any slides that you would desire to see.

Thank you, Bart.

So I think, board, what we should do just to keep it organized, maybe we'll do a round here if you have general questions or clarifying things for Bart, and then we'll just go into each item one, two, and three and go through each one separately.

Does that sound agreeable?

No, I'll wait for the specifics.

Supervisor Price.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Mr. Sloboda, thank you very much for your presentation, and I'll defer until the specific items are discussed.

Bart, when you said that I think it was 61%, I don't have that in front of me, 61% of the people responded to your inquiry when the letters were sent out, is that correct?

Yep, right here.

Those are still active.

So those are still active.

Yes, you're still.

All right.

So yeah, those are still active and we're working on those.

And so one of the things to remember with this particular program is it's kind of like digging a hole in the sand.

Every time we make some progress, we're sending out another batch of letters.

So we have, if you look through the staff report, it gives you some dates where we started with a few, I think it was 20 some, then we sent out a hundred.

Then we did those for a while, then we sent out another hundred.

So that number is going to be a kind of a hard target to reach till we move, to close that 39%.

Yes, so currently 297 letters have gone out.

queued up, I think it's close to another hundred already.

And the second party helper, since you hired them or hired, they got the software,

That's been 600 that they've found, or that that software has found.

Is there a lot, I mean, have they sort of gone through what's on the market now?

So it's constant.

So they're constantly going through the data.

And one of the things we're working with with them is when we

when we, what I call clear one of the letters, meaning it's compliant.

How do we identify that to take it off the list?

We do know that actually they've identified closer to 800, but when we vet their results, what they're getting is hits on, if I have a five bedroom house and I have three homestay rooms, I'm advertising three rooms separately as opposed to the all three under one advertisement.

So we have to pull those three back in

and the three becomes one.

And so that's where we lose some of those numbers.

Okay.

All right.

That's my clarifying questions.

I have a couple of questions and Bart just tell me if that needs to wait till later if these are not because I'm happy to but

I just am curious as to, we talked at the very beginning of this discussion, not today, but when we were starting this process, there would be a big flurry at the very beginning, right?

And are you all having a sense that in another year that flurry will have, because I understand you've probably been in the middle of that,

Yeah right now we feel like it's going to continue which is um I think this should be an annual check-in anyway just because of based on the revenues but I don't know yet I don't think we're far enough we're not close enough to the end to see if they keep things keep getting added on.

One of the things we do know is that the folks that we've talked with and that have become compliant have not become repeat offenders.

That's excellent.

Now, I do have just a clarification.

Right.

And I don't want to take us down into a tax question because that's really not why we're here today.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yes.

And so it's really a pass-through for the, not all of them, but some of them are pass-throughs.

I just think we need to remember that.

The other question that I have is,

Well, I do really agree with the annual check-in.

I think that's a great idea.

And I think I'll hold them for my other question for later.

Thank you very much.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

I'm not sure exactly where this was presented, but I wrote down that I didn't understand what it meant, an exception to owner occupancy regardless of property size.

So do we have some properties

where the owner is not required to be there.

Or is that the 45 days in the rural area?

So there wasn't an aha.

Okay.

Lost track of where it was.

I will wait on everything else.

Why don't we go ahead and jump into each one so we can deal with number one first.

Okay.

Set back.

and I guess I'll just go around through the order and supervisors can ask questions, make comments.

Yes, knowing that only a certain percentage and, Mr. Penbart, you were mentioning the people that responded, that's for tax purposes, correct?

Okay.

I guess my feeling is regarding the 125 foot setback, I know we've gotten special exceptions and such.

I tend to be in favor of keeping it that way.

probably at least for another year because I want to get everybody, I think, up and running, so to speak, regarding paying their taxes and everything, and then see what we have to do, if anything.

So I know they're looking at redoing this.

I think it's, in my opinion, it's too soon.

We've just implemented it, and now if we change it, that may add more people that may or may not

Thank you, Chair Galloway, and again, Ms.

Christopher Voboda, thank you for your answers.

I am not opposed to retaining the 125-foot setback for another year.

However, I would be more inclined to go with the 75-foot setback that is the current zoning requirement in the rural areas, recognizing that many properties are in noncompliance because they were constructed closer to 75 feet from the border before the zoning regulations came in.

If less than if 125 feet if we keep that or less than 75 feet then I do believe that supplemental regulations is the staff recommends the buffer screening things like that should should also be part of the consideration for anything where the property the building is either less than 75 feet if we go to that or less than 125 feet if we retain it.

