HomeMy WebLinkAbout11 12 2019 PC MinutesAlbemarle County Planning Commission
FINAL November 12, 2019
The Albemarle County Planning Commission held a public hearing on Tuesday, November 12,
2019, at 6:00 p.m., at the County Office Building, Lane Auditorium, Second Floor, 401 McIntire
Road, Charlottesville, Virginia.
Members attending were Tim Keller, Chair; Daphne Spain; Jennie More; Karen Firehock; Bruce
Dotson; and Pam Riley.
Members absent: Julian Bivins, Vice -Chair; and Luis Carrazana, UVA representative
Other officials present were David Benish, Planning Director; Carolyn Shaffer, Clerk to Planning
Commission; Scott Clark; Rachel Falkenstein; Michaela Accardi; Andrew Knuppel; Andy Herrick;
and Bart Svoboda.
Call to Order and Establish Quorum
Mr. Keller called the regular meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. and established a quorum.
From the Public: Matters Not Listed for Public Hearing on the Agenda
Mr. Keller invited comment from the public on other matters not listed on the agenda. Hearing
none, he moved on to the Consent Agenda.
Consent Agenda
Mr. Keller asked if any commissioner cared to pull an item from the consent agenda. Hearing
none, he asked if there was a motion for acceptance.
Ms. Riley moved to approve the consent agenda. Ms. More seconded the motion, which was
carried by a vote of 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from the vote.)
Public Hearing Items
Agricultural and Forestal District Reviews and Additions
Mr. Keller said there would be a series of public hearing items for the Agricultural and Forestal
Districts (AFDs) and asked Mr. Herrick if he needed to read them all in.
Mr. Herrick replied that there could be a single public hearing but that there should be separate
motions for each of the items.
Mr. Keller asked if he needed to read all of them.
Mr. Herrick replied that Mr. Keller should identify the eight matters. He said if the intent was to
have a single public hearing, it would be good for him to identify each of the matters that will be
the subject to the public hearing.
Mr. Keller read aloud the list of AFD reviews: AFD201900003 Buck Mountain District Review;
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AFD201900004 Bucks Elbow Mountain District Review; AFD2019000005 Chalk Mountain District
Review; AFD201900006 Fox Mountain District Review; AFD201900007 Jacobs Run District
Review; AFD201900008 Sugar Hollow District Review; AFD201900009 Yellow Mountain District
Review; and AFD201900011 Yellow Mountain Addition -Albert.
Mr. Scott Clark said the list included the final seven of the eleven districts that had been up for
review in 2019. He said they also had one addition, which was a review of the situation with the
policy on district reviews. He recalled that in November 2018, the Board of Supervisors directed
staff to look at five-year district reviews (rather than ten-year) for those districts that contain
parcels that have no development rights and that are in the Open Space tax category. He said
staff has been following this since the earlier round of review that came through earlier in 2019,
in the summer. He explained that for districts that are in this situation, staff will recommend a five-
year review period for the districts that are not going to stay in the standard ten-year period.
Mr. Clark said that after the Board approves the district reviews, for those districts that are in the
five-year group, the Finance office will notify those particular landowners of their options for
qualifying for use evaluation in the intervening period before the Board chooses to act, or not, on
the possible withdrawals or removals five years from current time. He noted that during the current
year's round of reviews, no one is being removed from the districts, but that the possibility was
being set up for 4-5 years from current time.
Mr. Clark said he would quickly cover the seven districts under review and would leave time for
questions from the Commission.
Mr. Clark said Buck Mountain AFD is a 627-acre district that was originally created in 1989. He
said there was a withdrawal request for the two parcels totaling 151 acres. He said there were
some parcels that are in the Open Space tax category and have zero development rights, and
therefore this AFD was up for a five-year review. He said the District Advisory Committee
recommended renewal for the five-year period.
Mr. Clark said the Buck's Elbow Mountain AFD was created in 2009 at just over 3,200 acres. He
said there were four parcels in this district that are in the Open Space category and have no
development rights. He said this was a five-year review with no withdrawal requests for this, or
any of the other remaining districts. He noted that landowners can withdraw up until the Board
acts, and so there could be further withdrawals between current time and the December Board
meeting around that matter. He said the District Advisory Committee recommended renewal for
the five-year period.
Mr. Clark said the Chalk Mountain AFD was located south and southwest of Crossroads and is
about 1,600 acres. He said the only parcels in this district that are in the Open Space category
have development rights and therefore, this AFD could be renewed for a ten-year period, at the
committee's recommendation.
Mr. Clark said the Fox Mountain AFD is located in the northwest of the County near the
intersection of Brown's Gap Turnpike and Blackwell's Hollow. He said it was a 436-acre district
with one parcel of 26 acres that is in the Open Space category without development rights. He
said the District Advisory Committee recommended renewal for the five-year period.
Mr. Clark said the Jacob's Run AFD was just over 1,000 acres and is located northwest of
Earlysville. He said there are four parcels in this district in the Open Space category and no
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development rights, and therefore is another five-year review period. He said the District Advisory
Committee recommended renewal for the five-year period.
