Board of Supervisors Meeting   8/10/2021

Mr. Harvey, can you lead us in the pledge?

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

Our first order of business is public comments.

I don't have anyone signed up ahead of time, but if anyone would like to speak to the board, you have three minutes.

I'm Thomas Nelson.

I live at 304 Beowood Court in Roseland, Virginia.

I just want to talk about veterans.

We know we're trying to get a Veterans Museum started for Vietnam somewhere in the county, and that really encourages that effort.

But I want to let you know that the American Legion now has a fifth cemetery we're going to recognize on Memorial Day.

That's a centenary cemetery over in Arrington.

In the heat Saturday, it was very warm.

We put 52 plastic tubes in the ground so in the future the American Legion can put flags

We now have five cemeteries.

We're over 500 veterans being recognized for their veteran.

So it's an encouraging thing for the people to know that we do remember our veterans no matter what war or anything.

We're putting flags out and recognizing that's done by the American Legion and the two rear tank clubs we have in the county.

I have a packet to give you while I'm done, is that okay?

Let me give it to you first.

Basically these are excerpts, I'm just going to read a few.

I'm Barbara Piper, I live in Harrington.

I'm here to request that a proper enforceable peacekeeping noise ordinance become effective in Nelson County.

In mid-March, as soon as we had our first spring-like day, my next-door neighbor started playing

extremely loud music and went on from 1 p.m. to 11 p.m.

It was nonstop rock, rap, hip-hop music, some of the offensive, all the lyrics, always very heavy bass and steady drum beat.

I spoke to them on a number of times, a number of occasions and nothing changed.

So I therefore called the sheriff and we'd go on to call them on five different occasions.

While the officers wanted to be helpful, they all said there wasn't much they could do without sound level meters and all they could do was ask them to lower their music.

Since that time in April, I've had to deal with another neighbor and his excessive good loud music.

He has a loud speaker on his roof.

I went over to meet him and asked him to politely turn it down.

He said, well, it's not summer yet.

Just you wait because it's only going to get worse.

He was playing a song that was extremely racist called I Wish I Was a N-I-G-G-E-R.

I could not believe it.

It was shocking to me.

There's now a third neighbor due to the area who was starting to play music late at night.

Perhaps he thinks it's okay since other people are doing it.

I won't speak to him.

I don't want confrontation.

The bottom line is this persistent noise is affecting me, my wellbeing, my right to quiet enjoyment.

It interferes with my ability to rest, to relax, to pray, and even think.

It's torturous.

I feel like a prisoner on my own property.

It is an assault on my senses.

It's simply unfair that I'm forced to be an unwilling listener.

I have some, I've done research and in my packet,

My suggestions are, number one, to make this noise ordinance enforceable not by measuring decibels, which are often a gray area at best, but by using another regulatory tool called a plainly audible standard.

Rockbridge County uses this.

Again, I have all my information on this in my packet.

And it's really a very good way of doing it because it measures distance rather than decibels.

I would ask you to consider a 9 p.m. cutoff time, not 10 p.m.

Frederick County's noise ordinance is 9 p.m. My reasoning for this is that 10 p.m. welcome goes into 11 p.m. and midnight with these folks and 9 p.m. it's more realistic in my opinion.

And third, to increase the fines, make the first offense $100 and subsequent offenses $1,000 to give them a sign that we're serious here.

A great resource is the Noise Pollution Clearinghouse.

It's a non-profit that helps communities with noise issues

I spoke to a man named Mr. Blomberg.

He actually travels around the country visiting different townships to help them do their ordinances, and he's a Baltimore formation.

And lastly, I'm very willing to help serve on the Citizens Committee or in any other way to get working on a proper ordinance here in Nelson County.

Thank you for your question.

Where do you live specifically?

You don't have to give me that information.

Yeah, part of the problem is it's a dead end road and people think they can just do what they want and there's really not much policing around there.

Yeah, I was curious what it was.

I was laying there.

Anyone else like to address this?

Okay, we'll close with public comments and move to the consent agenda.

Yes, just a quick inquiry to staff, budget amendment.

Is there a chance we could talk about overtime and status on that while David wants here?

So as we've advised the board, as of July 1, the state law change that mandated payment of overtime to applicable employees in the county and constitutional offices, and some employees are exempt, some are not exempt, the non-exempt employees will be subject to overtime.

Rules change for employees, such as the county

and law enforcement.

Law enforcement is treated differently by federal law.

They can work a schedule of 171 hours during the 30-day work period.

So a little bit different there before employees in the sheriff's department, for example, would be subject to a time and a half compensation.

So the state law mandated that all employees, regardless of classification of employment,

I think the work level would be subject to overtime compensation instead of compensatory time where, for example, if my opposition is exempt because she's in my opposition, if I work more than 40 hours of the work week, then any hour over that 40 would be subject to time and a half, either for the accident

So compensatory time went away as of July 1, but as of this morning, Mr. Blount advised me that the two assemblies made a change to stay long, the governor has met the assignment, but reinstituted the state's use of compensatory time.

So today's budget amendment includes funding for various county departments

to provide for overtime compensation that may be accrued during the year and also we use internal funding within the Sheriff's Department for vacancy savings to address overtime and Sheriff's personnel may incur subject to now reinstitution and compensatory time.

So as long as we're assured,

until the governor signs this new change and says all into effect, which should happen hopefully this week as we're planning to get it.

All employees who would accrue overtime, you'd have to pay them.

I can take questions on that.

It should say the governor signs the law by Friday, then the cutoff date where

to pay overtime compensation or compensatory time.

The budget amendment today provides for payment of overtime on an annual basis based on historic estimates.

As I try to say, with the Sheriff's Department, we just use vacancy savings for any department to provide for any overtime the Sheriff's Department may incur until the law is changed.

Sheriff's here is here.

He's recommended to county staff that in lieu of the 171 hours that Sheriff's Department personnel can work before there's a bit of overdone compensation, that it be changed to 160.

I want to discuss that with Sheriff

We oppose that.

We think the board should stay with the ones in more or less with federal law.

This current budget amendment, this takes care, takes in the request of registrar's office and many others in the overtime ask that they have.

Yes, on an annual basis.

On an annual basis.

Wouldn't be just through, let's say the end of this

Do we need to change the budget amendment resolution as it stands?

Yeah, I would recommend just approval and we can monitor overtime in my office, finance and HR,

and then I will decide whether or not we should bring it back to board with a new amendment to reduce the overtime funding or just watch as time progresses.

I think it's just over 19,000 on an annual basis, so it's not a significant fund for county staff.

The sheriff's side, the president, I think it's about 21 or 22,000.

end of this one.

Then the question becomes, is the sheriff going to request additional overtime funding for additional months throughout the year or go back to compensatory time or blending?

That would be the board's decision.

I'll note that when the county's been challenged by former deputies of the Sheriff's

of course, that the county's not required to pay that overtime compensation, the officer has that obligation.

Thank you all for inviting me in.

So Mr. Carr stated I am in favor of their deputies being compensated any hours past 160 within the 20-day cycle.

As he stated, historically speaking, the county has

I'd say with constitutional officers, especially sheriff's deputies, law enforcement, and fire and I think rescue as well, there was an exemption with federal law that from hour 160 to 171, it's referred to historically as gap time.

And so that's 11 free hours every month that I can technically work a deputy sheriff.

You multiply that by 12, that happens every month.

That's 132 hours a year

that we get out of each and every deputy if we do that.

You all may follow the mental health news a little bit more so nowadays, but we're being inundated with temporary detention orders, emergency custody orders.

Just as of last week, to my knowledge, we settled two different TBOs and two individuals, one,

Costaire County, 56 man hours, which is setting one individual.

That's a one out of the three deputies.

If we're fortunate to have three workers off the roadways just to settle with a mental health patient.

So a lot of times, and that's mandated by law that we settle with those individuals.

I can't work around it in any way or form.

As Mr. Carter stated, previous administrators, they were sued, the county was sued.

The courts ruled that the sheriff was responsible for

making sure that the money's there to pay these individuals.

Well, I do not control the purse strings, you all know that.

We control the manning, but if the manning's not there, or if the manning's there, those hours accumulate over a period of time.

So I've conversed with a lot of different localities.

Some of them have gone to painting.

So there's many different approaches throughout the state.

I think we could be a leader here by doing this, but then again, you have to have the money there to do so.

Where's that money going to come from?

But morale, this does affect individuals, especially when they're

a couple years into it and they fear their time.

They fill the time sheets out.

They report it in.

If they work over, we go back in the cross reference to make sure that they were actually on a call.

A lot of these calls may be those mental health warrants, mental health orders that we are required to serve by law.

We may have to transport them to Gail Axe, to Richmond, where have you, that could pretty much take a whole 12-hour shift.

But anyhow, the morale of our guys and gals, this takes a toll on them.

They know that they're sacrificing 11, three hours a month before they're getting anything at all.

So at 172, that's when we've been giving them time and a half.

So I'm not an attorney, and I told Mr. Parr this yesterday, and he's been very helpful trying to sort all this out and try to figure out something.

But as I was perusing through and reading in your tactics, I think there are many different articles that are referenced.

But one of the things that stood out to me is when you go to the federal website, there's some information in there that says, where an employee is subject to both the state and federal overtime laws, the employee is entitled to overtime according to the higher standard.

For example, the standard that will provide a higher rate of pay.

I don't think there's anything that prohibits you all from saying we're going to give you X amount of dollars to pay these guys and gals for their overtime.

I would just ask that you consider, you know, flip the script.

Pretend you're a deputy for a day or a year and to know that you're sacrificing 132 hours a year and you're not getting anything off.

Then after those extra 132 hours, you're getting time and a half.

In order for me to give you time and a half off, I'm having to

Give people all and then your response times, if you're a victim, your response times go down because we have less people working on the road.

So it's just, you know, I'd ask that you all do everything you can within your power.

I did put together some figures over the past three years.

We do have current vacancies.

We reported from the state two new positions that comes from documentation for the past, say, five years or so.

That will not take care of overtime, totally, no it will not.

It's some of these situations with these ECOs and TDOs and that's some legislation.

Yes, just kind of getting to the piece here.

So going to the drop in, we're just saying 160 hours where your time

Yeah, so this was based off the last three years.

In the current year of 2021, that's a projection.

Our last six months were usually our most difficult.

because the holidays, a lot of depression sets in.

