Board of Supervisors Regular Second Meeting   8/19/2020

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

The supervisors who are electronically present at this meeting are supervisors Ann Mallek,

District, Supervisor Donna Price of the Scottsville District, Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District, Supervisor Liz Palmer of the Samuel Miller District, Supervisor Diantha McKeel of the Jack Jouett District, and myself, Ned Gallaway of the Rio District.

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.

Also with us today, we have our County Executive, Mr. Jeff Richardson, our County Attorney, Mr. Greg Campner, our Clerk, Ms.

Claudette Borgeson, and our Senior Deputy Clerk, Mr. Travis Morris, all present.

All right, thank you.

And if everyone would please join in a moment of silence.

And next is the adoption of our final agenda and this would be the appropriate time to pull any items from consent.

I believe there is one item that definitely needs to be pulled.

Item 8.6, is that correct Mr. Kammer?

Yes, Mr. Chair.

Ms.

Aye Ms.

Mallek?

Yes Ms.

McKeel?

Yes Ms.

Palmer?

Yes Ms.

Price?

Aye Mr. Gallaway?

Chair Galloway, may I please state also that regarding 8.3 and 8.4 that it missed, there was a slight misstep in that both vehicles will have all the equipment on them.

They will not be removed, that's correct.

I think that was the way it was in there.

It was stated that way that I think we'll be okay.

It's fine.

We have an agenda and that will take us to brief announcements by board members.

and Ms.

Oh good, thank you.

Let me do the scary one first.

Just got an email today about the spotted lanternfly which is moving south in Virginia.

I'd make sure I'm, yeah, and so I would just like to announce since August 27th there is a Zoom meeting at 7 p.m.

being put out by the Cooperative Extension Department for anyone with orchards or

Fruit.

And so please contact the BCE or Kerry Swanson, our extension agent, and get all that contact information because this is a nasty creature and we need to squash it whenever we can.

Very good news for the Western Albemarle Rescue Squad and that is that they have purchased two lots south of the railroad tracks in Crozet and west of Crozet Avenue.

and will be over the next several years designing and building a building suitable for their 80 to 100 workers and also to give them faster access to the southern area of the growth area where they won't have to deal with the four-way and the trestle.

So that's really good news.

August 3rd through 5th, the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center organized their 2020 Lewis and Clark National Trail Heritage Annual Meeting.

This is a three-day conference that was held here virtually.

It was going to be here in person, and we were expecting these 270 people to come here, but they still had a very, very successful conference over the whole entire time.

Jeffrey Hammond from UVA, who is one of our premier archaeologists in the area, Elizabeth Chu of Montpelier and formerly of Monticello,

and Carolyn Gillman for the Museum of the American Indian.

We're all presenters.

Thank you.

Nothing at this time.

Yes, thank you, Chair Galloway.

I just wanted to make everyone aware of the fact that there's a bipartisan bill that is going through Congress called the Restaurants Act.

This helps independent restaurants, which are uniquely affected by the pandemic.

and I'd like to send out information to the board to perhaps take action in support of this bill.

Independent restaurants employ 11 million Americans and 90% of the money they make goes right back into the communities.

So we really do need to do something because we have restaurants even in our community that are closing and we don't want that.

We need those independent restaurants and I think we need to be supportive so I'll be asking at the next meeting if we can support that and if any residents out there want to know more about if they can take action at saverestaurants.com.

Thank you, Supervisor Palmer.

I just want to make the announcement again that the IVMUC recycling center is open and fully functioning now.

It is very well set up and so people can drop off their recyclables for free and that the 30 gallon trash bags are still $2 to throw away.

So a very convenient, inexpensive way to get rid of your trash and recyclables.

That's it.

Thank you.

Not at this time.

The next item, number six, Proclamations and Recognitions.

We do have an introduction that will be made to the board.

And my understanding is Mr. John Oprandi will be joining us.

Oh, Nicole.

Nicole is great.

Yes, Mr. Chair, are you ready?

Yes, sir.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and members of the board.

I'm Dan Eggleston, Chief of Fire Rescue, and today I'm here to introduce our new emergency manager, Nicole Matthews.

Nicole is a native of Virginia who recently separated from active military service after six years in the Army.

During her time in the military, she specialized in sea burning and hazmat operations.

Prior to entering the military, she received a bachelor's degree

and International Relations from Mary Baldwin College.

Having been stationed in Washington State and Texas, she's decided to get back to Virginia and close to her family.

Besides being our new Emergency Management Coordinator, Nicole's also in graduate school with Park University to get her master's degree in Administration and Disaster in Emergency Management.

So I'm really happy to have Nicole on board.

Of course, she started right in the middle of this pandemic and has done a wonderful job to help us

to manage this both from the government side as well as to protect our citizens and residents of Albemarle.

Hi, I just wanted to take the opportunity I've had in passing the opportunity to meet some of you, but haven't had the chance to engage with you.

But just wanted to take the time to let you know how excited I am to be here and how I believe that there's never a better time for an emergency manager to start than in the middle of an emergency.

You really get to know everyone and get in depth on all of the projects.

So while I am getting to know everyone here in the county and getting to know the processes, I'm excited to be here and ready for the challenges that are coming along with all the events that are happening here in the county.

I have sent out, you sent out the information for my work plan and I believe a few of you had the opportunity to review that.

Yes, thank you.

I have the great good fortune to listen in on the Ruritan's and White Hall's Safe and Ready Committee, to which Nicole is a tremendous asset.

And so we are her guinea pig to try out these new things.

But I'm very, very encouraged with all she brings to the table and the amount of work she's piled up for herself is pretty astonishing.

Welcome.

It's wonderful to have you here.

I did not see your work plan.

Maybe I missed it, but it would be wonderful if you could share that once again with the board because I would like to read that.

And Nicole, welcome.

We're thrilled to have you.

Next item on our agenda number seven from the public.

These are matters not listed for public hearing on the agenda or on matters previously considered by the board or matters that are pending before the board.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

During the time set aside for matters not listed for public hearing on the agenda, individuals may address the Board of Supervisors concerning matters previously considered by the Board or matters that are pending before the Board other than items listed on the agenda for a public hearing.

Individuals are allowed three minutes to speak and a sign-up sheet is processed through the Clerk's Office.

Timekeeping is conducted through a timer.

The timer will commence when you begin speaking and this begins your allotted time.

You will be notified when the three minutes are up and you are requested to bring your comments to a close as your microphone will be muted after about five more seconds.

In order to give all speakers equal treatment and courtesy, the Board requests that the speakers adhere to the following guidelines.

When called to address the Board, please state your name and if you live in Albemarle County, your Magisterial District.

Address your comments directly to the board as a whole.

If you have written statements and other supporting material, you may email them to the clerk to be included in the record.

If you represent a group or organization, you may identify the group to be recognized.

If the speaker does not use all allocated time, the unused time may not be shared with another speaker.

and speakers are permitted one opportunity to comment during each of the public comment periods per meeting.

Back and forth debate is not permitted.

You're reminded that all comments are live streamed, recorded, and published on the Albemarle County website.

If participating by phone, please press star nine and if by zoom, we ask that you remain muted until you are called to speak.

All right, thank you.

Good afternoon.

My name is Josie Taylor.

I live in the Jack Jouett district.

I'm here to speak against the request for exceptions to allow for a home state permit at 888 Woodlands Road.

I've already sent you a great deal of information about issues we've experienced on our property since the home state began to operate almost a year ago.

Dogs overflowing garbage cans left out near the road, late night food deliveries, and a constant flow of strangers coming and going next door to our home.

I won't repeat details on all of that here.

Instead, I want to address the claim that Mr. Bobbs resides on the property and is always present during rentals.

We've seen no evidence of this, nothing to imply that there is someone living on the property full time.

Instead, we've heard the opposite from renters.

Just a brief sample from a time when the homestay was supposed to be shut down pending this hearing.

On July 24th, I spoke to a gentleman who said he was renting the upstairs part of the house and he didn't know anything about trash collection.

He said that there was no one else there on the property to ask.

On August 3rd, I spoke to a family from Atlanta and New York who told me they were renting the entire property up and down.

On August 6th, we lost a tree that took down the power line to our house.

An electric wire was down on the ground close to Mr. Crane's driveway until the following day.

The renters came out to look, but at no time did anyone else come to see the damage.

Mr. Crane lives very close by but I've seen no evidence that he has checked on the property and made sure the homestay had indeed shut down as requested.

Please vote no on Mr. Crane and Mr. Bob's request.

Thank you, Ms.

Heller.

Ms.

All right we will work with Ms.

Lane.

I am Marta Kean with the Java, the Jefferson area board for aging.

I'm also a resident in the Rio district.

I just wanted to make sure that all of you knew and that all of our residents who are listening in know that during COVID, Java continues to offer services and supports for seniors and caregivers.

We've been doing a lot online with information and assistance, options counseling and insurance counseling by phone or Zoom.

And our community centers and adult care and preschool and our volunteers have created ways to stay connected.

We've had weekly check-ins,

Activity kits, Facebook live events from touring a petting farm to cheer yoga to someone telling jokes, singing a song, just a lot of great ways for people to be entertained.

Our karaoke kitchen has been a big hit.

And probably the most fun was our conference called Bingo.

And that's been going on every week.

It's been a great way to keep people feeling connected as we try to weigh the negative impact of isolation against the risk of transmission of COVID.

We're also getting started again with FISH, which is our friends in schools helping and we're setting up virtual mentors to work with students and teachers.

I understand we have the middle school in Crozet as our first pilot and as we work it out, we're hoping that many other schools will take advantage of many volunteers that are looking forward to supporting students during this difficult time.

We've been in constant consultation with Dr. Bonds as we try to make decisions about the best way to support parents of preschoolers and caregivers of those folks with dementia and physical disabilities that need the benefit of our adult care.

So two weeks ago we opened the adult care center and our Shining Star Preschool

following all the CDC guidelines and making sure we have plenty of PPE with much thanks to you all for help with the masks.

And we're always ready to close if a situation changes.

We recognize this is fluid and are never stuck to just keep going forward.

We're always examining every day what the risk is.

But I'm proud to announce that

All of our preschoolers and all of our members of the adult care wear their masks without any issues so that's been a lovely finding and it certainly helps us feel like we are doing things as safely as we can so thank you for your continuing support and I just wanted you to know that we continue to be there for all the seniors.

Yes, ma'am.

Sorry, I'm really having trouble trying to figure out my computer.

Thank you, and I'm sorry that you had to skip me on the order of your speakers.

Mrs. Josie Taylor gave you some very clear information, and I would just like to thank you for an opportunity to add a few more thoughts.

One of my biggest concerns here is the noncompliance that has gone along.

Mr. Bobbs doesn't live at this house and never has.

A notice of violation was given and yet the rentals continued.

The lease was supposed to end in April and I don't know if it was renewed.

I'm not sure why Mr. Crane would renew a lease on a property that was in non-compliance on a homestay issue.

I just feel that

Mr. Bobs has been snubbing his nose at the county all along.

The other concern I have is that, and lately on some of his correspondence with you, he says that the house has not been rented since June 30th and only family and friends have been staying there.

But the truth is that there have been renters continuously for the past seven weeks and the Airbnb listing has been up and active all that time.

You can only see that listing after seven o'clock at night so there's just an issue with some of the advertising going on for this property.

