Board of Supervisors Regular First Meeting   2/3/2021

Other staff will introduce themselves at the appropriate time throughout the day.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation

Okay, thank you everyone.

Are there any other items or changes to the agenda we need to take care of right now to include any items to be pulled from consent if needed?

Oh, you need a motion to approve the agenda?

Yes, please.

Maybe as amended.

Oh, as amended, okay.

LaPisto-Kirtley.

Bea, we didn't get your vote there.

Oh, not again.

Go ahead, Travis, sorry.

I'm just not very good at talking.

Very good.

Any announcements this afternoon?

Thank you.

Supervisor Malek.

Thank you.

All right, Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley, can we hear you?

Hear me?

Whatever you change, the volume's low, so if there's a way to up the mic volume.

I'm not going to mess with it, but is that better?

When you leaned in, it obviously was better as well.

I'll check with the new computer.

Any announcements this afternoon?

No, thank you.

All right, Supervisor Palmer.

I have no announcements right now, thank you.

The next item we will go to, we have a proclamation

Supervisor McKeel.

It almost makes me cry.

Bea LaPisto-Kirtley?

Aye.

Mr. Gallaway.

That motion carries.

I think we have some people, normally we'd have people here to accept it, but it looks like, Ned, we have some people on the... We do.

And I understand you have an introduction for us.

Thank you for joining us today, Dr. Gaines.

It's an honor to be here and to accept it on behalf of the Carter G. Woodson Institute.

Supervisor McKeel, any comments?

So thank you very much.

And it's just been a great experience.

I shorten it, but my quote right now is, you see something, you say something.

Supervisor Malle?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley.

and I won't you know not when I say people of color it sounds like they're separate no we're all in this together all of us are in this together to me there is no differentiation if you're a good person you're a good person frankly if you're a jerk you're a jerk and that comes in and all everything so that's my criteria if you're a good person and I certainly do know a lot of them and I'm very grateful for that and thank you Dr. Gaines again

Supervisor Palmer?

So thank you very, very much.

Thank you.

So for what it's worth I can share those comments with you.

So John Lewis, I think, is someone who has truly made a mark and made a mark around the world.

Yartifa, any comments today?

Thank you all for your comments.

And I think I can speak for all of the supervisors and that we'll be interested in taking you up on your offer to visit the the Woodson Center as soon as, as you said, we're able to go back to some normalcy and be together.

Thanks, everyone.

It's always hard to transition from something like that into the next agenda item.

Ferguson do we have some folks signed up today?

Chair Galloway I believe we have a couple of speakers signed up.

I'll go ahead, Vice Chair Price, if you can go through the guidelines.

Ferguson.

Our first speaker is Gary Grant.

Good afternoon.

Can you hear me?

Good afternoon.

Thank you for my less than three minutes of your valuable time today and best wishes for a productive meeting.

Our next speaker.

Our next speaker is Neal Williamson.

Later today, you'll receive a presentation outlining conceptual scope of the 2021 comp plan update.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

Has anyone else signed up today?

We do not have anyone else signed up.

Thank you to those who signed up to speak.

So moved.

Second.

Call the vote.

Mr. Gallaway?

Our consent agenda has passed.

And that will take us to number nine, our first action item today, non-arterial entrance corridors.

Can you hear me okay?

Yes, ma'am.

Are you by any chance seeing my screen at this point?

Yes, we are.

Are you seeing just the slide or are you seeing my notes as well?

I do not see notes, but I do see the main slide and you can see the future slides over there.

Are you still able to see the slide?

Wonderful.

I'll stop sharing my screen.

Supervisor McKeel, questions here?

So thank you very much.

Supervisor Malek.

So those are my two questions.

Thank you.

Marcheski.

He's probably going to answer them much more readily than I can.

Thank you, Mr. McDermott.

But I don't think, like I said, there's nothing directly conflicting between those two things.

So safety is definitely going to be a major issue for this area of the county.

facilities like are recommended in that corridor plan if it were an arterial that they're not going to make that distinction.

In my district that appears to be the one with the the greatest development taking place of any of the roads that are mentioned in the Scottsville district.

evaluate and consider this road as an arterial and expect it to carry volumes of traffic similar to what it does and expect that to you know likely increase just as we do in our master plan unless the only negative would be if we wanted to completely change this road to something different but at this point the road is what it is and I think it's going to continue

Maleczewski, same answer?