The calls increased quite a bit, court dates as well.

Okay, well, you know, I think it's worth a conversation of sorts on that.

Figured out that over time, I'd be interested in getting a little bit more commentary out of staff to see how we can further support our deputies.

I think that would be, since we kind of have a big budget amendment, I think this kind of needs to be its own item on an agenda, if that makes sense.

Ernie, that's just my two cents.

I think using the 171 parameter and the information from the Sheriff's Department, the overtime calculated for a year was about, I think just a little bit less than $50,000.

At the 160 hours, it's about $100,000.

So what happens, and I certainly don't want to be in conflict with Sheriff Hill, but the

Frank Hill just created a larger financial burden on the county if you want to continue to budget overtime funding at 160 versus 171.

Initially, after the governor signs this change in state law,

Both the county and the sheriff's department, each of the other constitutional officers, as a political, can go back to be some compensatory time.

Then it becomes an annual funding question that the board wants to do.

I think that would be probably a little bit in my personal take since it's a little bit broader.

It looks like we're trying to do something a little bit more different than we're getting close to six figures.

Unless the board's uncomfortable with the budget amendment that pertains to county staff, which is on an annualized basis, I think it's just over 19,000, the amendment today

Is it possible to pull out the overtime based on function?

In terms of the mental health support that you mentioned, something along that level would fall under the parameters of the economic stimulus package, which allows mental health support and mental health functions.

have some funds available.

I would suggest September to bring it up in the agenda item.

Yeah, of course.

OK.

You have the capability of raising some of those funds too.

That's a conversation we can have sometimes.

And I'll tell you that it affects the traffic safety as well.

When you're sitting in the hospital for multiple hours, it's taking them off the roadways.

And so we use every person we can.

Well, what I'm saying is that we need the proper amount on the road.

Yes.

I mean, I can come down sometime.

I'll show you the schedule and who's going to like the call box.

All right.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Second.

OK. We have a motion and a second.

Mr. Barton?

Yes.

Mr. Harvey?

Yes.

Yes.

The first of our presentations today, the VDOT report focusing on the discontinuance of a portion of Castle Creek Plain, Mr. Brown.

I think y'all may have a resolution in front of you

This is to approve a discontinuance of 0.24 miles of Castle Creek Lane.

We did our public notice and sought comments from the adjacent landowners to where the road may have been.

We've received no comments or

for anyone opposing this action.

So the discontinuance allows for the right of way to remain in place.

Do you have any paperwork that actually shows

I have not seen any Mr. Harvey.

I went back and looked at the old apps and I still have a suspicion but I haven't been able to prove it as to where that mileage was.

But there is property that's

I don't think we found anything.

You and I have had a conversation about that.

I know you and Mr. Kessler had a conversation about it.

Okay, any questions for Mr. Brown?

Mr. Chairman, we approve Resolution R 2021-44,

I'll second.

Just spit the specific portion.

Yeah.

But they have no backup to the drawing.

Yes, we did.

Okay.

I do have a little report to give us and a couple items from last, once more today.

The request that you all made, there were several of them.

I don't know if all of them have been completed or not, but they have been passed on to our field forces to complete in a timely manner.

Mr. Hogg, I haven't been back on 150 Mile,

I've got nobody doing any cutting any bushes or not, but that is less time you've been about cutting the bushes up and around.

No way I'm 150 on a six overlap deck.

If they have not done it, I will follow up on that.

Kevin Reed, you asked about Route 828, Riverview Road as far as Blue Rock City.

It will qualify for rural-rusted because it does have a current traffic count of 70 vehicles today.

So I'd like to look at that in the future as far as adding to the rural-rusted parking list to serve and qualify.

Mr. Parr, we are looking at doing, working on the paint and all the fires around there.

We hope to get something that works on that between now and the fall of the year.

Our intention is we're going to have work on that rather than the forest.

Maybe don't know the ways and maybe don't know some of the good planning.

So hopefully that will happen.

That will happen between now and the fall.

In the traffic counts, I said we've been communicating some of the traffic counts.

You and I need to talk a little bit more about that offline to get a little bit more information.

Those traffic counts I sent you, they are actually, I know they said they were new 2020 counts, but they were actually counts that were, same counts that were taken back in 2017 that were factored for 2020.

That's just kind of how they look at it and adjust them on whatever information they have.

As far as getting specific counts up there for certain times of the year, we need to talk about a little bit more about that.

I'm not saying we can't do it.

In fact, one of the specific times was in the fall of the year, I guess when the foliage has been

and something like that if impossible.

So I'd like to talk a little bit offline with you about that, give a little more information.

And Mr. Barton, we talked about the dumpsters over at the command center at Shipman.

And I've looked at that and I've looked at the old format where they were originally put in.

and Steve and I have been communicating a little bit and at this time I'm not in favor of doing a reversal over there.

I think there's some limbs and brush on the hand and right away that is limited to site distance.

I would like for us to go ahead and trim that right away back and get that maximum site distance back that was there when the convenience line was built and see what that does before we

I think that's all I have.

A little bit above the post office at Afton.

Somebody's trimming that curve.

Well, my instructions to the superintendent of the grounds was go up there and cut that whole corridor.

Cut what?

Go up six, cut that.

If it's going to be up there, let's go in there and cut one.

We've had site distance issues before.

And one being up there, six at Stage Road.

I wanted to cut that off.

I wanted to stay out there for a few days.

And one more thing, Mr. Barton.

I have studied that, you know, you've been asking me about the variety of those roads.

I went back and pulled all the traffic studies and you're not going to find an individual sign for that specific curb.

When we reviewed that road back in

Jenkins, 2011, was when that actual review was done.

There was a curve sign with multiple curves on it with a 35-mile or faster speed flat underneath it.

And those signs are at two locations over there.

One incorporates that curve that you have been asking me about.

So I don't know that we'll go back.

Somebody called, one of my constituents said they were going to do it.

But it's not the two curves, it's the one.

And it would be much more fruitful just to have it assigned for the one curve.

The other curve is not so bad.

This one is more than 90 degrees downhill.

It's a dangerous place.

There's been a couple of accidents there.

That's all I have, I'm sure.

Any update on the report going on, the re-cap, that curve?

The re-cap, we're still having it.

We're planning on our hourly payment contract and completing that.

I think looking at it, it's really, they're not comfortable paving over that hill, but we've got to find, do something different, but it will be, it will be, we still plan on paving it.

I don't know exactly who will, but we'll find them, we'll find a way to get it, to get it surfaced, pave it up for them, we'll reach them.

Is that actively on a to-do list?

Yes.

In fact, they met up there last week and that's when our contractor said he was not comfortable bringing his equipment up there and working on it now.

I had a couple of residents contact me in the last two days about two different things and I haven't looked at one of them, but I don't know

Well, we're getting ready to cycle again.

We're going to start cutting the four lanes and cut the primaries starting, well actually we started down here in Nelson County on 29th floor

South of Schuylkill, South of Colleen, for the Lock In Festival, and I'm sure it's all about cutting it down there around the schools.

So we're down there, starting down there Monday I think, but we'll get back in our cycle.

I certainly wouldn't say that

It doesn't need cutting.

We can't be everywhere at once with our mowers.

We have three or four tractors and we need to stand on schedule.

We run them every day and you just can't cut anywhere at once.

I know it seems like it takes a while to get back and it does.

I can't remember if you and I talked about this individually or if I brought it up in the board meeting

from Kyle River Elementary School, where 29 pops over, Harvey Lane comes out right there, there's still concerns about those residents coming out on 29.

Our traffic engineers reviewed that and they really didn't, as far as, I think they had one recommendation

and Vance Morgan, signed for the intersection, but other than that, they did not make any real recommendations on that.

Well, it should be.

who operate businesses within my district.

South of Lovingston, you have the veterinary, you have the hardware store, Invitos uses land that they don't own to get back across the highway.

The motel there, there's no way to go,

It's not dangerous to go back across the highway south of those businesses.

So you have a lot of traffic with the veterinarian and the hardware stores, the hotel, and a business that failed there.

Are you talking about the intersection right at Blue Moon?

I'm talking, that's the intersection that does exist.

That works.

That's fine.

And they go from FITOs, property, but I'm talking about the hardware store and the veterinarian.

There's no way to come back across the highway.

There's no lane to go over.

It's a medium.

What?

You're saying a medium?

Medium lane to go over back.

It's a dangerous situation.

Across the mom.

I mean.

Well, there is one turn lane down beyond the motel, but there's no way to go over.

I mean, you're you're in the N-29 and then you have to swing

Back, and you can, you know, there's no way to slow down and move over there.

It's a, you're probably aware of it.

It's a dangerous situation.

And, you know, the idea of, you know, other businesses operating, and even vetoes, vetoes, to get out of vetoes, you come into someone else's property to get back.

There is, that's the last place you can go

across the highway until you get right down to the corner.

Coming out of vetoes, I mean, you can always go south and use a cross over that as a safer location.

Yeah, a mile down.

Or, of course, no penalty.

I mean, I understand what you're saying.

I don't know what we can do about it.

I mean, because I don't

I don't know how we could get them in there.

I mean, was there an accident there recently that they're referencing?

But I think you could put an area where a car could pull off.

I mean, maybe it's done, maybe we'd

Just take a look at it.

I'm saying if you've got a crossover that's unsafe to use because of site distance, the best thing to do is to remove it.

I mean, I'm just talking to y'all.

Just check it out.

Okay, I have nothing else.

Thank you.

Now we're looking at doing unfinished business.

David, you've been really patient.

Thank you.

I just wanted to talk to you just a little bit the sound created

I just want to talk a little bit about the authority that counties now have to let you stick around taxes, give you a little background on at least one area in the state where some of that administration is already going on on a regional basis.

Talk a little bit about the work that has been done so far regionally at TJPDC working with the localities towards establishing a regional administration and then a little bit about some

So as Mr. Harvey knows, Mr. Carter, Mr. Wood, they know that I have come to the Nelson County Board of Supervisors for many years now to talk about legislative issues.

And every year we talk about counties having the same authority or similar authority that cities and towns had to generate revenue.

And finally in 2020,

We had some success, not total success, but part of the additional authorities that were granted for counties included, effective about a month ago, the authority to enact a local cigarette tax up to 40 cents a pack.