But again I'm concerned this man states that he lives there and he doesn't and you can't enforce the rules when you're not there and not to go back and list all the issues that you've already heard from us.

I would really hope that the

to have a permit given and to have the setback requirement vacated and to let him be a resident manager.

So thank you very much.

I kind of lost my thought a little bit on what I was going to say to you because of my computer issues.

Thanks very much for letting us have the opportunity and thank you again for the effort that you've gone in to do the analysis that you have for this issue.

Thank you.

One more potential speaker, Mr. Lee Condor.

Well, like I say, I wanted to speak only about an item that's already on the agenda.

So if there are questions for me when that item comes up for discussion, but other than that, no, I just have an alternate idea for the Rio Road improvements and just wanted to be sure that it was considered.

That's all.

All right, we will close the public hearing.

Mr. Chair?

Yes.

Well, I believe I've already communicated most of what I had.

I just wanted to be sure of that.

You know, that there is an alternative to some of the proposals for intersection improvements with Royal Road and the Parkway and also with Belvidere Avenue that provide better traffic flow that actually address the problems and don't cost any more than what VDOT has proposed.

and like I say, if you have any more questions, you have my email address, you can ask them at some later time.

I just want to make you aware that I am available to answer questions and I do this totally as a public service.

I'm just trying to help.

And so thank you for your consideration.

That's it for me.

Thanks.

All right so that was all of our speakers so we have our consent agenda to approve minus 8.6.

So moved.

All right call the vote.

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

McKeel.

Yes.

Ms.

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Yes.

All right, the consent agenda is approved.

Yes, that'd be fine.

Supervisor Price's question and clarification to me that came in either yesterday or Monday, it struck me that the amendments to be made need to be expanded.

And one of the ideas would be to have a set of rules that apply for virtual meetings.

Most of the text I think will be similar, but it may be more easy to manage.

to have special rules for the virtual meetings because right now it looks like the board may be having virtual meetings for quite a while and I think that I took the board's direction too literally and did not think about

I was creating an incongruity in the board's previously adopted rules.

Is there any objection to this approach?

It sounds like we have some work done.

This will come back to us.

All right, thank you and Mr. Campner, thank you so much.

I think you have once again exceeded expectations here.

I had raised a couple of questions and I think you looked even deeper into it than I had initially understood and I really appreciate you taking the initiative to look at this from a broader perspective and I just want to thank you for that.

I think that we have an opportunity

and I think your suggestion is an excellent one to recognize that these virtual meetings are going to continue longer than we initially anticipated or even a few weeks ago may have fully contemplated and I think that with a little more work we will have an excellent policy that we can set up for both virtual meetings and if we ever can get back into Lane Auditorium

to do those.

We had briefly discussed at an earlier meeting about having someone who is speaking under matters from the public choose either the one o'clock or the seven o'clock but not both on the same day.

So I would just remind the board to think about whether we wish

rather than looking at our virtual meetings and I don't know if you were really going to do this but coming out of this pandemic we may very well end up with a hybrid of meetings of some sort because we're seeing a lot of increase in public engagement through our zoom meetings so when you're writing that I would not look at it write it just through the lens of in an emergency we're having a virtual

I would write it in such a way that it is an option that we utilize for our meetings based, and I don't think you have to give the criteria necessarily, but I just wouldn't want it to say that in an emergency we move to Zoom, right?

Yes thank you I'm looking for it now.

So my official declaration is I am electing to disqualify myself from participating in this special exception.

I was previously a party to a contract with a business owned by the owner of the property at 888 Woodlands Road.

I have completed and signed a disqualification form and request that this fact be recorded in the appropriate public records for a period of five years.

All right.

Thank you, Supervisor Mallek.

She'll be rejoining when we're through with this item.

And let's see, Rebecca, are you?

Oh, there you are.

Good afternoon, Rebecca.

Thank you, Chairman Galloway.

Thank you.

I have a presentation I will share with you.

Okay, is that showing up okay for everyone in the slideshow?

Yes.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

Rebecca Ragsdale, principal planner in the zoning division of community development and I've reviewed the special exception requests before you for this property along with our co-compliance staff.

So as you've seen before, we'd like to remind you which of the homestay regulations apply to the specific requests before you, since we do have separate set of regulations depending on the zoning and acreage of parcels.

So this is a parcel less than five acres.

Therefore, it would be limited to no more than two guest rooms, no use of an accessory structure, no more than one homestay use on the property, no whole house rental, which means rental when the owner or resident is not there,

and then the requirements that there be a 125 foot setback from all property lines for parking and the building used for the homestay and that it must be owner occupied.

All home stays must obtain a zoning clearance before beginning operation, and that would include the safety inspections, the final check of parking, and that neighbor notice has been provided so that neighbors have an emergency contact in case issues arise.

So there are a number of special exceptions that may be applied for and in this case the two before you today are to reduce the setbacks

to the western property line into the front property line and then to waive the owner occupancy requirement.

The property is owned by the Cranes and then the tenant is Philip Bobs is the applicant and proposed tenant for the homestay.

The factors that we consider are that there is no detriment to any abutting lot, and that there's no harm to public health safety or welfare when we review these requests.

And that's in the homestay analysis section of the ordinance.

In general, special exceptions may be approved, denied, or approved with conditions, and the board's not required to make specific findings in support of its action.

So giving you the regulatory background, I'd like to switch to sort of an overview of the property in the neighborhood and then get into the details of this specific request.

It is located as you've heard on 888 Woodlands Road and it's about halfway between Earliesville Road and Free Union along that stretch of Woodlands Road and it's in about the middle of the map there with the

with the blue asterisks and it's situated pretty close to Mount Air Rock Lane and then you've heard how close it is to Cola Woods Lane to the west and you can also see on the map here all of these abutting property owners were notified of the special exception request and we've primarily heard from Ms.

Taylor and then Mr. and Mrs.

Mr. and Mrs. Taylor and then Ms.

Lane that you heard from this afternoon.

So I'll get into a little more detail about the properties.

Again, it's 888 Woodlands in the middle of your screen there and this just shows you again the proximity of the homes to the site.

There are a number of residential properties around this site.

A special exception request again is to that property line shared with 2814 Cola Woods Lane to the west and then to the front property line.

So this was the exhibit that was provided in your packet that gives you a sense of the distances and some of the characteristics of the property and I do have some site photos because you know we look at these areas aerials a lot and they are helpful but until you're on the ground and you kind of see the relationship then it's it's hard to see but in this case you'll see where

The Taylor's property comes up along the property line there along that western property line with the proposed homestay.

There is some wooded areas, but they're not entirely located on the

the Homestay property.

Parking is proposed to be located in front.

There's a parking area that is lower than the upper level of parking and then the guest rooms would be located on the lower level.

There is an existing

fence that sort of screens between the upper and the lower level.

So I'll go ahead and show you those photos now so you can follow along with what I may or may not be describing that well.

So this shows you the carport is to the left and the upper parking is to the left.

along the western property line, and that's as close as 16 feet.

This is an older structure.

It predates our current zoning regulations.

The minimum side setback for a structure now like this is 25 feet, so it's a lot closer than what you may have seen before, and you do have the information in your packet about how the proposal is for the guest rooms to be located on the other side of the house at that lower level.

um this just shows you the the lower level and where the guest rooms are located from the eastern side of the property and then this shows you a view from the western kind of corner of the property and the and the rest of the structure and where that carport is and the outdoor areas where the fire pit is and everything that that guests may be using

We've heard from the two speakers, our co-compliance staff and myself have spoken with the neighbors and you've received a number of emails.

And I think you've heard, you know, in staff's opinion, how this particular property, you know, has the way it's situated and how close it is, not only the structures in the parking, but just how close the neighbor's yard is that they use to guess.

or close to the homestay and the interaction that they've had with guests and the things that they've been experiencing.

But some of the things that we noted in the staff report and that have been brought up are the ongoing compliance issues with this being a zoning violation and rented without a permit.

There's a history of the listing coming online and then coming offline.

But this is a property that we've been investigating since the end of November.

And there was a notice of violation issued as well related to it to the zoning violation.

but again we do have some concerns and about the proximity of this parcel and what the neighbors have been experiencing with what happens given the nature and the layout of the parcels within the homestay guests coming over to the neighbor's yard or the driveway walking the dogs and that sort of thing and then you heard about noise as well these are photos that were provided from the neighbor's property that were emailed to y'all earlier in the week so in summary

We are recommending denial of both of these requests for the reduction in setback and then also the request to waive the owner occupancy requirement.

As I've stated, we just feel like it's too close to the neighbors and there have been too many issues and impacts to neighbors.

And then there is the ongoing compliance issues.

And we feel like that this sort of situation is not consistent with the purpose and intent of allowing those special exceptions.

for owner occupancy to begin with.

So our recommendation is for is for denial to summarize and then you have the motion uh the recommended motion resolution before you is to deny both homestay special exceptions.

Thank you, Rebecca.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Ms.

Ragsdale, thank you very much for your presentation and the material that was provided.

I have no questions for you at this time.

No questions at this time.

I have no questions at this time.

Thank you very much.

Rebecca, thank you.

I think you have described this succinctly, and I appreciate your good work.

I do have a question, and it was referenced earlier in one of the public comments that this Airbnb listing

is actually only active in the evening hours after 7pm and you can't find it listed during the daytime hours.

I'm questioning

Is that possible?

Have you had any experience with that?

And I see Donna nodding her head because I never stay in Airbnbs because of this exact.

Yeah, we do still have an ongoing investigation related to the compliance issues and I did recently discover that the listing was up in the evening as one of the neighbors stated.

I didn't think to check it in the evenings.

That's something we're learning as we work through these homestay compliance issues and

and the different things, but we do have access to the listing and I checked it on, I think it was Monday or Tuesday evening and it was up again.

Yeah, and that's really good I think for all of us to know.

I didn't realize, I just never really thought about it.

I didn't realize you could do that either.

One of the only other, and it's more of a comment really rather than a question, but I noticed in the documents we have that it was suggested by

the applicant or the folks that were renting this A or B and B that if you had a large amount of traffic you should park in the parking lot at the Methodist Church down the road and I was just curious there's only one Methodist Church that's really close by which is on Ivy Creek Methodist and I actually call them and ask if

Anyone from that residence, anyone at all had called and asked their permission for this Airbnb to use their parking lot for parking and they said absolutely not.

and that had someone called, they would not approve that parking.

But I just thought it was interesting.

They were sending people to the Methodist Church to park and to drop off cars when they hadn't even checked with the Methodist Church first.

And that's more of a comment, Rebecca.

Thank you.

All right, so Rebecca, if I dismiss this in the way it was written or where it's at, so who's the actual, I understand that the owners are making the application and then I understand the proposal for the gentleman to be the resident manager, but who does the, is it the owner that's profiting from this Airbnb or is it the proposed tenant?

Is this, my thinking here is that, I mean, are tenants that are renting places allowed to start their own Airbnbs on people's property and they're just getting owners to go along?

I don't know the financial or the lease arrangements between the Cranes and Mr. Bob.

When I alluded to what we thought the purpose and intent of what a special exception to owner occupancy would be earlier was

We had in our mind maybe larger rural area farms that would need a farm manager to live on the property or a larger rural area property that had multiple homes that may be held in a family estate and the family can't live there but something that's more along those lines than

The encounter times of our residents like it's being called into question whether

This is the actual residence for the tenant or not?

