Planning Commission Public Hearing on Zoning Ordinance and Map   9/14/2023

And good evening.

We are now in order and ready to begin our listening session.

And that's what this is going to be about.

We want to listen to you.

We want to sit back and let you guys walk us through the things that you like about the work that's been done and the things you'd like to see changed.

We will not be engaging in a dialogue.

We'll not be going back and forth.

There are a lot of people that want to speak, and we're getting engaged in dialogues, and we're going to be here until 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning.

So we're just going to be listening to you guys today.

We will be here until everyone who wants to speak has had an opportunity to speak.

With that, and again, once again, this is a listening session, not a dialogue, so please don't expect us to go back and forth with you.

Again, we'd be here all night.

With that, I'm going to toss the ball to Mr. Freeze, and then Ms.

Creasy, he is going to actually moderate the meeting.

Ms.

Creasy will kind of walk us through the rules of engagement.

Good evening, Chairman Mitchell, members of the Planning Commission.

Pleasure to be with you this evening.

David, is there

Maybe a little bit closer to it.

David, is the presentation available?

Great.

Thanks very much.

So this evening, as Commissioner Mitchell noted, our goal for this evening is to listen to the public.

So I'm going to keep my remarks brief and simply open the meeting.

So this evening we are conducting a public hearing for the Charlottesville Development Code, the proposed Charlottesville Development Code.

As you all are well aware, this is the culmination of our three-part Seville Plans Together process.

We've seen this slide a number of times.

As you'll recall, back in 2021, the City adopted the Affordable Housing Plan and the Comprehensive Plan.

And now we're moving into the rewrite of the Zoning Ordinance, which is the implementation of that prior work.

Briefly, what is zoning?

So zoning refers to a set of regulations that govern the use and development of land.

There are two parts to the zoning ordinance.

Don't want to skip ahead.

There's the zoning map, which divides the city up into districts, by which the regulations are then applied to different parts of the city.

and then there's the text which provides those rules in terms of both the rules for use, rules for development, those rules that apply specifically within different districts, those rules that apply generally throughout the city and significantly those rules for administration that govern how we basically administer and enforce the zoning ordinance.

The public hearing for tonight is on both of these, both the map and the text.

So as I noted, the purpose of this zoning ordinance rewrite is to implement our adopted comprehensive plan and affordable housing plan.

So zoning ordinance is in fact one of the primary tools we have for implementation of vision and goals of these plans.

So noting the vision, I'm not going to read all of this to you.

You guys are familiar with the vision as presented within the comprehensive plan.

But by way of reminder, the vision speaks to both the supply and the affordability of housing within the city, looks at the issues of

inequities in the distribution of land uses and the impacts of development, and looks at how can we make the city both more walkable, more people focused, protective of the natural environment, and allowing additional housing types and a greater mix of uses.

Of course, it also speaks to the urban design and historic preservation goals of the city as well.

And within the comprehensive plan we have a set of future land use objectives and these echo many of the things that we saw within the vision itself, speaking to increased opportunities for development near community hubs and amenities, utilization of vacant and underutilized land, walkability, bikeability, and things like the long-term economic sustainability of the city.

and the Land Use Chapter goes into a great deal of detail on various strategies to pursue, particularly within the Zoning Ordinance.

Goal number one of the comprehensive plan speaks to adopting a new Zoning Ordinance and provided us with the basis for moving forward with the drafting of this Zoning Ordinance.

And the Forestly Affordable Housing Plan had three major initiatives within it.

The idea of allocating $10 million annually towards affordable housing, building a governance system for the allocation of those funds and for our policy around affordable housing that was inclusive.

And finally, as what we're here to discuss this evening, adopting a progressive and inclusionary zoning reforms.

So the challenge we faced as we went into this effort to draft this development code was how to promote the creation of more affordable housing, how to create opportunities for a range of housing choices in all neighborhoods of the city, and ultimately how to craft a zoning ordinance that advances all of the city's goals as identified in the comprehensive plan.

And our result is this, the draft development code.

Now I'm not going to go into every bit of this.

You guys each received a staff report.

The staff report was made publicly available that provided more detail as to the contents of the draft code.

But I wanted to note a couple things about it.

One, I just wanted to note, as noted in the staff report, that the proposed ordinance grants property owners more rights, certainly, but it also places more responsibilities on development that basically are aimed at helping our community reach its goals related to housing, particularly affordable housing, economic development, our environmental goals, and ultimately goals for quality of life.

Now I think through the work we've engaged in over the last couple years in this, we all know this already, that there are no easy answers in this work.

So I'm going to say right now I don't believe this draft that we have before us is our final draft.

I believe we'll see changes over the course of this adoption process and indeed over the course of the future as we respond to changing conditions in the city.

I expect that we will see amendments to the code.

As we hear new ideas, as we hear new perspectives I think it's important that we are able to respond and make tweaks as necessary or as appropriate.

So with that, to close, I want to thank all of you for your work over this time period.

Thank my staff and all the others who have been involved in this process.

And I look forward to working with you to see us through to the end of this project and a recommendation to the City Council as they then consider the final decision on the Charlottesville Development Code.

If anyone has any questions for me at this time, I'd be happy to take them.

All set.

All right.

Ms.

Chrissy.

Sure.

All right, we have points of information that we're sharing.

We have currently reached our capacity in the room here.

We have an overflow at city space that this is being broadcast to as well.

As you came in, if you're interested in speaking, you received a note and we will be calling folks in order of those notes alternating with virtual speakers.

We have an entire virtual audience as well.

So anyone who is interested in speaking virtually will have the opportunity to raise their hand in the application.

We're going to rotate three in-person individual speakers and then we're going to move to three virtual and we're going to go back and forth throughout the evening.

There are a number of people off-site

by, as time goes on, who will have numbers.

And so we will be calling the numbers in sufficient time to allow folks who are offsite to come back for their speaking timeframe.

And so just keep that in mind.

As this room, if this room chooses to clear out or as we have people who may move

move to listening to it at home then we will be able to allow more people in this room here but the same broadcast is going to alternate spot and online.

Each speaker is going to have two minutes to speak

and that's one time, not speaking virtually and speaking in person.

That's one time each.

We've got a lot of people who want to speak and we want to make sure that everyone is able to have the opportunity to do so.

Let's see.

And if you have, if there are any mobility related concerns, we ask you to, when

When individuals come in the building, that's a good time to share or if now we have others around the room who can assist with that, we just want to make sure that we get people where they need to be as comfortably as possible.

We're going to limit discussions in the hallway so that we can hear what's going on in chambers and that the commission is able to do that.

the commission will be taking breaks every two hours so at 6 p.m.

they'll take a five minute break at 8 they'll take up to a 15 minute break and then 10 12 to from there on and to allow for just personal business break

so we just wanted to get that information out there ahead of time so that it wasn't a surprise and we'll repeat these in increments as the evening goes on.

Chair, did you have any other follow-up before we begin calling speakers?

Thank you for that.

That's very helpful.

Yes, please.

When you come up to the microphone or if you're in our virtual audience, please say your name and your address and then you can begin your talk.

We have up to two minutes.

The chair will be watching that and we really need to stay to two minutes so that we can make sure that all of our community members have ample opportunity.

Thank you.

That's very helpful.

All right.

So we will start with our first speaker.

We're going to have our three in-house speakers.

Logistics question, sir?

It is not.

This is the Planning Commission's public hearing.

City Council will hold a public hearing on this when they receive the materials and are prepared to do so.

So that will come later.

There will be another opportunity.

Very good logistical question.

All right, so I'm going to call the first three speakers.

And if the, if one, two, and three can be lining up as we're calling speakers, that would be wonderful.

The first speaker is number one, Robin Kells, followed by Scott Clark and then Diane Wackett.

Welcome.

Thank you.

My name is Robin Kells.

I live at 2503 Westerly Avenue.

in the Fontaine neighborhood.

Community doesn't flow from the top down, first of all.

It's not tidally organized.

It grows sort of like a forest.

It's all these little parts that come together and grow sort of organically from individual elements.

and as much as appealing as the overview of the plan is and as many wonderful terms as I hear in the plan, it still concerns me because it seems very top-down and tidy.

It's sort of like the difference between a pine plantation and an actual functioning forest.

I am not opposed to increasing residential density.

In fact, I applaud that.

I applaud the acknowledgement

that our community needs more affordable dwelling spaces, more accessible amenities, but we need to be very careful in how this is achieved.

Our neighborhood is very funky and scraggly and it's not the greatest thing to look at when you drive through it, but it is wonderful.

It also has some of the best tree cover in the entire city.

It's right next to O'Hill.

It's ecologically kind of a miracle.

It's just a wonderful place to live and it has some of the most congenial neighbors I have ever experienced in my entire life and I've lived many places.

People who have been there for decades.

One of our neighbors was literally her family built the house where she was born and grew up and still lives there.

We have single family units.

We have multiple family units.

We even have a group home in our neighborhood.

And it all works.

It's all a community.

But we as a neighborhood are very concerned that

that we are not going to be heard.

My neighbors don't feel that they are being heard.

They don't feel that they have been considered.

They don't feel that they have been reached out to.

They don't feel that there has been a lot of communication about this.

They don't feel that they matter.

So please, I urge you to reach out to them and to consider what a community really is.

Good afternoon.

I'm Scott Clark.

I also live at 2503 Westerly Avenue, just off of Fontaine.

Given the two-minute time limit, I want to focus on one element of I will try.

I don't have a loud voice, but I'll try.

I want to focus on one particular element of the draft ordinance, which is the RX mixed-use districts.

We heard the vision for the future of the city about density, affordability, walkability, transit.

I support all of those things.

However, I feel that the Rx mixed-use districts will not help us achieve that.

As those regs are written, there's nothing in there to require a mix of uses.

They simply permit institutional or commercial or residential by right equally.

That means for a neighborhood like ours that's sandwiched between the university, the hospital, and the research park along a major US highway, there's going to be immense economic pressure to convert our residential neighborhood to institutional and medical uses.

There's nothing in that mixed use regulation that will keep our neighborhood residential or allow it to evolve to mixed use or to walkability.

Further, the fact that the RX regs allow by-right remote parking means that we could easily become infrastructure for the highway-related uses on Fontaine rather than a mixed-use neighborhood.

This also means there's going to be a huge increase in impervious cover in a neighborhood that right now has a very mature tree canopy that's been encouraged by all the residents.

So I'm going to leave you with two things.

Please either rewrite or replace those mixed-use regs with actual mixed-use regs.

And also for our block between Plateau Road, Westerly Avenue, and Summit Street, please take away that mixed-use designation.

The RB is fine.

RX3 doesn't work.

Thank you.

It's impossible to have any more scenario.

Is there a microphone if possible?

All right.

My name is Diane Walkett.

I am a homeowner and resident of 2319 Tarleton Drive, and I represent myself and many of my neighbors in the Greenbrier area, in particular, those of us who live on Tarleton Drive, who have major concerns about the impact of your proposed changes on our zoning designation, a life-changing impact with deleterious consequences.

The signed petition which we presented to you is for the following action.

Maintain, do not change, the current RA zoning in the Greenbrier neighborhood

specifically the entrance onto Greenbrier Avenue from Rale Road and the length of Tarleton Drive until where it crosses Bandbury Street.

We oppose the potential zoning changes because this area of Greenbrier, this street, Tarleton Drive in particular, is a family-focused part of Charlottesville that is populated by those who want their children to be able to safely walk to Greenbrier Elementary School, who want to walk their dogs and ride their bikes along the road without having to dodge cars that drive fast as they do along other streets, who want to have yards and space to live in, who want to grow their gardens and their flowers so they can enjoy the work of their labor, as can all the rest of us.

to change this street and to subject our families to more traffic, less safety,

the density of multiple unit complexes and to change the nature of our property is not a wise, appropriate, or necessary decision by the Planning Commission.

This is not a neighborhood of wealthy people who should suffer a diminution of their quality of life for no good reason.

We have all worked hard, often with multiple jobs, to be able to purchase and live in a town and a neighborhood that we love, one that should not have its beauty, peace, and character altered forever by the wrong decision of the Planning Commission to change our zoning.

We are the street and the neighborhood that is Charlottesville.

This is what Charlottesville purports to be.

Do not change our zoning.

One last personal comment.

Growing up in Illinois, a small house, lots of kids, and lots of yard to play in.

The state took our property by eminent domain to add to the adjacent state park.

No more yard, no more home, loss of value.

That is what your proposed plan to rezone our homes and yards feels like to me.

All right, before I call our virtual speakers, I'm going to get our next three in-person ready to go so that when we finish there, we'll be ready to go.

Number four is Mr. Harwell, Philip Harwell, followed by Jerry Scott and then Eric Gunnarsson, number six.

Our first virtual speaker is Valerie Long.

Ms.

Yes, I have.

Yes, and we can hear you.

Great, thank you.