Mr. Clark said Sugar Hollow AFD is one of the County's larger districts at 5,000 acres located
near the Sugar Hollow Reservoir along Sugar Hollow Road. He said there is one parcel of 21
acres with no development rights in the Open Space tax category. He said the District Advisory
Committee recommended renewal for the five-year period.
Mr. Clark said Yellow Mountain AFD was 748 acres, and all the parcels that are in the Open
Space tax category have development rights. He said therefore, the appropriate review period is
ten years. He said the District Advisory Committee recommended renewal for the ten-year period.
Mr. Clark said there was one addition request for the Yellow Mountain AFD which would add a
parcel that is directly adjacent to the district, which is 14.5 acres and contains almost 9 acres of
important soils. He said the property has four development rights and is therefore eligible to be
added, on top of its soil quality. He said at the District Advisory Committee meeting in October,
the committee recommended approval of the proposed addition.
Ms. Firehock said she was not sure that she entirely understood Mr. Clark's memo. She said Mr.
Clark had mentioned the Board of Supervisors directing staff to implement a plan to review
districts for a five-year period rather than ten years, notify the landowners that their parcels may
be removed at the end of the five-year period, and that they have the option to withdraw from the
Open Space Use Evaluation now to avoid rollback taxation and fees when the parcel are removed.
She said she understood how the law works in that if one prematurely withdraws from the
designation, they must pay back taxes. She said she did not understand the way the statement
was written because it implied to her that in five years, the landowners could be denied renewal
and would then have to pay five years of back taxes.
Mr. Clark explained that the five-year period was precisely to avoid the rollback problem. He said
people have been accepted into the districts and if the Board removed them immediately with no
warning, they would be hit with the five-year rollback.
Ms. Firehock asked if the five-year period was then to let the landowners know that the Board
intends to remove them and was giving them a five-year notice.
Mr. Clark replied yes, adding that they can either find another way to qualify through Agricultural
and Forestry, or they can go back to paying full -rate taxes so that, at the end of the five years,
they've paid full -rate taxes, but they don't have to pay the rollback fees.
Ms. Firehock said that, to be clear, in five years, a landowner has not found a way to qualify for a
renewal, for example. She asked if the landowner was out at that point and did not have to pay
rollback taxes. She said the County was saying that they didn't think this landowner was qualified,
as they had no development rights and therefore it wasn't the landowner choosing, but the County
choosing.
Mr. Clark replied that it is the Board's choice.
Ms. Firehock said she was literally taking the statement the way it is written and asking if Mr. Clark
was saying that, in five years, if the landowner cannot come up with a way to qualify, they then
must pay rollback.
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Mr. Clark replied that this was the reason why the County was notifying them immediately after
the Board's action to say that if they don't have another way to qualify, their other choice is to
return to paying full -rate taxes now, year by year. He said they would be paying one full year's
payment per year rather than, at the end of five years if staying in Open Space and then getting
pulled out, they will be paying five years at once of back taxes plus fees.
Mr. Clark said that the original thought was that the Board wanted to simply remove the
landowners but realized in looking at the taxation regulations that if they did this, they would have
no authority to excuse them the rollback. He said they must give the landowners the opportunity
to pay regular taxes for five years, year by year, rather than having to pay everything all at once
at the end of the five years.
Ms. Firehock asked if the Board would like them removed, but that the Board didn't have a way
to simply remove them.
Mr. Clark replied no, stating that the Board could simply remove them, but the Board did not want
to, without warning, hit people with the equivalent of 6-8 years of taxes. He said the Board could
end the entire district, if they so choose, as part of their legal ability, but did not choose to do it
that way.
Mr. Dotson said this answered his question.
Mr. Keller opened the public hearing.
Mr. Neil Williamson (Free Enterprise Forum) that as this had become a five- or ten-year tradition,
he mentioned that there was a public hearing for AFDs and no such hearing for a conservation
easement. He pointed out that both have equal taxation benefit and that it seemed as though it
would be logical to involve the public when taking land off the rolls.
Mr. Williamson said the Free Enterprise Forum has grave concerns with the issue Ms. Firehock
spoke of. He said the idea of the conservation districts, originally, was to protect the areas and
was similar to renting rather than buying, making the conservation easement last forever. He said
this wasn't forever, but was for ten years, and the ideas that are enumerated in the
Comprehensive Plan talk about habitat fragmentation.
Mr. Williamson expressed he was lost, explaining that if there are 100 acres in the middle of
Forestal District that have no development rights, and it has been a part of the Forestal District
but perhaps the development rights were parceled off as they could, that piece goes under regular
taxation and is prime for mega -mansion development. He said it would result in habitat
fragmentation, which was the very thing that the Comprehensive Plan speaks of not wanting to
have happen. He said the cost -benefit analysis was lost on him, acknowledging that the numbers
were not that great for what the County was gaining, and that the acreage was not insignificant.
Mr. Williamson said he was betwixt and between because those property owners have done
everything they were supposed to, and the County changed their mind. He said he didn't think it
was beyond the Planning Commission's purview, since it is charged with reviewing the districts,
to say that they have concerns about the policy. He expressed appreciation for the proactive way
that the County was trying to notify landowners, but that notifying them that they are going to be
hit in five years with rollback taxes wasn't what he was expecting out of local government.