I mean, I would think that would be something that we should be able to confirm.

So when we met with Mr. Bobs on the property, it sounded as if they were deciding whether they were going to establish full-time residency there.

And Mr. Bobs sent me a copy of a driver's license change to 8888 Woodlands Road that was issued on 722.

He sent that to me on Tuesday, a copy of the driver's license.

That's one of those things that

you know, has been an ongoing issue with this property being rented with no one there.

And they did want to see if the special exception was going to be approved before they followed through with the rest of the process in terms of the homestay clearance and formally moving there.

But that was the information we were given.

So in the packet

But it sounds like with Supervisor McKeel's question about this 7 p.m.

listing and after 7 p.m., but in the packet it seemed like they were operating and they were not compliant.

Notice of violation, then they removed the listing, but then the listing became reactivated.

Staff contacted them to basically explain how that was going to proceed.

The listing was removed again.

That was the end of it in the packet, but it sounds like now after listing removed, it's been popping back up again.

So non-compliance has continued up until as recently as last week.

We are still investigating that, and it seems that that may be the case, you know, based on looking at the listings and recent visits to the property and what we've observed.

But that's why I said we've been working closely with our code compliance officer on this site.

I understand.

Thank you.

Those are all the questions I had.

Supervisors, I can go back through the order if you wish to make comments.

Is that good?

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Supervisor McKeel, I can't speak specifically with regard to Airbnb, but I do know from my law practice advertising that when an entity advertises to the internet, they have something that are generally referred to as campaigns, and you can set the dates and times for those advertisements to appear.

and that clearly appears to be what has happened here.

That they have deliberately set it in such a fashion, at least the evidence to me would indicate it's been set in such a fashion as to minimize the ability of the county to know when the advertisement is appearing outside of regular work hours.

Yeah, so I understand, have they ever received a certificate to have a homestay?

No.

Well, it was brought to our attention the end of November.

Okay but since then they've been operating almost a year or certainly over half a year without any kind of permits or certificates or anything.

Well we, like I said, it's been an ongoing investigation with the history of the listing coming up and down and then a history of the applicant telling us it's family and friends that are staying there and not always homestay rentals.

So I can't say conclusively how many days, you know, it's been rented or how continuously

Okay, thank you.

Just one comment I guess is that I hope staff going forward will recognize that this, I'm sure they already do recognize, but they'll adapt to this when they run the software to check home stays that are active without a license and without approval.

And I just assume that's going to happen.

And thank you very much.

Well I guess we have to comment so I do have some comments and I just want to make it clear though for everybody that this is not a public hearing so we won't be having a public hearing on this so I think there may have been a little bit of confusion about that early on.

As the supervisor of record for this area I am very familiar

These homes are much too close to give any waiver of the location.

The impacts for the neighbors would be much too great.

I visited on a Friday afternoon and trash cans were out.

I assume they had been out for at least a few hours.

The trash in this area is picked up on Thursdays.

So that meant that the trash was going to sit there for another, almost another week.

So I understand their concern about the trash.

Having said that, that's just a minor concern.

Mainly the concern for me is the distance, the minimum distance is not acceptable.

the owner occupancy is not being adhered to.

This particular Airbnb has compliance issues and has had them now ongoing with staff having difficulty in working with the owners.

So for me, I will not be supporting either one of these

requests.

And I'm happy to make a motion at whatever time we're ready to do that.

But dogs roaming, sounds, impacts for the neighbors, this is just the wrong place for an Airbnb.

And I will loop back to you for that motion.

Thank you, Chair Galloway, and I apologize.

I was so focused on responding to a question from Supervisor McKeel, I forgot to offer my general comment.

So I have two general comments and then several specific ones.

First, I think this raises once again the concern

The second is a general comment and it's my understanding that we're limited to special use

I would ask that the board and county staff consider making a request to the state legislature that we be allowed to make these run with the applicant rather than the land.

turning specifically to this application.

And Judy Lane, she took the language I was going to use.

It appears to me from the evidence that this particular application involves individuals who are literally thumbing their nose at us with impunity.

Number four, I commend county staff for their active monitoring and enforcement.

I believe that it is too little too late that what they're saying they're willing to do here based upon the facts as they exist I too will vote against it.

I believe the evidence appears to demonstrate that there have been false statements and this applicant and the owner must be held accountable.

beyond mere denial and I appreciate county staff looking at the code enforcement and the county attorney.

I would offer Supervisor McKeel if you make the motion on the second line that we add after the words analysis comma any written that we add the words and verbal

before comments in order to make it clear that the decision that we may be making is based not only upon our written record, also the information that was provided to us by some of the speakers here today.

And with that, I thank you again, Chair Galloway, for the courtesy of allowing me to circle back so I could make my full comments.

Thank you, Donna.

My only comments, the compliance pieces here, it's disconcerting.

We have folks that are trying to run this and do this diligently and who have, when we put the new ordinance in play, have gone

gone to the extent of doing everything right to get their Airbnb operation up and running.

And that speaks volumes to me regarding future decisions as we work on these special exceptions, but I think it also speaks to the neighbors that you're willing to do the right things.

But then when you have a compliance issue going on,

To me that can be problematic and then when you have the proximity that Supervisor McKeel set back on the setbacks you just you lack faith and wondering if issues come up if anything's going to be handled appropriately because things haven't been handled appropriately thus far.

I do I may have one quick question and I'm not sure that Rebecca can answer it but going forward

Well, we have our enforcement steps that we can take with court and fines and filings in that regard.

I will remind y'all, we do not have the helper software right now.

We have the funding to renew it, I believe, but we've been discussing when we need to renew it for another year, the short-term rental helper service.

But when we do renew the service, it will be able to

find the listings even if they go up and down, but we do still have the links to this particular listing.

All right, thank you very much.

With that, if there are no objections, and Greg, I guess this is a quick question for the motion.

That's correct, and you have the resolution in your package.

That's attachment G, and I had recommended that

Tweak to the second line to recognize the verbal comments that the board received as well.

So it would be a move to adopt the resolution as attachment G with the amendment to acknowledge the verbal comments that were received.

It's been motioned.

The motion has been made and properly seconded.

Any further discussion?

Is LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Ms.

McKeel?

Aye.

Ms.

Palmer?

Aye.

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

Yes.

All right, that motion carries.

Thank you very much.

And Supervisor Mallek, we'll need to get Supervisor Mallek back into the meeting.

All right board our next item on the agenda number 10 Albemarle County 2020 smart scale application the Rio Road corridor.

Good afternoon thank you Chairman Galloway and members of the board of supervisors Kevin McDermott transportation planner for Albemarle County.

I am bringing up my screen right now to share with you

I believe you all can see my presentation now, is that correct?

Yes.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

So as a reminder, I'm coming back today at the request of the board from our

our meeting in June where we discussed the SmartScale applications and on the Rio Red Corridor projects I was asked to evaluate a little bit more information and come back another time before you are ready to approve that resolution of support.

So that's what I'm here today to do with you.

Just as a reminder of that background also, at the time we did adopt resolutions supporting nine projects, as you can see on the screen here.

Those all have been submitted, including, I'll point out the one at the bottom there, Fontaine Avenue, 29 Bypass, interchange improvement with some new designs that you all had seen through the MPO and other sources.

So you expressed interest in the improvements in the Rio Road corridor but requested some additional information.

The options were to apply for a roundabout at the Rio Road John Warner Parkway intersection, apply for an R-cut at Rio Road Belvedere intersection, or combine both projects into one application.

Staff continued to work with the Department of Transportation on this and try and come up with what our best options were.

And in the end, we determined that for the SmartScale application, our best option at this time was to apply for the roundabout at Raya Road and John Warner Parkway intersection.

And staff is also recommending that we include $2 million in local funding in that application.

The reasons for this recommendation are that the John Warner Parkway intersection is more problematic from both an operational and safety perspective.

There's been a lot more accidents at that location as opposed to Belvidere, as well as there's a lot more conflicted movements at that location.

So a lot more left turns against traffic that you're seeing, causing more delay for the overall intersection.

We are also a lot more confident that the roundabout is the right solution for the John Warner Parkway as opposed to the R-cut being the right solution for Belvidere.

We are about to enter into the Rio code, Rio Road corridor study and that corridor study is really going to be evaluating these intersections along with many others in the corridor and in reviewing this with our selected consultant on that project

We really looked at that John Warner Parkway roundabout as the only real option we have there to address the traffic problem.

Whereas at Belvedere, I think there may be some other options that we could look at that could be potentially signalization, potentially a roundabout or other innovative intersections.

So we would really like to do a little more research.

Vida

The R Cut would work best if we had a roundabout in place, making it sensible to move forward with the roundabout first.

And then the cost of improvements at the John Warner Parkway are fairly prohibitive for the county to move forward with on our own.

Belvedere, depending on what the ultimate solution is there, there's some options that we may be able to do with out of our CIP funding or possibly through a revenue sharing grant application in the next round.

Both of those would be able to be completed at a much faster timeline.

So just regarding that Rio Road-John Warner Parkway intersection,

The application will be submitted by us by the Albemarle County in the proposal to convert it to a roundabout.

It does include pedestrian and bike facilities.

This intersection was number 14 on the county priority list as opposed to Belvedere being number 17, so it is ranked a little higher.

Our final cost estimate on that that we received from VDOT just last week was $7.8 million, and that is scaled to a future construction date.

So that's why it's a little bit higher than if we were to build it right now, but we're looking out at five years for that add date.

and like I said, the staff is recommending that we add $2 million in local funding from our CIP Transportation Leveraging Fund in the future for that.

Here is a design that we have for this.

You can see that it does have the pedestrian crossings of Raya Road on the north side.

and of Rio Road on the east side and continues the shared use path through there and has new turn lanes.

You can also see there's a relocated bus stop with a bus slip lane on the northbound Rio Road movement and that is really all we have.

And so staff is recommending the Board of Supervisors approve the resolution of support for the SmartScale application that has been submitted for the Rio Road-John Warner Parkway intersection.

Thank you, Kevin.

Thank you.

Great step forward on this analysis, Kevin.

And my only question is, will

Is this application flexible enough that when we learn what we're going to learn in the corridor study we will be able to make appropriate changes or do we then have to start all over again?

Yeah, well that is, it's dependent on the level of changes.

Now, like I said, we do really think that this is probably going to be the right solution at this intersection.

SmartScale has a policy in place that if you make

McKeel.

cannot give additional funding if that's what's required, then it would be removed and we would have to do it.

But it's also likely that the level of change wouldn't be as much that we would need to rescore it or the CTB does have discretion on that and they would be able to allow the project to move forward even if there are changes.

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Mr. McDermott, thank you.

First off, I want to thank Mr. Condor for the submission that he made.

He didn't just simply have an objection.

He actually worked up a very professional submission, and I think that speaks to the highest level of public participation in this, and I know that you've reviewed it, Mr. McDermott.

I feel like you've become my new best friend over the last three or four months since the number of

zoning applications came through and I've come to you on a number of occasions about this entire corridor area.

I concur with your assessment.

I appreciate your professional analysis of all of this that the roundabout is the one

area, one item that we really should focus on here.

I have great confidence now with the additional knowledge that you have been able to share with me.