There was some additional legislation during the regular session this past year, or this year in 2021, in the form of Senate Bill 1326, that put some, I don't want to say,

parameters around, provide some definitions to cigarette taxation, encouraging local cigarette tax stamping and tax collecting through regional cigarette tax boards that would be made up of at least six localities, cited authorities that were already in the code that localities have related to the Joint Powers Act, as well as the Regional Cooperation Act, which is the enabling statute for planning district commissions.

and also defined the various duties that such boards could have and finally directed a task force review of ways to modernize the stamping and taxation system at the state level.

That's a task that has been assigned to different groups before.

They have not been able to come away with a solution that everybody was agreed upon that they were going to take another whack at it this year, but to my knowledge, they have not done anything formal.

So for a little background, there has been, for about 50 years now, a Northern Virginia cigarette tax board that's been collecting and forcing cigarette taxes for 19 localities in that region.

Most of them are towns.

There are a small handful of cities.

And then prior to the authority for counties that took effect more broadly on July 1st, there were two other counties, both in Northern Virginia.

that had the authority, and one of those was part of that board.

They have since that time, since the July 1st date, well I guess even prior to, had some others interested in joining the board in Northern Virginia.

Some other regions of the state also are in the process of exploring or establishing regional boards, and I'll just put a few of those there by Planning District Commission,

The Northern Virginia Board, at least what I've seen from at least one of the other regions, the structure for the board is really guided by some ordinances and memorandum of understanding or memorandum of agreements which spell out the membership of the board, the powers and duties of the board,

I'll also speak to the hiring of an administrator and the duties that the administrator would have and then some specifics about the collection of revenues and the disbursement of those revenues back to the counties.

Separately, in areas where a cigarette tax board is in place, the local governments that make up that board would also establish a separate cigarette tax ordinance to establish that tax rate and also to provide for

there are rules that pertain to the wholesalers and distributors and the retailers concerning primarily stamping of cigarettes and also laying out what would not be allowed.

Just to give you an idea of some of the work that we've been doing at the planning district and really as I said working with localities in the region we provided back in the winter just kind of an initial information session

We're very grateful to have the City of Charlottesville to provide that to local staff in the TJPDC region.

The City has been planning the cigarette tax for a number of years.

Currently, they're being 55 cents per pack.

We've also convened a larger group of local staff on a couple of occasions just to kind of brainstorm, get some response and feedback as to the formation of a regional board to administer cigarette taxes.

They probably more importantly have pulled together a smaller working group that's been able to meet for an ongoing basis and a more frequent basis to really guide the work towards trying to stand up for regional efforts, not only in the T-State PDC region, but really in just a broader area.

And we've been keeping the Planning District Commission updated as we've been moving through that process.

So continuing on with our work today, you will recall back in the spring you received a memo from me with an accompanying resolution which you subsequently endorsed just to express your interest in having the dialogue and having discussion about a regional administrative effort.

Some of your staff has been part of some of that discussion.

We've got eight localities that have expressed some interest in participating in regional administration.

That includes four of the five counties in the planning district region as well as Augusta County over the mountain and Madison County and Orange County to our north as well as the city of Charlottesville has been participating as well.

I've put together and my plan is tomorrow to send out to each of those eight localities a draft ordinance and memorandum of agreement.

That would be before you for your consideration and hopefully adoption to stand up this regional tax administration effort, to stand up this board.

And the request will be that you take that up at meetings that you would be having, depending on work schedules and loads that agendas have and the particular board, either later this month or the first part of September.

The other thing we've been doing is really just trying to get as much information together as we can and work towards a lot of the details that need to be addressed to start Cigarette Tax Administration by January 1st of 2022.

I believe in your package you had some information about some of the calculations and financial scenarios that have been done

Based on projected sales, what revenues you might be able to expect, we started taking a look at some of the potential one-time as well as ongoing expenses that would be incurred in terms of regional administration.

We also started looking at what the board may look like, how it would function, and really just more some of the details that would come with administering a new program and planning.

So the to-do lists are still to come.

Rather is probably better.

A better way of describing it, as I mentioned, the ordinance and the MOA for localities to consider approving and signing on to join the board, which will be forthcoming to you again hopefully tomorrow.

You'll see in that MOA that it really outlines the administration and the fiscal functions by the board that the board would undertake, including the key step of hiring an administrator to handle the day-to-day operations

There would also have to be an MOA between the board and the state tax department.

because the state tax department is the one that handles the cigarette stamping process.

They work directly with the full stamp voters and distributors in Northern Virginia region primarily right now.

They design stamps, they produce stamps.

In the case of Northern Virginia, which I think if we're gonna do this in this region, we could do something similar, and that would be to have a dual stamp.

There's a state stamp, the state tax rate is 60 cents per pack.

What they've done in Northern Virginia is to create a very simple stamp that includes two different sets of numbers and one is the state number and one is the regional number so that there's a proper documentation and accounting for the cigarette packs themselves as well as keeping track of the amount of money that goes towards the state as well as to the region.

Then as I mentioned earlier, there would be a step of considering a local ordinance to establish a local tax rate for cigarettes and also we would anticipate that we would request a small amount of startup funds in order to get the separate up and running prior to revenues beginning to be collected in January 2022.

And then the rest of the items, you'll get us a lot of back office things that we're talking about, planning district administrative tasks, you have to look at funding, there's a number of forms that are involved, you have to set up separate bank accounts, then you would get into looking at what your hiring needs would be, someone to do those back office and administrative plan functions related to the revenue collection and dispersing it back to the localities.

as well as what your education, what I've been calling education awareness and compliance efforts might look like in terms of someone who's out visiting with retailers to ensure that the cigarettes are being stamped properly.

Again, I referenced the spreadsheet that you had in your packet.

I don't recall.

One thing I don't understand is, you know,

You raise the price of cigarettes, people don't smoke as much.

Why doesn't a state just raise taxes and distribute to the locality?

Well, it's interesting you bring that up because

Two, three years ago, the state's cigarette tax rate per pack had been 30 cents.

They doubled it to 60 cents, and they were not interested in entering that kind of arrangement with the counties or cities in terms of giving off a piece of the action.

So again, the local authority was then giving local governments what they'd been asking for for a number of years to be able to have authority to generate revenue in the assets of the state.

I don't know how that would work.

I guess they could have figured out how to track sales.

That's one of the things I've been having trouble getting my arms wrapped around as we were trying to look at how we might be able to project what the sales would be.

I've been able to find anybody that really has that information.

The projections that we have on that spreadsheet for you all, I mean, it's a shot in the dark because it's based off of what the sales of the city of Charlottesville had calculated on the per capita rate.

That's it.

Well, none of the counties except Fairfax and Arlington currently

When we purchase the cigarettes from the distributor that we get them from, that's when the tax is paid and that's when the stamps and everything are on the cigarette

The local taxes would not be collected

So I believe that the distributors, when they purchase stamps from the state level, they're paying up front.

I don't have anything to do with this.

Cigarettes probably have been bad for my health and I stopped smoking.

But it's a tax on the poorest people.

It's so easy to tax poor people.

I know you shouldn't smoke.

and health costs are enormous and everything else.

But it's so typical to me when you're going to have a tax, you know, it reminds me of the lottery, heaven forbid, you know, where the lottery is supposed to go to education.

It does go to education.

but they pulled that same amount of money at the bottom of education and put it in the general fund.

So that was my question.

Are we interested in doing cigarette tax?

Well, I mean we ran into this situation where the entire

I think people would wind up being assured by secrets.

The action previously was to address the interest in the discussion, which is the action that the others have done as well.

Nobody's got to the point of

I think, you know, there's a lot of ways to look at this.

And, you know, I pay taxes most of the time.

But you can also look at other situations where I wish we had a local participation on breweries and wineries and, you know, their distribution.

So we only get the meal side of that.

My goodness, the millions and millions of bottles that leave our county, you know,

would be a great potential to participate in some of that.

You know, I personally don't have much reservation of having the cigarette tax.

I mean, my goodness, Phillip Morse made the statement the other day, did you hear what the CEO said?

He said they're getting rid of cigarettes in the next 10 years.

I mean, you know, who knows?

It's the tax thing you're talking about.

And we're trying to look at this from a regional basis, as opposed to having, you know, an album all ten cents higher than Nelson, then, you know, I don't know.

I think it was a couple of months ago.

But we'll be looking at doing action in our September meeting, correct?

That's a question for me, David.

Well, what we'd like to do is

Folks could be in a position to be able to have a pub here in the dock sometime in September.

I'm not saying the first meeting, second meeting.

I think, as you recall, our board exceeds once a month in second Tuesday.

You know, I think most everybody else is going to be doing it in, I've got one of them that's going to be doing it late this month, most of the rest are going to be in September.

The provision in the MOA, actually the board is established once at least six localities

I have no objection to doing the hearing.

This is totally up to the board.

Well, we're not required to have a destination for it.

You just go in the general fund.

But it's a discussion with him.

I would suggest that we give some level of just a consensus of taking this to public.

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

Then we should bring it to a vote.

You know, this is a public hearing, so that everyone knows.

This isn't endorsing it yet, but I move that we, upon the reception of the ordinance, have a public hearing in September to discuss a regional cigarette tax with the PJPDC, I guess.

Can I be any more thorough?

All right.

Okay.

And then we can correct me if I'm wrong about this but for a significant period of time

And secondly, when I was City Manager, of course, we had a cigarette tax and I can attest that the Treasurer here will not like having to administer the cigarette tax just within her office.

Yeah, that's a good point.

Any further discussion?

Mr. Barton?

Yes.

Mr. Rutherford?

Yes.

Mr. Parr?

Yes.

Mr. Reed?

Every Footstep in the Courthouse Just Money I'm going to give you a quick update and then I'm not asking for money today, unusually.

You're the only county out of 12, I'm not asking for money.

You're so kind.

Yeah, we'll talk about that in a little bit.

All right, so Firefly is spreading its wings a little bit.

This is what Barney would look like if he ever got run over.

The CDC area is in green.

That will be completed by next year, mid-year.

This regional project that we're undertaking and pursuing funding for will build out the purple area.

And with that purple area, it will serve all of the unserved locations, buildings and residences, and all 12 of the counties that touch it.

So it's a pretty massive

In some ways, in the other ways, we're actually already all around that area, so it'll mean constructing about the same pace we've been constructing for three more years.

In Nelson County, you've got good news that most of it's been constructed.

So, I added another color in just to mix things up here.