So Bart, if we reduce it to 75 feet or whatever, and an application is made and it meets all the requirements, are the neighbors still notified of the application?

Yes.

Yeah, the

Other regulations would still stay in effect.

And the one that we did deny was denied for the 125-foot setback.

That's how we, as I'm remembering, that's how we came to that conclusion.

That was our ability to deny it, essentially.

So if the home state

That is the sense that we're getting from the board.

So that is part of one of the questions that we want to have answered besides these three is based on that criteria for special exceptions, if we have an objection, because there really wasn't a clear cut

What specific objection needed to come to the board?

My feeling having, and I didn't get a chance to go back and see how close that one was that we voted against.

I think it was 60 feet or something.

I might have even been closer to that.

I just don't remember.

I do like the fact that

there seems to be, and maybe this is incorrect, but there seems to be a little bit more scrutiny and a little bit more chance for the neighbors to complain about something if it comes to the board.

And so the homestay that meets all the qualifications and doesn't have anybody complaining about it would not be on our consent agenda.

It would just go on through, correct?

Currently, we're not offering up administrative approval.

We can consider that, but currently what we're saying is if there's no objection, it would go on consent agenda.

Okay, all right.

Okay, so as long as it's on the consent agenda for all of these then and we can pull it and we can say we have neighbors objections therefore for this reason we are not going to approve this.

Yeah, now staff may still recommend approval but it would be an agenda item for vote.

Again, we would evaluate

on the merits of that thing.

One of the things I just want to be conscious of is sort of the answer to this particular question, and I understand this is part of the process, but whether or not we're going to stick with the 125 as opposed to change it or look at reducing it.

So as we talk about these questions, please keep in mind that really what we're also after is

I understand that.

I just wanted to make sure that if the neighbors object to something we're still going to have an opportunity to reject it and this is more, reducing it from 125 to 75 feet is more for

staff efficiency, essentially, it doesn't make a difference necessarily in our ability to say yay or nay.

Okay, all right.

So I'm open to reducing it if it helps staff with their time issues.

So that's where I am.

Did you say?

Oh, it's my turn.

Sorry.

Bart, I really appreciate staff's time, and I guess I'm looking at this through a different lens.

And you are more than welcome to push back on me and tell me what I shouldn't be doing.

I'll be careful.

And maybe it's because of my medical background.

I am very concerned during a pandemic

on opening up our community to more people coming in and to reducing the restrictions.

I'm concerned already about UVA's opening up and I get that they get to and I'm just simply saying that

I am happy to sit back and buy my time for another year and take a look at this.

I think a year buys us time on the health aspects and the ability to make sure that our community is safe.

And I guess there's some argument that could be made that this particular, some of these changes wouldn't do that as much as I fear it might.

So that's what I'm talking about, about a little bit of pushback.

So the bottom line is

For right now, I feel comfortable buying ourself a year because I think we're going to know a lot more in a year on where we are.

Maybe we could come back to us in six months.

Maybe it doesn't have to be a year.

But for right now, I'm kind of comfortable with where we are.

recognizing your staff time.

And I would really like to talk to that about that budget issue and your ability to keep a staff person, part-time staff person or someone to help you with it.

Very good.

Thank you.

I'm trying to wind my way through all these different categories to find something that makes a difference process-wise, but also preserves the accountability.

So I may not be on track, but if one kept the legal requirement for the 125, but with the categories which were mentioned,

maybe only certain members of guest rooms might get an easier path to the consent agenda.

Parking is a really big issue which is affected by the setback and so if there are particular ways in which we can ensure that neighbors are not having the headlights going into their houses all the time because of where the parking is laid out and the applicants can certainly be

told these are the requirements, figure it out so that it's not a burden on staff, but we give more guidance to what we find acceptable.

And the buffer screening, I'm very glad to see that there is more attention now paid to a thickened 20-foot undisturbed buffer.

And if a derecho comes through and pulls the trees down, then things have to be replaced.

They can't just say, oops, they fell down.

We don't have that anymore.

So there are ways that I could support getting to reduced setbacks on the consent agenda, but only with some really clear criteria along the way.

And I don't know if having two rooms as opposed to five is one that should be considered, because I think there is fewer impact possibilities on neighbors, the fewer people there are.

So I think that's

And that would be the special circumstances category, which I think you mentioned.

Thank you.

It seems like just kind of keeping count here that we have

four that are in favor of keeping the 125 at least initially for a year.