I'm confident with the corridor study that the county is committed to addressing this.

I also believe and I appreciate your analysis.

I think that right now this avoids multiple complexities that otherwise could have come up with some of the alternative considerations.

and I support this.

So thank you very much.

Fine on you.

No, thank you very much, Kevin, for your presentation.

Big fan of roundabouts having used them all over the world.

Thank you.

I agree with this.

And I do appreciate Mr. Condor's contribution to this discussion.

I have one simple question.

Well, the local funding, I assume is what you're referring to.

If it were funded, then we would have the opportunity to work with VDOT to schedule when that funding would need to be available.

At the very latest, I think we would be looking at about four years out, but I think if we had the money available,

Before that, we could move forward with using that funding to begin the process and try and accelerate this.

Great.

I just wanted to make sure there was flexibility there, not knowing what our budget is going to look like over the next year or two.

Thank you.

Thank you, Kevin.

I think your advice is right on point, and I certainly agree.

I think the roundabout seems like to me really appropriate in this particular location.

I was kind of getting at what Liz was asking.

If this was approved, I was trying to figure out a timeline for when we might be able to anticipate

I'm sorry.

I must have hit the button by accident.

How far did I go?

Yeah, that's correct.

So, as you know, this application cycle

the way SmartScale works is that every project has to be fully funded in the six-year plan that it's identified in.

So sometime between next year, next June, June of 2022,

or July of 2021, sorry, through the next six years, that would have to be fully funded.

So we would have to put our money up at the front end of that period.

So given that, then we would be looking at

If the county did have that $2 million available ahead of time, we could start working on the design phase of this.

And once again, VDOT would have flexibility with this from my understanding.

If we started working on that and put that county funding up ahead of time and completed the design phase, I think we would have a high likelihood that we could receive some of these.

We do have the 2 million local funding available next year or the year after.

Great.

Well, I really support this.

I appreciate all your work.

And I definitely agree that looking at this intersection before we tackle the Belvedere is the right approach.

I too would like to offer up my appreciation to Mr Condor, he's a member of our ROW 29 CAC and we recently was recently appointed to C-TAC.

You know when I've pondered what solutions could be at this intersection the way that the loop around after you pass through the intersection and go down is not one that I never was able to brainstorm so I think that actually has some merit to it.

I would like to offer that the email with the drawings, we can put that into the conversation just included in the minutes if there's no objection to that, since it was sent to the board as public information.

The roundabout at Dunlord Drive could be interesting just because of the, there'd have to be some work done there just because of how steep of a hills there.

Kevin, the

I mean, I do agree with the, I like the approach.

I think that the roundabout or a solution of some sort here, there can't be but so many ideas that can come up with this intersection that waiting for the corridor study for the other intersection seems to make more sense than putting everything on hold for it.

I'll be curious to see where this falls after we put SmartScale in.

Maybe I just got a few projects that had in my mind the last go around and when nothing got funded, I don't get my hopes too terribly high when we see these projects go through, especially knowing what they're up against even just here locally, let alone the rest of the state.

But certainly I'm in favor of moving forward to see how this scores and to see what the state says about it and hope that the additional funding to this one will help its chances.

Kevin, in the meantime, as we

Do a corridor study and we're going to have to figure out solutions for the Belvedere intersection.

As volume continues to increase there, there may have to be short term solutions before a permanent solution.

I know that VDOT has said for years at some point that may merit or we're in a traffic light or something like that.

Yes, that's correct.

I think after we recover from the COVID kind of shutdown that we have right now and Senior Center starts to open up to service, I think we should look into bringing someone in to do another warrant study at that intersection and see where it is, because I'm sure it will be getting close.

Right, and I do appreciate the cat bus, the way that that's thought of here with that right turn bypass where you got the bus stop.

That's clever and allows people to still get around if they're traveling out west.

So that's well done.

I have an additional comment, but it's not related to this.

Mallek

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel.

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer.

Yes.

Ms.

Price.

Aye.

Yes.

All right, thank you for that.

That motion carries.

I just have a comment that I want the board to be aware of.

I recognize that Kevin has gone over very well the alternate plan for the Fontaine 29 intersection, but I do want to just say that

My concern with this, I have other concerns with it, but one of my concerns with it is the historic crossroads community of Batesville.

We've talked about Batesville a lot in the past.

Before Bea and Donna joined the board.

If you put into Google Maps right now, Red Hill Elementary to Brownsville Elementary, it will take you directly through Batesville.

And we have constant traffic through that area.

This makes it 10 miles different than the route to go through Batesville.

My concern was with the original plan and the diamond, I was concerned about this, but this new plan makes it a bit more cumbersome to get off and come around.

And while I'm not trying to stop this particular application, I just want the rest of the board to be aware that this will have impacts

to other areas outside of the 29 Fontaine travel path.

And that's all I would like to say.

All right.

Thank you.

Yes, may I?

I will ask my perennial question, and that is, since we are in such a state of flux with new plans coming and going on a seemingly daily basis, how tied in, if this is approved, is this it?

Or do we have several years to dig out the old plan, look at it, and see with partners if that old plan is better, the one from five and seven years ago?

So that's

Again, what are we signing up for?

And are we saddling ourselves with a cheaper, ineffective, or not as good solution before we have a chance to find out what our true partners can do for us?

That's my question.

To respond to that, I'll say this is going to be in the exact same situation as I described for the Rio intersection.

If it were to be funded, it would move to design and there will be opportunities for us to provide input during that design process.

They will be evaluated

And if the design changes, then it would have the potential to possibly go back to be rescored and possibly need to go to the CTB for approval if we want to move forward with a different design.

But we will continue to look at our other options there.

And this is going to be a very difficult project.

I can tell you that.

And one final thing, I agree with that.

Thank you.

And because we've taken a sort of less solution oriented thing further for 118 intersection, it's pushed the problem down here.

Whereas seven years ago, we were talking about stoplights in extra lanes, and it was going to make a nice solution.

So anyway, it is a complicated mess that involves all of those intersections altogether.

All right, Kevin, thank you for everything here this afternoon.

Thank you all.

So the next item, number 11, COVID-19 community response.

And this looks like a couple different people.

Doug, are you starting this or who's starting this?

I'm going to start.

Thank you so much to the members of the board for having us this afternoon.

I'm going to share my screen while trying to also talk, which is harder than it looks.

COVID-19 has been unlike any emergency that we've really worked as a local government on to date.

As you're well aware, the incident management structure is the structure that we use as a local government to respond to an emergency.

And typically your incident management teams are going to be working on a timeline that is measured in days.

and this one really looks like we're going to be looking at a response on the timeline of months.

So it's been a much different experience than even our most seasoned emergency management folks and public safety folks have had experience with.

And another thing that's very different is that typically you have a pretty distinct response phase and then you transition to a really discrete recovery phase.

And with COVID-19 what we're seeing is we are sort of both responding and recovering all at the same time.

We're still very much in the response phase, but we wanted to take a moment before time gets too far away from us to highlight some of the things that were done during what is now referred to as phase zero and sort of that height of the response phase that ran from March 15th to May 15th.

And so I want to take everyone back in your minds to the second half of March and early April when there was just so much that felt so uncertain in the community.

I'm going to turn the presentation over in a moment to our incident commander, Doug Walker, which is a title that he rotates with Trevor Henry, to share a little bit more about some of the work that was done by local government to support the community during this

There's a bunch of numbers on some of the slides that they'll be going over, and those are a snapshot in time.

And we're not going to cover all of them specifically in this presentation, but we'll have this information available in various forms following the presentation.

And we really appreciate the time on the agenda today to review all this with you.

Thank you, Emily.

Am I able, are you hearing me at this point?

Yes.

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, members of the board, Doug Walker, Deputy County Executive.

It is, it's remarkable.

Here we are in mid-August and look at the adjustments that we've made in our daily lives, all of us.

And what we have, I guess, come to take for granted and how it is we get through every day and

And everybody deals with that differently based on their different circumstances.

But I know in the case of those here in the office, the wearing of a mask has become so natural and so normal that in a rare occasion where

In my case, I step out of my office and I take about five steps down the hall and there's this panic that I've forgotten my mask.

And it's just an awareness of how much life has changed in our work life.

And of course, you each have your own examples in your life, both with the county and personally, and those that are the listening public

can tell similar stories about how they have adjusted and where it is in their mind that they see where they have now come to take certain changes in the way that we engage in public life differently.

I tell that story just to kind of create that perspective and part of taking back to where we were back in the middle of March when

All of this was brand new.

Yes, we were hearing in news coming out from around the world about what we thought that we were going to be facing, but we're not obviously aware of what the implications were going to be.

And so this is intended to kind of frame out the first two months of what we were characterizing as phase zero.

This slide obviously shows the goals from both the response phase and the recovery phase.

This presentation is really not intended to be a celebration of all the things that we've accomplished for our community.

We really don't want to characterize it that way, but we do want to make sure that we are able to use it as a way to account for the early stages of our response.

The onset of the pandemic locally and how that served as a foundation for the work that would continue unknown to us at the time for months.

Of course, continuing and ongoing into an uncertain future.

So back in March, if you go ahead and go to the next slide, Emily, please.

One of the early tasks of the INT or the challenge that we had was to kind of frame

what this was all about to guide our work.

And you've seen this a lot.

I'm not going to kind of over communicate it at this point, but just to emphasize for you and for those who may not have seen this as much, how frequently the IMT, the incident management team, relied on the goals in order to kind of filter and guide our thinking about are we doing the right work and are we doing the right work in the right way.

These are not mutually exclusive.

They do work in combination.

So from that period of phase zero, reducing transmission among staff and the public, protecting people who are at higher risk with adverse health complications, and maintaining essential services for the public, this became fundamental to how it is that we approach virtually every single day.

Next slide, please.

So we'll try not to focus but so much on the numbers on the slide.

I do know that there are a listing public that may not have the benefit of the visual.

Emily has indicated the will to get this information out in a number of different formats.

Actually, I believe this is where I'm supposed to turn to Trevor.

I'm doing a little handoff here.

Hey, thanks Doug.

I thought you were going to cover my slides for me.

No, no, no, thank you.

We'll try not to do that.

Mr. Chair, a member of the board is Trevor Henry, Assistant County Executive.

I've been serving on the incident management team along with Doug as co-incident commander for the past 163 days now, if we're keeping track right.

As Emily mentioned, this is a busy slide in some regard, but really it's just a snapshot in time.

Looking at that two month period or phase zero,

on some of the work that we did.

And our organization, as the board knows, has traditionally been an in-person operation for many of our services and customer interactions.

And we offer certainly electronic means and remote means, but a lot of our customers, especially when it comes to paying bills and things like that, they want to have that person-to-person connection.

And so that is our culture.

As part of the leadership team well before this COVID period, we have been working quite a while on a work from home policy and just working through it.

And one on our leadership team used to always say, it must be present to win.

It's just really kind of that old school and got to be here to serve our customers.

Well, when you have an event that hit us in early March,

We had to basically reinvent how we work in order to continue our service to our community.

And so inside of just one week, we had to figure out how to completely transition our workforce and as many of our services to digital phone, video conference, drop-off services, or really a combination of these, which has maintained through today to serve our community

while keeping our employees and public safe.

You know, DEF used the phrase many times that we essentially reinvented local government operations in a week, which was a pretty amazing thing to see happen and to be part of that.