The green area in the Central Virginia Electric Co-op Service Area, that'll all be built up by mid-year next year.

We are going to build the yellow and purple areas.

The yellow areas, we actually have already received some funding with Connect America funds.

And so those aren't eligible for additional funding from the state.

The purple areas are.

We're going to ask you today to allow us to include Nelson County in a grant application.

We'll pursue a little bit of funding.

And I'll tell you, the main area that we're worried about with this is right up top with the

I don't know if I can figure it out.

Mainly that Afton area up there, that's going to be part of a Dominion build out.

To be honest, we're going to already have built Schuyler, Shipman, and Anken, so they're not going to go into this batting request because we're already doing that.

In fact, this is a good point.

Let me catch you up to date on where we are in the cannon.

This past weekend, we completed a railroad crossing, two railroad crossings at Gladstone that we've been waiting on since last October.

We got from that and put CSX a long, long time to dedicate a flag to us for a day for two crossings.

So we've had the fiber pulled in all the way up to Norwood for a while.

We haven't been able to do the splicing on it because we're waiting on these last two crossings.

Those two crossings happen.

That means the rest of the way down to James and Norwood and actually turned up at Windjana.

They're starting to splice that this week.

So then we have another 500 or 600 locations that we've been held up on.

This week, actually, last week in Shipman on the north side of the tracks, AEP started to make ready construction

It took them a while from when we first started, but they have a crew down there.

They intend to finish that within the next week and a half.

It's not that large of an area.

And our crews will be in either the last week of this month or the first week of September building fiber.

That was in the Cares area.

So it's on the north side of the tracks.

We'll wrap that up fairly quickly.

Then they'll move over.

They've got a little piece in Amherst that's eight to 10 miles.

Then they will be back.

and started work in Arrington and then Schuyler and then Shipman.

AEP still needs to do their make ready ahead of that, but they're scheduled to finish their make ready in all of those areas I think by about October.

So we'll be following behind them as they finish make ready equipment.

And those are the areas that we asked for funding last year.

And you granted, I said we could get it done in 12 to 18 months.

If we're lucky, if everything breaks right,

The first areas on that side of the tracks will get connected before year end and in the first part of next year we'll get those three little areas done.

We've also started doing data collection along Buffalo Mines Road up here.

So that will take us the rest of the way to the Piney River up in the Piney River area in the AEP system

That will actually be built out next year as we finish up the CBEC build in the Piney River area.

But we've started work because it takes a while to get ahead of data collection and make ready work in those types of things.

But we're starting to work in another area on the system.

We'll also pick up a couple of little areas up there.

There's a little area right in 56 and 151 with a dozen or so homes.

And there's a little area on Jenny's Creek across from Henderson Store.

up through there that isn't covered, so we're picking up those as part of doing the Buffalo Mines piece.

So starting to get data collection in there, then there'll be design work.

It'll still be six months, eight months before we're connecting those folks.

Shipman, we should be able to get connections.

We could start connecting people in the Cares area by October.

And then the Arrington

Skyler and Shipman areas will come in starting before year end.

We still have those other areas that we'll be building in and completing as we said.

And I think we've told you we'll finish by 2024.

We'll certainly do that.

There's really not that much area left.

It could be earlier than that, but I'm not quite ready.

Sure.

All right, Matt, go back to that now.

What would you do to Lovingston?

Lovingston is, it's,

under the grant definition.

Because the Nelson County fiber runs through, the fiber of the gel transfer dust runs through some of those areas, there's still a little piece of Lovingston.

There's a couple of pieces.

And we have them on the list.

We're not leaving it out.

We actually, on the Connect

on what we call the Central Virginia Network, which is the five that came up in the county.

We started work up behind Mr. Harv's gas station in the Tanbark area.

We have about 30 people who applied for service up there who didn't previously have service that we're going to connect.

But we had to do a good bit of rehab on the underground boxes and

There are a number of things.

No need to get into the details.

It's going to take us a while to get those rehabbed, but we're getting them connected.

The next area of that system that we're going to look at cleaning up and expanding is in the Lovingston area.

And we'll be doing that soon.

There's still a little area that I know several people are interested in just outside Lovingston and headed down 56.

And

We know that that's one of those little areas.

I've got a set of miscellaneous areas.

It's about 150 homes around the county.

There's three or four of Colleen that are right across Route 29 from between Arrington Road and the church.

The front on 29, those are all Apto homes.

Everybody behind them on Sunset Ridge has fiber.

Everybody across the road has fiber.

Everybody left and right has fiber, but there's four or five homes in the building.

So we'll get to that.

We know there's some places like that in the county, and we're gonna pick those up.

And I could go back into the reasons why those little gaps have come up over time, but trust that we're gonna get everybody, we'll have everybody connected to make sure we get that.

All right.

Any other specific questions here before I tell you what we're asking?

We've got about, right now we've got 9,071 electric accounts in the county.

Five will be passed all of those.

Some of those electric accounts are obviously electric fences, water trawls, but you can think in terms of about 90% of those that are locations that could have internet service.

So we have another 400, why am I getting the wrong button?

Another 400 passings already

Place, well that includes the Shipman area with the CAERS projects.

So we've got the CBC ones by, we'll finish up by next year, the other one here.

And then these additional passings where we already had people connected on the fiber you sent over.

What's remaining are these thousand or so after that, and about 425 are in that yellow area.

and then about 600 in the purple.

So if we go back, there's some big yellow areas where people really spread out and then the little purple areas have a little more density.

The 600 baddie project service area locations are what we would be putting into the grand application.

Here are the group of partners.

We'll have Dominion up on top of the mountain working with us a little bit in Nelson County.

Thomas Jefferson Planning District will act as the lead applicant for this application because it's regional.

We've got a number of counties involved.

We wanted to go through a regional group and David and his folks with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District have been really good in helping us enacting the lead on that.

This just gives you a little background on who all is in the county as far as electric service, which again is our best proxy for the total number of locations to pass.

We're looking at a project that will have about $5 million more we have to invest.

We're going to ask the body for about $600,000 of that.

We're going to ask that the $1,025,000 you gave us last year committed from broadband authority will be counted as a match for this.

Having the match from the county helps us in terms of the battery supply.

That's why I'm asking the county to participate.

You don't have to give us anything else.

We can just use the money you've already funded.

It's part of the match to help us get some additional funding to offset some costs on top of the mountain, particularly in those other baddie areas.

So we have to have that application in by the 14th of September, which is why I'm here today, asking at this meeting for you to approve the resolution joining the project.

By December, we'll hear about the baddie awards.

Dominion, for their piece, has to get approval from the State Corporation Commission.

They'll go in and file for that early next year.

They'll actually start their design.

They do some easement procurement as part of that.

That will start quality applications under review.

And as soon as it gets out from review, which we expect to be mid-year next year, they'll be ready to start construction.

So the application with the SEC is mostly procedural.

Dominion filed their first one this year and everything was approved and they used it as a learning process.

And they also have a state law passed.

The first one was under a ballot program and now it's a permanent law.

And they feel very comfortable when they put information in.

Prior to going to the commission, we will have the Department of Housing and Community Development will verify that those are unserved areas.

That's the biggest sticking point.

That will happen this fall.

Once that's done, then it's just a question of go through the regulatory review of how much they're spending and how they put it into their rates.

But here's the resolution.

We sent a template for resolution over.

It just throws in some numbers that gives you our preliminary numbers.

These may change.

We are still, we did a big survey and we may tweak this up or down a little bit to get actual numbers, but we want to use the county piece that you gave us as matching and include the county in that body request.

Yeah, I'm fine with it in the resolution, yes.

This is only going to help us and expedite it.

And as I mentioned before, we're already working in the county.

The Dominion area, because we have to wait for Dominion, because they have to wait for their approval, will likely be one of the last places just because of waiting for them.

And they will build fiber along the main route on their lines and lease it to us.

and we will take the fiber from the park way down the pole and take off and build up to the homes and build mountains.

Cool.

Any questions for Mr. Woodruff?

Thank you so much.

We love good news.

We love it.

All right.

Anyone like to make a motion on this resolution?

I can do that.

Mr. Chairman, I move that we approve the resolution R 2021-45 Nelson County Board of Supervisors resolution to participate as a partner in the Regional Internet Service Expansion Project.

I second.

Okay.

Any further discussion?

All I can say is this is good news.

Mr. Parr?

Yes.

Mr. Harvey?

Yes.

Mr. Barton?

Yes.

Mr. Rutherford?

Yes.

Thank you, Mr. Wood.

I'm going to work.

More work.

Next is a request for a pump and haul

Oh, I missed that.

Okay, consideration for request to rename officially named county roads.

I checked it off before it was done.

There are two requests for renaming the county streets or roads.

One is from Davos Backbone to James Moseby Run to Crandall Run.

The request will include

expense of the replacement of the road signs.

The second one is, Dustons Lane in Afton, and there is a petition as the ordinance, the local ordinance requires from the adjoining property owners and actually live right across the street from this, from this street sign that can attest that

The ordinance authorizes the board to make these changes predicated either on a petition

I understand the change from Osby to Crandall, as Steve Crandall, someone we all know.

I don't know the owners of

There are, I think, really three properties impacted by the change to Desmond's Lane, and two of those properties have changed hands to new ownership in the last couple of years and the next have become Airbnb's.

So I'm assuming that the owners of those two properties, or the owner of those two properties, initiated this request with the existing, their existing neighbors.

The road I think was initially named for a family member that lived on that, lived in San Diego County.

This Dustin, this is a grandson

of the lady that used to own the two houses that Steve's talking about that passed away.

They no longer own the property.

It's all in the family there.

The Campbell's gentleman, the Campbell family, has passed away, but he and then his sister was

The grandmother of Dustin Knight, that's where they had it done.

Yeah, I can actually attest to the Airbnb.

We don't see any traffic at these two homes, particularly during the week or weekends.

Both of the two homes on the north side of the road have carts there every week.

I'd like to remove the two name change requests.

Well, we do have a motion and a second.

Thank you.

So I'll begin by noting that Mr. David Schreed, the Executive Director of Wintergreen Adaptive Sports is here and hopefully will correct me if I misstate anything, but the staff received communication from Wintergreen Adaptive Sports in the last week.

Approximately the, if I may, WAS is doing an addition to their existing facility and they're going to include bathrooms within that facility, two restrooms,

and with the request before the board is to authorize a pump and haul permit for wintergreen adaptive sports to be included with the pump and haul permit at the county hall of the Department of Health.