If I've got that incorrect, you can speak up.

I know we have one open to reduce.

I'm certainly open to the conversation to reduce, but I'm happy to stay with the 125.

I think my biggest piece is the consent agenda item.

and how we can work to that.

I think I had mentioned previous I know there are some other areas where they go to it's not exactly the same thing but a waiver of some public meetings for some applications and they usually come to the home supervisor and ask would you be okay with forgoing the public meeting and the supervisor says yay or nay to it.

I almost think like that's a decent check-in for the consent agenda item that the supervisor in the home district could get a look at it and say okay with going to consent or okay with going to the agenda and I only bring that up as a time manager or an agenda management aspect.

Having something pulled from consent agenda can really throw a schedule off track whereas

I would like to know if Supervisor X would like this item to be placed on the agenda for action and I'd be happy to accommodate that versus having it stay on consent and just get pulled.

you know, was waiting to the last minute.

They don't know if they need to be prepared to respond to it.

I just think it gives us better organization from a meeting perspective to perhaps consider it that way.

But I just throw that out there to say that I'd be fine with some items going to consent and happy to explore caveats from what we need to to maybe help it along to get there.

I'm open to that conversation.

Bart, I think you've got an answer on your 125 setback item.

Got to unmute.

Then board, is there any feedback on consent agenda?

Do we have any other thoughts on allowing these to go to consent with

I would just like to say one thing.

If we're contacting individual board members about whether it should go on the consent agenda or not, we need more than the Wednesday before.

Just to give us time to look into it, to go by the place, see the information,

Oh yeah, I think it would definitely have to, when I look at pre-agendas and know when we see these, you know, 30 to 60 days ahead of time, the conversation would have to happen then so that it can be done for the planning.

So I agree, I think it would have to happen with more notice than that.

I don't know how staff feels about that.

I don't know what kind of work or problems that may bring up that I'm not thinking about.

If we're okay with knowing where we're at on the 125 and we're going to keep that, perhaps staff, you can reconvene, give some thoughts to a consent agenda and brought up some items that would get her to accepting things going to consent and we can revisit the conversation.

No, that's fine.

Yeah, with the notice, I would want to also vet that through county attorney's office and see whether it's all the board, some of the board,

depending on how we identify that.

And it was just a thought.

I'm not going to be wanting to belabor it.

It was just a way to organize it so the home district supervisor can flag it if there's concerns.

I think that could be a good change perhaps.

um so that we maybe will plug to to do a little bit of work and bring back for additional conversation part yes the second one is what is number two that should the zoning ordinance allow a special exception for the owner to occupy regardless of parcel size in the rural area district and so miss malek on your comment i think the way we say it makes it sound backwards

Right now the rural area does not have the option.

So under the current ordinance only rural area parcels less than five acres in size or residential zone parcels may seek a special exception for this requirement.

I've had it backwards.

So a three and a half acre parcel could ask for a waiver if they're a little cottage that

Right, so all we're asking on this one is that we include this option for all the parcels that qualify for home stay now.

So that's why we think from a staff perspective we miss that and it was an oversight on our part when we wrote the ordinance and we just kind of wanted to verify that we have permission to go ahead and

So may I ask a follow-up question?

So would that be a solution to a small property, you know, next to the bigger one where people live where they could on the numbers of

Yeah, so that is item number three.

So this is not a solution to that question.

All right.

Got it.

Sorry.

Yes.

So remember in home stays we have the three categories.

We have more than five acres and then we have that are RA.

We have less than five acres that are RA and the residential zone parcels.

So you can get the exception in the less than five acres

So if you're a place with a dozen houses, this would allow you to have those continue to be rented out as, what do you call it, vacation properties or something like that with no owner-occupied link.

Yeah, it's really trying to get to the kind of family farms that are under LLCs or owned by a bunch of people and permit this use there.

That's really what we're trying to get towards.

I'm not ready to do that in my personal opinion.

Okay, so I am confused.

I understand wanting the ordinance to be equal for all three scenarios.

but are we saying that a special exception to owner occupancy, i.e.

the owner does not have to be present?

Okay, so... 45 days, right.

And also this is a special exception option.

So just wanting to know, we have approved and please forgive my mind, but we've approved other parcels, other homestays to not be owner occupied.

I think I'm having trouble following you.

I thought the whole purpose of the homestay was to have someone who lived there and who wanted to rent a couple rooms or a few rooms to make some extra money or a whole house like a cottage if they have a house.