I would note, you know, there's one story there says 102.

You know, one critical piece to that was us having the actual technology to give to some of our staff

that traditionally worked on site with a desktop to be able to work from home.

And school stepped up.

We made a request early on to the superintendent's office and they turned that around in minutes of, yeah, anything we have that is not being used, you can use.

And so over 100 laptops were loaned to us from schools.

And that was a significant boost for us to just allow our staff to be able to transition to a work from home environment.

And just a shout out to our leadership and all staff in our information technology department, but especially the leadership in really getting us to work through all the

the issues that come in a virtual environment.

And then for our facilities crew, you know, that remained and helped convert the physical spaces that we have today to allow those of us that did remain primarily onsite to do so in the safest way as possible.

You know, a lot of staff certainly supported that, but IT and facilities really played a big role

in that first week or two of COVID response.

While we shut the doors to the visitor's entrance at the county building, we made a commitment that if someone showed up and needed services, we would do our best to serve them in a safe and efficient manner.

Over that two month period, when we kept track of this, this was data that was important to us, data that would get reviewed daily at the incident management team meetings, but we served 923 people

with face coverings, sneeze guards installed, gloves, and all the other measures that we put in place following our CDC and state guidelines.

We quickly spun up a virtual public meeting strategy, and we're able to meet the time-sensitive work that our board had, that you've experienced, the planning commission, the EDA, Economic Development Authority, and our broadband authority, kind of the key public governance

meetings were able to be spun up and I think pretty well managed so that the county and project work just didn't freeze in place.

We knew by keeping these processes moving we could help lift our local businesses and keep the work of the county moving forward.

Back to you, Doug.

Thank you.

So the board will recall in the earlier stages in the May timeframe, the board participated in approving a program development using county money.

to provide loans to local businesses.

It's modeled after the payroll protection program that was funded by the federal government, put capital into the hands of businesses that were impacted by the restricted place to reduce the transmission of COVID-19, also to help them reopen or open further after weeks of low or no business.

Part of that was to help keep employers from payroll, to restock their shelves, to adapt their service delivery.

It was an early

and a pretty aggressive effort to overcome the impacts in the business community of the virus on the economy.

More recently, just to kind of tie this and complete the story, the CARES Act money has now enabled us to translate these loans into grants.

So it actually does restore the general fund money using CARES Act money instead.

It was an early effort not knowing that there would be any CARES Act money to make that an investment.

We also prioritized with a rapid and weakened construction project turning the lobby of community development into a safe work space by creating that full plexiglass barrier that you may have seen that separates the lobby from the intake space down there, enabling us to continue to receive plans and permits that were critical in keeping the construction, the engineering, and design industry moving forward during this period.

Building inspections were never stopped.

Intake, although the intake counter was reduced to three days a week versus five days a week, never stopped.

We made enhancements to our digital submission capability to make it easier for people to not come to the building if they didn't want to or didn't need to.

And what you can see by the representation of the numbers is the value that gets added back into the local

economy of continuing to issue certificates of occupancy during that period, the value that it adds to our local tax base, and as much as anything, the support that we give to that significant segment of our local economy, everyone who is tied to the construction industry.

construction workers, of course, and then all of those associated suppliers and designers and transportation.

There's a lot that goes connected to that.

And so our ability to maintain that level of service really enabled us to sustain a pretty significant portion of our local economy.

There were so many safety and human service needs that came to the forefront during the pandemic.

Our call safety agencies were on the front lines with first responders continuing to enter homes, interface with patients, and always respond to the urgent needs of the community.

Enhanced personal protective equipment PPE protocols were and still are a pretty visceral reminder of the hazards inherent in these jobs.

At a time in our community, most needed them.

These numbers are only for the two-month period of the response phase, but they represent how, in an uncertain time, adult and child abuse and neglect cases continue to be received and investigated.

And of course, 911 calls were answered.

Early in the pandemic, the efficacy of the N95 masks for preventing the spread of COVID-19 became known, and then the need for people to learn how to get a proper fit became crucial.

Worn incorrectly, the N95 won't be as effective.

Working through the Regional Emergency Operations Center, we worked to have 1,500 healthcare professionals fit tested so that they could do their jobs safely.

We found new community needs working with the community partners and agencies, and at a pop-up community site, we distributed over 24,000 cloth face coverings during this period.

Trevor?

All right, that was needed.

Thanks, Doug.

As the pandemic really turned all our worlds upside down, it certainly created a shock to our local economy.

Many individuals and households faced uncertainty, faced joblessness or wage reductions that put a lot of stress on families in our community.

concerns about being able to pay for essential items such as rent, mortgage, car payments, insurance, etc.

was difficult, if not possible, for many.

Through a partnership with the CACF, the City of Charlottesville, and others, funds were made available for county residents needing support to help maintain a safe and stable home.

Also, as I mentioned previously, our building posture changed significantly.

and so we weren't serving as many of the public in our buildings, we were actually able to serve a record number of public and customers in our parks.

We did have to shut down some of those gathering areas early on, pavilions and bathrooms and picnic tables were taken away, those kind of gathering spots were shut down, but we worked really hard to

to be able to keep access to our trails in our just hundreds of acres of green space.

We keep track weekly of vehicle count, and then we can extrapolate that to visitors, visitor count.

We estimated over 400,000 visitors came to our parks during that two month period.

Comparing it to the previous year, it's almost 100% more activity at our parks.

with all of the sporting events that normally would bring people to parks closed.

And so we really worked hard to do that.

And there were concerns about how could we do that safely?

So our parks team created an ambassador program.

We turned that around in a couple of weeks from concept to execution.

And it was and continues to be critical, I believe,

in keeping our parks open and helping to keep the public safe.

We were encouraged safe and responsible use of our parks and trails.

Again, this was a new concept and something that we had not done before, but we were able to turn that around and it enabled our count of over 400,000 visitors to have an opportunity to exercise, enjoy nature, or just take a break.

from the stress of the world that we all were living in.

So kudos to Parks and to the board for supporting this program to keep us open and usable, keep our space usable for our citizens.

Emily, I think you're up next.

Thanks, Mr. Henry.

The goal was to provide emergency financial assistance for people who were in crisis directly related to COVID.

So the crises involved not being able to pay their bills, but it was COVID related because it was probably due to a loss of job or loss of a part of their employment earnings.

So the city of Charlottesville has a program called the Pathways Program and

It staffs a hotline for residents to call when they are needing financial assistance of one sort or another.

And so they began to receive a number of calls from individuals, both in the city and the county,

who were severely impacted by the onset of COVID.

For example, they might have lost their job or their working hours were reduced, thus affecting their paycheck.

And they were struggling with paying their rent or mortgage, utility bills, maybe even childcare providers.

Given that the county really didn't have the staffing capacity to run the hotline like the cities, what we did was we came back to the county executive's office and asked for funding that we could reserve to help residents, but piggyback on the city's Pathways program.

So the county approved $150,000 and that was put in the social services budget

so that we could disperse the payments.

So the city's Pathway staff received calls and screened them to ensure that the need was COVID related.

and then they would send the information on the client and the vendor to social services and we would cut the check to the vendor.

Because of the business closures due to the pandemic, many families and individuals across the county saw a significant decrease in income.

That has made it difficult for them to pay the rent or mortgage payments and buy food and medicine and everything else we depend on day to day.

We were able to take some money from the county's housing fund and put it towards housing homeless individuals and families in hotel spaces.

When COVID hit, we knew we needed to provide social distancing options for people who needed shelter.

And working with the county has allowed us to place people who are at high risk for contracting COVID.

and for complications from COVID in hotel rooms, which has helped us to keep COVID from spreading in the homeless population.

Ending homelessness is a public health response and by being able to provide private rooms and the opportunity to social distance during this pandemic for people who don't have their own homes has helped keep COVID from spreading in the homeless population.

ACOH put together a cleaning supply program with funds that came from the CARES Act.

When we received these funds, we tried to identify how we could have an impact within our participant family's lives.

One of the avenues that we decided to go down was a cleaning supply program.

Back in June, we started planning out the program and the ultimate goal was to meet a need that many of our participant families have, which is to keep their homes safe and sanitary in the midst of a pandemic.

So for our participant families, some of whom are low income, having to purchase these supplies would have caused a financial strain for them.

And we were able to give away, to date, 289 cleaning supply bags.

We have just under 400 participant families, so we're continuing to give away these cleaning supply bags.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, our office has given away more than 20,000 face coverings to Albemarle County residents and we have only been able to do so with the help of our incredible staff volunteers who have given us so much of their time as well as the cooperation of our community partners.

Our goal in doing these free giveaways of face coverings was to ensure that Omaha County residents, regardless of their geography or their financial status, had access to face coverings in order to keep themselves and our community safe.

because we realized that the individuals, the residents at these long-term care facilities were at risk.

And so with my connections with in regards to Humains and all the other ancillary work that I've done, I have a relationship with those nursing homes and building on that

One of the responses we had from economic development was to create a business continuity plan.

We went from helping businesses grow to helping businesses survive.

We changed the time frames for when their taxes were due, we created access to capital, and then we educated the community on other opportunities for business support.

Economic development used to focus primarily on big business.

When COVID-19 hit, we had to pivot and change our strategy.

We created a microloan program for any existing local business that met the qualifications.

The county provided funding to Community Investment Collaborative, who then administered the program.

The general idea was to get capital into struggling businesses' hands as soon as practical.

Well, they could use it for anything like paying rent, keeping employees engaged and employed, and or just survival.

When we surveyed the community businesses, we learned that they were unaware of opportunities that existed outside of our region.

As an organization, we knew it was important to keep the community going.

So what we wound up doing is making a decision to stay open even while we were trying to figure out how to keep our customers and our employees safe.

Because we weren't sure what we were facing,

In community development, we implemented some new procedures both for our inspection staff going out in the field and we implemented new procedures and physical distancing barriers here within CDD, in our lobby in particular, to help keep our customers and our customer-facing staff safe.

It has greatly impacted our interaction with customers.

Typically, we were able to serve our Spanish-speaking residents through face-to-face interactions as they were able to transmit their payment details with paper.

Going contactless, it was a big challenge and we found that we were not going to be able to support them properly without bringing in translation and interpretation services.

So we contacted our fellow friends in the Office of Equity and Inclusion to connect us with interpretation and translation services and they were amazing partners with the Department of Finance and Budget and so we were able to bring in a few translators and interpretation

Yeah, COVID-19 has actually had a huge impact on the Yancey operations as it was strategically planned.

But it had a serious impact on the operations, even the food pantry, which is still operating.

And they were able to do curbside as other food pantries did.

And just it kind of rose up that we had people that had always come to Yancey to sit in the parking lot to get to maybe check a website or something.

They usually stay

10, 15 minutes and they're gone.

But I noticed that there were a few cars that were coming that were out there for an hour and a couple of occasions, two hours.

I was like, what are those people doing?

And then I finally started like just, you know, when I was leaving, I was like, you know, how are you doing?

But, you know, what are you doing?

And I found out that, you know, they were teachers or professional people that was trying to do their services without going into the office or couldn't go into the office.

We provided a needed service in the community without compromising the overall standards of safety that the organization had put in for facilities.