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Mr. Keller closed the public hearing and brought the matter back for discussion and action.
Ms. Firehock said she often reminds herself that she is not the policymaker of the County, but
merely the advisor. She said for many years, she has said that the purpose of AFDs is not merely
to protect the County from excess development in the rural area, but to provide a district or region
where people can practice agriculture and forestry in the same area. She said this means that
things such as the noise of tractors and logging trucks going down the road are understood to be
appropriate and helps ensure there is a market or commonality of use in one region.
Ms. Firehock said when someone signs up for the AFD, under the County's guidance and state -
enabling authority, and then is informed by the County that they are only interested in the districts
if they have to do with development rights, would mean that the County is letting people down.
She said the County would not be upholding the spirit, nor the letter of the law, as it pertains to
the purpose of AFDs. She said she was deeply opposed to the idea of the five-year setup that the
Board has. She said again that while she didn't make the policy in the County, she was not in
support of enabling someone to only have five years.
Ms. Firehock noted that the Planning Commission does not decide whether people stay in or out
of an AFD, and that they make recommendations. She said the Board has made it clear that they
want to get rid of those that they say do not have value. She pointed out there were other values
provided rather than simply keeping or moving a development right by keeping the land in
agricultural and forestal use, even if they are not making a giant profit or preventing a development
right.
Ms. Firehock said that as someone who lives in the rural area and cares about it, she was very
upset about the way the County has gone about this. She said she was not blaming staff, as they
were working within what the Board has advised them to do, but that she simply did not agree
with it, and that she said this the last time it came up. She said she did not know what she could
do about it because she was not the policymaker, but wanted to register her deep disappointment
in it, adding that it was a disservice to the rural landowners.
Mr. Keller asked if staff could provide more background. He said at the Agricultural and Forestal
Advisory Committee meeting, there was a lengthy discussion about this, and Mr. Clark had
provided a thoughtful background on where staff has been and how they have been continuing to
work to see if there would be a way to solve the dilemma of a case where a person has property
in the Open Space category and is doing something that is positive and supportive of the
environment, yet is still being removed, as opposed to individuals who are not meeting the spirit
of what the Open Space category was about.
Mr. Clark said he would back up to several years before and how the County got into the situation.
He said the origin of the problem was after the County began doing its use value taxation
revalidation every other year, there were many more people who were motivated to find ways to
qualify for use value taxation. He said many of those people were not farming or doing forestry.
He said they had 21-acre to 25-acre parcels, most of which had been fully developed with no
development potential left.
Mr. Clark said that for several years, a large proportion of the parcels that were added to the
districts were those already -developed parcels that were not being farmed because this gave
people a route to the Open Space tax category. He explained that whether or not they were
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actually limiting development in the rural areas by being in the district, and whether or not they
were doing farming (which most were not), if they met the criteria that they were in the district and
had the minimum acreage, they qualified for the Open Space tax category.
Mr. Clark said the concern became that this wasn't equitable to the people who were actually
doing farming, forestry, or Open Space protection and getting the conservation -related tax benefit.
He said it wasn't fair that other people whose land was already fully developed were getting that
same benefit.
Mr. Clark said that about two years before, the County changed the criteria for adding new land
to the districts. He said this was how this began -- that it wasn't a matter of looking for people to
pull out but was a matter of changing the County's practices for how they add people to the
districts.
Mr. Clark said as part of the recodification of Chapter 3, which administers the AFDs, the County
added criteria about development potential. He said the districts mainly operate through limiting
subdivision, but that their goals are much higher and broader than this in trying to protect areas
for agriculture. He said they work is by preventing subdivision, and so parcels that don't have any
subdivision potential don't make a difference when they join the district as far as the operation of
the code goes. He said they are not being prevented from doing anything because they have
already done it. He said this was the first step -- ceasing to take parcels that didn't meet that
criteria.
Mr. Clark said the second step with the Board became that some Board members wanted to undo
those steps and remove those parcels. He said that as part of that, Ms. Mallek asked staff (he,
Mr. Kamptner, and Mr. Lynch) to look for other ways that people might qualify, perhaps by staying
in the districts or staying in the Open Space tax category, so that the Board wouldn't have to follow
up on the option of pulling them out.
Mr. Clark said the problem was that, while there are clear and consistent qualifying criteria for all
of the other use value taxation categories (e.g. certain amount of income, acreage for farming,
forestry plan, certain amount of acreage for forestry, horticultural business for the Horticulture
category), there weren't any programs that were consistent over time in their application and
effects that the Finance office could look at a form and determine that one would be doing Open
Space conservation while another was not. He said it was all too inconsistent and changed too
much too frequently, with programs that came and went.
Mr. Clark said one example was having a conservation plan in a soil and water district, but that
this could mean many different things because they were not all the same and was not something
the Finance Department is equipped to analyze and make judgment calls about, whereas every
other category has very clear, qualifying criteria.