I don't have anything to add.

Thank you, Chair Galloway, and thank you both for your information and presentations.

Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley?

Okay and we're looking and is it we're looking to change it from a collector to an arterial or an entrance corridor?

So it would remain a collector under that proposal.

So, but that really what you're saying from what I'm hearing is that that doesn't have anything to do with it.

That would probably be something that we would consider as we're looking at it as a Scenic Highway designation.

Is that what we're looking at?

That is our recommendation to consider that and to look into to making that happen.

And then if that's considered a scenic highway designation, which I definitely think it is, it's a beautiful beautiful road, what would be the benefit of doing that?

Okay perfect.

Route 22 from Shadwell all the way up to Gordonville is an entrance corridor.

Route 22 is one of the streets that is listed as an entrance corridor but doesn't have the arterial status.

Okay but we're not and we're not looking at it have to have and the arterial status is that correct?

We don't think that that street has the characteristics that would allow to qualify as an arterial and so an alternative we're recommending is the county scenic highway designation.

So let me get my

I'm not recommending any change on this lower portion.

I mean I'm having problems, I guess what I'm asking, I'm having problems seeing that as an entrance corridor

At this point where it turns off to the east it does not have the arterial status and so we're recommending county scenic highway designation for it.

And I'm talking about and I understand that I'm talking about from Route 22 along Route 231 up to Gordon'sville.

There's no problem with the arterial status.

Okay, so I guess maybe I'm not understanding the the terms, but why wouldn't it be a county scenic highway designation?

So yeah it's really possible that many of these corridors could qualify as entrance quarters could also qualify as scenic highways could also qualify as historic areas.

You're talking apples and oranges because all of those are multi-lane roads for the most part and whereas 231 is a narrow two-lane road with deep ditches on each side.

You know what I might suggest at this point is that if the board does want staff to consider these scenic and historic designations that maybe you want to just broaden the recommendation and that we consider the scenic designation, the historic designation for all of the corridors that are in question and see which ones would work best where or what combination might work best where.

Okay, and last question I think is if they were considered county scenic highway designation as opposed to entrance corridor, what kind of control do we have or assistance or non-assistance from VDOT or the feds?

I don't know that that has any impact at all.

Would we have more control of our roads with a different designation other than an entrance corridor?

I don't think so but I don't know if Kevin wants to

That is something that would be enforced through the county code and not VDOT, so they wouldn't really evaluate for that factor.

I guess I'm trying to ask how the heck did we end up with that?

I'm not sure exactly when that happened.

So here you've got this straight shot, it is a straight shot, but midway it goes from 45 to 50.

you know not saying that would never change maybe at some point Albemarle County would support something like that but it would it would not change without our support and I think VDOT's more than willing to work with us on on those kind of issues.

So we could also reduce the speed limit that's within our power.

No, but we can try and get it done, but I will say that VDOT's not going to increase the speed limit on us.

Is that correct?

We are updating the federal classification of the roads so that we can enable the entrance corridor status on those roads.

In other words, if we make this change, then it limits the county's ability to do some enforcement along there.

That change would not have any effect on that.

Okay, so it's basically kind of cosmetic.

So that's the essence of the discussion that the board's having.

Why would you have an entrance corridor in a strictly rural area?

What happened in 1990 was that the board at that time just took every street that was designated an arterial, plus a few others, and designated them as entrance corridors.

So I've raised that same question in the past, Bea, but the reality is that there is a potential there for commercial structures in the RA that, you know, my veterinary offices and things like that, they're all within

Okay, thank you very much.

Supervisor Palmer.

Or is it different on all different arterials?

Did you have something that showed that?

I don't think it says specifically that.

So the speed limit in a school, in a school zone is 25.

That's absolutely fine.

We have lots of arterials with school zones and school speed limits of 25 that exist all throughout the county, and that's not a problem.

What would be the downside of doing that?

The downside would really be related to the review by the ARB and our ability to review any development that might change in that portion of the corridor that is not designated as an arterial.

Okay, and so what I'm hearing from you is that a collector, are we going to have any more difficult time narrowing lanes and putting in a roundabout in a collector versus an arterial?