So we recognized that with all this craziness going on in people's lives and trying to balance the work life, their personal lives, excuse me, the work life, and stay at home with the kids, we felt that if we could find a way to keep these parks open in some fashion, even if it was a modified version, it could help people kind of decompress, escape

Go outside, enjoy the many offerings that the parks have, but be able to do so and feel safe about doing so.

It was a collaborative effort between our parks team, the county executive office, as well as IMT.

And through those discussions, as I mentioned, of trying to see how we could possibly keep these facilities open, that's where the park ambassadors program evolved.

The park ambassadors, we have a total of 16 at seven different locations.

There are generally two at each location, but we place three at two of our larger regional parks, Darden Tow and Walnut Creek Park.

Their role is to engage, to educate, and observe.

And we feel, or I felt rather, that it was absolutely essential, almost critical,

that we keep our park facilities for the quality of life and mental health of our community taken to keep our facilities open.

Thanks, Emily, and I think I'll be wrapping this up here.

Just a couple more seconds of comments here, if I may.

This was really a truly an all-hands effort by staff for us to pivot the way we did and for staff to really work outside of what was normalcy for most of us.

Our public safety staff are hired in to

an expectation and a way of life that's 24-7 operations.

And they get that, that's what they sign up for.

But for many of the other staff, that's really not what our traditional government operations have been.

It's Monday to Friday, nine to five, eight to five.

And when we really ramped up our effort, our response

did turn us all into a 24-7 operations.

And I just, I can't thank staff and our leadership team enough for everybody really just throwing their heart and soul into this work while we all have had to deal with our own personal situations with the pandemic at home.

And so there was a lot of juggling happening at the time.

you know, personal thanks to Jeff and Doug for their just tremendous leadership through not just phase zero, but continuing into day 163 of our operations.

Doug started with our, you know, talking through the goals, you know, for the response phase.

What I interpret that as, you know, those goals were leadership intent, and that's something that we communicated to the board

We communicated to our public and especially to our staff.

And they weren't just words on a PowerPoint or words on a whiteboard.

They truly were our decision-making framework or lens by which as information came in, we needed to take action or decisions.

One of us always stood up and said, okay, let's look at it through this framework.

And I do believe it allowed us to make not just timely decisions, but the best decisions that we could to continue to serve our citizens in public while appropriately protecting staff and our public.

I'll say just a personal experience, I came from

Navy background.

I served on submarines.

I was a watch officer.

Officer of the deck as a submarine was underway.

And in that role, you have the responsibility of the safety of that vessel, but also the responsibility of continuing the mission.

And my experience that I had years ago in that role, it has been very similar to what I felt this experience has been

not just through the phase zero time, but continuing to this morning and how we have been working as a team on keeping the mission of the county moving forward.

So finally, I just want to thank the board for your support.

Without your support, none of this could happen.

And I would just also ask for your patience as we continue to work towards whatever this new normal will be for us.

And so Emily, Doug, Jeff, I think with that, that's the end of the presentation.

Really, it's opening up the board for questions or comments or next steps.

Thank you, Trevor, Doug and Emily.

Supervisors, questions or comments?

Yes, thank you very much.

This has been so inspiring to hear it all put together in one place and to hear in more detail

how you all have devoted yourselves to this throughout the last many months and I really appreciate the watch officer comparison because it is so understandable and it's what I guess a more official version of what all of us try to do to keep our families intact and

The Quartermaster filling the groceries, the refrigerators and all that.

So it has been something where everybody has had to pull together and we have a long way to go.

And all I will do is repeat what I said years ago when we were having lots of demands on services and what about this and what about that and I'm as guilty of this as anybody else.

But timely is great.

and correct is more important than fast.

And so all of us, myself included, I hope will make more pacts even to give a chance for responses to come.

And all I ever need is I got it and I'm working on it.

And then a month later I may swing back and say, is there any news?

It does not mean do something right now and drop everything else when I ask a question.

And I think that's pretty universal.

So congratulations everyone to all that you have done.

Supervisor Price.

Thank you Chair Galloway.

Thank you all for that presentation.

I think it is very helpful for our constituents to see the continuation of work here at the county.

I know a number of communities in Virginia have not been able to achieve the successes that you have and in my law practice I'm dealing with federal agencies that are so far behind Albemarle County.

Yes, I want to say thank you also for the presentation.

I will let you know, as a Board of Supervisors member, this has been very seamless and easy.

So I know it's like a duck on the water because on the top it's, for me, it's smooth sailing and very easy.

And I know you guys, your little feet are just going 500 miles an hour trying to make it look easy for us.

And congratulations because you've done just that.

And not only that,

servicing our residents too.

I agree with all the good words everybody has said.

Thank you very much.

I do have a question though.

Could somebody tell me or explain to the board a little bit more about what you're doing for restaurants now and getting their, helping their tables to get outside and keeping them going.

I can address that at least to some extent, Supervisor Palmer

The board may recall that we've made some recent adjustments to our process for really using the zoning clearance process to do a virtually same-day approval of restaurants initially that had, through the ABC permitting process, were they allowed to kind of extend their ABC activity outside the doors

to enable them then to move into spaces that otherwise were not permitted for that activity from a landing standpoint.

So a parking lot or sidewalk or some property that they owned.

And so that was now more than a month ago where we worked with businesses through an application process to enable them to expand outdoor seating.

That was at the same time that that indoor seating really wasn't allowed.

More recently, we're seeing that opportunity continue, not necessarily associated with ABC, but through more recent approvals of emergency ordinances by the board.

with what we would call Phase 2.5.

And Greg Kamner can speak more definitively to how that plays out, but it does enable us for temporary signage, temporary authorizations of use of space to support those businesses being able to operate in ways that they wouldn't.

The last thing that I would say is that the first round of the CARES funding that is

that is actually going to be communicated to recipients as early as today does focus on, among other businesses, those that are impacted by the tourism economy.

So restaurants is a category of local business.

that is eligible for the funding.

And so we would expect that would then help them to mitigate the consequences of the debt and burn in their business.

And those are just some examples of where we focused specifically on the restaurant industry.

No additional comments there?

Oh, quick follow up question.

So for restaurants with whom you've already had discussions about moving outside, do you automatically send a note today saying

Hooray, CARES Act success.

There has been some outreach.

It's always difficult to know that you're making the right connection with the right people.

And so that Emily's work of trying to blast this out, word of mouth,

It's a combination of means to try to let them know that we can work with them.

I do know, Ms.

Mallek, that you have a business to contact at you, that you put them in touch with us, that we didn't follow it up.

So there's not one best way.

It's probably one of the ways that we're trying to communicate to local news.

I'm like everyone else, I want to thank you for this.

This was a really great presentation and I always

I want to thank everybody that I'm seeing on the screen, everyone I know that works with us, but there are so many people behind the scenes that I never see.

and I never really had the chance to thank and I know that somehow or another you all manage between Doug and Trevor and Jeff to get that message to them that we really appreciate their work.

I'm not sure how you do it because there are a lot of them but every single person that runs into one of our residents represents the county and it is so important and they're doing such a good job.

The only one thing I want to just ask about is that often when we are in budget season

or we're passing new policies or new ordinances, our community says, what are the deliverables?

We want to see the details.

We want to see the outcome of what we're spending our money on.

So my question kind of gets at that.

This is great information for the community and some of the other board members have said this as well.

So how do we get this particular document or these metrics out to our community without looking like we're bragging or pounding our chest and saying what a great job we've done.

But the truth of the matter is you all have done a great job.

And I feel like Bea, I just kind of, you made me look good.

at the expense of working long nights and every weekend.

I had people calling me and saying, we think you should talk to the university.

We think, are you guys even talking to the city?

You were having, you had what, 30, 23 meetings, but no one knew.

And I get that, but how do we actually inform our public about these wonderful deliverables?

I'm sure Emily has an opinion.

I mean, it was kind of smooth and they really didn't.

Thank you so much for the question, Supervisor McKeel.

The hope with the materials that we put together for the presentation is to start telling folks about the work that's been happening.

I think it is evident to everyone that a lot has happened.

And I think people just struggle with the words to put it all together to really articulate what you can feel that things have been happening, but to really be able to see it.

So we hope that the video, we'll send that out through the e-newsletter and put that on social media.

The slides, the graphics with the numbers and the short phrase that goes along with it to describe it, we've prepared into a front and back sheet of paper that we can have available for

When we plan to do more face covering giveaways, we try to have a couple of things that we can hand people, information about why face coverings are so important.

During tax season, we had some tax information on how to make a payment, and that would be something that we would put in that pile.

We certainly will be leaving a stack for you all.

Because it's not intended to be a celebration, as Mr. Walker said, but more just a, you know,

You know, the county has spent funds during the pandemic, and we received funds from the federal government to reimburse some of those initiatives.

And so, you know, for us, it's really more of a reporting out.

You know, what were those funds going to?

And it's so important to us for those who may not have seen or been directly reached through some of the programs that we put in place that a lot of work went into seeing how can we support our community during

An extremely unprecedented time and the stresses that people were feeling were coming from many different directions and our staff really worked very hard to identify what are the problems and how can we be in a position to support some of the solutions that would help

make things just a little bit easier or really solve a real problem for folks.

So we hope that that is the message that is received.

Well, and I recognize we can't do this one person at a time, but this could be a really

Great presentation for our CACs.

I would love at some point for my CAC to see this presentation, right?

And the other thing I would just throw in and then I'll stop is I have the ability to send some of this information out to a neighborhood association.

So if I had something electronic, then we could embed this into our monthly newsletter, right?

Actually probably two neighborhood associations.

So just maybe thinking about getting something to us.

And I know Ann has a neighborhood group that she has the Earliestville group she sends out.

So maybe that would be another way we could help you distribute it.

That'd be wonderful.

Quick follow up.

I see no shame in what you are sharing with us today.

And please don't be embarrassed or feel like somebody that you're bragging about something.

This is an amazing accomplishment and also helps people understand what's been going on behind the door.

But Achievement Awards through VACO are coming.

And so please keep all this going.

I know we were sort of out of cycle last time when I suggested this, but a lot of other communities could benefit by learning what the county is doing and

A lot of them don't have the staff available to think of this from scratch, but they can certainly pick up a recipe provided by somebody else and make their own lives better as well.

I certainly echo all of the comments and remarks by my fellow supervisors.

I mean, it seems like ages ago when you all went back and took a several month budget and turned it around into a new budget within a matter of a week.

to 10 days.

And I mean that seems like an eternity ago at this point.

And that was the proof that I mean all the countless hours with all the what we've talked about all the folks that like Supervisor McKeel said we can't see on the screen.

And it just continues not just from a budget perspective but to keep the operations moving forward.

So incredibly grateful to that.

Thank you.

Board we are running a little

Yes, I move that the board go into a closed meeting pursuant to section 2.2-3711A of the Virginia of the Code of Virginia under subsection 1 to discuss and consider appointments to two county advisory committees and under subsection 8

to consult with and be briefed by legal counsel regarding specific legal matters requiring legal advice about an event to which supervisors have been invited and the following all pertaining to the pending removal of certain memorials in the county-owned portion

of Port Square Park in September.

One, under subsection 8 to consult with and be briefed by legal counsel regarding specific legal matters requiring legal advice regarding the removal of the memorials.

And two, under subsection 19 to discuss plans related to the security of the county-owned portion of Port Square Park and the safety of persons using that facility.

And three,

Second.

Ms.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

Ms.