Mr. Clark said that, if staffing permits, they hope to pursue more options for finding ways for people
to qualify for the Open Space category for landscape protection, habitat restoration, native
meadows, and other things that the County likes to see people doing, but that there wasn't a way
to work this into the AFD program, which mainly operates by limiting subdivision in the rural area
zoning district. He said there are limitations to how much can be adjusted within the restrictions
of the AFD program but that, longer term, staff has hope of opening more options for supporting
people who are doing conservation work in the rural areas.
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Mr. Keller asked if there was a motion.
Mr. Herrick again suggested that the items be considered separate. He said it was his
understanding that Mr. Clark had separate suggested motions for each of the eight items.
Ms. Spain moved that the Commission recommend renewal of Buck Mountain District for a five-
year period, minus the requested withdrawals.
Mr. Dotson seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from
the vote.)
Ms. Riley moved that the Commission recommend renewal of Bucks Elbow Mountain District for
a five-year period.
Ms. Spain seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from the
vote.)
Mr. Dotson moved that the Commission recommend renewal of the Chalk Mountain District for a
ten-year period.
Ms. More seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from the
vote.)
Ms. More moved that the Commission recommend renewal of the Fox Mountain District for a five-
year period.
Mr. Dotson seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from
the vote.)
Ms. Riley moved that the Commission recommend renewal of the Jacob's Run District for a five-
year period.
Ms. More seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from the
vote.)
Ms. More moved that the Commission recommend renewal of the Sugar Hollow District for a five-
year period.
Mr. Dotson seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from
the vote.)
Ms. More moved that the Commission recommend renewal of the Yellow Mountain District for a
ten-year period.
Ms. Spain seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from the
vote.)
Mr. Dotson moved that the Commission recommend approval of the addition of AFD2019O0O11
Yellow Mountain Addition -Albert.
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Ms. Firehock seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from
the vote.)
Mr. Keller thanked staff for their work. He commented that the organizational framework for seeing
how the process works was much clearer in the staff report, and that he appreciated the
organizational format they evolved to, which was helpful.
Ms. Spain said that the last time a group of AFD reviews came before the Commission, they had
also approved what the Advisory Board recommended. She asked why this was a legislative
decision and not an administrative decision.
Mr. Kamptner explained that it was set up in the state code that every addition or review to a
district requires a public hearing. He said it is a very detailed process and was set up in the 197Os
when the state code was originally written, which was mandated to follow that every single step
requires a public hearing and legislative act.
SP2019O0O1O Rivanna Solar
Mr. Clark presented the staff report. He said this was a request to amend a previously approved
Special Use Permit (SP2O17OOO18) to extend the expiration time by three years for that already -
approved solar energy facility, with solar panels occupying approximately 90 acres on a 149-acre
parcel.
Mr. Clark said the facility is located at the intersection of Thomas Jefferson Parkway, Milton Road,
and Buck Island Road. He said it is directly adjacent to the existing substation that is near that
same intersection.
Mr. Clark presented a panorama image of the property as it looked like a couple years before. He
also presented the conceptual plan for the use, noting it was unchanged and was still the same
plan from the previous permit application. He indicated to gray areas, explaining that they are
envelopes in which the panels themselves might fall, and the landscaping area out by 53 on the
Entrance Corridor to help protect that area.
Mr. Clark said the original request was approved in March of 2018 and since that time, the
applicants have been pursuing necessary permits at the state level with the Department of
Environmental Quality. He said that, as it turns out, any such facility must go through that process,
and it is very time consuming and more than the two years of the County's standard approval
process. He said the applicants are requesting a three-year extension to allow them to finish their
state permitting process and begin construction before their permit expires. He said nothing else
about the proposal was changing.
Mr. Clark said given that the proposal was not changing, the County's policy for the rural areas
have not changed, and the area is significantly the same, there is only one recommended change,
which is to the last condition to change the date of expiration.
Mr. Clark said that, in summary, the conditions have not changed, and extending the permitted
time for three years will not introduce new impacts. He said staff did not find any adverse public
impacts from extending the approval of the already -approved permit.
Mr. Clark said he had all the conditions for the Commission to review. He noted that the element
changing was the last condition (Condition 11) to change the expiration date. He presented the
ALBEMARLE COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION —November 12, 2019
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possible motions to the Commission and offered to answer any questions.
Ms. Spain asked if the delay was because the permitting at the state level took longer than the
applicant had expected.
Mr. Clark replied yes, adding that the applicants found that getting through the length of the
permitting process, with the documentation they must provide and the public input process for
that, was taking longer. He said if they do not get the work done within the two-year period, their
permit will expire. He said they would not be able to get through the permitting process and
arrange for construction in that amount of time.
Ms. Spain asked if the applicant could not have started the state process before they got the
decision.
Mr. Clark replied no. He said the applicant had to get the local approval and then the County had
to document that.
Ms. Spain asked if this had to come before the state process.
Mr. Clark replied yes, adding that it would have been unwise of the applicants to go into the state
process without having the detailed conditions already in place and knowing what they were held
to. He said the County had to provide County signatures on documentation of the approval before
they could get through their process.
Mr. Keller invited the applicants to come forward.
Mr. Charlie Johnson with Apex Clean Energy Charlottesville addressed the Commission, noting
that he was joined by Francis Hodsoll of SolUnesco, a partner on the project.