Good afternoon, members of the Planning Commission.

My name is Valerie Long.

I'm with Williams Mullin and our office is located at 323 2nd Street Southeast.

I've just submitted this to you by email, but I also appreciate the opportunity to share these comments now.

I'm speaking on behalf of our client Tarleton Oak LLC, which owns nine parcels downtown located on the block that's bound by East High Street

Lexington Avenue and 9th Street Northeast.

All the parcels are in common ownership.

We ask that you consider zoning all of the Tarleton Oak parcels as NX10.

Eight of the nine parcels are designated urban mixed use node on the land use map.

And the ninth is designated for urban mixed use corridor.

As you know, the map provides that urban mixed use node is appropriate for up to 10 stories.

The property supports the higher zoning and is consistent with zoning proposed nearby, but the draft zoning map continues to propose the zoning as a mixture of NX10, NX8, and CX8.

We request that you consider the request to zone all of it as NX10, given its prominent location downtown,

the lack of adverse impacts that would be associated with a taller building and the fact that the properties are all under common ownership.

This decision is consistent with the decision that was made at a recent work session regarding the former Martha Jefferson Hospital property across the street directly across Lexington Avenue now often known as the CFA Institute property.

That property was also originally shown on the initial zoning map as NX8

but following a request by the owner was changed to NX10.

Unfortunately at that same meeting there was no discussion specifically about the Tarleton Oak request.

So we respectfully ask that you consider that request to change all the parcels to NX10 as you continue your deliberations in the coming weeks.

Thank you very much.

All right, our next virtual speaker will be Doug Turnbull.

Hi, my name is Doug Campbell.

I live at 108 Robinson Woods in the Rose Hill neighborhood.

My family has had some relationship to Charlottesville for almost a hundred years.

My great uncle Knox lived on Chancellor Street for a time.

This home has now become student apartments.

My dad would visit my aunt Kitty on Brandon Avenue where she owned an acre of land.

He would walk to the drugstore at the corner for an ice cream.

Brandon Avenue has had a massive influx of housing.

Over the decades, the area has changed a lot, and I think mostly for the better.

New students and neighbors can be a great thing.

I fear what will happen if we suddenly stop change and stop growth.

This morning, I had my teeth cleaned.

I've had two dental hygienists in the last two years.

Both have moved away to more affordable areas, areas they can afford a home that doesn't require a long drive.

My now third dental hygienist is a new grad.

She's had to move in with her parents to afford to live here.

she has to commute 45 minutes away putting more strain on the region's transportation system it's possible she'll find a home and live farther away she'll have to drive down 250 or go through the city where she needs needs to go or she'll just give up move away and health care will gradually become less affordable for everyone

If we do not approve the draft plan, my question would be, what will be the plan for increasing the transportation network to account for dental hygienists, restaurant workers, hospital orderlies, teachers, firefighters, and police that keep our city running?

How many of us want to see Greenbrier, Preston, Barracks, McIntyre, it's turned to superhighways because we want commuters instead of neighbors?

I'd rather have neighbors than commuters, rather a home behind me than a super highway.

People will move here.

They will live far away in Green and Louisa and they'll put more cars on the road or they'll live nearby and put less car hours on the road.

Thinking about my dad walking to the corner for ice cream and his grandkids now walking to school, I hope we choose density.

thinking about my kids' teachers and the difficulty owning and staffing a small business like the drugstore.

I hope we choose affordability.

I'm not sure what's going on over there, but yes, I'll do that.

I need our in-person four through six to be standing up here while I call Mr. Rice, Jonathan Rice, virtually to speak.

Please admire the photo of my dog.

First of all, I would like to ask that you allow written comments to be admitted for this discussion as part of the record for this meeting as I've talked to several people who very much wanted to attend.

Sir, your two minutes has started.

Okay.

All right.

Let's see.

Name and address, please, sir.

Oh, sorry.

Jonathan Rice.

I live at 1144 Merriweather Street.

Okay.

All right.

I agree with, well, I appreciate all the hard work that's gone into this planning process and I certainly agree that we need greater housing density and affordable housing.

I would love to see the city become far less dependent on cars

to get around it.

That's absolutely essential to being able to manage higher density and to being able to reduce our carbon emissions at the same time.

And I agree that parking lots are tremendous waste of space

except that I'm very skeptical that reducing parking in itself is going to get us to a place where we're actually less dependent upon cars.

I think it's really just going to annoy a lot of people and be actually harmful to many city residents.

I worry that city planners might be projecting their own personal and professional circumstances onto our city's population as a whole when they view this problem because not every city resident is physically able to ride a bike to get around town or even to walk.

E-bikes are not the solution because of the fire hazard posed by the batteries.

So many city residents have limitations in terms of disabilities affecting their ability to walk or ride bike to get around town and I don't to my knowledge these people are not being really taken into into account also low-income residents

A lot of people have the privilege of being able to work remotely or have professional status that frees them from having to be at work at a fixed and precise time.

But a low-income retail worker has to be at work at a very precise time.

Thank you.

All right.

Thank you, sir.

We appreciate that.

I'm just going to call the names of our next three virtual speakers, and then we'll move to our next in-person speaker.

The next three virtual speakers are Elizabeth Stark, Renee Ackley, and Luann Chamberlain.

Philip Harway, 707 Alta Vista Avenue.

Thank you for your efforts on the FLUM plan.

That said, I wish to say dial it back way back.

I'm disappointed we're so close to proving a drastic change in our zoning without having planned for things not working out the way you expect.

Many of us are concerned that changing our city so drastically will create unforeseen problems.

We should have fewer cars on our roads.

It's a significant factor in climate change and we should all be concerned about that.

But it's wishful thinking that the present citizens will do away with most of their cars.

We walk where we can and we would bicycle more.

Except it's very dangerous.

One neighbor said he no longer bicycles except on the sidewalk because he's a father now and cannot afford the risk.

We use our car when it's too far for us to walk.

Your plan will eliminate the need for developers to provide parking for their new customers, creating a huge problem, especially for the impaired and the elderly.

You will penalize the citizens who have lived in the city many years to allow a new development without any required parking.

We've been told since the beginning that this document flum is a living document and nothing is set until it's finished.

This gave hope for many of us who would have preferred your rolling it out in stages

and adjusting to what happens before moving on.

We requested a parking plan to be included, recommended by a land planner out west, allowing a block-by-block permit parking if the majority of the block wants it.

This plan would give two permits per lot, including the lot a developer is about to develop.

In that scenario, it's the developer who has to worry about the parking for his new customers rather than the existing citizens who have been here many years, some older or feeble, and who would now possibly not be able to park in front of their house.

I was told by planning it would be considered and told by a council member that one neighborhood did not want this, but none of this prevents it from having been put in the plan, which it hasn't today.

And I expect that many other good ideas from your citizens have not been seriously considered.

Dial it back.

My name is Jeralene Scott, by the way, and my head name is Jerry.

I would like to tell you that I've lived on Tarleton Drive for 50 plus years.

and it's been wonderful.

Two daughters, one at Greenbrier walked to school and then at Walker in Charlottesville High School.

My worry is the fact that the impact of the zoning is going to change our entire Greenbrier neighborhood.

It's so safe right now and it's

got it's just a good neighborhood and good neighbors so I would like to encourage people to consider putting not changing the zoning in our area because it's perfect right now.

Hi.

Eric Gunderson, Yorktown Drive in Greenbrier.

I guess a couple of thoughts, observations about the process.

It seemed to me that as this came underway, it was under the auspices of primarily affordability.

And it seems like affordability has sort of transitioned more into development.

and maybe a bit of a bait and switch and that if you want affordability there may be other ways to get to affordability through tax code, through capping property taxes on people with fixed income or when they're no longer working.

But I also wanted to talk also about the neighborhood and as I've been also losing sleep over this and mulling over the issue of eminent domain and while eminent domain may

refer typically to the seizure of property.

In this instance, I think it applies analogously to taking the fabric of a neighborhood and changing it.

And part of the charm of Charlottesville are its neighborhoods.

We get to pick where we're going to live.

They all have their own charm.

They have their character.

Greenbrier is fantastic.

It's perfect for us.

The trees, the space between houses, the sidewalks, it's safe.

We know our neighbors.

We talk to them.

It's a fantastic place to live.

We've remodeled and we now have ramps.

We're staying there for the next several decades.

We're not going anywhere.

And I'm very concerned about how the rezoning is going to shift the character of the neighborhood.

And I hope that you would take that in mind for the people that are there who have invested and are hoping to live there for many, many years to keep that quality not just of Greenbrier,

but of the other important neighborhoods.

And I think that is a mandate for the city to help the people who are there.

Our next three in-person speakers can work on lining up.

Lynn Shupa, Nancy Summers, and Roy Van Dorn.

Our next virtual speaker will be Elizabeth Stark.

Elizabeth?

Hi, can you hear me?

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Hi, commissioners and city staffers.

Thanks for having this hearing today.

My name is Elizabeth Stark.

I live at 408 Fairway in the Woolen Mills neighborhood.

And I just want to say I'm a renter who lives in dense housing.

And I've raised my children here.

And I love my neighborhood too.

And I would love to have more neighbors.

and better use the land in this neighborhood to accommodate many more people so they can enjoy the river, proximity to downtown and all the amenities that me and my family have enjoyed.

I also want to say that

You know, everyone in Charlottesville deserves quality of life, walkable communities and access to these amenities.

I appreciate all the people that are saying how much they love their neighborhood, but I think more neighbors is the better thing for us.

I support much of the zoning code and think it will improve our community and help to welcome even more community members into the fold.

I do ask that you pay special attention to the neighborhoods that have been at high risk for displacement, specifically historically black neighborhoods and the places where those historically black neighborhoods abut commercial areas.

These neighborhoods have already borne the brunt of Charlottesville's growth and many who have lived here for generations have been displaced.

Please provide an anti-displacement overlay for these so-called sensitive neighborhoods.

I also ask that you allow more density in historically exclusionary neighborhoods to address race equity.

We know that many of our neighborhoods have been explicitly racist.

They've had explicitly racist covenants and we need to make that right.

These historically exclusionary neighborhoods should have more density.

I also ask that you allow

restore the four story height limit and reinstate height bonuses to link density to greater affordability.

Expansion of affordability, especially at the 50% AMI is essential.

We do need more affordability and the only way to do that is to incentivize deep affordability for developers and people that are moving to the city.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

All right, our next speaker, Luann Chamberlain.

Yes.

Hi.

This is Kelly Louann Chamberlain.

We're at 1158 Farrow Drive in the Belvedere subdivision.

And thank you for listening to us tonight.

A little background.

I was in the military 21 years when I've lived in big cities all across the United States.

And unfortunately, what normally happens with growth is they put the cart before the horse, which is, I think, the direction we're heading.

where the expansion's looked at, but there's no infrastructure in place.

One of the best places I ever lived was Pensacola, Florida.

They wanted to bring a small major league team, minor league team in there.

And they said, not until you build the roads, build the schools, have the utility system, and have the law enforcement and education in place before you can do that.

And they never expanded.

And I think we really need to stay focused on that.

The one thing that concerns me having an Airbnb

is a discussion about closing down altogether and kowtowing to the big businesses, the hotels out there so they can charge more money and pushing out the Airbnb as a small business who now pay an occupation tax which renters do not pay and people who rent to them do not pay.

The city has already closed it down so that

People who have an Airbnb must park on their property where renters can actually park in the street.

And that's kind of asked backwards if you think about it because you have someone in here that's a couple days, three, four days or less than 30 days a month that can't park in the street.

You have someone who does park in the street and occupy it who pays no taxes on that.

Something to look at.

If you do away with Airbnbs, you also open up those owners.

and make them become renters.

Now they have to worry about squatters rights and go through long-term rental processes if they need to get rid of some people.

And there's a lot of people who would just like to have a small business and you're taking that opportunity away from them so well.

doing away with Airbnbs and turning them over to just being rentals may meet the requirement of making more affordable housing available.

It really won't.

Many, many Airbnbs will not open their house up for 30 days.

Technically, if I want to- That's fine, sir.

Thank you.

All right, our next, we have our speakers lining up in person.

Our last virtual speaker, Renee Eckley.

Yes, ma'am, we can hear you.

Okay, Renee Eichle, 518 Mead Avenue.

We actually, I'm calling to extend the conversation about Airbnb home states, but from a different angle.

For one thing, I think the city has gotten out of control with commercial building and has not formed a plan, and here we are.

But we need a comprehensive transportation and housing plan.

that incorporates Albemarle County and probably beyond.

But on the short term, I did request, you know, answers.

And my answer from the city was that you're looking for solving some of the short-term rental crisis in the city with taking the Airbnbs away.

And yes, that, you know, admittedly that would be at the expense of the Airbnbs home state owners.

We actually are 30-day renters now because we're no longer home safe.