As the board may recall, Blue Mountain Brewery and, I didn't look up the name of the glider port, but right now the president of the county holds a pump and haul permit with the Department of Health and the two historic subcommittees

and the Nellysford area.

WS has worked with the service authority.

Their facility will be beyond them.

The service authority's requirement for connection to their wintergreen system is beyond 300 feet.

So they are going to, or do plan to, connect to the water system that the service authority operates.

I think the health department required that.

And Mr. Sherif can correct me.

and we check with DEQ and that company that will actually pump and haul the waste from the WES facility, the company actually has to permit to treat the waste and then a land

followed up and told me.

The board has fairly considered this, and we've worked with Mr. Schreib, and we would do all the administrative process to facilitate adding WS to the Pump and Haul contract, including an agreement, I think, that we've done with both the County Court and Blue Mountain Brewery that sort of makes all the things associated with the Pump and Haul contract

First, just a word of thanks for speeding us on to the agenda.

I really appreciate it.

As Mr. Carter said, we're trying to get this project done before the ski season.

It's something we had planned back in 2015 and went to resort at

changed hands that year and they called time out on the project and so we've been waiting for five years to do this.

The only thing I would add is that we expect that the capacity of this tank for our season which runs from about mid-December to mid-March, sometimes early March if the weather doesn't provide us a couple extra weeks, is going to be about six

The capacity of our tank is 1069 gallons.

It's a two-piece polypropylene waste tank.

Mr. Carter mentioned that we have other plans already in place that we propose with the health department.

We've been working closely with Tom Mike there.

So being beyond the 300 foot threshold under which we would have to connect to the service authority system, having worked with them back in 2015 on this, and then again this year, I also learned that the connection will be made, for those of you who know the resort area well, on Grassy Ridge Drive

And so in addition to being difficult to connect because of the distance, it would be an extremely complex, expensive, and time-consuming effort if we were to connect it at that point.

Anyone have any questions?

It's always intriguing to me that the state makes it go through this process.

This is the what?

Fifth one we've done in four years?

Second?

Third?

I could add too that serendipitously when Tom Ike at the Health Department showed me the template used by the Rockfish Gliderport folks

Good, good, great.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you, Mr.

Sheets, for reminding me.

I thought about it and then failed to mention it.

The actual waste stream is pretty minimal for this season.

Okay.

Do we have a motion?

Yeah, sure.

Okay.

Second.

Okay.

Motion and second.

Mr. Martin?

Yes.

Mr. Parr?

Yes.

Mr. Rutherford?

Yes.

Mr. Harvey?

Yes.

Okay, next we have a memorandum of agreement for replacement of the bridge.

Thank you.

This is a multi-party memorandum of agreement that pertains to replacement of the historic bridge on Oak Ridge Drive, Oak Ridge Drive, Oak Ridge Lane, across the Norfolk Southern lines.

So the plan is to replace the historic bridge, or that's actually what's going to happen.

I just didn't feel comfortable signing it in the way that the board's consent.

The package includes a lot of information about background information about the development of the bridge and includes information about how the bridge would be reconstructed and VDOT there.

our archaeological staff, our archaeology staff, our historian, video of the demolition of the bridge, report information about the existing bridge, and then they're also going to install interpretive signage about the existing bridge.

There's been a lot of discussion about this.

Move forward.

Any questions for Mr. Carter?

Is there any objection to approval of the memo agreement?

Okay, there is no objection.

Thank you.

The Millennium Group has been working on the restoration of the gymnasium at the

The Heritage Center and among their fundraising activities they've utilized a grant from the Perry Foundation that requires a match that the local match should be $52,500 and they submitted a request to the board to provide that funding with an amount of $52,500 to assist them with their overall project.

I think the executive director is here today, the board has some specific questions,

We've seen pictures of the restoration bridge, excuse me, of the gym and I know Mr. Bill Urban with the county's building inspection department is working with them as well.

Very good.

Mr. Burdette, do you have anything you'd like to

Thank you.

Thank you to the board just for the opportunity to stand and speak and to receive our proposal.

I think that the proposal as presented exactly states where we are and what we've been doing to date.

We've raised as a group over $200,000 for this project alone.

The renovation of the gym is extremely important to the community as a whole, especially to

that ended the county to have this gym up and functioning for a place for safe physical activity as well as just fellowship for the community as well.

So this will help with phase three to continue the work in the gym and to have it open and fully functioning.

So we thank you for listening to our request and for considering it.

I have none.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, I went over there the other day and met with several members of the committee and looked around and

They've done a lot of work over there.

It's looking really good.

The gym's coming along.

The HVAC is pretty close to being finished, and then they'll be able to dry out the floor and be able to finish the floor and the roof's done.

Things are looking good, and I think this is going to be a huge asset to the community having access to this facility.

So, Mr. Chairman, if you're ready,

I approve the request from the Millennium Group to provide local funds to match the Prairie Foundation grant in the amount of $52,500.

Second.

I agree with everything you've said, Mr. Parr.

It's really important to find in the county.

I feel like we're moving forward and becoming representative and helpful to the community.

It can be a beginning, a huge beginning.

So I'll begin with the status on the COVID-19 virus and I'll note that the status that I've reported here has changed

of the virus in the county, a seven-day average of two new daily cases.

And since the board's July 8th meeting, the total number of cases in the county has increased to 903 from 892.

As of today, there is, I think, three to six more cases of the virus in the county.

So with that, a question for the board is what to do.

If the current guidance on entering county facilities is given on our system as we previously reported, you could wear a mask.

We're not going to ask you if you're vaccinated or not.

It's sort of at your discretion.

And the board may be aware that Governor Northam last week had a news conference

All state employees will be mandated to be vaccinated or if they don't agree to do that, they'll be tested weekly.

I checked with the Center for Disease Control's website and Nelson County is now at the highest rate of transmission.

So some of the guidance from the CDC and the health department, which is still working on its guidance, is if you're in a low transmission area, then you can be more deliberate or considerate

where, according to the CDC, down to high transmission areas.

So I guess the question we present to the court, the board is, should we, at my level, our county staff, reinstitute wearing a mask in county facilities?

This is an initial first step as we sort of monitor this new Delta variant of the virus, which is stimulating

And as I said at the date, we're pretty relaxed.

People aren't wearing masks.

A few people do.

And it's just been an honor system because we had so much success with combating the virus.

But seemingly, it's unfortunately not significant yet, but starting to see increased caseloads in the county.

So rather than, as a staff leader, I'm just making

Dr. Fink questions.

My personal experience is that I'm in a high-risk category myself.

A lot of us are of an age that might put us in that category.

I'm hoping to travel to Spain in about three weeks in a quota, visit my granddaughter, and of course if I test positive, that won't happen.

The CDC guidance as of today, looking at it again, is if you're in a high transmission area, which you wouldn't think that the number of cases in the county would put us in that category, but it's a color chart and we are in the red category, which is high transmission.

This is obviously a discussion we've had at the planning district level from a regional standpoint and you know the data is kind of in a whole bunch of different places obviously it's more often than not whether it's unvaccinated we're starting to see vaccinated children we're starting to see things change I believe it would be best for us to just monitor it and you know I don't think we need to make any big change in the mask policy I think it should maintain being optional I think people

who want to be safe, hey, wear a mask.

I think it's completely reasonable.

At some point, we're gonna have to get back to some level of normalcy without a doubt.

Of course, I'm vaccinated.

I think people should get vaccinated.

That's your option though.

and you know in that event I think that would probably be you know I would be remiss if it was the board.

I think you have the authority to do so, but I think it's not previously reported.

We had some concerns about mandating that in county staff, but at least if it got worse, that could be a consideration.

I think you ought to monitor it, but I think whenever the opportunity arises, we should encourage people

to get vaccinated.

Yeah, if you monitor the CDC or the health department's guidance, and if you watch the news, that's quite centered.

Well, we've actively encouraged county staff to be vaccinated, but as I said, there are several who have chosen not to be vaccinated.

So, is...

Status quo.

Okay.

The American Rescue Plan continued to report this, and there were still sort of

tomorrow about it, which we'll participate in.

Sort of the good news about it is the funding, I don't think you have to actually make final decisions if you wanted to wait that long until 2024, and then the funding would have to be fully expended by 2026.

We'll follow up in a couple of questions if we can see for David.

He says there's funding, and hopefully soon we'll be able to report to the Board a list of recommendations and more specific information

seriously consider.

From my perspective today at least, there's no real rush to decision making.

You know, I think Grace running this off, it was an interesting read, a lot of repetition, but it was worth reading.

And the conclusion I reached from it, from having read it

Yeah, it's supposed to be COVID-related.

But you can do that.

It's, from what I read, they encourage you to do that, to be thoughtful.

But I also think in terms of

of the law that was passed was to encourage the economy.

And I think it would be particularly important that we spend this money within the county.

The money you're gonna be spending goes to county people or county services.

But I think we ought to think about it.

Yeah, I think this is our problem.

We've seen the board frequently ask questions about pieces of the funding.

As I mentioned, Grace, Sandy, myself, most of the county staff are monitoring.

County really hasn't focused on two of the broader areas that money could go to when it's serving the hardest hit communities and families.

And the other is premium pay for essential workers.

One of the things that needs to be thought about, too, is some of the sheriff, he talked about the increased numbers of mental illness that he's having to deal with.

Social service is having to deal with this, too.

Right.

Now, I don't know if you disagree.

To date, Ms. Rose really hasn't come forward with any specific request or recommendations, but we're certainly cognizant that we talk to her, of course, pretty frequently.

I just haven't wanted to rush to a conclusion on these things until we're pretty clear and we see really beneficial uses of the funding.

I mean, Mr. Harvey, he's probably going to report on this.

We had a meeting earlier

The consideration of replacing all the existing radio equipment throughout the county could be another use of this funding.

It could be very helpful because it's going to be a significant cost at the border

Moving on, the Piney River and Westwater system, we have completed all the initial work we set out to do on this USENCO pump station.

And I'll just remind the board, this is probably the most critical pump station in the Piney River system.

It's on 56, and it's the last leg of pumping wastewater from the Piney River system over to the service authority for treatment.

So everything's going to address

and the pump station.

More of those pumps has an issue that it's probably going to result with part of replacing the pump.