Mr. Johnson said that Apex Clean Energy consists of about 200 employees located in
Charlottesville. He expressed that Rivanna Solar was an exciting project for the company, as it
was a local project. He said Apex travels across the country to build renewable energy facilities,
take them to construction, and ultimately operate them throughout the life of the projects.
Mr. Johnson presented a map showing the amount of facilities Apex has under development,
construction, and operations for both wind and solar. He noted they were very active in Virginia,
with solar and wind projects in Southwest Virginia.
Mr. Hodsoll said he founded SolUnesco with his business partner, John Hillis, in 2015 when they
saw the market in Virginia starting to open up. He said during the period of the past four years,
they started 13 different projects in Virginia. He presented a slide about the project, noting that he
had started it 3-4 years before and that they sold the project to Apex in 2018 to jointly develop the
project with them. He said generally, SolUnesco's role in development is to get projects started
to identify land that makes sense, work with landowners, and then bring in companies like Apex.
Mr. Hodsoll said the applicants were before the Commission in February 2018. He said the project
is a 12.5-megawatt project that is roughly equivalent to 2,500 homes being powered. He said the
parcel is 150 acres, but the development envelope is 90 acres where, based on the conditions at
the County level, the applicants are allowed to place solar panels. He said they would expect a
project like this to have about a 35- to 45-year life.
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Mr. Hodsoll said that one of the benefits of the project and why they think it is a very good project
is that the substation is located nearby, and so the costs to interconnect to the transmission
system are competitive.
Mr. Hodsoll said the only other feature he would point out is that Ms. Sweeney (the landowner)
has entered into an agreement to not harvest any trees within her parcel, which also is the parcel
along Thomas Jefferson Parkway to the left of a dark buffer. He said they were basically
completely buffering along Thomas Jefferson Parkway between the planting right along the road
and the conservation easement they have with Ms. Sweeney.
Mr. Hodsoll presented a slide showing more detail that goes into the buffering plan that they
worked with County staff on to make sure that the plan meets the County's requirements.
Mr. Hodsoll presented the conditions, offering to go through the details but noting that the
Commission had already reviewed and approved the project. He pointed out the only condition
that was changing, which was the expiration piece.
Mr. Johnson said that Mr. Clark had provided good details about the applicants' request. He said
he would highlight a few things that the applicants have been working on specific to the permitting
process. He said in 2018, they received approval from the County for the Special Use Permit and
that since that time, the applicants have worked closely with DEQ. He said they were currently in
permit review with DEQ through their permit -by -rule process. He said this was not the only timeline
item, but that the applicants expect to have approval by the end of the year.
Mr. Johnson said that along with this, the applicants have also worked with the Army Corps of
Engineers to delineate the site for wetlands. He said they have since committed, with their
application to DEQ, to also adhere to the 100-foot buffer from other fingers on the property, which
is the 100-foot buffer that is set in the County ordinance. He said the applicants were actually
buffering from all wetlands that they delineate, not just the County -recognized stream through the
project. He said the applicants have received determination that the wetlands have been
confirmed by Army Corps.
Mr. Johnson said that another set of details the applicants must work on in the meantime is a set
of expensive studies to allow for the design of the project. He said they have performed
geotechnical studies on the site and that they have flown the entire site for detailed imagery and
topography for aiding in the design of the project. He said the applicants have worked with third -
party consultants to help design the site.
Mr. Johnson presented some high-level construction target dates, noting that there was much
work to be done between the permit -by -rule approval and construction including final engineering,
securing offtake for power purchase from the project, lining up the financing (whether through a
sponsor or construction financing for purchase of the equipment), and final engineering for the
project. He said the hope was to be operational by mid-2021, at the very latest, adding that it
would hopefully much sooner than that.
Mr. Keller opened the public hearing. Hearing no comments from the public, he closed the public
hearing and invited the applicants to come forward again for questions.
Ms. Riley asked the applicants to further describe the power purchasing plan for the project.
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Mr. Johnson said that traditionally with utilities projects, utilities in the past have been most logical
purchaser for power, but as of late, they have seen a big push from the corporate market (e.g.
Facebook, Google) as those big corporate power consumers are very interested in solar and
wind. He said that specifically where they are on the grid, solar in Virginia and PJM is currently
very competitive. He said Apex has been reaching out too many parties and have been making
some headway, but that it was another step along the way to get into construction.
Ms. Riley asked if there was joint ownership at that point and if the intent for the future was that
Apex would be the sole owner.
Mr. Johnson asked if Ms. Riley was referring to joint ownership between Apex and SolUnesco.
Ms. Riley replied yes.
Mr. Johnson said that currently, Apex owns the project as the sole owner, but SolUnesco is
working with them as a contractor to finish out the development. He said at that point, it was tough
to say if Apex would own the project, expressing that they would love to be able to, but that they
pride themselves on being flexible with the market, as many customers would like to own the
projects themselves. He said it came down to the capital to be able to construct it themselves. He
said future ownership was unknown at that point and depended on the structure of the power
purchase agreement or potentially utility, if a customer wanted to own the facility in their market.
He said that no matter who the owner is, they would have to comply with the same permitting
regulations.