But when we did, we actually housed a lot of UVA students, parents, people coming to look at the university and a lot of the hospital systems.

We have a transient city.

We have a place that needs short-term rentals for these families and you're taking that away.

They need a place they can afford and they can cook their own meals and not have to stay at expensive hotels.

and go out to restaurants.

And that's what the homestays are really good for.

Who's going to house all the people who go to the football games?

And has UVA been challenged to address their own issue with having so many renters in the city?

so I think we need a plan that incorporates the real character of our city and our real business sector that's the original business sectors in addition to the new corporate overbuilding which has already taken place and you know the transportation plan as well please cut me off when I'm done but the transportation plan needs to incorporate going out further

like every other city that grows and having some sort of mass transit plan in place.

And that does not mean e-bikes and walking.

It means a way of people getting the city.

Because if the city is planning to grow like this plan shows it is, then it's not going to house everyone.

And by the nature of a growing city, housing becomes more expensive.

Okay.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

All right, I'm going to call our next three virtual speakers so they can be ready to go.

After our in-person, Katie Darden, Liam Keough, and Al Pola.

I'm Len Schapa, 1439 Westwood Road in the Kelleytown neighborhood.

I want to speak in favor of one part of the plan that hasn't been mentioned yet this evening and then raise some concerns about another part of the plan.

So the part of the plan that I think makes the biggest difference for affordable housing is the one that requires 10% of units to be set aside if you build more than 10.

So future multi-use, multi-unit housing developments that are built around the city won't have one by one separate negotiations that might lead to just small sums of money that maybe are not delivered at the end of the day.

But under this new plan, you have set a high bar for how much money you need to set aside if you want to buy your way out of actually providing units that are affordable at 50% of AMI.

So I encourage you to keep that level at 50% of AMI.

Keep the kinds of formulas you have for what you need to pay if you don't provide it and stick with the plan that says put the money up front because that's the one financial incentive that's going to actually encourage these developers to include some reasonably priced units in their buildings instead of

everybody trying to buy out, which is what they've done until now.

My concerns in the plan are that late in the day, we learned that the protections for the sensitive communities have suddenly disappeared.

When the comprehensive plan was passed, we were told that we could have this RA with

three units of housing for every lot because in the sensitive communities there would be some extra strict provisions that would say you could only have those three lots if you had your very first unit affordable, if you preserved an existing unit.

Now, we're told that we can't do that.

Instead, what I would encourage you to do to avoid the charge that you're doing that only in some neighborhoods is to extend that kind of protection for affordable older houses on small lots.

to more of the city.

Because if you just do the sensitive communities, you could be vulnerable to some legal challenges.

So let's take that kind of approach that preserves housing and creates rooms for trees in more of the city.

I'm Nancy Summers.

I live on Blue Ridge Road.

You must reconsider upzoning the Barracks Road B Preston corridor from R1 to high intensity residential commercial.

This historic corridor is one of the busiest in Charlottesville.

Barracks Road has steep embankments and contains critical slopes which make it almost impossible to widen.

In fact, there is a plan in place to build a sidewalk on the south side of Barracks and narrow the lanes.

Just a few years ago, the city refused to allow a large apartment complex to be built in the Meadowbrook Shopping Center because of the limitations of Barracks Road.

Barracks was given a grade of F in the associated traffic study, as well as presenting watershed and critical slope issues.

Now the city is proposing that apartments be permitted all along this very busy, narrow, non-expandable corridor.

Although it is required by state law, the city did not do a traffic analysis.

when it developed the comprehensive plan on which the zoning is based.

Had the city done so, the plan to increase the density on barracks would surely have been nixed.

Similarly, the city should have conducted environmental impact settings, including watersheds and critical slopes as they prepared the flume.

They did not do so.

Had these studies been done, the limitations of development on barracks would have been evident.

There is a reason the Barracks Rugby Preston Care Corridor from Emmett Street to Washington Park has been zoned R1 and it has nothing whatsoever to do with exclusionary zoning and everything to do with the limitations of the natural and built environment.

By the way, the city is eliminating parking requirements for developments.

There is absolutely no room for parking on Barracks Road.

There is a good reason that the state requires localities to engage in, quote, careful and comprehensive surveys and studies as it prepares its comprehensive plan.

This reason is to protect the city and its citizens from faultless and destructive decisions.

Roy Van Dorn, 1522 Rugby Avenue.

I wish to address the consequence of RC setbacks for the Rugby Avenue and Rose Hill neighborhoods.

The Planning Commission and city staff have repeatedly promised to protect the community from tear downs and developments built out of scale with the neighborhood homes.

Rugby Avenue is unique is that the road itself was built in the 40s.

And it was going to be a major east-west boulevard.

When the neighborhood was built out in the 50s,

They were purposely set back 50 feet from the street to reflect the road noise and traffic.

Imagine building your house on the bypass.

This was before sound walls.

All homes on Rugby avenues were therefore set back 40 feet from the sidewalk as Rugby Avenue was the de facto east-west bypass then.

That setback

is treated much differently than Avon Street where high fences and hedges dominate to shield the homes from the street.

Rugby Avenue, alternatively, our homes openly embrace the sidewalks, neighborhoods, and community.

As proposed today, a developer who will not be our neighbor can build a 38-foot high, three-story, eight-unit apartment building five feet from the sidewalk by right.

That results in a multi-story wall that consumes 87% of our front yard.

This is totally out of scale and creates sawtooth development for the entire neighborhood.

and makes a mockery out of the promise made by the Planning Commission to keep development house scale.

I'm going to call our next three in-person speakers so they can be ready.

Andrew Shelton, Kathy Galvin, and Bill Emery.

Our next virtual speaker is Katie Darden.

Katie, can you hear us?

Katie?

Can you hear me?

Yes, ma'am.

We can hear you.

You can begin.

My name is Katie Darden.

My husband Jason and I live at 1638 Meridian Street in Belmont.

We're homeowners.

I'm a small business owner and we're parents.

First, thank you to everybody who's worked on this draft zoning code.

I know it's incredibly complicated and difficult.

We really appreciate your efforts to make Charlottesville more inclusive, welcoming and sustainable community.

I support zoning reform that'll let more people afford to live in Charlottesville.

My husband and I live on a wonderful street that includes single family homes, duplexes and apartments.

We were really lucky to have bought our house in 2011.

Home prices were much, much, much lower than they are now.

We chose our house because it was one of the few on the market that we could afford at the time, but we still needed family help to make the down payment.

We also love the fact that in this neighborhood, we can see kids bikes in the yards, kids playing outside.

When my 11 year old was even younger, there was a whole pack of children that played outside up together on the street all the time.

But over the years, most of them have moved away.

We've seen friends and neighbors have to leave the area because of the tremendously high cost of housing.

We really miss them.

And I'm not sure there's going to be any kids for my three-year-old daughter to play with nearby as she grows older with so few families can afford to live here.

We've heard from people who want their children to be able to walk to Greenbrier School, which is great.

Others have talked about being able to pick the neighborhood where they live.

But let's not forget about the people who would really like to be able to choose to live in Charlottesville in any neighborhood.

and for their kids to attend Charlottesville schools at all.

But for many of them, the out of control housing market makes it impossible for them to live anywhere near the city, even as they work here and we interact with them every day.

I understand people have concerns about this zoning update.

We're never going to get it perfect, but with so many families suffering from the high cost of housing and climate catastrophe essentially upon us, we really don't have time to get it perfect.

Liam Keough?

Yes, sir.

I would like to primarily spend my time speaking on the dairy market expansion.

It was dairy market expansion at 10th and page.

But I would also like to comment also on what has been previously mentioned.

If we are serious about the comprehensive plan, we cannot pay credence to

letting older neighbors prevent change.

I would like to make an observation that everyone who was against the proposed ordinance is mostly older.

We cannot let the privileged desires of older residents outweigh the needs of potentially thousands of new residents, low-income residents, and non-white residents.

I would also like to make an observation that the dog whistles such as protecting the safety, the charm and the peace of their neighborhoods inhibit the change.

We cannot let these dog whistles also this way the change needed to address the vast increase in population in Charlottesville.

We cannot allow quaint neighborhoods to impede change.

But to my main point of the 10th and Page proposed development, at the beginning of this meeting, it was alluded to that the comprehensive plan, the new comprehensive plan is aimed at some of the core tenants of historical land preservation, affordable housing, economic development,

We cannot have this in the comprehensive plan, but also propose this dairy market expansion, which directly contradicts the wishes of the neighbors of the 10th of Page neighborhood, most of whom are low income and non-white.

That is time, sir.

All right, Al Poloa.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

My name is Al Poloa.

I live at 1624 Amherst Street.

Much has been said so far that I wanted to talk about.

I support the 50% AMI that was mentioned by Mr. Schapa.

I think those are good starts to this.

My concern, and I hope the Planning Commission pays attention to this, is that while I'm in favor as a Latino homeowner of increased density, increased density across the city does not necessarily translate to increased affordability.

That only happens if we have multiple units that have affordable housing.

Case in point, the new Cherry Avenue development.

If that was done in a new development, it would have been done by Wright.

Look at the number of changes that have had to go through solely because they were forced to have input from the neighborhood.

Same thing with dairy market.

It increases the number of units, vastly, vastly increases the amount of density on Preston.

But how much of that is going to be affordable?

I haven't seen anything that says any of those units are going to be affordable.

Increased density does not mean increased affordability.

Also, increased density without attention to infrastructure is something that I think this plan does not address.

How are you going to translate increased density, for instance, on Preston, where there's no buffer between pedestrians on the sidewalks and traffic?

What are you going to do about the stormwater?

What are you gonna do about the schools?

What are you gonna do about all the other infrastructure needs that increased density brings?

If we are serious about changing the zoning code and increasing density, we have to address also what increased density brings and do that before we allow increased density by right.

Our next three virtual speakers to get ready, Ellen Tully, James Scott, and Sarah Malpass.

Andrew?

Hi.

I am Andrew Shelton.

I'm actually currently a county resident.

I rent down Old Lynchburg Road just south of town, but I have lived here my entire life, a good portion of that which was within the city limits.

Unfortunately, my wife and I had to move out of town a few years ago because the price of housing simply wasn't affordable for us.

I'm not talking about designated affordable housing.

We have good jobs.

I'm a carpenter.

She books buses for a travel company.

But the existing housing market is simply not sustainable for young people who don't have existing investment in their home that's been being built for 30 years.

I've lived here long enough to remember when they changed the zoning back in the 90s.

I was a kid, but I remember hearing all of these people talk about how we needed to control growth and make sure that the existing residents weren't driven out.

That happened because we don't have enough housing for the amount of people who want to live here.

This is a very wonderful place to live.

A lot of people want to move here and a lot of them have the money to afford what I would consider exorbitant prices for homes.

And if they can buy them, I can't.

I would like to live in town, the town that I grew up in.

I'm not able to.

I would like to ask you guys to please support the recommendations in the housing coalition letter that was signed by dozens of local organizations, including neighborhood organizations, racial justice organizations.

I believe they're good recommendations.

I'm actually very happy with the process and the current recommendations so far, but I believe that they could be improved and that that would be a good set of recommendations to do it with.

I'd like to ask you to particularly pay attention to the need to not displace farther black neighborhoods and to hopefully expand density in the neighborhoods that have historically had exclusionary zoning.

Good evening.

Thank you.

I'm Kathy Galvin.

I live on 712 Lyons Avenue.

Four points.

Land value inflation.

Zoning impacts land value, often driving the most profitable legal land use of the land.

How will the city counter rising land value sparked by the citywide upzoning, which may ultimately raise, not lower, housing costs?

Two, affordable housing and building heights.

Developers can either build 10% affordable housing on site or pay into a housing fund.

How is that any different from what we do now?

How is it better than what we do now?

Second, increased building height does not automatically promote affordability and lower unit prices.

That's because the height directly impacts the cost of structural and mechanical systems.

So why are we giving away 10-story buildings by right instead of using additional building height above what we currently allow as leverage to get what we most need, affordable housing and public open space?

Do we really need more luxury apartments?

and office space.

Three, constrained right-of-ways.

Turning areas south of the downtown mall into essentially the Navy Yard in D.C.

could make sense if the public right-of-way along Garrett and Second Streets were 120 foot wide

12-foot-wide sidewalks, protected bike lanes, street trees, and other green infrastructure features that mitigate flooding and manage stormwater.

But they're not.

At best, they're the typical 60 to 70-foot-wide right-of-way with five-foot-wide sidewalks cluttered with utility poles and no dedicated bike lanes, let alone protected ones.

Plus, mature canopy trees were cut down within the public right-of-way along Garrett Street to accommodate redevelopment, but the new zoning does nothing to prevent this in the future.

Infrastructure improvements.

After 2003,

The zoning changed West Main Street, but nothing was done to accommodate greater foot, bike, and vehicular traffic.

It became one of the city's ten most dangerous streets.