It will be part of the review process, but I don't believe it would stop us from being able to do any of those improvements.

There would be no real difference if we went with an arterial for all those improvements.

uh if you can imagine you know what what the context of the road is on Avon is you're driving in the city is very uh urban with um crosswalks pedestrian crosswalks and and residences right up against it um so it's not uh it's I would say just keep that in mind that we can have that type of road and it can still be an arterial

I'm a little bit confused on your map because you have Country Green Road going right into Old Lynchburg Road and my map calls that Sunset Avenue extended.

I know and you'll see on my earlier map I had it called Sunset Avenue but on VDOT's functional classification map it is listed as Country Green even though it does that loop.

So if I just explained that wrong, correct me.

Yeah, when we were discussing it about two years ago, it's the same, today's discussion is just a continuation of that and at that time we discovered that some of the entrance corridors or some of the streets that were, that are in county code listed as entrance corridors didn't have the arterial designation and this is just one of them.

So for the benefit of the community in that area, can you explain what the oversight is because some are quite, they thought they were gonna have architectural review board input and now it's clear that they will not.

Right, that development would be reviewed according to county code for site plan requirements, building permit requirements, but there would be no architectural review.

It's not possible, but that would just be the setbacks, would be the only thing that would be affected.

Just can't say exactly what it might be, but just giving the example of what it was previously.

Road.

This one was not asking for arterial status.

Okay so and let me just ask then why would we not ask for arterial status to go down to include the Southwood area?

Kevin, can you fix what I just said?

And there was really nowhere south of this Country Green or Sunset, whatever the real name of that is, there was nowhere south of there that we could find that

All right, we're back on.

So is it would it be reasonable to consider asking VDOT to go down a little bit further to take in that major development that's going in there?

That would be wonderful.

So thank you.

Supervisor Mallek, did you have something in addition there when Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley was... You're muted, Ann.

Thank you.

OK.

Yes, I wanted to ask Mr. McDermott whether or not 22 and 231 being

Supervisor I'm going to ask you to lean in closer to that microphone.

So is that still effect because it is June 2014 the report we received?

The 231 and 231-22 south of the intersection is already an arterial.

But what about roundabouts?

So having roundabouts on arterials is not an issue.

No further questions.

Second.

Call the vote.

Ms.

McKeel?

Ms.

Ms.

Ms.

McKeel?

Yes.

Ms.

Ms.

Do you have what you need there or do you need further clarification on that end?

It sounds like you do want staff to pursue the studying the possibility of the County Scenic Highway and historic designations for those other streets.

I didn't hear any objection to that, so yes.

I think that we'll need to have a meeting with VDOT anyway to get the the arterial designation process started so we'll just that I think we can get right on that okay so there's no change in any of the motion that we just took I couldn't ask fast enough and get just I just want to make really clear that we haven't you know we haven't

with a new recommendation for that to change.

Can I ask really quick so I can put in my calendar to circle back with you when you think that conversation might take place, months, weeks?

I'm sure we can have that conversation within a month, so yeah, a matter of weeks.

Thank you.

Great, thank you both.

Thank you all.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon Rachel Falkenstein, planning manager and I'm joined by Charles Rapp our planning director who's actually going to kick us off today and while he does that I will share my screen.

So with that, I'm gonna hand it over to Rachel to get into some of the more detailed proposed scope and other elements of the draft before you.

Thank you very much and I'll stop sharing so we can have some discussion.

Supervisor McKeel?

Have you looked into that at this point?

So I'll let him take this one.

So I think there's certainly some opportunities maybe to figure out how can we really keep the things that we want and remove some of the stuff or consolidate it down to just some policy statements or some briefer items that could be addressed in more detail in the master plans, in more detail in the zoning ordinance where you really want that detail and keep it kind of as that guiding larger document.

and allow you all to move through this and perhaps just to think about that and I don't know if you can even give me some answers on that but I would like for you to think about that as you go forward.

But some of the actual production work, we could certainly use additional support resources.

I mean, is there a way to go back and do, to make some of those changes that some of us have expressed concerns about even recently?

I mean, we would certainly want to work with the county attorney's office to make sure we follow the process on how we did those things.

Thanks.

You're good, Supervisor Mallek.

That's an interior current staff question, right?