So we're in the process of making that decision, but everything else needs to be completed and we're very happy with the restoration of the units, so to say.

The company did a really good job.

The comprehensive plan, I check with Dylan

last week and so she's still working with Thomas Sheets and PDC staff on the draft of the request for proposals to retain consultant services that's supposed to be in this week for her review and our internal review of any comments and then once we sort of flesh it out it will go to the commission local commission to the board for review and make sure that it meets your

Yeah, your consent to go forward and issue that thing as far as, issue the RFP as far as the scope of the work to be done.

The general reassessment, I spoke to Mr. Haynes this morning.

He does plan to report to the board in September.

He said they had about 26 or 100 properties to review.

He feels confident that they've completed on time

and things are moving along well.

County Initiatives in the Recreation Project, Works in Progress.

We had meeting with Tenements and Architecture Partners last week, a Zoom meeting.

We're focusing on sites for the project, and that's moving along very well.

And then I've recommended that we have a planning charette to include

So we'll have them part of this planning so we can see what it will actually look like on a big scale.

We have several options to go with that.

We're trying to schedule that planning session for I believe next Thursday, depending on the availability of a couple of the consultants.

Also, we're looking for a recreation director, right?

Well, I thought about that.

So I made the offer today to, the gentleman's name is

and Ms. McGarry, Dandy, Brian Kelly, Emily Harper, who is the former County Director of Parks and Rec, who's been working for us in Claire's absence.

We were the interview team, and we all were in agreement that the gentleman's name was Gary West.

He's present working for Rockingham County as their program, one of their program directors.

He has 11 years experience with Rockingham,

background, intensive background, Parks and Rec, and we all were very pleased with his interview and his references were outstanding.

Where is he?

Yeah, we put in the advertisement relocation to the county

is highly desirable in one year and we emphasize that to all the applicants who we interviewed.

So to be determined, but I think the board will be very pleased once you meet Jerry and get to know him a little better.

We were very well taken by his interview and his references.

I think he'll be a very good fit for the county.

As I said, he's agreed to start the first of September.

The business part, Timmons has been more focused on assisting architecture partners with the recreation projects, and that work really hasn't gotten too far out of the gate yet, so I'll just note that to the board.

The Ag Center Project, I think we've now scheduled a meeting at the two local government committees next Friday at 10 a.m. here in the county.

I did include information to Mr. Rogers

The administrator from Amherst sent over responding to questions.

I may still have some questions about that, but one thing I would, that included herein is I think it would be in the best interest of both localities if we commission what's called a preliminary architectural report and what I envision that to be is

because at this point, I have really no idea what facilities would be constructed, operated, et cetera.

So the PAR would help develop the overall plan of development, so to say, what facilities would go in, what would they entail, et cetera.

We would put a cost estimate together for whatever's conceived.

and Emily with, for example, it's just been proposed just by the property and then go from there.

So this would be more, I think, comprehensive and valuable information you're just sort of seeing what happens.

So I hope there's more of the support when we meet next week

We're continuing hopefully architecture partners.

I've asked them to put a proposal together.

I think it'd be much more insightful and valuable information.

McGinnis Building, Mark Ketchum Varnes is also assisting that building.

The next step, they're waiting on Hurt and Profit, their structural engineer, to do some geotechnical work which is hopefully being scheduled either later this week or next week.

There should be a fuller report on what needs to be done to the building.

the VDOT Transportation Alternatives Grant Program and we're waiting for VDOT their decisions on whether or not R2TAP pre-applications Gladstone, Depot, Mumps, and Revitalization will be approved for some new or final applications which will be due in October.

So we're just sort of waiting to see if they move forward to the next step.

Redistricting the Information Systems staff

Susan mitigated there wasn't really a lot of insight from the Census Bureau yet and seemingly we're supposed to at least receive the preliminary data sets that would enable us to work on redistricting in the county sometime later this month

at the end of September.

So they've been looking at it, as I reported previously, there may not be any substantive changes to the district, but that's still to be determined.

And it's difficult to know if the redistricting would be used for the November election or not.

Susan thinks not, but we don't know yet.

Demolition of the Masses and Hill Bus Office Building that's been completed.

I know that's something that was presented to the board.

The shipment collection slide, as Mr. Brown indicated earlier, you know, they recommend, VDOT is recommended about not reversing the entrance and doing some clearing on the north, I guess, on the east end of the facility.

And just internally, Joseph noted this last month, to flip-flop everything at that facility

will probably cost tens of thousands of dollars, so hopefully clearing some vegetative growth at the east end won't be satisfactory.

Yeah, it would create a significant cost just to flip-flop that site to Wayne's configuration.

I don't know, we've asked VDOT to do it, assuming that it's in the right of way, because it could be, it's a property in the northeast of there is privately owned, but hopefully most of it that wouldn't have anything to do with site distances in the right of way, so we'll stay after Mr. Brown.

So we did provide Mr. Reed with, and I think the board on his request for information on not necessarily prohibiting

You may have misinterpreted my request.

The idea is to see if there's any tools that we have that can limit the solid waste stream by somehow dealing with single-use plastics and plastic bags being the one.

And I did get a call from the Commissioner of Revenue telling me that I had suggested that we do tax plastic bags.

Right.

I don't think we said that to her.

She wasn't very pleased about it.

But I'm misunderstood as well.

Well, that's what would happen.

Just for example, if I go to the grocery store in

Whoever the grocery store is, I have six bags of groceries that are all put in plastic bags and you enact the ordinance.

All those bags are going to be in nickel each.

Right, but like I say, that's not a positive reinforcement.

That's not a good thing.

That's not going to deter use.

So I understand.

I had a question.

Were the staff reports in the packet?

Any questions for Mr. Carter?

Thank you.

Report reports.

Emergency Service Council met this past month.

The Virginia Department of Health received

some CARES Act funding, and they used part of their funds to buy three generators that are pretty big, massive-sized generators.

And they agreed to house one of those at Wintergreen behind the fire station up there.

It is a mobile unit that is available to other departments in the county as needed.

So Curtis offered that up if any

Speaking of generators, they brought up at the meeting wondering if it was possible for us to consider using a portion of our American executed plan funds.

All of the generators in the county

Fire stations, Tommy, you probably speak to this better than not, but they're getting near the end of their life cycle.

And they were wondering if it would be a good opportunity to replace the generators at the fire station.

So it's something for us to keep in mind when we're allocating those ones.

But something for us to look at.

And then Tommy, you probably,

I should speak to this, but the rescue squad, the 12th hour versus 24th, they were talking about, we currently have one 24 hour ambulance rescue squad.

Talk to Curtis about that and see what their load is.

I'm going to be there next Tuesday.

We meet on odd months.

So it'll be September.

I just, I mean, they might have a call meeting, but their regular schedule is odd months.

And then just, I would like to see if it would be possible.

I sent her an email and I figured she was out.

we've begun pretty in depth.

We're trying to get some applicants for our Executive Director role and we've gotten some applicants in.

We're going into the interview process so hopefully by October we will have made a decision on who the Executive Director will be, which reminds me I need to talk to you about something at some point.

And with that, broadband authority is what it is.

We heard that kind of today.

Regional Housing stuff, I believe they're coming.

RHP is gonna come here in September afternoon, so we'll kind of get an update of what this new big regional housing plan that we've just recently done and some of the data.

I had made mention on some points, probably need to be edited, but it's a living document, so just beyond that.

That's all I can think of.

Starving Social Services have recognized that both COVID and increased problems with drug abuse has really strained them to an enormous degree.

I think that that's the idea that they want to make clear to the community that for many people in our county, they are in crisis and there's more than there were before, you know, in this last year or two.

We need to recognize that.

That's all.

And think about ways that we can attempt to alleviate

for that crisis.

Okay.

I don't have anything in the service, though.

I don't really think there's anything in there.

So I'll pass on that and move on to appointments.

Nothing right now.

I think her dad says she will be boarding an application to me for the social services board.

I'll be looking for that.

Okay.

Thank you.

Correspondence?

Yes, actually.

CenturyLink and Schuyler.

It's been kind of a disaster.

I would know via social media, phone calls, and all sorts of other things.

Can you get Susan to outreach to them?

And please ask if there's assistance that's needed.

I mean, there's a lot of people who that's their only form of communication is the lack of self-service and whatnot.

So it could impact 911 incidents.

I hope that's not a case.

And when I'm here, I think it's backup, but if we could outreach to them, that would be exceptional.

And say the impacts of how that is in the need of an emergency.

Thank you.

Oh, and no, I'm not done.

And the railroad in Fauver looks like kind of got a little bit of steam from here and back from some of the representatives.

They're looking into it.

We kind of went through the congressional's office.

and Martin Directives.

I'd like to revisit something, if I might.

Back in

September and October of last year, we had numerous people show up and give some opinions on the presence of the Civil War statue outside the courthouse.

And at that time, Mr. Harvey was the chair.

He suggested that it was something that was on the front burner and then we would take it up and we would have more time.

I think that maybe now is the time to do that.

Personally, there's three things that I've noted that have happened recently that bring this to my attention again.

First is that I've had personal discussions with many constituents about

The second is that I went to the Nelson County Historical Society presentation in July.

Roger Glass did a presentation focusing on his great-great-grandmother who lived in Afton and was, in 1936, 114 years old.

and lived through the Civil War and it was interesting that at the time the Civil War started, the population of Nelson County wasn't too significantly different from what it is now.

There were almost equal population of whites and enslaved colored people in Nelson County at the time that the

Civil War Star.

And that was a little eye-opening to me.

I had no idea that that was the case.

There were over 6,238 enslaved colored people in Nelson County at that time.

The presentation was wonderful and I commend the Historical Society for doing that.

The third thing that happened is that

In July 8th, Judge Dorsey in Roanoke County, in a letter to Roanoke County Board of Supervisors, stated that in its present form and its present location, that the Civil War statue, which is almost identical to the one that we have and almost identical in location, was, quote, an impediment to the administration of justice.

judicial fairness and neutrality without a hand of prejudice.

There's a legal, intellectual, and moral imperative to move this statue with all deliberate speed.

And that hit me particularly hard because it was a perspective, again, that was an additional one from what I'd had before or previous to that.

The Virginia Board of Historic Resources in June endorsed a resolution to facilitate removal of statues.