That led to a three-year public process to create an improvement plan and got VDOT funding.

After years of delay, funding was returned.

It was never built.

So how can the public trust city officials

to safeguard a livable city.

Time is out.

Thank you.

Bill Emery, 1604 East Market Street.

The implementation of the draft zoning ordinance will further decrease the city's shrinking tree canopy.

How low can the canopy percentage go?

The code writers say we can't ask developers for more than 20% canopy coverage, the state's maximum requirement.

But developers and landlords can be incentivized.

The codes, greenscapes, zones, and setbacks can be adjusted.

And we can ask our city councilors to join us in this goal.

Look at the money.

The city takes in $100 million in real estate tax.

The city spends 1,000th of that planting trees.

We talk the green city talk.

Let's start walking the walk.

Trees and density can coexist.

You just act.

Plant a $10 tree in the ground, care for it, and step back.

In 1975, the city had a plan to plant a multitude of trees in the commons in the right of way.

In the wool mills, 90 trees would line East Market from Firefly to the Riven.

Shade, walkability, habitat, carbon sequestration, oxygen production, stormwater control,

Of the 90 trees, one has been planted at 1606 East Market.

Square that lack of follow-through to the Standards and Design Manual, Chapter 964, which reads, Trees must be installed along all right-of-ways regardless of the location of overhead or underground utilities.

Ask the city to plant the commons and to support designs that incorporate nature and housing plants.

I'm a small-scale affordable housing provider going for 100% canopy.

We can get this done.

We're going to get our next three in-person people teed up.

We have number 13, Tyler Miller, 14, Jeff Garman, and 15, Bernd Hewitt.

I'm going to move to our virtual speaker, Ellen Tooley.

Ellen?

Sorry.

Yes, ma'am, we can hear you.

Great.

My name is Ellen Tully and I live at 1442 Westwood Road.

I would like to 100% support the previous speaker.

One of my big interests is in preserving the tree canopy.

It is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to replace a 50-year-old tree in five years.

So as many big trees as you can save is what you need to do.

and you only can do that by putting teeth in the developer for the developers.

No one will preserve a tree unless they absolutely have to.

At least put it this way, no developer will.

Even people who are building private houses will cut down trees rather than have their architect redesign it.

I'm 100% in favor of a tree canopy.

I also support lens.

I also support the teeth in the over nine unit

requirement for affordable housing, it's very important that that be maintained, that you don't let it slide.

Developers will try their best to get out of having to do anything that cuts into their bottom line and to preserve the affordable housing in the city, you really need to hold their feet to the fire.

and a third thing I wish to speak about is lighting.

All right, your time's up, Ms.

Tully.

Thank you.

Mr. Scott?

Mr. Scott, can you hear us?

Can you hear me?

Yes, sir.

Okay, thank you.

My name is Jay Scott, 1863 Winston Road.

I'm the current president of the Venable Neighborhood Association.

Venable Neighborhood is quite diverse and as such our neighborhood has a broad spectrum of opinions about the comprehensive plan, the future land use map, and proposed zoning changes.

Our board of directors met last night and asked me to share the following thoughts which we feel are relevant regardless of individual perspectives on the proposed zoning changes.

and feels that the following items are critical for the success of any future planning.

The city, county, and the university must establish a more collaborative and joint effort or joint venture approach to addressing affordable housing challenges in our area.

Student housing continues to overtake lower income residential neighborhoods and historically African-American neighborhoods adjacent to the university and UVA to date has been unable to develop actionable plans to fully deliver on its commitment to house all second year undergraduate students.

Second, the City needs to address not just the infrastructure plans outlined in James Bria's memo to Council on July 7th of this year, but it also needs to work with Rivanna Water & Sewer to ensure that the available water supply can support any planned growth.

Global warming has put pressure on water supplies worldwide and our area is not exempt from that, as evidenced by the front page article in the Daily Progress just yesterday.

Mr. Fraser's memo clearly outlines the excellent work the City is doing to upgrade our water distribution networks, but as far as we can tell, there hasn't been any adjustment to the water supply assumptions based on the impact of global warming and more frequent droughts.

Third, we understand that a large number of City government positions are currently vacant.

This includes vacancies in neighborhood development services and building inspector positions.

In order to support the planned future growth, these critical positions must be filled in advance of any newly permitted growth so that any future development can be done safely in accordance with

We're all aware that for the second year the city has not been able to provide transportation for many of the students.

Will there be room for our schools to provide high quality education for future students and will the city be able to transport them to school?

Sarah Malpass.

Yes, thank you.

Yes, you may begin.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, everyone.

This is Sarah Malpass.

I live at 626 Bailey Road.

I'm a resident of Fifeville and I'm also the vice president of the Fifeville Neighborhood Association.

The FNA has signed on to the Housing Coalition letter because our residents want to see all homes with housing for all kinds of people in every neighborhood in our city.

We especially want the city to pass policies and programs that will stop the displacement of black residents from our community and remedy the racist long-term effects of exclusionary single-family zoning in Charlottesville.

The Fightville neighborhood is particularly hopeful that the city will fund zoning, will provide zoning, funding, and programmatic tools to prevent displacement from our historically black community and at the same time expand opportunities for affordable housing in communities across the city.

On a personal note, I want to share that finding housing at affordable rents is a god-awful experience in this city.

I recently walked with this black Seville mom who was attempting to find housing before the birth of her first child.

She had a housing voucher, but there was no available housing to use it on.

Despite her extremely proactive search from the start of her pregnancy, it took many, many months to find an apartment that was available.

So many months, in fact, that she was not housed before her child was born, and she had to continue looking for housing in the weeks directly after the birth of her baby.

She should have been able to spend this time resting in her own home and bonding with her new baby, but due to the housing crisis, she had to be up and pounding the streets to find housing soon after giving birth.

This is not acceptable.

Housing is a human right and the city should do everything it can to make housing more affordable for everyone and to stop displaced from the black residents and low income residents.

I support CLIP's recommendations and the housing coalition's letter and ask that you continue to improve the zoning code by allowing for more housing and medium intensity zoning

Improving Inclusionary Zoning Regulations to Provide Greater Depth of Affordability.

Thank you.

Our three next virtual speakers to make sure that you're ready when we're coming back, Brad Campbell, John Faust, and Crystal Passmore.

Hello, my name is Tyler Miller.

I live at 1500 Green Street in Belmont.

And I guess first I want to say to the displacement of residents, I just am thinking of my neighbor, Mr. Johnson, 18-year resident of the neighborhood.

He's a black person.

He's been driving buses in the city for all of that time, who recently was told he has to move out of his house because the developer that owns it is turning into, quote, as many units as possible.

So, you know, sometimes it goes both ways.

I think that we need to upzone modestly by working with homeowners to add housing while not further commoditizing housing.

The RC tier specifically is essentially commercial-like zoning.

It's geared towards revenue generation and not adding affordable units.

RC designations will pick winners in neighborhoods.

Those lots fetch a premium as they are essentially commercial.

That granularity will increase inequality, not lessen it.

I would point you to the work of Strong Towns and MIT PhD candidate Jana Freemark, who have done great work in that area.

A few points as well.

5.4.4.8 was moved to a new location.

The designation of a particular violation in the schedule of civil penalties cannot be construed to allow the imposition of a civil penalty.

I think that that needs to be removed.

I would also point you

the way that making essentially most of the city by right would open it to VA code 15.2-2313, which basically allows people who do not receive notice of development the right to sue, which I think is somewhat antithetical to the goal of removing that overhead of meetings and notice.

Hi, I'm Jeff Gaiman from 1534 Trail Ridge Road.

We live in Johnson Village.

and as I looked over the plans, they look like they sort of assumed that everyone is coming at this with a good-hearted intention.

You know, people are basically good down deep.

The truth of it is the heart of man is deceitfully wicked and above all desperately sick.

We have to remember this simply because

The investors that are going to be investing in these properties as well as the people who are buying into them and renting them are not necessarily always good people.

I mean, good people, yes, but our intentions are not always going to be to watch out for our neighbors.

So we just have to be aware of that.

As I looked through the documentation, I found that there are examples of cities that have done things like this, but I haven't seen any resounding successes.

You know, the increased affordability, the increased density, but I saw several examples of, and we tried this and it didn't work, and so we're back to the drawing board.

We have some examples of places that have worked.

We need to model ourselves after something that's successful.

Maybe I missed something in all of this.

But I'm just not sure it's out there.

We also have to keep in mind that, yes, we've heard comments from people that say we need to be, you know, not be thinking of the older people that have been here for a long time and who sort of grew up in the area.

Remember, though, that people make choices when they buy houses.

Some of us buy houses because we want our children to go to certain schools.

We buy them because we like the community, we like the neighbors.

So I have a proposal.

Hi.

Excuse me.

My name is Bern Ewart.

My wife and I live at 1609 St.

Ann's Road.

We've lived there for 30 years and prior to that when I was deputy city manager in Greenbrier for five and a half years, we and my neighbors opposed this badly designed and unpredictable ordinance.

that will dramatically increase density.

I know of no one in my neighborhood who supports it.

I was a commercial developer for 20 years, and I say to you, you have put your faith in commercial real estate developers, and that's a mistake.

Citizens expect predictable behavior.

What you can count on from City Council.

This plan isn't effective or predictable.

And that's no surprise, since you've done no impact studies.

Peggy Vanieri has reminded us that the tree canopy is reduced by 25%, and I can tell you, if this ordinance goes through, you'll reduce it by another 25%.

If there are a thousand new school children, you'll increase operating expenses for the city by 15 million dollars a year.

And in terms of traffic and pollution, no study was done and the Deputy Director of Planning lied to VDOT saying that there would be no impact from your proposal on traffic or the 56 signalized intersections.

I'm sorry to say that you've deceived your citizens and VDOT and I have a simple plan for you.

Rezone the city to R2 and buy land that you can build affordable housing on so we can be sure that it's affordable forever.

We know that you can do that because you notified us by mailer.

So good luck to you and let's try to be practical.

This is a very, very complicated issue.

Our next three in-person speakers to get ready, number 16, Jeff Levine, 17, Candace Zabrini, and number 18, Mark Cavett.

Our next speaker is Brad Campbell in our virtual audience.

Hi, I'm Brad Campbell.

I live at 852 St.

Charles in the Martha Jefferson neighborhood.

I want to say that I strongly support the new zoning code, and I think it's a substantial improvement over what we currently have in place.

It will enable more neighbors, more people to be able to live in Charlottesville, which is a good thing.

and this is critical for our environmental goals that people are able to live close to amenities, jobs, and the city of Charlottesville.

The zoning code allowing for more types of housing, more flexibility will enable this.

Thank you.

Our next speaker, John Faust.

John, can you hear it?

Yes, sir.

I'm John Faust, 1501 Rugby Road.

I have a very short question for the Planning Commission.

The recently proposed development at Dairy Central on Preston Avenue appears to embody the central themes of this rezoning proposal.

That is, one, it's a dense, multi-story residential development they asked for.

Two, relaxed parking requirements.

And three, it was in a commercially zoned high-density site.

I asked the plan

do you agree that this would be approved under the new zoning automatically?

If not, why not?

I know you're not going to answer in the session, you said that, but I would very much appreciate an email response to my definite questions.

That's at jlp at virginia.edu.

All right, Crystal Passmore.

Crystal, can you hear us?

Yes, hello.

Yes, you may begin.

Hi, my name is Crystal Passmore.

I live at 1430 Forest Ridge Road.

and I believe it's important for our community, for equity and for the environment if we reverse the restrictive zoning that was put into place in the city decades ago.

The zoning we currently have only serves to make Charlottesville more segregated, more expensive and more exclusionary and I sort of believe that these are the features that current homeowners

calling in want to preserve when they think their neighborhoods are perfect, when they are afraid of more people, when they are afraid of duplexes.

The things that they like is the segregation and that their housing costs a lot of money.

It's a simple matter of math.

If we continue to add jobs in the community, which I believe we like, then we must also add the housing to support the workers that need to work there.

If we fail to do this new workers will either bid up the price of housing in the city if they are rich

or if they are poor or middle class they'll find housing farther and farther out in the suburbs and if they are forced to do that they have to have long commutes they create traffic they create pollution and they create deforestation because if people are concerned about the tree canopy the amount of

trees lost when people build duplexes in the city, when people build apartment complexes in the city, pales in comparison if you've ever seen deforestation when people build single-family homes in areas where there currently aren't any, which is what people will do if Charlottesville and Albemarle continue to push single-family housing as the model that they want to chase.

Basically, I agree with what the Housing Coalition letter has stated.

We need to allow more housing to be built in the city.

We need to increase density, increase height limits.

All right, you've gone over time.

Thank you so much.

Hi, Jeff Levine, 600 West Main Street.

I listened to a lot of this today.

A lot of it is very complex, very emotional, and affects people to the core.