If I may Mr. Chair and Bart I can I can kind of frame it a little better for you.

I think we've got three different things we're intertwining.

Thank you.

May I?

So we have three different regulations in the ordinance.

Someone must reside on the parcel.

And our regulation is that it must be the owner unless someone asks for a special exception.

And we would be reviewing that special exception and vetting it, you know, as we've done with all the others.

So what this ZTA would be about is just the opportunity for someone to ask, waive the owner occupancy requirement,

and allow a resident manager.

They must still have someone reside on the property and establish their residence there just like an owner would and they would be present during rental.

We have another section of the ordinance where neighbors receive notification and they're provided an emergency contact, responsible agent if you will,

to respond to concerns.

So there's kind of three separate things and what we're asking is should we amend the ordinance so there's just the opportunity to ask for any property to consider whether it would be appropriate to grant an owner occupancy waiver.

and some of the examples that I've seen over the past six months have been, you know, a couple farms that are in an LLC.

The people that are the LLC live there but technically that's not owner occupied.

So you have a couple under review that we have under review that you'll see coming up.

I know we haven't had any of these types of special exceptions but that's really

um what that's about and then whole house rental is something only properties greater than five acres in size can do and that's the limited seven days per month 45 days per year where no one is present during rental we would still

have that responsible agent requirement that someone respond if there is an issue that arises.

So I wish we had a chart of all this on a slide for you.

Okay.

Well, okay.

That makes, all right.

All right.

No no no that's no problem no problem so the whole house rental is for not more than seven days a month and 45 days in a year is that correct?

Is that what you said or?

Yes.

Okay okay and in that instance the owner does not have to be present but a responsible agent has to be available 24-7.

Oh no, I did not.

Now that I understand it, it makes sense.

Thank you.

Supervisor Price?

Thank you, Chair Galloway, Ms.

Ragsdale, Mr. Svoboda.

I have a broader concern perhaps than this specific item.

I have real problems with a registered agent rather than actual owner occupants.

And so let me ask this question, and Mr. Campner, you may also want to weigh in on it.

Is it possible, or is there anything that precludes an individual from establishing a number of LLCs?

Each LLC purchases a property.

On each property is a responsible agent.

I think, Mr. Fassova, you said that was the language.

A resident manager.

Yes.

Thank you, Mr. Kamner.

And I am opposed to that.

I recognize that the impact of this may be that some families who have now placed their family farm in LLC may then be precluded from using homestays.

But I see the homestay ordinance as one that allows an owner, an individual who owns property, who lives in the property, who wants to be able to make a little money on the side as an ancillary business and not

a business that comes in and essentially establishes a chain of homestays in our county whether it be the rural or development area and so I am opposed to anything that expands

that reduces the actual owner occupancy requirement of the ordinance.

But may I ask a question?

Since that already exists, Supervisor Price, I mean and I agree with you.

I don't like the idea of resident managers and that could actually happen in

something that's less than five acres too because I could have smaller properties and do the same thing and have a resident manager in there and then rent out the rooms.

I spoke recently with a person who does rent a cottage and in actuality I said, well, why don't you just rent it out year round?

Because they make like a huge, four times, five times as much money

making it a homestay, renting it out as a homestay rather than renting it out on a permanent basis.

So I'm in agreement with Supervisor Price.

I mean, I like the idea and I don't know how you undo that, but I do like the idea of owner-occupied being able to give the owner there an ability to make some extra money, but I do not like it as a commercial enterprise.

Thank you, Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley, and my comment goes to I want to amend the ordinance to require actual owner occupancy.

I agree.

Hi, goodness.

So getting back to Ann's comment about the properties who have multiple accessory structures or multiple houses on them, is there a limit to the number of accessory structures on a piece of property that

Okay.

So that would take care of the properties that have, you know, they're really large properties and they have 10 houses on them and they're renting them out as vacation houses.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I thought that this was focused on this because I thought we were talking about family farms where there were additional houses on them that

could be rented out.

I guess you go and then I go and we can see if we right I'm trying to I just I just want to make sure that we're talking about are we talking about farms that you know that are

Are we talking about accessory structures at all in here, additional houses on pieces of property?

So for this one, we're not changing anything with accessory structures or the number of guest rooms.

This owner occupancy

regulation applies to any size parcel with any number of structures.

And again, we're very focused on just the question about owner occupancy.

It doesn't change anything related to the number of accessory structures they can have or the number of guest rooms because the larger parcels can have up to five and they can configure those in a number of ways as long as the accessory structures were existing as of August 2019.