Palmer?

Yes.

Ms.

Aye.

Mr. Gallaway?

Yes.

All right, we're in closed meeting.

Second.

I can call the vote.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley.

Aye.

Ms.

Mallek.

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

Yes.

Ms.

Price?

Aye.

I move that the board appoint the following individuals to the following respective committees.

and James A. Dean.

All right.

Go with the vote.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley.

We didn't hear that there.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

Palmer?

Yes.

Ms.

Price?

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

All right.

Very good.

I'm now volunteering on our commit CACs and that'll bring us to number 15 on the agenda from the public matters not listed for public hearing on the agenda or on matters previously considered by the board for matters that are pending before the board.

I think I'm handing to Andy, or is that incorrect?

Yes, I am up.

If you give me one moment, I'm going to pull up a very brief presentation just to provide a reference for the board and the public.

I am Andy Bowman, and I am a, or excuse me for one second,

I am Andy Bowman.

I am the budget manager in the Department of Finance and Budget.

I have just a few brief comments for this item which is a public hearing and action item on the fiscal year 20 budget amendment and appropriations.

The Virginia code requires that a public hearing be held before the county amendments budget and the total amount of funds exceeds one percent of the currently adopted budget.

2020 budget amendment that is an increase of approximately $5.9 million.

That $5.9 million consists of 19 appropriations that were approved by the board at prior meetings.

Tonight, there is an appropriation of $170 million in federal funding from the CARES Act or what is the Coronavirus Aid Relief and Economic Security Act is the long form of that.

And this is to reimburse the county for expenses that occurred in the most recent fiscal year that we're in the process of closing fiscal year 20 related to the pandemic.

Thank you, Andy.

Supervisor Price, any questions?

No, thank you Chair Galloway.

All right, I do not have any questions at this time.

We will move to the public hearing.

Call the vote.

Ms.

LaPisto-Kirtley?

Yes.

Ms.

Mallek?

Yes.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Palmer?

Yes.

Ms.

Aye.

Mr. Galloway?

Yes.

All right, very good, Lauren.

That is approved.

Thank you, Andy.

Thank you, Lori.

The next item on our agenda this evening, number 17, SP2026, Spatz IV exon.

And let's see, Tori.

Oh, there you are.

Good evening, Tori.

Good evening.

Great.

So I'm going to go ahead and share my screen.

Okay great.

Good evening Mr. Chairman and members of the board.

This is a public hearing for special use permit SP 2020-6 IV exon.

My name is Tori Kanalopoulos and I'm the lead planner for this project.

Frank Pohl, county engineer, is also available this evening for any questions.

This is a request for an expansion of an existing auto service station to add an additional four service bays for a total of seven service bays.

The site is located at 4260 Ivy Road, also called Route 250 West.

To the east of the site are residential and agricultural uses.

To the west are commercial and institutional uses, including offices, a restaurant, and a church.

The two adjacent parcels to the west are also zoned C1 commercial.

The building shown directly to the west of Ivy Exxon is being used as a publishing house.

The second site to the west is currently undeveloped.

However, there is a special use permit currently under review for a new vet clinic and offices.

The parcel directly adjacent to the east is zoned C1 commercial and is owned by the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority, RWSA.

The next parcel to the east is zoned RA Rural Area and has one dwelling unit and is also used for agriculture.

These are pictures from staff site visit.

The image on the left shows the existing fuel pumps and existing auto service station.

The image on the right shows the existing parking area to the east of the service station.

These are additional pictures of the site and show more of the existing parking area.

The image on the right also shows the existing on the site.

The community meeting requirement was met in the form of mailed letters with information about the proposal with response options including contacting staff via email or phone call or using an online input form.

The applicant mailed letters to property owners within a quarter mile radius of the proposal.

The letters were mailed on May 1st and staff received approximately eight individual responses and the major concerns heard were stormwater management,

access to the site, traffic, groundwater contamination and scale and these will be discussed in the following slides.

The property is owned C-1 commercial which allows for auto service stations not served by public water or a central water supply system by special use permit.

It should be noted that the existing auto service station is a by-right use in the C-1 district

Regardless of approval or denial of the special use permit, the existing use may continue by right.

Therefore, staff has analyzed the potential impacts of the proposed expansion and nearby and adjacent parcels are zoned C1 rural area and village residential.

This property is a designated rural area in the Comprehensive Plan.

It was rezoned to C1 Commercial in 1980 as part of the comprehensive rezoning of the county.

This property and others in the nearby area were previously within a development area known as Ivy Village.

Ivy Village was removed as a development area from the comprehensive plan in 1989 as the area was considered mostly built out and is within a water supply watershed.

Nearby uses include a post office, garden center, restaurant, medical offices, church, a recently closed country store with gas pumps and residential uses.

The auto service station is in existing use and has been in operation for more than 50 years.

The proposed height of the building expansion is 24 feet.

Adjacent nearby structures have varying heights ranging from 16 feet to more than 30 feet in height.

The proposed expansion is approximately 3,200 square feet, which would bring the total square feet of the auto service station to approximately 5,150.

Nearby commercial and institutional uses have a range of building footprints as well, ranging from approximately 2,500 square feet to 10,000.

The proposed expansion will also require architectural review board approval, which will include consideration of the surrounding context.

The existing use is a 1950 square foot auto service station with service bays and two fuel pumps.

As mentioned, the building addition would add four service bays to the rear of the building and result in a total of 5,150 square feet with seven service bays.

There is no proposed change to the number of fuel pumps.

The number of employees is not proposed to increase.

The applicant estimates eight cars per day are serviced on a typical day with the existing service station, which would increase by about five vehicles per day to a total of 13.

Customer and employee parking would be within the gray parking area shown on the application plan.

And parking of repaired vehicles or vehicles awaiting repair would be located at the rear of the property in the yellow area shown on the application plan.

There's also a landscaping buffer shown on the east side.

And I will note that there have been no changes to the application plan since the Planning Commission public hearing.

Given that the special use permit is for the expansion of the existing use only, staff has analyzed the potential impacts of the proposed expansion.

As mentioned, the expansion would result in approximately five additional vehicle service per day, which would result in approximately 10 additional vehicle trips per day and staff did not find this increase in traffic to be a substantial detriment.

The existing structure is located partially within the 100-year floodplain.

Therefore, the applicant must submit a letter of map change to formally determine the location of the floodplain.

The applicant expects that the existing building is not located within the floodplain, and this letter would need to be approved prior to any site plan, stormwater management, building permit, or other site planning related approvals.

If the floodplain is adjusted, the stream buffer would also be adjusted, and a small portion of the eastern edge of the site would likely still be within the stream buffer.

The applicant is proposing plantings within the revised stream buffer for mitigation, which is included as a condition, and once the buffer is adjusted, there will be no parking permitted there.

The proposed expansion would require a Virginia stormwater management program application and would need to meet the minimum standards for channel and flood protection.

I will also note that release of petroleum is prohibited by law and considered an illicit discharge.

Given that the letter of map change is required prior to any site planning improvements and the applicant will need an approved Virginia stormwater management program application, staff finds that stormwater management has been addressed.

The proposed expansion would not generate a significant increase in water usage.

There does not appear to be a need to improve the existing water and sewer systems based on the impact of the expansion.

Existing groundwater contamination has been brought up as a concern, and the Department of Environmental Quality, DEQ, provided information to staff, including that the existing contamination at the Toddsbury site across the street has had substantial corrective action and has had natural attenuation

occurring both there and at IV-Exon.

DEQ did not have any concerns with the proposed expansion and does not anticipate the expansion having any effect on the existing groundwater contamination.

There is an existing private joint access easement that crosses the IVX on property.

It's also used by two adjacent parcels.

One is used by RWSA and the other by a residential property.

There are concerns from the residential property owners that the use of their access easement could potentially change with the site planning changes that the applicant is considering if a special use permit is approved.

and the access easement and or access to these properties may be adjusted in order to meet current standards for access management and safety since VDOT finds that the ingress and egress for this property does not meet VDOT's current design standards and that upgrading to meet current standards could potentially affect the joint access easement.

There is a note on the application plan stating that access for all parcels will remain even if the access easement or layout needs to be adjusted and that the final location and layout of the proposed landscaping area and ingress and egress would be determined with a site plan.

Staff met with the adjacent property owners of parcel 58A224, VDOT, Scott Collins, and Scott Ram, the owner of IVXON on site last week.

Different options for the joint access easement and for overall ingress and egress for the property were discussed and regardless of the final layout an access management exception from B-DOT will be required.

It's very likely that the landscaping area in front of the gas canopies will be used to reduce the area of open frontage and then it will be up to the developer and the users of the joint access easement to determine the most suitable layout for ingress and egress for the eastern portion of the site.

These are the additional regulations that apply to the auto service station use which are found in section 5.1.31 of the zoning ordinance and the applicant has included these requirements as notes on the application plan.

These include screening cars awaiting repair from public streets and residential properties and performing all vehicle repair services within an enclosed building.

Staff is recommending approval of the special use permit application with the following conditions, which I can return to if there are questions.

At its meeting on June 16th, 2020, the Planning Commission recommended approval of SP 2020-6 with a vote six to one with conditions.

Please note that one condition has been removed since the Planning Commission public hearing.

Building height was removed as a specific building condition as it is already included on the application plan.

The commission also passed along the request that staff and the applicant determine whether the building would need to have a sprinkler system installed and staff contacted the building official who responded that a sprinkler system would be required if the building was greater than 5,000 square feet and if the existing building and building addition were not separated by a firewall.

The conditions shown on this slide are the same as those in the transmittal summary and the resolution for approval and since the planning commission public hearing there have been no changes to the application plan.

These are the motions for consideration.

Thank you.

Supervisor Price?

Thank you, Chair Galloway.

Ms.

Kounalopoulos, thank you for your presentation.

As always, it's very thorough.

I do have some questions, however.

I drove out to the site today to make sure I could really get a sense of it.

And there are a couple of areas where I do have some questions and some concerns.

The first relates to the creek right next to the property and reading in the report about some flooding and everything and it just brings back to my mind the discussion we had with the Early Childhood Development Center application

a few months ago.

Now I recognize there are some differences here.

This is an existing business.

It's been there for many years and it's an expansion, whereas that was a zoning change.

But one of the major concerns that was raised was about vehicles being parked in an area that is potentially subject to flooding.

Sure, I can start and then refer to Frank Pohl as well.

People can be aware that in order to get any future site plan approvals, they would need to submit that letter of map revision and determine that that area is definitely outside of the floodplain.

Okay, another thing, another area that I had some concerns with is you're heading west on 250 towards this property, which is on the north side of the road.

You come down a fairly significant downhill right-hand curve on the road.

And one of the concerns expressed by some of the residents was the safety of vehicles coming in.

And so I take it that staff again, and I saw both staff and Planning Commission voted, you know, well, staff recommends and Planning Commission voted for recommending approval.

Sure.

So VDOT did not find there would be significant additional traffic generated by this use.

And if there's no expansion of the use, they still don't need a site plan and they can still keep their current frontage and access as they have it, which VDOT definitely does not prefer that type of layout with any new or revised developments since it's just an open frontage.

So if they were to go forward and get a site plan, they'd have to meet VDOT's current standards.

We could apply for an access management exception to allow more room for that existing access easement and still allow ingress and egress for their business as well.