I'd like to focus on something that I think is a little more technical and just doesn't come within reason of review of the zoning code.

In every draft, there seems to be consistency on a height limitation in feed, and yet there's this limitation to that by stories.

and common architecture principles, efficient residential development principles will tell you that you can get more stories in the feet that you have proposed.

So in a, and I'm not talking about the lower density, I'm talking about like CX-5 or DX where you can go with a bonus to 12 stories or 170 feet and 170

You can build 12 stories in like 135 and 140 feet.

So I don't understand the loss of use of those extra feet.

So I don't know why we're not just approving height.

And we can debate and argue over what the right height is, but I don't know why there'd be any limitation to what a story is.

And if there's some public policy about a residential story, then I would strongly urge that the definition

just limit a story to or exclude from the definition of story non-residential use.

So for parking, mechanical, non-residential, it actually would address something that the No Way Back guy said or whatever said about the parking.

The market's going to dictate parking.

So even if there's no parking restriction, developers are going to have to provide parking.

and if you allow parking to be excluded from the naming of a story, you would allow some above grade parking to be built, which is much more cost efficient than underground parking.

So I just think that whatever we're going to do, we can debate it all day, but I think we want to make it so there's common sense and we want to make it that good principles are followed when we're building buildings.

Thank you.

I didn't call our next virtual folks to tee up, so Michelle Rowan, Ann Ineskis, and Jamal Bouie just be in the reserve there.

Good afternoon.

I'm Candace Zaporini.

I live on East Water Street.

This is my first meeting, and as much as you're looking at us, I'm looking at you.

I see barely any of you taking notes, and actually I've watched three of you fall asleep.

This is the first hour, so I'm sorry it's so boring to you, but those of us who live here, it's really important.

I have two simple things I wish you would write down.

Green space.

The only new green trees I've seen downtown are on top of the coal building.

You're obviously not honoring, you're planning.

in which you said you would put more trees in our city.

There aren't trees.

You built the AA buildings near Three Notch.

Where's the park for the kids to play in?

There's no green space planning.

My second topic I wish you would write down, 35 million, the Belmont Bridge.

It's beautiful.

It's beautiful.

Guess what?

It's the biggest graffiti, eyesore, promoting gang strength in the city.

How are you getting rid of the graffiti?

I've talked to the head of the police, I've talked to construction workers.

Supposedly the plan is when the bridge is done and you all sign off on it, they're going to get rid of the graffiti once.

What's going to prevent it from turning into a graffiti?

Let's go gangs, let's sell drugs, let's do prostitution as the hallmark and entrance to our area downtown.

You have no trespassing signs, you have poor lighting, you have no consequences for putting graffiti in, there's no planning there.

I wish you would write down graffiti, how do we get rid of it, and the best way is as soon as it goes up, you get it down, and I wish you'd put some green space in.

And I wish when you agree to something like putting in trees, you would plant them.

Mark Cavett, 400 Altamont Street.

To those that oppose, to those people on the opposite side of the fence than me, we actually agree on many points.

We just think the proposed plan will not achieve the stated goals of the city and recommended modifications.

Concerning signs, there have been

signs that have been put on private property like these and replaced with this, repurposed.

Need to remind those individuals that are doing that that this is actually a misdemeanor crime when they were moved off of private property.

We have placed cameras on some locations to record anyone removing signs.

The downtown area is being proposed as a high-density district.

This district would run south of the Mall and off the High Street, including all buildings on high.

What concerns me and others is that there has been talk by BC in work sessions to increase height to eight to ten stories.

This could result in putting existing buildings in jeopardy of being torn down and replaced.

Just because this area is an ADC district does not give them protection.

We need to have some protection in there because I don't believe that the city council and the city wants to see that happen.

State law has a process for owners to replace buildings.

Don't give a financial incentive to tear down 200-year-old buildings that have been well maintained to be placed with new structures.

Be careful what you give by right.

Maybe keep the current SUPs for very high buildings.

If you want to preserve the area and character of the area, which I believe City Council wants to do, be careful.

Phase in the plan is also another suggestion I would like to make.

All right, our next three in-person, two speakers to get ready, 19 Carmelita Wood, 20 Matt Gilligan, and 21 James Franken.

We'll move to our next virtual audience participant, Michelle Rowan.

Michelle, can you hear us?

It's 530.

Michelle, can I check one more time with you?

All right, we will move to our next speaker, Anna Ascanas.

Anna?

Anna, can you hear me?

Yes, Anna, we can hear you.

My number one concern is infrastructure.

As I'm sure many of you have noticed, the increase in traffic in Charlottesville.

I am very, very concerned that the roads that we have, particularly in my neighborhood, I live on Lewis Mountain, are not able to handle the traffic we currently have.

In fact, the Virginia Department of Transportation has given

Emmett, Ivy and Alderman and F in terms of their ability to handle current traffic.

I'm very concerned that we are out of compliance with state law, that we are out of compliance with what the Virginia Department of Transportation, their regulations about having infrastructure in place before you increase density.

and I don't see that happening.

I don't see people being concerned or the planning commission being concerned about the roads, about the traffic, about the increase for the schools.

All of these things need to be in place before we increase density.

I've lived in the city, in many cities, in Washington DC in particular, and I can tell you when you have increased density, you have problems with noise, you have problems with pollution, you have problems with crime, you have problems with parking,

and if you think that people in the city of Charlottesville are gonna give up their cars, you are living in a fantasy world.

Even the students, when they go home to see their parents, they take a car.

They move their furniture in, they take a car.

They go to the grocery store, they take a car.

Charlottesville is not built

for people to, I love to walk, I love to ride a bike, but it's not practical to do that for everything you need in Charlottesville.

And if we were in compliance with state law, in compliance with the Virginia Department of Transportation, that makes sense to me.

Going ahead with the Planning Commission's recommendations and forgetting about infrastructure.

Thank you so much for your comment.

We're going to try Ms.

Rowan one more time.

Ms.

Rowan?

Okay, we're going to move forward.

Janelle Bowie?

Janelle?

Janelle.

It's Janelle.

Oh, yeah.

Sorry, a little blurry on my screen.

Sorry.

No worries.

Yes, sir.

Okay, thank you.

And thank you for your hard work, Planning Commission.

I first want to urge the Planning Commission to incorporate the recommendations of the Housing Coalition, whose letter was signed by 30 organizations, including affordable housing groups, racial justice groups, student groups,

and neighborhood associations.

In particular, I want to urge the Planning Commission to maintain medium intensity zoning, modify the inclusionary zoning regulations to improve financial feasibility and achieve deeper affordability.

I also urge the Planning Commission to provide the flexibility and rules and standards to actually ensure that new housing can be built and to proceed with the original plan for sensitive areas.

Having said that, I want to speak about my own experience in Charlottesville as a renter and a homeowner.

I've lived here since 2017.

By the time my wife and I returned to Charlottesville that year, we had both been here at earlier points in our lives, the housing crisis in the city was already essentially out of control and we struggled to find an apartment at affordable rates.

We now own a home.

And the reason we were able to form a home in this housing market, this often ruinously expensive housing market for many people, is because I just happen to have an unusually lucrative job for my career.

The Charlottesville housing crisis affects the people across the income spectrum, including gainfully employed young people who hope to live in this city for decades, who hope to contribute to this city for decades, are essentially unable to afford housing and unable to contribute to the community that they love and cherish.

I've heard lots of concern in the conversation so far about what might happen.

Lots of reflective claims of futility and perversity.

If you make this change, you'll make things worse.

But let's look at what is happening.

Broad displacement, ruinously expensive prices, increased homelessness.

You should not have to be a New York Times columnist to afford a home in Charlottesville, Virginia.

That is just not right.

All right, your time is up.

All right.

Ms.

Wood.

Hi.

My name is Carmelita Wood.

I'm at 825 Orangeville Avenue, current president of the American Association.

This zoning rewrite will allow more housing to be made affordable and hopefully solve some of the housing needs in the city, giving all the people the opportunity to live and raise their families in neighborhoods they choose to live in.

I believe this rewrite will stop displacement in areas that are high forward.

My family, along with other families, were displaced long ago.

It's not fun, people.

We lost a lot, like generational wealth, generational motivation, social status, and put in schools where we weren't welcome.

People are in need of fair, affordable housing for their family to thrive and the future generations

for them to increase their generational wealth, their social status, and to stop educational detachment.

Isn't this what we all want for our families and our kids?

One reason the FNA signed on to the Housing Coalition was to speak volume to the rewrite.

Stop displacement.

to stop fighting people with the back and forth about the rezoning.

Learn to share our spaces.

People stay in our lanes.

We can't take it with us when we go.

We have to leave it for someone.

We voted counselors in.

We have the planning commission hired them to do their jobs.

So let them do it.

And if they don't get it right, it's on them.

Thank you.

I just want to our three next virtual speakers so that they are ready, Kimber Hockey, Josh Karp, and Zianna Bryant.

Good evening, Planning Commission.

My name is Matthew Gilliken.

I live in Fightville.

I'm also the co-chair of Livable Seaville and the parent of three children in the Charlottesville City Schools.

I would express my appreciation for the hard work each of you all have put into this process.

Some of you have been at it since, I think, seven, six years ago?

We're almost there.

And the vision is becoming reality.

Housing is a human right.

Charlottesville is in an affordable housing crisis.

We are also in a state of climate emergency that must be addressed locally.

The current zoning code does not serve our community well when it comes to housing or when it comes to climate.

In fact, it's creating harm.

It's displacing black, brown, and low-income residents.

It's resulting in a worsening homelessness issue in the area.

And it's a significant challenge for families with small children and community helpers like teachers, nurses, and social workers to find a place to live here.

In 2017,

When there was a lot of talk and a lot of action around taking statues down, a lot of people said, why are you all so focused on statues?

Why don't you all do something substantive, meaningful?

Well, I think we're doing both.

We've taken down the statues, and now we're addressing our affordable housing crisis.

Each of you have an opportunity to play a role in that substance.

We've taken down the symbols.

Let's make some substantive changes too.

The Affordable Housing Plan calls for a ladder of housing opportunity.

We need to allow a much wider range of housing types and increase funding for affordable housing to make that ladder possible.

Every neighborhood should be open to some change, but not drastic change.

Rate of change analysis that have been done indicate that there will in fact be gradual change in the low density areas of the city, not dramatic change.

When people talk about how great their neighborhoods are, I hope they would do that with an attitude of wanting more people to experience that quality of life.

The draft zoning code is a significant step forward from what we currently have, but it does need a little bit of work.

I think we need to allow for more housing in the medium intensity areas and consider allowing a four story as a bonus to include designated affordable homes.

We can improve the inclusionary zoning ordinance through tax abatements.

and proceed with the original comprehensive plan for the anti-displacement zones.

James Van Branken, 625 Ridge Street.

I'm here to speak in favor of the zoning plan.

I grew up in a city that has roughly the same area as Charlottesville, but twice the population.

When I moved here, I suddenly felt like an imposter any time I wasn't in a car.

Walking here is horrible, cycling here is horrible, but driving is expensive.

We had to sell our car, and the traffic is bad in any case.

And it is possible to fix those things, but first we need more density.

Density will give us more money and more demand for buses, better roads, less traffic, more cycling infrastructure.

I want to thank you for eliminating parking mandates.

I'm excited by that.

I think that's huge for the city.

I love that commercial uses will now be allowed in residential areas, and I encourage you to... My time is not running, sorry.

I'll try to keep under a minute.

Yes, sir.

I encourage you to allow as many of those by right as possible, especially small-scale commercial enterprises, things like coffee shops, hairdressers, corner stores.

I think navigating and obtaining a special use permit could be prohibitive for new business owners.

I encourage you also to reduce or eliminate the standard setback requirements.

I think they're a bit arbitrary.

No one looks at beautiful cities in France and Italy and thinks those buildings should be further from the street.

I don't get it.

I'm excited that the new residential zoning will allow for more density, especially in those neighborhoods that have grown wealthy off the back of historic and ongoing segregation.

To be honest, I don't understand a lot of the minutiae of this zoning code, but I feel so strongly in support of it because we're living with an old zoning code that was largely created to stop black people moving into white neighborhoods.

All right, our next three in-person folks to be queued up, John Doran, Don Dunham, and Sadie Van Venken.

We're going to move to our next virtual participant, Kimber Hockey.

Yes, can you hear me?

I'm Kimber Hawkey.

I've lived in Charlottesville for 20 years.

I want to say that this whole process needs to be put on a pause and reviewed in much more depth before sending it to the council.

There are illegal actions that need to be fixed.

The city has failed to hold a competitive bidding process to begin.

The city failed to submit a new transportation plan, and the city has illegally upzoned parcels that violate legal proffers as per the map.

This is not a thoughtful house by house.

block-by-block analysis with house size development that has repeatedly been promised by the city.

I would like to add that there has been a proof of failure of commercial and residential neighborhoods.