So I think we used the example of the family farm where you might picture a large parcel with multiple structures, but it could be just a 10-acre lot that's not necessarily a farm.

Again, it was just the question whether the opportunity to ask for the special exception should apply to all parcels regardless of size.

Yeah, I'm trying to look at this much more narrowly that we're just talking about.

So actually, I'm okay with this as much as I have a problem with the commercialization of this.

I don't really see that as an issue, but I'm a little bit confused because Greg said early on when Ann made her comment

that this was the worry or this was the concern prior.

Yeah, I think the concern was with being able to track LLCs and the opportunities that these artificial entities provide for

I guess I'm going back to when we very first started this whole process when we had groups of people who came in whose, you know, maybe their parents died, they wanted to keep the family farm so that all the kids could come back and those kinds of situations.

And I did have a reasonable amount of sympathy for that at the time.

but I guess what I'm going to say then is let's keep it this way for now until we understand a little bit more about that until because I do understand what you're saying about a family farm that can't ask for this because they're in an LLC but then the broader problem is

is a bigger issue, I think, that we've been talking about, about the commercialization of property.

So I'll go.

Supervisor Palmer, you're a no then?

I'm a no.

I'm definitely a no.

I am very concerned about the transparency and the limited liability company portion of this.

And when you think about short-term rentals, that's exactly what we're concerned about is the commercialization.

That's what we're seeing happen.

So I'm just cutting to the chase here and I am a no for this one.

Right.

Yes, a question for Mr. Campner.

Yes, it's possible.

Yes.

And I guess that's what worries me is I really do agree with Supervisor Price and the others.

You know, maybe something that we look at over the next year, you can have that family LLC, but there's nothing that prevents that LLC from adding other members who may not be

Family, who have that skin in the game, who can be the substitute for the resident manager.

So you really have an artificial entity occupying the house.

Okay.

And so we are at a clear no on this one.

There's more than consensus here.

Personally I would have been fine because I know it would come back to us as a special exception.

It could be scrutinized as a one-off application just like the other special exceptions.

But I think you have direction on that one Bart.

We are past time for this.

We had the 60 minutes allotted.

We're running behind but we still have to get number three knocked out.

Can you go to that one?

This is not recommended by staff.

Go through the order.

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley.

This is the one I think that causes some current problems.

I can't think of a good solution to change it, unfortunately, unless you have one owner allowed one property with the very next lot or something like that rather than having any other if there are ways to do it in that way.

But I think there are some properties where there is different financing on different properties and pulling

property line adjustment is just not possible.

Some of these have been in operation, I think for a long time.

So it's the only one that I was trying to find a better solution for that I've failed at so far.

And so I mean, having the homeowner next door, but not in because you can't live in two houses, you know, if one is

a lot smaller than the first one.

I know in the ACE program we had the accessory house is only allowed to be 25% of the square footage of the main house.

You can't have two great big accessory houses, something like that, in order to try to keep these, keep the density down.

So I don't have a solution to change it.

Unfortunately, I wish I did because I think this is the one that's just, people have no, no option.

We're clear on this one.

There's a way for it to continue to be worked out on.

And I think we can continue to kind of brainstorm it.

Thank you Chair Galloway and Supervisor Mallek I think actually you just referenced something I did get a I think maybe this one I actually got the email on as the meeting was beginning.

Some of these are complex and I don't know that we will ever be able to come to a resolution that accommodates every situation and you know legislation is drawing the line.

and unfortunately there will be some who will always find themselves on the other side of the line.

I don't want to discount the impact on them.

My greatest concern with the entire homestay situation is avoiding the commercialization of our housing situation here.

And as I think one of the other supervisors earlier mentioned that people are using the homestays because they can make four to five times the amount of money

And I have no problem with people trying to make money, but I do have a problem with losing our housing stock under these circumstances.

So unfortunately, I recognize some people will be adversely impacted by this, but I think the greater good for the community is to not support this.

Yes, sir.

If I may just summarize quickly, which is on the three

All right board, the next item on our agenda.

Make sure I'm in the right order here.

Number 12, community survey results.

Siri Russell, you're with us this afternoon.

Siri coming in.

I see Dr. Fitzgibbon is here.

Here she is.

Yes, I am.

Happy Wednesday and thank you for having me.

Just a second and I'm going to get booted up here.

Yeah, I'm coming.

Just a second.

OK.