Okay, yeah that would be kind of that working with the project coordinator there would be an internal staff person to go through and that's really more than the existing analyzing existing plans existing documents and identifying specific items right there.

Thank you very much.

All right, Supervisor Price.

I do recognize that it will be a time-consuming process but given what we're dealing with I think it's a necessity.

Not hearing you Bea, I'm sorry.

How's that?

That's better.

Thank you.

Alright, Supervisor Palmer?

Anybody?

So all good points.

is how we're going to get our farm and rural landowners involved in this because it's a lot easier to go to a park or something like that in the urban area and get lots of input from urban folks and Emily's lifting her finger.

And so, while the CACs are important stakeholders in the process, in the community process, the thought around the advisory group was really to ensure that we're hearing from sort of the fullness of Albemarle County.

I guess that's a Rachel question.

But that was how we came up with that estimate.

So I guess those are my comments and I would just like to hear more about how the board is gonna be involved in it.

Falkenstein, Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley, you had a question?

And I'm definitely in favor of keeping the supervisors apprised as we go along, even if that means going chapter through chapter, but doing it.

Supervisor Mallek?

Thank you.

Where do you want to go from here on that particular question?

I don't know if Charles you had anything to add or if the board wants to add anything onto that list as well.

Supervisor Malek.

Thank you.

But I'll leave it to Mr. Richardson or the county staff to clarify if I was mistaken in my impression on that.

Can either Charles or Rachel speak to that?

But the actual writing of the plan, yes, that would be staff's role.

Supervisor Palmer?

I just wanted to make that statement that I'm hoping we can really weave that in well into this whole process and make sure that when we're doing outreach that the folks know that that is a strategic priority for the board.

Mr. Richardson, is there any Supervisor LaPisto-Kirtley?

Thank you.

Mr. Richardson, is there anything else with regard to the first question and that is the direction of feedback or do you believe county staff is satisfied with the understanding and explanations at this point?

So the answer is yes we have, but we would like to come back, nail those expectations in right out of the gate if that's okay with the board.

And is that something that we should take a vote on, Mr. Campner, or is that necessary?

Okay.

Supervisor Mallek?

Regarding what Mr. Richardson just said, should this happen when that next round comes back and everything is cleared up rather than doing it now?

Mr. Campner, Mr. Richardson?

We can continue with our pre-planning work and come back to the board to get clarity in a relatively short period of time.

Chair Galloway, I'll turn the meeting back over to you.

We are back from our recess.

The next item, number 11, Rio Road corridor plan.

Good afternoon.

With that, I'm going to pass it on to Sabrina to discuss the public engagements component.

I'm available for questions also, but David back to you.

And I can close the presentation unless anybody wants me to leave it up, or I can bring it back up.

Supervisor McKeel, any questions here?

Is that the timeline for those projects?

So it is not as quick a turnaround in SmartScale, so it would probably take several years.

But a pretty quick timeline when we compare some of our other projects.

SmartScale can take longer, depending on... That's correct.

Then you got to get to design, you got to get, so it's a ways out.

That was probably just a, okay, I'm getting it now.

Yeah, okay.

Thank you very much.

All right, Supervisor Mallek.

Thank you.

I have no questions.

We want to lean in.

Thank you.

Supervisor Palmer?

No questions.

I'm sorry, does the extent of the corridor... The Rio Road corridor study would go from the small area plan to the Warner, the intersection with Warner Parkway.

and some of the information in that area.

So I don't know if there's any way to get creative in trying to include, you know, I mean it wasn't long ago where we had a roundabout project in for smart scale at Penn Park Road.

But at that point, maybe it's best to have Charles sort of chime in on that.

So we just have to be, we have to be prepared for that, I guess, walking into it.

You know, the project as negotiated really has them focused in on that corridor from the John Warner Parkway north and west.

We shouldn't, we got to make sure that that's communicated as part of this because all of these pieces are going to ultimately put together.

We'll most certainly do that.

I suspect that when we talk about community outreach during the comp plan, you're going to get, I suspect this one will be one that people will be paying attention to and participating in.

I want to get a bean about it, I think.

All right, thank you.

Phyllis, am I turning to you first?

Yes, sir.

Good afternoon.

Do I have that right?

Yes.

Awesome.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Good afternoon.