There's been four groceries in the Belmont area that have failed.

The businesses that have established here are noisy, they take up parking, and they have driven out families who can no longer sleep or enjoy their homes.

If housing is a human right, then why are we taking away housing for unnecessary commercial and residential neighborhoods?

Mostly and also importantly is the blatant propaganda about affordable housing.

This plan does not and cannot guarantee affordable housing.

I'd like to address the elephant in the room that others have mentioned and insist that UVA house its own students.

That alone will free up housing for middle income and affordable housing for families.

There are many unused and underutilized areas in Charlottesville that can be used for housing and infill.

This has been proven by an NDS study that was done about five years ago now, as well as by the research by the citizens for responsible planning who showed

that there are places that can be used for infill.

I want to also state that this idea of revenge zoning is bizarre.

And it's a little shameful that you are allowing classes and ageist statements while claiming to be an equitable city.

It's just- Thank you for your comments.

Your time has escaped.

Okay, good evening, everyone.

This is Josh Karp at 1430 Forest Ridge.

Updating the zoning ordinance is part of how we plan for the future of our community.

And as I think about the draft zoning code, I think about the kind of future I want for my children and all the kids in the community.

And first, I think about the kind of lessons I want to teach to my children.

I try to teach them to be welcoming and to value and accept all kinds of people.

But our current rules don't live up to those ideals.

We limit most lands in the city to detached single-family homes, which are the single most expensive kind of housing that exists.

And that means that we increasingly exclude all but the wealthiest families from living here.

The proposed ordinance isn't perfect, but it's a lot better in the status quo.

It would allow a broader mix of housing forms, including lower cost housing like townhouses and small apartments.

And it would allow more housing to be built in the city, which we know from lots of research and cities around the country and around the world will push down housing prices.

These are the values I want to pass down to my kids and all the kids in the community.

Anybody who works or learns or plays in our community should be welcome to live here.

And to accomplish that, we need to allow all kinds of housing for all kinds of people.

And obviously, when I think about the kids' future, the other thing I think about is climate change.

The floods and wildfires and hurricanes of the last few months alone are a reminder that the climate is changing fast, and we don't do enough to stop it.

And one of the most impactful things we can do on climate as a community is to allow more housing in the city.

We've been adding jobs faster than we've been adding housing for a long time.

And more and more people who work here are driving farther and farther to get to their work.

The proposed zoning changes would allow more housing in the city, and each home we add here means one less family commuting from Elfemarle, Louisa, or Green, or farther.

That means fewer cars on the road, less greenhouse emissions, and less traffic.

Our current patterns of sprawl and car dependency are a climate disaster, but the current draft zoning ordinance represents real progress in reversing those destructive patterns.

Overall, I see the current proposal as making real progress towards the kind of community we all want to build for our children, and for our future.

I hope you'll get the job done and get this thing passed.

Ms.

Yes I can.

You may begin.

Okay, so I want to start, I'm a Charlottesville resident.

I want to start by asking that any recommendations made to council hold space for the nuance that is in advocating for increased affordable housing while also looking ahead in a way that protects neighborhoods that are already under the threat of displacement due to systemic racism, rising costs in taxes, and other related housing costs.

I think it's important that we understand that displacement can be slow and does not always happen abruptly.

We know this from past experiences and we asked the Planning Commission and City Council to keep this at the forefront of their discourse throughout the process.

I also believe that there's a need for deep and affordable housing and we believe that those in neighborhoods like Tenth and Page deserve to have their voices heard and neighborhoods respected in the process such as this zoning process, planning processes and future development.

The dairy market debacle has been a clear example of how developers make promises and they don't always keep them.

And I think that this is a both and situation.

I think we need to recognize the anti-displacement zones and put protections into place that respond to the needs of those neighborhoods and prioritize deeply affordable housing.

And when we say deeply affordable, we mean less than 40% AMI or around 40% AMI.

I think that it's important that we are committed to equity.

And if we say we are truly committed to equity, we would understand the need for both.

I also want to note that since we've been talking about the tree canopy, that has a horrible tree canopy.

And we see that as being a consistent trend across low income and black neighborhoods.

So I think it's important that we think about that.

We think about the fact that these neighborhoods have historically not had ecological effects really weighed in when thinking about the development in those neighborhoods.

So I just think that if we're going to talk about it being important on Park Street, if we're going to talk about it being important in Willa Mills, we need to also have those same conversations in neighborhoods like Fifeville, Tenth and Page, Cherry Rose Hill.

Those neighborhoods deserve the same amount of consideration.

Thank you, Ms.

Bryant.

We will go do our next three in-person speakers, and then when we come back after the break, we'll start back with our virtual speakers.

So the virtual speakers following the break will be Genevieve Keller, Robin Hoffman, and Eileen Bartels.

My name is John Dorian Brown.

The first name is not used.

I live in Johnson Village, 104 Eric Place.

I wanted to agree with the people who have spoken in favor of the canopy, the tree canopy.

It seems like against the

commitment of the city to reduce the heat quotient that we produce, whatever small contribution we make to global climate change, and not pay attention to the plant life in the city to make sure that that's protected.

It looks like a small area, a block in the city, according to the plan, can be occupied by

just buildings and concrete.

And we need to counteract that by bringing in plant life.

Also, beyond that, I'm concerned that homeowners opening up their properties to development can be scalped by

developers can come in and offer ridiculous prices for their property, and then take over the property and reduce.

I mean, it seems like the plan allows for a division of an acre of property into four parcels, into 17 tiny pieces.

That means like my little quarter acre property could be divided into four.

16th of an acre sizes, and then they could develop on that as they wish.

And I could be misunderstanding the plan, so I just want to make sure that you know that I'm concerned about developers really being able to make a heyday of this and make a huge profit at the cost of

of affordability.

Also, I'd like to suggest that lowering taxes is one of the things that actually can help in the process of lowering, you know, the cost of living.

Thank you very much for holding this session, and I want to thank all of you for the amazing amount of time you've put into this.

But I'd like you to think really hard, because you're not old like me that I've been accused of being.

You're developing your legacy for the work that you are doing.

You're going to, 20 years from now, see the results of this.

I strongly encourage you to listen to what you've heard here, and we will judge you by the number of changes that you make to this plan, because you've heard a lot of them.

I've been to many of the processes along the way.

I don't feel like anybody's listening to the neighborhood.

When you vote 5-0 to everything, I don't think that's listening.

Now, I just finished today an 18-month process of building an affordable housing unit in Woolen Mills.

God, that was hard.

And that's with free land and as of right now, not any additional taxes.

But I will tell you, when I challenged my taxes this year, I was told by the assessor's tax, everyone listen, as soon as this is passed, they are going to raise the value of your land to what it could be by what you could build, not what you are going to build.

I was told that by the assessor's office.

So if you could build 12 units, you're going to be taxed for 12 units.

That is not right.

Secondly,

I believe we've got our lawyer in the room.

I believe Code of Virginia requires a transportation plan that you've heard a lot about.

And we need it.

So what I would encourage you to do right now is scale this back to two things.

Affordable housing, because it's a huge problem.

Let's work on that diligently.

And a transportation plan.

If you can solve those, and maybe the Dewberry Hotel,

You have the right to do all this other stuff.

My name is Sadie Van Vranken.

I'm a middle school history teacher and a resident of the Ridge Street neighborhood.

I support myself and my husband on a teaching salary.

We spend 48% of our post-tax income on our rent.

It's a one-bedroom basement apartment.

We're very grateful to live near downtown Charlottesville.

Because we don't own a car, it's important to us to live within walking distance of downtown.

We sacrificed half of our income to be able to do this.

I know so many people in this city are unable, despite spending 40 to 50 percent of their income on rent, to find housing that meets their needs.

People are being forced to make ridiculous compromises to find housing, living far from town, living with other families, living in decrepit buildings, the list goes on and on.

Increasing density across all neighborhoods in Charlottesville is a vital priority, which is why I support the draft zoning code.

Upzoning single-family homes to three-unit lots will be a step in the right direction Sure, some of these will initially be luxury, but so was Ridge Street when it was first built Let's be in it for the long haul I urge you to recommend the draft zoning ordinance to council because everyone in our community should have access to housing that meets their needs and finances I appreciate your expertise and hard work on all of us.

We're going to go ahead and let the commissioners take the five-minute break.

You have the opportunity to stretch as well.

Also, we have many people who are in the hallway and will have the opportunity to come into council chambers at that point in time.

We thank you for those who have commented.

If anyone is choosing to leave at this time, you're welcome to stay as long as you'd like.

Green!

All righty, ladies and gentlemen, I think we are ready to hear a little bit more.

So, Ms.

Sure.

I'm just going to give brief instructions again.

It's been a few hours.

We've had a lot of people join us along the way.

Everyone is getting the opportunity to speak two minutes, whether it be in person or virtual, one or the other.

We're doing three speakers virtually, three speakers in person and we're alternating that continually.

I'm calling the numbers in advance of individuals who are going to be in the next group so that folks can be teed up to do that.

and make sure that you say your name and address when you come up to the speaker so we can gather that information.

So we're going to start now back to our virtual audience and again to our virtual audience if you are interested in speaking

Keller can you hear us?

Yes I can can you hear me?

Yes ma'am you may begin

Genevieve Keller speaking as President of Preservation Piedmont.

Thank you for already addressing some of our concerns, especially those affecting our commercial urban core.

We presented our remaining concerns in a letter on 9-11 and in three detailed letters in August.

We ask that you six men address those in your amendments tonight.

We remain concerned about the number of historic streets delineated as RB.

Consequently, Section 4.2.1, Existing Structure Preservation Bonus, which defines the preservation of an existing structure as maintaining 25 feet behind the facade, needs elaboration for historic properties.

That definition should be qualified that any proposed demolition or partial demolition of a designated property including those subject to the 25% rule be subject to BAR review and approval.

We believe also that the RC property should include a bonus provision for preserving the original structure.

This bonus is especially warranted in areas with existing affordable dwellings.

Some streets and neighborhoods where houses could be lost unnecessarily are the Ridge Street area, Rugby Avenue, Rose Hill Drive, Avon Street, Elliott Avenue, and Cherry Avenue to name some of them.

all listed in or eligible at least in part for the National Register of Historic Places.

Please note that many properties in areas designated as RC are quite large, enabling preservation of an existing house while still allowing additional units, such as properties on Rugby Road, Rugby Road Extended, and Oak Lawn on Cherry Avenue.

And if a lot is too small to accommodate the original structure plus additional units, we ask, why is it RC?

Please take another look at the RC districts and determine if that is really an appropriate designation for our most iconic streets.

Finally, Preservation Piedmont remains concerned about the role of this code in future teardowns, unaffordability, and displacement.

We also support the tree commission and relief in retaining front setbacks that can support shade trees, as well as ensuring lot coverages that can support tree canopy retention and new planting throughout the city.

Ms.

Keller, you've hit your time frame.

Thank you so much for your comments.

All right, Robin Hoffman.

I'm Robin Hoffman.

I am at 524 Caroline Avenue.

Back of my house is going to be a parking lot now.

And we have all our sewer pipes back there.

Most people here have Orangeburg pipes.

They wanted to replace them and they're sitting there

and limbo because we don't know where the pipes are going to go.

It's like a waste of money and we have to live with poor sewer drainage.

We also have no surveys in Willam Mills area at all because they built a lot of these houses without permits for the workers.

So I don't know who's going to pay for all that, but I'm thinking it's going to be the city and the taxpayers.

As far as the rain bombs, we've been petitioning for all sorts of things and we are losing our trust.

in the neighborhood structure where if we write a petition for something, a blind person needs crossing an ADA and that sort of thing.

For the last 10 years that I've lived in this house, we've been doing it as protocol and we have not been seen.

And I want to say to all those people who have been speaking out, it's true.

Every time that I participated in any of the planning meetings, it's as though we say nothing.

And so they get somebody from Richmond to do the things that, you know, people who live here and know how things work.

And people are working every day.

They need to be able to get to where they're going.

They'll tell you what they need.

If they write a petition and they have an association, et cetera, et cetera, that's how you should move forward about your zoning.

It's as simple as that.

Ms.

Hoffman, your time has run out.

Thank you so much for your comments.

Ms.

Sorry, can you hear me now?

Yes, ma'am.

You may begin.

Thank you.

Good evening.

My name is Eileen Bartels.

I live at 710 Stonehenge Avenue, and I am in favor of the new zoning.

No one should have to live with housing insecurity.

Anyone who needs to live in Charlottesville should be able to find a safe and affordable home.

The current zoning rules are bad and unfair, particularly to black residents, and city leadership has an obligation to change them.

The proposed zoning is not perfect, but it is much better to approve the plan you have now and refine it in the future than to do nothing.

It's common sense that a densely built community will be more energy efficient and burn fewer fossil fuels.

Not building more housing in the city forces ever larger numbers of people to live far out of town

and used more gasoline.