Mr. Keller closed the public hearing and brought the item back for discussion and action.
Ms. Riley moved to recommend approval of SP2O190O010 Rivanna Solar with the conditions
outlined in the staff report.
Ms. Spain seconded the motion, which carried unanimously 6:0. (Mr. Bivins was absent from the
vote.)
Work Session
ZTA2O190O0O6 Rio-29 Form -Based Code
Ms. Rachel Falkenstein (Principal Planner) and Ms. Michaela Accardi (Senior Planner) presented.
Ms. Accardi explained this was the last of four work sessions that year to receive the Planning
Commission's feedback on the Rio-29 Form -Based Code. She said they would be presenting the
draft framework with the document (which an outline or structure for the ordinance) was
essentially, followed by a series of discussion questions. She said staff would also close with a
reminder of the next steps for the process.
Ms. Accardi presented a list of project goals. She said the first goal is to support and incentivize
development that aligns with the vision in the Rio-29 Small Area Plan, which includes allowing
development that meets the vision through a by -right development process, developing a code
that works for the present day, and also allows for the area to transition over time.
Ms. Accardi said the second goal is to establish clear expectations for residents, property owners,
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and developers in the County for new development in the area
Ms. Accardi said the third goal is to find the appropriate balance between regulation and flexibility,
and the goal in regulation is to achieve the desired form with the flexibility to accommodate market
changes, creativity in design, and a mix of uses.
Ms. Accardi said the fourth and final project goal is to develop a draft ordinance through an
inclusive and transparent community engagement process. She said staff is aiming to foster an
understanding of zoning and form -based code across the public through the process.
Ms. Accardi said that this originated from the Small Area Plan in that there are several
recommendations related to this, including updating the zoning ordinance to allow for the desired
form and mix of uses and pursuing form -based code as a mechanism to promote the desired
form.
Ms. Accardi presented the project timeline, explaining that they had worked through a series of
staff technical working groups that have conducted research and case study analysis. She said
they have a steering committee that has met several times and held the summer engagement
process while collaborating with the Board of Supervisors and Planning Commission.
Ms. Accardi presented the outline of the document that staff shared with the Commission. She
said the first section includes the Regulating Plan consisting of the zoning map, use table, a series
of drafted definitions (noting they may differ from existing definitions), and an affordable housing
requirement.
Ms. Accardi said the second section of the document has General Standards, which is the largest
section and the bulk of the document with a range of standards from building to architectural and
amenity standards.
Ms. Accardi said the last section of the document, Incentives, is the newest section staff has
worked on between the last work session and the current one, noting that staff would provide
more information on this later in the presentation.
Ms. Accardi said the Regulating Plan includes the zoning map that contains several character
areas: The Core (noted in red), Flex (noted in white), Edge (noted in blue), and Amenity Space
(noted in green). She said the idea behind it is that the character areas dictate permitted uses
and general standards applicable to each property.
Ms. Falkenstein said regarding the topic of use, there was a work session with the Commission
about that topic, among others, in August, and staff brought to the Commission a couple topics of
interest that they felt were key decision points. She said the first was around the topic of Light
Industrial, explaining that they had heard a lot of interest from stakeholders and from the public
about having a more refined definition of Light Industrial that might allow some of the employment -
type uses that would have a small fabrication component, but not impact adjacent residential.
Ms. Falkenstein said they had also discussed ground level uses and whether they felt there should
be a requirement for retail commercial on the ground level. She said at the time, staff was
recommending that the ground level be constructed to allow those uses, but not requiring the
uses in the immediate code.
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Ms. Falkenstein said there was broad support from the Planning Commission for the
recommendations and that staff had also brought to the Commission a broad list of categories of
uses rather than the very specific uses they have in the draft framework. She said in the
framework, it was represented in a table, adding that staff had also updated some use categories
and definitions that will need to be further refined, but serve as a starting point on some of the
new topics that were discussed for uses.
Ms. Accardi said the first section also included an affordable housing piece and, reflecting on
community engagement staff had heard in August that year, they heard from 68% of respondents
that they were in favor of an affordable housing requirement, noting that this group was largely
based in community members and not people from the development community. She said in
September, staff brought the question to property owners and developers in the area and that
47% were in favor of a 15% affordable housing requirement, while 33% were not in favor, and
20% were unsure or wanted more information.
Ms. Accardi said that following the community engagement, staff's recommendation was that, if
adopted as an optional overlay, one of the following categories or percentage of units at a certain
AMI would apply. She said this would provide for some amount of flexibility for property owners
and aims to provide a range of affordability in a development. She said staff heard general support
from the Planning Commission for the approach, but some uncertainty about the appropriateness
of the specific percentages.
Ms. Falkenstein said Section Two of the framework covered building standards and that it was
one of the lengthier sections that includes the topics of height, ground floor ceiling heights, block
length, build -to lines, and stepbacks. She said these standards would be applied to the character
areas, so there would be different standards for each based on which character area a property
fell under.