And we also have numerous successes across the Commonwealth from every part of the Commonwealth to have statues that have moved on and been relocated

I'd like for us to have a discussion about that here and consider where we're home for the statue that now stands outside the courthouse.

That statue to me represents tragedy.

The tragedy of men who go to war.

One-third of the people eligible for military service in the South who were white died in that war, that civil war, and many more in the North died too, much greater population.

Now, the reasons men go to war differ, and there are always many reasons, and there's even more reasons

Why people try to get other people to go to war.

But that war doesn't occur without slavery.

There is no civil war without slavery.

And slavery is based on a lie.

A lie that one man is better than another man or a woman.

It's lives like this that often cause many problems that we face.

Now that war, Lincoln said that if you believe in God and you believe that God controls history, you have to believe that that war was the price we paid for the existence of slavery.

Now 100 years after that, people in Nelson County, some people,

Some people in Nelson County put a statue on the front of the courthouse, the representative of democracy and freedom and equality and all men are created equal.

While that statue was put up, segregation exists.

Jim Crow laws existed.

Jim Crow is based on

the lie of racism too that one person is better than another person.

Now I came to Nelson County 40 years ago and as a teacher, the first thing I noticed when I was a teacher, I went into this school, into the cafeteria.

I taught in New York City, I taught in Rhode Island,

that there wasn't a single table at the cafeteria, that there weren't some white people, some black people sitting.

And in this time that people get to know each other, that those young people in Nelson County weren't taught not to be racist.

They learned it.

They learned that all people are equal.

Now I'd like to keep the statue and I'd like to have the statue, the inscription changed and I would like to have us recognize the contributions that all people made to this county.

Now if we could do that, that is acceptable to me.

But if we can't do that, we have to understand that that statue was there, was put there

to support segregation.

And then the war that it was talking about was fought because of existence of slavery.

We have to say goodbye to that tragedy.

As a nation, as a people, we have to move on.

And I honestly think that although I would

Obviously, this is always a delicate conversation when we talk about race, when we talk about the Civil War, when we talk about, you know, the impacts and how people feel.

And I think in most actions, my goal is always to see what is the goal.

You know, obviously, when we talk about Jim Crow law, that's a very sensitive topic for many people.

And we've lived it and we've solved it.

I didn't.

But many of those in this room have and have gotten to see it and how that has impacted them.

You know, the one thing, if the objective is to take that down in an effort to basically, and please tell me if I'm not taking this right, an objective to remove a symbol of a bad thing.

A symbol of a racist thing, you know, slavery, correct?

Which is a lie.

Right, certainly.

And, you know,

When we start doing that, you know, you're going to have this community of people who need, who need to talk about it.

I mean, we just objectively, we as a board just took down the statue or moved it, whatever it might be.

I'm concerned about, you know, how the community reacts.

I mean, I, you know, my family comes from both sides of the Congress.

My father's family fought in the union.

My mother's family fought in the CSA.

So, you know, and both had relatives die.

And that's something that brings a unique perspective, I hope.

When we talk about it, like I'm sure next month the room will be full of people and the topic's going to get heated and it's going to be more upsetting for different groups of people.

I'm concerned and how we can have this conversation and make it healthy and something that we can build on each other.

If we're going to be talking about this, actually, if we just objectively do that, we didn't take care of the overlying problem.

You know, if racism is the topic, then hey, let's talk about it.

Let's go at the heart of that.

You know, taking it down doesn't really take the root out, you know, of what that is.

You know, and how you can get somebody who says that's heritage, that's history, you know, getting them to think about it that way.

I mean, they might have a different kind of perspective of it.

You know, there's families here who've had dozens of people in their own name die in that war.

It was a tragic war.

You are absolutely right.

And I had family members die in it.

I've had

many friends and as a result obviously you know there's something there that is deep in all a lot of people and of course slavery what an intimate terrible thing that we paid for you know in bodies and I agree with that quote that Lincoln says you know my goodness we paid for that in what I believe the number was 750 000 Americans died in that war you know it was a lot um

I don't think this topic should be as simple as a leaving it up or tearing it down.

This is community conversation.

I agree with you.

And I truly believe that a rash decision by this board of taking it down would not give us good results.

And we would have a very, I would be concerned about a rebuttal from the community.

I mean, we also don't need to be the interpreters of history.

I mean, what I'm saying in this, yes, slavery is bad.

If we had a great resolution right now, absolutely.

But what I am saying is that all of a sudden we don't want to be

We can always.

Mr. Barton, please.

I'm pretty much wrapped up.

And I want to let Mr. Parr speak to this.

So I want to start with a quote that I have in some notes.

I'm very sympathetic to what Reverend Rose had to say.

This was after last year's meeting.

I understand the feelings of seeing the statue, but to me, it's important that that statue is not a statue of a general.

It's a statue of a soldier and soldiers that paid prices for a long time.

End quote.

Anybody know who that was?

That was Skip Barton at last year's meeting.

talking about this statute being appropriate.

You just had another quote a minute ago saying that statute was put there to support segregation.

And I heard similar comments spewed on the news by someone last year in an interview on the courthouse steps, the same information.

But do you all, part of the story is getting lost in how that statute came about.

There was a little old lady in Shipman who had a cemetery on her property of Confederate soldiers and over the years that cemetery got overgrown and it was inaccessible and she tried to get a group to come out and clean up the cemetery.

And it was determined at that time that the cost of cleaning up Ms. Perthes'

would be so much that it wasn't worth it.

So she decided to share an effort, head up an effort to collect funds to have a memorial in place.

And at that time, Nelson County was one of two counties in the state that did not have a Confederate memorial in the county.

She raised money.

I know there was a cemetery, I can't remember who it is, that did the headstones in the county back then.

He gave money.

Louise Payne's brother.

Anyway, they all got the money together and there was some state funding as well.

That was the purpose of the memorial, was to replace the cemetery that could no longer.

It joined

A number of other war memorials that are on county property.

Right now we have, this is one of several war memorials that we have on property.

But I want to say my opinion is irrelevant.

I was elected to represent the West District of Nelson County and not the household of David Parr.

I've said this last year and I'll say it again, local governance should not be based on volume.

It should be based on mass.

And the monument at this courthouse, like I just said, is one of many war memorials on the property.

And it does not memorialize a Confederate general or glory days gone by.

It is our somber memorial to honor our local residents, both white and black, who gave the ultimate sacrifice for this county that we all hold dear.

And our love of Nelson County should be what unifies us

and not what provides us.

Now we want to have a discussion about adding an additional memorial, which has been talked about for a long time, to recognize other Nelsonians.

I'm completely open to that discussion, but I'm not going to sit back and let this memorial be held hostage for those discussions.

Thank you, Board.

I'd like to speak to this myself.

My intention on bringing this up was not to decide if the statute should be removed.

My intention is to determine whether it's an appropriate place for such a monument outside the court of law.

at his my intention.

What that monument represents to each of us and to people I think is gonna be very personal, but what it represents to a court of law is that it commemorates a basic injustice to the people of the country

and also, it also celebrates a war that was fought to dismantle the United States of America.

There was the Union and then there would have been Federacy.

A court of law is dealing with federal laws

It is my opinion that adjacent to a court of law there is absolutely no reason, no positive reason to have a memorial that represents the division of a country and a division of the people

and therefore I would like to offer a directive and my directive is that that we assess where would be an appropriate location for the monument in a way that honors its history

in a way that does not in any way jeopardize the equal protection and the equality of people under the law and the pledge of allegiance to our United States of America.

So

In every case where statues have been relocated, they have not, quote, been torn down.

They've been relocated.

Communities have looked for suitable locations for them.

And many people in many institutions and many places have stepped forward and said, yes, we'll take that.

In the instance of Roanoke College, stepped forward and said, yes, we would love to have the monument.

In our county, I do not know who would want to house and put on display and put up the monument, but I think that it would be a really good exercise for us to see

and I think that's up to the community.

I think if the community thinks that our court of law is the best location for a Civil War monument, I've been to the community.

But I still believe that it is not.

And an appropriate location for this that honors its history I think would be

A noble effort.

I'd like to add another directive that we don't do a thing.

Big things as it is, it's been there, and it's wasting staff's time and county money to do anything other than that.

If you don't like it, then let's put on a referendum.

Have a referendum.

Let the people of the county vote.

You know, this is a very, very

Sensitive thing.

And it's not as simple as let's move and tear down.

It's a community growing or not.

I mean, some people's interpretations on one side feel some sort of way about the relatives who died.

And obviously there are those who are hurt.

I'm very hesitant to make a decision of moving it.

And that's not even going to be a sensitive thing.

It's not going to be easy.

You know, I'm open to continuing the conversation to some degree on how it is we can support those who feel bad.

As Mr. Parr mentioned, adding to I'm right there with you, you know, add to it.

Let's celebrate those who who have got liberated.

You know, I think that would be a huge thing to do.

You know,

Just making the blanket coat thing and saying that the entire community feels one particular way, you know, that's not accurate.

for suggestions of or for volunteer locations for such a monument to see what the community could bring forth that would both honor this and

and come up with something that might be beyond our ability to do by consensus because it does give, it does empower the community to come up with a solution that would not require consensus by this.

And then of course we could decide whether that's an action we would want to take or not.

If I may, two, possibly three times since you started your directive, Ernie,

You've started a sentence with I'm not here to talk about removing the memorial or I don't want the memorial removed.

And in the same breath, you finish that sentence with you want to establish or have a directive for the county to discuss where it should be put, where you can't put something somewhere else unless it's moved.

I think we're putting the cart before the horse.

And by all means, we need community input

We need stakeholders involved and we need to take our time and discuss where the best location is for the memorial at that time.

I appreciate your comments.

I appreciate your interpretation of what the memorial stands for to begin with.

What you just said, what does the statute stand for?

You told the story, but I've heard other stories about why that statute is where it is.

That complete went counter to what you said.

But what I was suggesting is that, and I think it's valuable and it's quite possible we still might be able to do it, is we talk about

So often slavery was a lie.

It was something that people in order to command the labor of someone else pushed forth and it was accepted and it became part of our society.

Then we fought this war and people fought in that war for all different reasons.

I know that.

But the war happened because of slavery.

And then we moved to a period of segregation and Jim Crow that was also based on a lie that people are somehow different than other people or better than other people.

All I want us to do in this discussion, and we don't even have to do anything, is to say that we recognize that we need to move on from that and recognize, like,

Chairman said that that statue is where all men are created equal.