When my daughter, who was a teacher, moved here, the only housing she could afford was in Scottsville, which meant an hour of driving every day.

There is no environmental benefit to suburban sprawl.

Tree cover is important, but preserving trees in the city means more trees cut down in outlying areas.

Mixing commercial and residential development would improve quality of life throughout the city.

It's a neighborhood amenity to be able to safely walk or cycle to buy groceries, get a haircut, or a cup of coffee.

I'm happy to see that the lots on Avon Street, directly adjacent to my house, are designated CX3.

I'm a member of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City of the City.

Thank you so much.

I realized I didn't note our next three in-person speakers so I'm going to list those individuals.

I'll go back and get our virtual folks ready to go after that and then we'll get started.

So our next in-person speakers, which will be now, is 25 Kip White, 26 Martha Smythe,

and 27, Michael Salarita, who I pronounced wrong.

I'm so sorry about that.

And for our virtual speakers following those three, Cameron Lynch, Katie Inberger, and Peter DeBeer.

Hi, Kip White, 1012 Locust Avenue.

Thanks for taking time to have the hearing or the Q&A tonight.

Specifically, I'm concerned that the new residential zoning district, RC, has inadequate setback requirements, 10-foot minimum.

from primary street lot lines and omits a key reference to observing the existing range of adjacent structures.

The RA and RB districts do observe existing range, and I strongly recommend that the Planning Commission adopt the same consistent standard for RC districts, which will be located along the very same streetscapes.

The existing range of building setbacks on a residential street will be important to uphold for key safety reasons including pedestrian, bike, and traffic visibility at intersections and along winding residential streets.

And I urge you to consider using existing range as the setback standard for all three new districts RA, RB, and RC.

The visibility and safety issue will only be compounded by the increase in on-street parking and construction activity resulting from the new density.

Many RC districts are located on residential neighborhood corners where current dwellings are set back by more than 10 feet, thereby providing safe sight lines and visibility.

By drastically reducing the setback requirements for dwellings in these RC districts, particularly on street corners, the city will impair visibility and lead to more dangerous traffic conditions.

Ms.

Smythe.

Good evening.

My name is Martha Smythe.

I live on Rutledge Avenue, a racially mixed street from the 1950s and 60s.

I am in favor of affordable housing.

I would love to know more about the ways that it would be paid for, because I think that's really the crooks of the matter.

I'm suggesting some changes to the new zoning, the DZO, that the city

make these changes before implementing the law.

First, the select areas should be reconsidered.

They represent the sincere intention to do right by the people who live in them.

If this is not legally prudent, then at least prohibit tall buildings that would barricade these and other less affluent neighborhoods.

A five-story building may as well be 10 if you're across a residential street from it.

Secondly, phase the rollout of the DZO, dial it back as we like to say.

Strategically select one area to implement the new zoning.

The first area is a test, so assess the results thoroughly, make adjustments to the zoning and to plans as indicated by the outcome.

Then select subsequent areas for zoning changes based on what was learned.

Third, develop and communicate the guidelines

for exactly what commercial ventures will be permitted in residential and mixed residential neighborhoods.

Even better, permit those that are in the current code only.

Keep it simple and make it manageable.

Also, I'd like to see us improve the communications about ongoing zoning and plan changes.

The Charlottesville Plans Together website needs a redo badly.

It is cumbersome, difficult to use.

Evolving information is not transparent if it's there at all.

And finally, please avoid using the term red line when identifying changes to future zoning

revisions.

Let's make it a blue line next time.

Though outlawed in 1968, the term is a hurtful reminder to the past to many black members of our community, and it's shameful to us whites who deeply regret it.

Thank you for your serious consideration.

Michael, number 27, Michael.

I'm sorry.

I don't want to mess it up any more than I did.

Do we see Michael here?

Okay.

Then we will.

Hold on.

We'll get there.

All right.

So we'll move over to our virtual audience then.

All right, and that will be Cameron Lynch.

I can.

Yes, sir.

All right.

I'll keep this short and hopefully sweet.

I'm just speaking in favor of the plan.

I'm a resident in the county.

I live at 1869 Tinkers Cove Road.

Would have loved to have lived in the city when we bought our house, but there's basically no inventory and the stuff that was available was kind of rough.

Would just love to see a lot more housing built, be that high density, single family home, doesn't really matter to me.

All seems to come down to supply and demand.

Thank you.

Our next three in person are going to be Jason Espy, Charlie Hanley, and number 30 Elizabeth Sloan.

So we will now go to Katie Emberger.

Katie, can you hear us?

Yes, Katie, you may begin.

Hi, my name is Katie Ebinger.

Thanks for everyone's hard work on the planning draft and for allowing us to share our thoughts and experiences today.

I work at a local nonprofit, the Community Climate Collaborative, which is very much in favor of inclusionary zoning towards climate and social justice benefits.

People have said, when we co-locate, we work and live, it's possible to really reduce our common footprints.

But I also want to speak today on behalf of my own experience as someone who has a front row seat to what it's like to rent a multi-family house in a largely single-family neighborhood.

I live in north downtown.

And it really does provide the opportunity for a wide range of people of different incomes to live in what were historically exclusively sharing neighborhoods.

I live in a school-level duplex from the street you wouldn't even know it's a multi-family house and on the weekend you might find my housemate and I weeding in our garden and I say garden with very heavy air quotes or enjoying a long walk in our neighborhood.

My point is that we don't just rent here we really do live

here, and we're a household that includes a teacher, myself, a climate advocate, a librarian, folks who could not normally afford to live in a neighborhood like this.

But when you open up exclusionary neighborhoods like North Downtown and allow multifamily homes to exist here, we can bring more people of various income levels into exclusionary neighborhoods.

So I'm here to speak on behalf of, I'm sorry, in support of inclusionary zoning.

and say that the draft zoning code as presented is a really great step in the right direction.

Thank you.

Yes, Peter, we can hear you.

Good evening.

My name is Peter de Beira.

I live on 1043 Locust Avenue with my wife.

We have two children.

I support attempts to make Charlottesville more inclusive.

The plan, which you call an inclusionary zoning proposal, has, however, not much to do with affordable housing, especially in residential areas.

Affordable housing is only required for structures with more than 10 units, which is a lot and does not affect residential RAs, RVs and RCs.

Developers can also buy out low-income people.

Increased density does not mean increased affordability.

I'm an economist.

I'm amazed by the extent to which the plan caters to the interests of developers and not to those of the communities.

I worry about how financial incentives will drive decisions, especially for RCs.

You offer a financial bonanza for those who sell a parcel that is open for an RC and a developer, irrespective of what the community wishes.

The increased density created by RAs and RBs

will already create a large challenge.

Neighborhoods may be willing to engage it with incentives for inclusive, affordable housing.

Take away DRCs in my neighborhood.

We want to bring more people to Charlottesville, but I see no mobility plan.

I see no attempt to increase biking and walking.

I see no plan as to how our schools and our already stressed infrastructure, leaking pipes, sewage, will deal with this inflow.

Make adjustments.

We can do better than this.

Thank you.

Our next three virtual speakers, so that you're keyed up, will be Michelle Rowan, John Hosack, and Peter Gray.

All right.

Good evening, everyone.

My name is Jason Espy.

I live at 145 Baylor Lane in the Fifth and Ridge Street neighborhoods south of downtown.

I want to thank the Planning Commission and the staff for all the hard work that you've done to get us here.

I affirm a strong support of the proposed zoning ordinances.

I love the city.

I love our home.

We are not expanding our borders.

So our options are upwards and infill.

while maintaining tree canopy, green space, environmental care.

And I know it's going to be a tough balance to accomplish all that.

But to the extent that we can, we can do our best.

The framework for these changes will guide Charlottesville to a more equitable, inclusive, affordable, and livable place for all.

and it will respond locally to the largely existential crisis of climate change.

It strives to address the historical racism that is embedded in code.

I have read the changes.

I see the good progressive ideas in there.

I support them.

I trust the implementation of these.

will be necessary to be thoughtful and done correctly.

We will be among many communities across the Commonwealth and elsewhere who are doing similar reforms to address legacies of racist underpinnings that have segregated and not united people.

Housing is a human right, and we need reforms like this to make housing more affordable for everyone and to decrease the displacement of black residents.

I want my daughter to be able to afford to live here, not just my basement.

Though she is welcome to as long as she wants.

But I still want her to be able to live here in Charlottesville.

And she's in college right now.

We are stronger.

We are more diverse.

We're more inclusive.

And we're not just an inclusive enclave of wealthy people who are established.

So, in conclusion, I say change happens, embrace it, and don't let the enemy perfect you for good.

I urge you to favorably adopt.

Charlie Hanley, 500 Court Square.

First, I'm grateful for the immense amount of work that's gone into this process so far.

I strongly support the proposed ordinance, the increased density, the elimination of parking minimums, and the limited commercial uses permitted in residential zones.

I urge you to stay the course on those.

Let's legalize housing for people and steer our future toward housing abundance.

I have one minor suggestion to put forward.

I believe the ground floor transparency requirements in residential zones of 30% by area may be excessive.

30% by area is actually quite a lot of glazing.

That makes a lot of sense in commercial buildings or large buildings but less sense for smallish residential buildings.

My concern is for energy efficiency.

In our climate, you generally want windows mostly on the south side.

Windows on the west side can overheat you and windows on the north side just sort of bleed energy.

You can overcome that with expensive windows, but that's going to add to costs.

So if the primary street for a building happens to be west of the building, requiring a whole bunch of glazing area is going to cause an energy penalty or increase costs for the project.

I recommend that you consider reducing the 30% requirement in residential zones especially RA or maybe for smaller buildings in particular for more flexibility for energy efficient realties.

Ms.

Sloan?

Yes.

Hello.

My name is Elizabeth Sloan.

I live at 2024 Minor Road, Charlottesville in the Lewis Fountain neighborhood.

I'm going to read my comments.

I'm not a great public speaker.

Thank you, Planning Commission, for your work on preparing the new zoning ordinance.

I appreciate your commitment to improving our city, and I support the desire to increase density in eliminating the single-family use group.

This is important work, but what exactly is the rush?

Let's get it right.

My major concern today is that the letter that was sent to property owners in August from neighborhood development was not clear.

I think most people do not understand zoning and how it works.

I don't think they understood the letter or knew what Chapter 34 referred to.

In an ideal world, the city would contact each property owner and let them know exactly how this new zoning ordinance would change the use of their property and how it affects them.

Secondly, the actual zoning document is obtuse and confusing.

I happen to be an architect and even I, and I'm used to reading zoning ordinances, I find it very difficult to sort through it.

It is over 400 pages long.

I wanted to print it out and then I uploaded it and sent it out to various printing places and it turned out it would have cost me almost $300 to print the document out in color as it has been written.

Personally, I think more printed copies should be available at an affordable cost and affordable to purchase and provided by the city, more like $10 or something.

There are a couple of documents at the local libraries and that's great but there needs to be more.

Also, I would just like to say that use group adjacencies are too vast.

I suggest that RA should not butt up against CX uses, and I'm concerned about the loss and reduction of rear yard setbacks.

Again, please slow this process down.

All right, I'm going to call out our next three in person and then we'll move to our virtual speakers.

Our next three to be keying up is number 31, Rob Warner, 32, Adam Smith, and 33, John Dudley.

Michelle Rowan, Michelle, are you, can you hear me?

Michelle?

All right, I'm going to move to our next speaker and we will come right back to Michelle again.

Our next speaker is John Hosack.

John Hosack.

I agree with previous comments about the problems with the draft ordinance.

I wish to focus on debate and scripture aspect.

Many promises were made in the original document, and many of the ones critical to resident livability and affordable housing were quietly dropped.

From the beginning, the City has sold this plan on the promise of affordable housing.

However, according to multiple statements, especially in recent work sessions, the plans will produce only a handful of affordable housing units.

Dimensional criteria for current neighbourhoods have been ignored.

Suggested development in adjacent to residential properties are not as initially promised to be house size, and this especially applies in RB and RC.

It has been said that RB and RC density is actually being dropped or made less dense, but that neglects the fact that the lots can be cut down to 2,500 square feet from the original 6,000 or thereabouts.

Demolition is largely by right, and only a worthless bonus is offered in the RB if you retain the original structure.

Honestly, has anybody found a house that can be divided into eight within the original structure?

The flum was passed as a works in progress.

All five council has used the words to that effect.

However, only the most modest of changes were functionally made to the flum.

The reason given was that we wanted to respect the transparent process, which was neither transparent nor a process.

Additionally, what few changes that were made were not communicated or explained to citizens but occurred via silent text changes.

Finally, an affordable housing plan stated that critical to success were three principles, equity, regional collaboration and a comprehensive approach.

Upon examination, none of these three goals is actually met for reasons I've explained before Council.

Thus, the underlying plan tells us this ordinance cannot succeed.