Ms. Falkenstein said staff's engagement around those topics included support for smaller block
sizes and taller heights (especially in the Core area). She said there were discussion with the
focus groups about what an appropriate height would be, and staff brought to them what the
Commission had discussed a by -right height of four stories. She said there was pushback on this
because the focus groups felt that this would have some negative implications. She said the
steering committee also felt that a more appropriate by -right height would be 5-6 stories, which
reflected building code requirements and code construction for stick -built architecture.
Ms. Falkenstein said that when staff brought to the Commission in August the topic of building
height, staff had initially recommended a five -story by -right height with up to six stories for bonus
factors. She said that most Planning commissioners had said that a more appropriate height
would be four stories by right, five stories for bonus, and six for special exception.
Ms. Falkenstein said that based on the feedback staff heard from the focus group, staff revised
the height recommendation and was a question they wanted to engage the Commission on. She
said that within the draft framework, staff recommended that buildings in the Core must be at least
three stories tall and that five -story building will be allowed by right, with up to six stories with
bonus factors and possibly up to seven stories with bonus factors and special exceptions. She
noted that they have held questions that evening until the end of the presentation and that staff
would come back and discuss this with the Commission, as it was different than what it had
recommended initially.
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Ms. Accardi said that in reflecting on street standards, in July, staff had worked with community
members to identify key street amenities that should below on each street type. She said that with
the focus group, they talked about funding redevelopment and streets, with 35% of respondents
citing that funding redevelopment in the area would be the most significant financial impact, which
was largely related to building out an internal street network in Rio-29. She said that related
County infrastructure was cited as the most meaningful incentive to stimulate development.
Ms. Accardi said that with this engagement and research in mind, staff's recommendation was to
use the Small Area Plan street sections as standards in the form -based code and use the
information from community engagement for the amenities on each street type. She said local
streets inside the Core are recommended to be subject to higher street improvement
requirements, as this is the area that would be more pedestrian friendly and have mixed use. She
said staff had received support from the Commission on their recommendation, though they had
introduced a new term called "destination streets" and were told not to add a new term. She said
staff has dropped this and instead state, "local streets inside the Core are subject to higher street
improvements."
Ms. Accardi said that in the draft framework, staff outlined the four street types that are included
in the Small Area Plan: boulevard, avenue, local street, and through corridor (Route 29). She said
the draft framework also includes a street section components table, which breaks down the street
sections that are in the Small Area Plan, as well as a new streets amenities table that reflects
community engagement and staff research.
Ms. Falkenstein said that the topic of parking is also addressed in Section Two. She said with
community engagement with this topic, staff talked more broadly about what appropriate types
are and received good feedback from them. She said in the focus group, they talked about staff's
approach for minimum versus maximum parking and that there was a mix of feedback. She said
broadly speaking, the focus group's developers and property owners wanted maximum flexibility
and so there was pushback on a maximum parking standard.
Ms. Falkenstein said that when staff came to the Commission in September, they had talked
about removing parking minimums, which was staff's recommendation, and instead creating
parking maximums for the Rio-29 area as a reflection of the fact that the area is currently
overparked. She said this was to also encourage shared parking and the "park once" approach.
She said the Commission had supported this concept in theory, although they thought of it as
more of a long-term goal and were concerned that the County's infrastructure for alternative
modes of transportation other than driving wasn't quite there to do away with parking minimums
altogether.
Ms. Falkenstein said staff's recommended parking approach is to have a minimum parking with
a lower threshold that what the County currently has, of one space per 1,000 gross square feet
of development, or one-half a space for hotel rooms, with a maximum not to exceed 150%. She
said the maximum would only be applicable to private, on -site surface parking so that if the parking
will not be shared, it will be surface parking that is capped but if there is willingness to share
structured parking, there will not be a cap. She said they would also allow for the minimum parking
to be met off -site so that if there is a shared parking agreement with a neighbor or if district parking
available for use, it could be counted towards the minimum parking.
Ms. Accardi said regarding architectural standards, staff began community engagement by
conducting a visual preference survey with the community in August. She said this was a
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recommendation in the Rio-29 Small Area Plan and helps to identify appropriate architectural
styles for the area. She said staff had also brought a question to its focus groups in September
about the ARB review process, since many of those people move through the process with their
development projects. She said staff consistently heard that those who attended the focus groups
recommended codifying Entrance Corridor guidelines as part of the form -based code process.
Ms. Accardi said when staff came before the Commission in October, they had recommended
incorporating Entrance Corridor guidelines into the form -based code to eliminate the need for
ARB review and, as an interim approach, adopting a County -wide Certificate of Appropriateness
for the area that would focus on the topics of transparency, materials, and color; facade
manipulation; and lighting which are topics that are currently in the Entrance Corridor guidelines.
Ms. Accardi said this recommendation was brought to the ARB before the Planning Commission
and that staff heard overall support and willingness to work collaboratively with staff to develop
the County -wide Certificate of Appropriateness. She said from the Commission, staff heard
concern about architectural standards being too prescriptive that could limit creativity and
flexibility in the area, and that also eliminating the ARB would be a loss in valuable input and
expertise.