It's in the seat of government.

It sits there and came about because as human beings we're foul and we lived a lie.

and some people, and we all have suffered from that lie.

We continue to suffer from that lie.

And we just need to stay, all right, enough.

We're gonna move on because we gotta do better than what we're doing.

And all in our society, all I hear is it's that person's fault, it's that person's fault, and it's usually a person who's different than us.

I just, we have a chance

Nelson County, to make a statement that, all right, you know, we recognize that that person isn't a bad person.

You know, get caught up into something.

Recognize that.

Say it.

We see it.

We know it.

And we're going to move on from that.

And not a people

It's not just about Black folks having to look at that statue.

It's about all of us moving on.

You talk about the future.

Well, let's move on.

Let's forget it.

And let's recognize that that sort of thing hurt us all.

It crippled us all for generations.

You know, I don't want to

I have no intention of winning any sort of argument.

I don't have any intention of changing any of your minds.

Any final comments from anybody?

So I'm still new at this game.

It was just counted by Mr. Harvey.

I mean, the directive

is so broad brushed that I don't think you could just tell staff to go look for other locations and tell the community.

I mean, by you making this statement, I'm sure the community is now going to volunteer locations.

I am certain of that.

I'm certain of that.

This is a community discussion, and it can't just be something as simple as just us making a decision on this.

It's the heart thing, and it's the gut thing, and it's personal.

I wouldn't suggest doing that kind of directive if you want to have some kind of community conversation.

I think that given what a deep and personal issue this is with everybody involved,

that there is a certain amount of discomfort with dealing with such an issue.

But I also think that we are representatives of our people and we've been

put in a position to make difficult decisions and that is our responsibility.

I think I feel it's our responsibility to make decisions when they're difficult.

I'm not going to make a motion today.

I would hope that if there are

If there are ideas in the community of appropriate and honorable locations for such a monument that is not where it stands currently, I would love to hear those ideas.

This doesn't have to be a motion.

You can be rational.

We can be rational.

I think, you know, it's something we need to be talking about, which is good.

Mr. Parr?

Yes.

Mr. Harvey?

Yes.

Yes.

Mr. Reed?

and more supervisors.

First order of business is public comment.

If you intend to speak on any of the issues that are included under public hearings, this is not your time to speak.

If you want to speak about some other issue before the board, this is your opportunity.

So if anyone would like to speak during public comments, I'll open the public comment period.

Lowe's public comment period, and Rwanda public hearings.

So this is a request for a special use permit for a banquet hall on properties owned by A1 Agriculture.

It's located at 8761 Irish Road in the Central District.

This parcel is just under 320 acres in size.

The applicant is TAW Construction out of Ashland.

The owner is Magic Mountain Farm owned by Randy Sklar.

The property is currently being utilized for agricultural and residential purposes.

A bakewood hall is defined as a facility for hosting public and or private events, including but not limited to weddings, receptions, social events or parties, and or workshops, which is used as a venue for social, cultural,

The applicants are proposing to construct a 4,496 square foot structure to be utilized as a banquet hall.

The Planning Commission public hearing was held on June 23 at which there were six speakers in opposition to the proposal.

The Planning Commission requested information including a full site layout, the size of the proposed structure, the proposed entrance location with VDOT's comments, frequency of events, traffic management plan, and requested that the owner be present to address questions and concerns.

Attach with your report as the response from the applicant.

You also have a packet of public comments we received by email.

Three of those are just in front of you tonight, so we received those after your packets went out.

In total, from all your email public comments, there are six in support of the project and four in opposition.

And one of those four said they were not opposed to the barn, they were just opposed to the entrance location.

Zoning and vicinity is A1.

There are no 100-year floodplains on this property.

The two dwellings on the property are accessed by two separate entrances on Irish Road and Rock Springs Road.

The proposed entrance to access the Banquo Hall is located on Church Lane.

I received comments from VDOT today, which you also have the email in front of you.

The intersection site distance plan sheet dated August 6, 2021 demonstrates the proposed entrance location satisfies VDOT's minimum requirements for a commercial type entrance and no site distance easement is required from adjoining property owners.

The sewage disposal system will be required to be designed by an engineer and approved by the health department.

and the well will be required to be approved by the Office of Drinking Water.

Because land disturbance is proposed to exceed one acre, an erosion and sediment control plan is required, as well as a stormwater management plan through DEQ.

The property is located in an area designated rural and farming on the comprehensive plan, which would promote agricultural uses and compatible open space uses, but discourage large scale residential development and commercial development that would conflict with agricultural uses.

The Rural Farming District would permit small-scale industrial and service uses that complement agriculture.

At their meeting on July 28th, there was a motion to recommend approval with the conditions listed below.

The motion failed with a tie vote of three to three.

Opposing votes indicate that the request is not compliant with SUP requirements from the zoning ordinance, which you also have in front of you this evening.

I'll go through the conditions that were recommended for approval.

A final site plan in compliance with the plan dated July 13th shall be approved by all appropriate agencies with the entrance location on Church Lane.

Parking area and structure be screened with landscaping from adjoining properties and roadways.

Lighting be directional and glare shielded to prevent pollution to adjoining properties, roadways, and the dark night sky.

Amplified noise shall be directed away from roadway and adjoining properties.

and these additional conditions were submitted by the applicant.

The owner or event manager will be on site for each event.

Large events, which are 70 or more cars, limited to three per week in the months of June and October.

Large events limited to three per month in March, April, May and September.

Large events limited to two per month in January, February, July, August, November and December.

Sunday through Thursday, Amplified Noise does not start until after 12 p.m. and stops by 9 p.m. with the event ending at 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Amplified Noise does not commence until after 9 a.m. and stops by 10 p.m. and the event will end by 9.

Traffic Control will be in accordance with the Event Traffic Management Plan in accordance with VDOT requirements and the Church Worship Services and associated activities held in the facility

are exempt from the limited number of activities and amplified noise commencement time, traffic management and termination time still apply.

One last item I want to point out is after discussing with the owner last week, as some of you probably know that once a special use permit, should it be approved by the Board of Supervisors, the special use authorized has to be established or any construction authorized be commenced and diligently pursued.

within a year from the approval date of the permit.

The Board of Supervisors does have the authority to grant extended time to that, and so tonight, if the specialties permit is approved, the applicant's requesting an extension of two years for a total of three years to complete the project.

That's all I have for you tonight.

So you said how many acres does this sit on currently?

Just under 320.

320.

And so the particular ask that he has is basically it's going to be a venue.

They were Phillip approval,

That was two central representatives in the north.

Now, another question is, as it relates to this particular land, it's zoned A1, correct?

Yes.

Okay.

And on A1, obviously, there's many things that you're allowed to do, correct?

I mean, like you can do farm brewery, farm winery, and there's no limitation on the size of a home someone can build, correct?

That's correct.

Yes.

Bi-Rite events.

What is Bi-Rite?

Yes, so social temporary events are Bi-Rite used in the agriculture district.

That's with the caveat that you can only have 12 such events a year, less than 300 people.

Got it.

Correct.

And they could

Okay.

Randy Sklar.

The address is 8,761 Irish.

This is the general design of the barn.

Close to a barn we can get it and this is the proposed entrance there on Church Lane and the distance from each road.

The barn sits down lower, you know, topology doesn't show it here, but try to tuck it away as much as we could from neighboring properties and people that have a new site.

Fairmont Trees on the back side and on the front side along Church.

We did get notice from the VDOT that it would prove it.

Yeah, so the property runs along Irish and then it turns down Church and then down Rock Spring and basically everything you see there, yellow box with the

It's down in the bottom, well, center, bottom where they...

Yeah, where it says Rock Street, New York City.

Right, exactly, yeah.

So there's an existing driveway you can see where it says Irish Road is a driveway above that that's been there for, I don't know how long, probably since long before we were here.

And then there's a new driveway, well, it's an old driveway that we re-carved in down at the bottom.

where that arrow that points down from the barn, it pretty much lines, does it go to the right a little bit?

And then there's a house down, new house is right there where that red dot is, roughly, actually a little bit further down.

Show me.

Yeah, so the house, the new house is gonna be about right there, and then as a driver it runs along this

Royal Trees, and connects right there to Rock Spring Road.

But the new entrance, this entrance would not be, there's a road that comes through and then by these barns and then up the back side, but this would not be an appropriate location and neither would this.

This is the best option that we were able to come up with.

I think it's also important to note that Route 29 runs up here and it doesn't matter if you're coming north or south, it leads you down Irish and then turns right and then right again, right again into the drive.

So where's 6?

6 is right here.

And so you come in, you turn right, and you turn right, and you're done, and it will direct all traffic back.

One of those buildings, it says 800 feet.

Yeah, so this house right here belongs to Byron.

He's been renovating it.

He's currently living in our, so that's up here, the house that's on the property.

He thought I was going to kick him out and I said I don't have any purpose to do that.

And so he stayed and all along he'd been staying there.

for the last 18 months.

And I said, you know, as long as you eat.

I don't pressure him and I enjoy it.

Become a friend.

So I think he's a really nice fella.

We're planning on doing landscaping, anything that's disrupted, but around the barn area, we would want to put nice trees and plants.

And if we needed to put up a barrier here of trees to help Byron, he's probably the only person outside

I have a sight of it.

When I stand down here, I can see the top of the steep steeple on top of the church.

So obviously when it's erected, it'll be higher.

But I don't have a problem putting a row of trees.

I don't want to obstruct their view if they want to see it.

It's really.

It can go either way, as far as I'm concerned.

You know, I want to do it right for the neighbors.

Any large events that we have, we're going to hire an event management group to direct traffic out.

So this could be a rough term right here.

So we want to have safety for the community and for the people coming to visit.

And that's in the plan as well.

We could redirect them a different way, but I really don't want to send traffic down this

Everybody going in this direction.

Willing to work with the church on their schedule of any events.

I understand there's some events that can't be planned, such as a funeral.

Most of our events are going to happen in the evening, naturally with weddings.

And there may be conflict.

And so that might be a case for putting up a barrier.

Trying to create opportunities for people in the community for work.

Byron Sun, to chop wood for fire or whatever.

We'd have a fireplace in there for a 12-year-old, make some scratch money for that.

That'd be great, I think, for him and anybody else in the community.

And I've invited as many people as is interested over to fish in the pond.

I've got fishing rods, and some have taken me up on that.