Furthermore, extensive analysis by CFRP has shown that the ordinance has flawed both premise and execution.

To my knowledge, CFRP research has never been rebutted.

Thank you for your comments, Mr. Hesak.

Okay.

Peter Gray.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

The primary goal of this rezoning is to create affordable housing, and this is a goal that my wife and I, many of my neighbors, and I am sure many of the people in the room tonight accept as both important and necessary.

Charlottesville absolutely needs more affordable housing, but the city's own staff has gone on public record to say that this will result in little, if any, affordable housing.

And a consultant report commissioned this summer by the city confirms that the per square foot development costs will be so high that there's just no way any units built will be affordable.

But developers make money by maximizing the revenue that they can obtain for a piece of land.

What this means is that developers will build expensive housing to maximize their return on adjustment.

It is a fundamental mistake to believe that developers will, out of the goodness of their hearts, leave money on the table and choose to build affordable housing.

Charlottesville does not need more high-end development in the city and that is exactly what this new zoning will encourage.

Please place restrictions on the zoning code to discourage high-end luxury housing and encourage more affordable housing.

I'd like to ask you to also please ensure that the proposed zoning

isn't exploited by developers to build more luxury student housing.

It's easy to see how all the provisions of the draft zoning code could be used to build a lot of high-end housing for students, but this isn't the goal of the new zoning code.

Please implement restrictions in the new zoning code to limit its exploitation this way, but make sure that supportable

affordable units cannot go to full-time students.

Please make per bedroom lease rentals a separate category from normal rentals and place strong limits on the ability of developers to use up land that could be used for affordable housing in this way.

Without restrictions, this new zoning will only lead to more displacement of low-income residents.

I don't think either Planning Commissioner or City Council wants this to be their legacy.

Please take action to make sure it isn't.

Okay, I'm just going to call out our next three virtual speakers so that they're ready when it's their turn.

Mary Whittle, Kidder Bishop, and Lakeisha Washington.

Hi, I'm Rob Warner, 712 Highland, Johnson Village.

I've looked at the plan.

This is the perfect plan.

for 2043.

Yes, 2043, not 2023.

This plan involves all of us learning how to ride the little electric scooters or walk and to give up our cars.

I'm not in favor of that, but I have a plan.

You can take this plan, put it in a box, mark the box, do not open until 2043 and we'll be right on schedule.

Today you are just adding unwanted pressure and grief for those of us and the wonderful people who live in these neighborhoods now.

and especially the fact this plan has no affordable housing in it.

I don't know what to tell you.

Yes, today's contractors love your plan.

Amanda just finished had a perfect explanation.

I don't.

But you work for the people of Charlottesville, the residents, not for the contractors.

Thank you for your work, but no thanks.

And I want to, for sure, thank Missy Creasy for keeping all of us behaving the whole time this has been going on.

I'm dead serious.

She's done a great job.

Yeah, so I'm at 2313 Tarleton Drive.

I'm a teacher over at Burleigh Middle School and I've got a lot of students that definitely could use more affordable housing.

I think largely I'm in favor of that affordable housing.

It's funny, I don't think, and I want to say to everyone, both sides you've been really respectful.

And I love that about this community, that we can both express different opinions and still get along, so to speak.

So yeah, thank you, Ms.

Creasy, for maintaining that.

And like the gentleman before, yeah, my clock.

So my issues with it largely, and again, I live at 2313 Tarleton, I think I already said that, is that we're increasing density with unaddressed existing problems, kind of putting the cart before the horse as someone else put it.

In the 10 years I've lived on Tarleton, the main line on our street within 100 yards of me has been repaired four or five times.

Many people have expressed that that continues to be an issue with many communities, transportation, et cetera.

Greenbrier Elementary School, which we love,

is not overcrowded.

I really don't think it is.

As a teacher, I can say that.

But they don't have a cafeteria.

There's no room to expand for that.

The bathrooms are atrocious.

I've been in them.

I don't think they've been renovated in 50 years.

So again, we've got problems that aren't being addressed.

And we're going to increase the density and put more people in there and not kind of deal with those underlying issues.

And it's kind of like laying linoleum, which teaching could be like.

You push down one bubble and you create two more in separate places.

I think no one here has really been in favor of commercial expansion.

I think Miss Bartels was, and the gentleman said he was, another gentleman said, increase commercial and residential sort of combination, but really no one's been up here saying, I want more commercial development.

I want more commercial development.

Affordable housing, yes.

But across the street from us, there are empty storefronts near Gasoline Alley.

Albemarle Square Mall and Fashion Square Mall sit empty.

There's no demand for this.

There's no demand for more commercial.

So I really don't see why we're moving for that.

And so I think that commercial development really isn't something that we need, whereas affordable housing, I think, is wise.

And the CX-5 gasoline alley, I'd rather see that at most RX-3.

Thank you.

John Dudley, 1615 Meadowbrook Heights, which is Greenbrier near the bypass.

I just want to echo all the many good statements that were made, especially those involving lack of infrastructure to support

increased density.

Yes, we're all for affordable housing.

A plan is apparently not going to provide that.

And traffic.

I just found out that something mandated by the state was not done.

Here's what I think will happen with the parking.

If multi-family dwellings are built where residential is now, there will be some kind of subsidy given to the developer.

So the streets will be widened, so provide on-street parking.

Well, that'll take half of my front yard.

There will be all these things done by the city at taxpayers' expense, steps taken with developers.

The present property owners will be paying for this and it will reduce our own property value.

So, yeah, I object to that.

There's no way all this increased density will have parking.

What's wrong with the expansion of the county?

Everybody acts like it's a million miles away.

There are lots of units being built out there.

We could have electric buses bring people in.

It's a 10 minute ride on a bus.

Sure.

Yes, definitely.

Yes, if there's speaking going on in the hallway, let's minimize that to a whisper.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

So our next three in-person speakers who will be keying up will be Victoria Horick, Kate Frail, and then number 36, Gray Welbert.

We'll go to Mary Whittle who is on our virtual speaker.

Ms.

Can you guys hear me?

Yes, ma'am.

You may begin.

Okay.

I just wanted to say, as you consider this final draft of the zoning ordinance, I urge you to consider the state's chief intended purpose of zoning ordinances.

And this is to improve the health, safety, convenience, and welfare of citizens and plan for the future of development of communities to the end that transportation systems be carefully planned.

I have been extremely concerned that this central purpose of zoning, that transportation systems be carefully planned, has been entirely ignored throughout the entire Seville Plans Together process.

At no point were any zoning supportive plans made.

No transportation consulting or engineering firms were engaged.

No transportation system analyses were ever undertaken despite state law that explicitly requires such planning and analysis to incur.

In fact, in requesting proposals for the comprehensive plan and the pursuant zoning, the city categorized its transportation plan as complete.

That is before the planning and zoning began.

An additional primary purpose of zoning as enumerated in state law is quote to reduce or prevent congestion in the public streets.

I was shocked when earlier this week a Charlottesville transportation planning official informed me and a group of concerned residents that part of the quote philosophy of the zoning ordinance was to make the streets so congested that people would be forced to walk.

This official also said that the city planned to make

no upgrades to its roadway system and that he envisioned cars, bikes, walkers and scooters and buses all sharing the roadway and moving along at 12 to 15 miles an hour.

Councilor and Planning Commission, your lack of a transportation plan defies common sense and the law.

I'm not opposed to up-zoning despite what people may think of me, but it has to be done thoughtfully by professional planners and in compliance with the law.

Thank you.

Our next speaker, Kidder Bishop.

Are you able to hear us?

Kidder?

All right, we will come back to Kidder in a second.

Lakeisha Washington.

Ms.

Washington, can you hear us?

Yes, can everyone hear me?

Yes, ma'am.

Hi, my name is Lakeisha Washington, and I live in the Huntley Avenue neighborhood.

I want to thank you all for all of the work you've put so far in this actual draft.

I support the recommendations that were sent in to the commissioner's back and also the letter that the housing coalition put together.

I work for a nonprofit, Habitat for Humanity, and I have the pleasure of working with families who are working towards becoming homeowners one day.

Outside of my work, I spent a lot of time helping one of my staff members or co-workers look for other options for people who call in on a regular because they're facing hardship and they can't live in the current place that they currently have.

And so although I've heard people say, you know, slow down, there's not a sense of urgency,

It is for families who are working several jobs.

It is for families who are struggling to make ends meet.

It is for families who have their rent increased every year and they just don't know how they're going to make it.

It is for families who don't have transportation and have to just ride the bus and leave home two hours prior because the bus system

takes an hour just to get around town.

It is a sense of urgency for these families.

And so although I know that there are things that we could be addressing, I keep in mind that this is a living document and that this is the right step and the right path to doing the work.

But I also have those families, the 20 plus calls we get on a weekly where people are trying to find affordable housing,

Ms.

Washington, your time has finished.

Thank you so much for your comments.

I want to get our next three virtual speakers teed up.

That'll be Vern Buchanan, Sam Gulland, and Ben Heller.

Good evening.

My name is Victoria Horak.

I'm an attorney at the Legal Aid Justice Center, and we are here both as a poverty law firm that represents low-income tenants throughout the city and county, but also as an organizational resident of the 10th and Page neighborhood and as a founding member of the Charlottesville Low-Income Housing Coalition.

The first thing I want to say is that we just want to lift up the comments of some of the folks from the 10th and Page neighborhood and other historically black neighborhoods in the city.

We think it's really important that those folks' voices are heard in this process.

The other thing that we wanted to press upon on the commission is just that this ordinance needs to go further in two respects.

One to increase affordable housing opportunity throughout the city and the other to protect historically black neighborhoods The Charlottesville Low Income Housing Coalition has laid out a number of recommendations and we support those The first is to prevent further displacement in historically black neighborhoods by providing an anti-displacement zoning overlay the other one is to adopt or the other part of that is to adopt neighborhood friendly transitions and

transition zones between sensitive areas and commercial corridors.

That's especially important in areas like the 10th and Page neighborhood that have been put next to commercial corridors because of historic systemic racism in the planning in prior eras.

The other thing that should happen is to allow more density in historically exclusionary neighborhoods by reinstating the four-story height limit and height bonuses.

and continuing to link density bonuses to affordability.

And the other one is just to expand affordability, which includes providing tax abatements and keeping the new voucher provisions of the draft ordinance intact to address the greatest housing need.

And that's folks who make

50% of the area median income or below.

We need deeply affordable housing in this area.

Just as a personal note, I was in court today watching over 50 families face eviction for non-payment of rent.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Kate Fraley is my name.

Thank you for your work.

I support the recommendations made by the Charlottesville Low Income Housing Coalition.

I'll focus tonight on allowing more density in historically exclusionary neighborhoods.

My neighborhood is and was developed as an exclusionary neighborhood.

If we, the primarily white people of Greenbrier, fight more diversity in Greenbrier,

we will worsen the exclusion because the homes will be even more expensive and that will be intentional on our part.

If the city does not increase density in Greenbrier the city will be party to worsening Charlottesville segregation by wealth and race and that will be intentional.

This is a moral issue.

We cannot use our privilege and power

to extend segregation as those before us have always done.

We cannot use our privilege and power to prevent people who want to live in our neighborhood from doing so.

I want to ensure I support more housing, more affordable housing in Greenbrier.

Hello.

My name is Gray.

I live at 1215 Wortland Street, Apartment B, which is an apartment complex near UVA, as I'm a civil engineering student there.

I want to just begin by saying thank you for drafting this new zoning code, as it is markedly better than what we currently have, but there is more that can be done.

As everyone here already knows, affordable housing in the city is truly a crisis, and many residents have to move to Albemarle in order to afford to live.

As a student, that wasn't really an option, but this parking in UVA isn't affordable and isn't an option, so I must live near it.

Developers and landlords take advantage of this and charge egregious rent.

So my friends who live with four or more roommates have to pay $850 per month per person, and they live more than a 20 minute walk from UVA.

Others who choose to live closer are paying $1,000 per person or more every month,

This is not including utilities, it is just rent.

And that is with three other roommates.

We all know that UVA students have caused a lot of the rent increases in areas near UVA and new developments are being proposed because of the growth of UVA to accommodate even more students.

We are aware of this and we aren't happy about it either.

I'm speaking for other students that can't afford the egregious rent in this area and who don't rely on financial assistance from our families in order to go to UVA.

It's rough.

and we want to make sure UVA's effects don't displace even more low-income residents because of these developments.

Low-income students also want more affordable housing and want to be prioritized for future low-income students who must stay here to finish their studies and can't afford to live in UVA's expensive on-grounds housing.

There are multiple recommendations that have already been made and submitted in a housing coalition letter that Livable Seville drafted that is the support of many organizations within the city as well as fellow student organizations.

I personally believe housing is a human right and affordable housing must be our priority for any urban development especially so because those who are the most marginalized are always pushed out first when rents increase because of gentrification.