But they'd have to close a significant amount of that open frontage.

All right, thank you.

And that does appear to actually improve the site there from what you presented.

Another question that was raised in the staff report that we have relates to sales vehicles.

I don't think I'm just as anecdotally more than legally.

I don't think it's a surprise that an auto repair place may occasionally have vehicles that someone wants to sell, which does not necessarily make it a used car lot per se.

I'm not aware of any community concerns that came up with that.

I will note too that sale of motor vehicles is considered a special use permit use in this zoning district, so they would have to apply separately for that.

And in the zoning ordinance, it specifically refers to sale in the urban areas, so in the development areas of the conference of plan.

Okay, so it sounds like then they should not be selling vehicles at this service repair place.

I think the last general area of concern I have is you look at the

footprint of the existing building.

You look at the size of the proposed addition which more than doubles the space and they talk about the increase in the number of vehicles that would likely be there at a given time because now they have more service space.

So staff did not require a parking study.

The increased use only requires an additional eight parking spaces.

So there's two spaces required per service bay and then one for each employee.

There's no proposed increase in employees so it would just be the additional service bays.

and as far as vehicles that have already been repaired or are waiting repaired are not counting toward the actual parking requirement.

Vehicles that haven't been repaired yet do have to be stored out of sight of the public street and of residential properties but they are not actually part of that parking requirement.

So according to the zoning ordinance they must have between 24 and 29 spaces for employees and customers

Thank you, Ms.

Konalopoulos.

Your recall of specificity in regards to technical data is impressive.

The last area of concern, the Todsbury Plume.

I read about that in the staff report.

I take it that was some sort of a still

That's correct, yes.

And that report has been closed out.

I think there may have been some previous underground leakage from this site as well.

But that's all been naturally attenuating over time.

So DEQ did not have concerns with ongoing issues.

And the well that's still being monitored is actually on the IVX on site.

And as far as DEQ is aware, they haven't received any additional

It's my understanding that leaking underground storage tanks, lusts, was a problem much more in the past and that seems to be somewhat mitigated or remedied.

I have no further questions right now.

Thank you very much for your excellent presentation and again your recall of data is to be commended.

Yes, thank you very much, Ms.

Cantalopoulos.

I have a question regarding the storage tanks.

You say that it seems to have been naturally mitigated through time.

That's not real reassuring.

I'd like to know whether or not DEQ standards are strict enough to know whether or not there is any leakage going into the creek.

I am not sure about the answer to that question.

Unfortunately, DEQ could not attend this evening.

But I do know that for current underground storage tanks, they have to have a monitoring system in place.

So in theory, if there was any new leakage happening on any underground storage tank, that should set off some kind of alarm and then DEQ would be aware of that.

How long are the existing tanks?

Yes, I'm not sure though how new the existing storage tanks are.

Sure, kind of two.

Sales.

Okay, thank you.

Those are my questions.

I have most of my questions.

I'm going to wait for after the public hearing.

But I just have a few comments really quickly just to get through a couple of these things that have been asked.

I've been to the DEQ meetings about the leaking underground storage tank with respect to this property before Scott Ram bought the property.

This was an ongoing thing.

And it

It has been attenuated, it's being dealt with, and they've explained the bacterial degradation, et cetera, and that it's not going out.

And also, Scott can talk about this, but one of the times that this was all found out was when they replaced the tanks.

So that is actually in the staff report.

With respect to the number of cars, the sales situation came up from a question from me because I have routinely counted 50 some cars at the lot and I was asking if that could possibly be something that was going on and I was planning on asking Scott that given that that's a common

thing that a lot of gasoline repair places do help sell cars for customers when they've decided not to keep them anymore, etc.

That being said, for my questions for staff right now, the next door neighbor has, in the business next door to the west, has complained about noise.

and I don't remember seeing that really addressed in the staff report.

So that's a question for Tori.

Sure, so according to the noise ordinance it would be a limit of 65 decibels for commercial uses and the requirement for this auto service station is that all motor vehicle repair has to occur within an enclosed building so I'm not sure if perhaps due to space constraints or other issues there has been repair going on outside of the building but that is a requirement of the zoning ordinance that that has to all occur

within the building, which should mitigate noise as well.

So that would be, so if we get this complaint, or if I get an email from the next door neighbor, I should ask them to make a formal complaint and then that noise will be measured.

and you guys can go from there.

Okay.

With respect to the flooding, I have one question about that and then I have some comments later on when we get further along.

But am I correct in saying that the map, the flood map that will be

revised will be for a 10-year flood event.

Is that correct?

Is that how they are done?

I can answer that.

Okay, so it's the 1%, whatever that is, but it's the 100.

But the applicant needs to correct or mitigate for a 10-year flood event.

Is that correct?

When he mitigates for the additional parking space that he is putting in or the additional

Okay, so that's what we require when we ask a developer to mitigate for a storm event, the flooding is for 10 years, and as you have explained,

Yes, and for the flooding, it's for any proposed or existing stormwater piping or structures or facilities.

It's not anything related with the 100-year floodplain, so the term flooding might get confusing.

Okay.

All right.

That's all my questions for now.

I've got some more comments and questions after the public hearing, but I'll wait for that.

Thank you.

I think I have a question about the number of employees.

So the staff report says several times that they're not planning on hiring any new employees, and I understand what they were talking about rotating the bays.

Actually, I learned something that was kind of interesting, but it made sense.

Well it's not a condition that they can only have 10 employees so if they did want to hire more then they could do so.

If they did end up

Right.

And the only other, it's not really a question, it's just a comment that having followed that area for 30, 35 years, there are a lot of flooding issues in that area.

I mean, we all know that.

I think any of us that have had any experience with that area.

Just a comment.

All right, I don't have any questions for staff at this time.

We can go to the applicant.

This is... Ned, can I ask one more of staff?

Oh, sorry.

Well, because I just put it in.

I forgot to ask one of my questions.

I got sidetracked over other stuff.

The easement for the entrance for the Eaton's property, it's a farm entrance.

And I recognize the improvements to the entrance for safety for the gas and repair station.

is it going to be acceptable to VDOT or to the county if those farm vehicles have to go through the actual area where the pumps are?

I know this is supposed to be done at the site plan level, but I'm trying to understand what's acceptable to staff and to VDOT.

Sure.

So my understanding is that VDOT is more concerned about the spacing of the ingress and egress.

I think it would be more up to the business owner to be okay with farm vehicles and RWSA vehicles using gas stations to cut through.

But from VDOT's standpoint, it's a private joint access easement.

And so if the users of that access easement do not want to change it, then

So if the Eaton's easement specifies that they can keep their easement, their direct access to the road, then they would be able to do that legally.

VDOT would not stop them from doing that.

That's correct.

Okay.

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. Rand.

Yes, I'm here.

So some of the questions, Scott Collins, the site engineer, will be able to answer a little better about the U.S.

egress, that kind of stuff.

I would say if you have any sort of presentation that you'd like to make to begin with that, and then you have 10 minutes, and then you'll be able to, if you want to address some questions, you can do that at the end.

But there is, after your presentation, there's an opportunity for supervisors to ask you questions directly.

So I'd like Scott Collins to do most of the presentation.

I would like to address a couple of the questions.

So the existing tanks on the property are

somewhere between 20 and 25 years old, so they are not 50 years old.

When we took over as tenants in 2012, I did order a site assessment because I was responsible for any contamination on site, which I believe is kind of why the DEQ is monitoring now also.

So they did come in and put in more wells and monitor and set up.

filtering systems on property well waters.

We do daily inventory control leak testing and all that has been done for the last, I guess we're there almost eight years now, and that has all passed every month, so we are monitoring that all the time.

and the question about the motorcycle was the motorcycle in picture was there for a second inspection.

We have had some customers that would ask us to sell a car so we have in the past put cars out there with for sale sign on it.

We are not selling cars as a business.

That's all I have.

Thank you very much.

Really what I want to do tonight is touch on a couple of the questions and aspects of the project because Tori did an awesome job kind of laying out the whole report.

I don't want to, I don't need to go back over that, but I would like Tori to pull up a couple slides that I sent to her earlier today to kind of talk a little bit about the site in itself.

So that's what the site looks like.

now in its present state.

And so we're going through a special use permit and as we all know there's a lot that goes along with the special use permit and the site plan process.

There's the architectural review board process, site requirements, and site access and many other aspects.

So if Tori can go to the next slide I'll start talking a little bit about what this is actually going to look like.

This next slide sort of shows how the site starts to evolve

through the site plan process.

And I wanted, I thought this would be important to kind of share with you so you can kind of start to see different aspects of how the site looks and its current state and how it looks.

We'll start looking as it goes through the process.

The biggest thing you see is green.

You see a lot more green through the site plan process, and that is a direct result from the requirements of the site plan, access management,

and the architecture review process.

What you have is a fair amount of green along that southern property line, which is where there'll be landscaping, buffering and stormwater management over in that area to help attenuate the existing runoff from the parking lot and a little bit from the additional pavement.

But as you can see, we are reducing a lot of the pavement, certainly in the front and the side of the project.

You also have some green up front right where the pumps are located.

That is a requirement from VDOT with access management.

What the current situation you have right now is basically the entire front of the property is open so cars can turn in and out of the site from any direction from traveling east or west on Route 250 they can enter the site sort of free for all.

With this modification, it limits the access points to the site.

That northern access point will just be a exit only and we're working it out with VDOT still currently for that southern entrance to be an entrance and an exit.

And what you'll see right now is sort of the latest we've been kind of working out where we maintain the current

access easement to the property owners to the south but still maintain an entrance and an exit to the Exxon property and it sort of separates it but it's still all within their existing easement and gives a better entrance to our site and allows a little bit more stacking before you get to the pump so this is something we've been working on with VDOT and with the county and

We've shared it with the adjacent property owners as well.

Talking about flooding with the property, again, we're having that green area along the southern part that is going to help provide attenuation for the two and 10 year storm events.

And based on, we're not changing any grays on the site, which is, we're not doing any filling or any other different controls.

The creek's been studied a fair amount by FEMA, which is why they have elevations on the flooding that goes along that creek during the 1%.

And those elevations, when mapped on our site, is what's given us the assurance that this site and the parking as we're showing it and the site plan is outside.

of what will ultimately be unofficially the 100-year floodplain, which is why we're going through a map revision.

And I just wanted to share this with everybody a little bit so they can sort of see how the site starts to evolve, and especially also with the parking.

Again, you have sort of in the existing condition, you have that entire southern portion of the site available for parking.

But when we go through the site plan process and site requirements, parking becomes a whole lot more uniform.

You start developing parking spaces and screening and landscaping and interior landscaping within that building envelope that was shown on the application plan.

So all that will provide screening and buffering and that wide open parking area that everybody sees when they're driving up and down the road is really starts to be hidden by landscaping.

and by screening provided during the site plan process.

So I thought that would be helpful for everybody to see that.

Because certainly there was a couple of comments that came up about parking and the number of vehicles and I thought that was a good point.

Other than that, we're really just here to sort of help answer any additional questions.

Oh, I'm sorry, one other question was about the fire protection.

Yes, because these are two

Because you have existing building and then new building being attached to it, there is a one hour fire rated wall between the two that will remain.

So that is why no sprinkler system is needed for this facility.

Thank you.

Questions for the applicant?