Ms. Accardi said in reflecting on those different perspectives that were heard throughout the
process, staff has updated the recommendation and was a question that they would have at the
end of their presentation. She said staff recommended developing a new category of Certificate
of Appropriateness that would provide architectural standards on the topics that are in the
Entrance Corridor guidelines with a modified recommendation that parcels with frontage on Rio
Road continue to be reviewed by the ARB for a first review, while other interior parcels are
reviewed administratively.
Ms. Falkenstein said that regarding amenity spaces or standards (the term staff is using to
reference public open space), through the community engagement process, staff worked with the
community to identify what the appropriate components of amenity spaces would be. She said
they then spoke to the focus groups of the development community about how they think about
flexibility in amenity spaces and what some options could be for allowing flexibility. She said there
was strong support for a cash -in -lieu -of option for people developing near the amenity spaces
that were identified on the plan to provide some funding to support development of adjacent
amenity spaces rather than providing it all on site.
Ms. Falkenstein said staff's recommendation was that they use the framework from the Rio-29
Small Area Plan to identify required amenity spaces but in addition to that, to have a percentage
of amenity space required on site on each development, along with the cash -in -lieu -of option
discussed. She said the Planning Commission had supported this overall, but there was some
concern that there wasn't enough amenity space identified in the Rio-29 Small Area Plan. She
said there was also a discussion about the importance of design standards so that the spaces
were not just unprogrammed, green lawn spaces.
Ms. Falkenstein said the revised recommendation is to incorporate some additional amenity
spaces within the Regulating Plan, pointing out that these were included in attachments to the
staff report as well as in a presented screenshot. She indicated that there were spaces in the
southeast and northwest quadrants that were added by staff, as well as supplementation of
existing spaces. She said they would continue to have the requirement for all developments that
they must have a minimum area on site dedicated to open amenity space.
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Ms. Accardi said the last section was Incentives and that staff worked with the focus groups in
September to understand what key incentives would be beneficial to the development community
that were also aligned with project goals. She said this helped generate the first table in the
Incentives section.
Ms. Accardi said staff presented the draft idea to the Steering Committee for a points -based
system that is proposed in the framework and conceptual matrix and that they heard overall
support for it, though there was acknowledgement that perhaps the strongest incentive would be
tax incentives in public -private partnerships for some of the buildout of the spaces, such as streets
and public spaces in the area. She said, however, that this was not something that can be included
in a zoning ordinance, so staff has this in mind as adjacent policy that people have mentioned is
necessary.
Ms. Accardi said the draft framework includes a bonus points table, which includes a list of
additional non -required building elements where an applicant could warrant additional
development rights. She said the proposed points -based system would make them eligible for the
second table with bonus categories. She noted that the points allocations are a first draft and are
illustrative, and that they aim to solicit feedback on the approach. She said staff anticipates
working further on this.
Ms. Falkenstein said staff had five questions for the Planning Commission that evening, noting
they had also been included in the staff report. She asked if there were first any clarifying
questions the Commission had for staff.
Ms. Firehock said she was looking at the schedule for when staff would be developing some of
the other standards, generally running from January through June 2020. She said she didn't think
the County had standards for street tree planting and if this would be lumped in.
Ms. Falkenstein replied that if there was a desire for this, it could be included. She said currently,
there is a planting strip requirement and a list of species. She said if there was a desire for
something more specific, it could be incorporated.
Ms. Firehock said she would like to recommend this, and that this could be done as part of looking
at LID and other things in 2020. She said about 50% of urban trees last only 8 years, and the
reason is that they are planted in "tree coffins" that are too small. She said there were many ways
that the County could ensure that the trees that are planted in this new development are more
likely to last (unlike the ones at Stonefield that are dying).
Mr. Keller said he was recently in Falls Church and that with several developments that have
occurred in the public -private realm in the past decade, the vegetation is in dismal condition. He
said it was important to have vegetation that would live on.
Mr. Keller asked what the pleasure of the Commission would be as far as having members of the
public weigh in.
The Commission agreed to hear from members of the public.
Mr. Keller asked if there were members of the public who cared to speak.
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Ms. Nancy Hunt said she was on the Steering Committee for form -based code. She noted that
the optional overlay issue is a major one, with several people on the Steering Committee who
spoke up in favor of making it mandatory because if the County wants this to happen, mandatory
does have a bigger impact that optional overlay. She said this was with the understanding that
the affordable housing issue complicates a mandatory (or makes it impossible).
Ms. Hunt said if the County goes for the optional overlay (which was the staff recommendation),
it becomes very important to make sure that there is a sufficient structure that supports the
attractiveness of using form -based code.
Mr. Neil Williamson said the Free Enterprise Forum has been adamant in its support of an optional
overlay from the beginning of the process. He said he tended to agree with Ms. Hunt regarding
the need for incentives because if it doesn't "pencil out," it doesn't get built. He said if the County
makes it mandatory and it doesn't "pencil out," it doesn't get built.
Mr. Williamson said that by creating an optional overlay and allowing for some level of creativity
by the development community, this was the goal following the understanding that any form -
based code must have some form -based. He said ABG referred to it as a "form-mometer" that
talks about how high the dictates are, and allowing some flexibility would be helpful.
Mr. Williamson said there had been some concerns raised that day regarding the phasing of
projects. He said he didn't believe the concept has bene presented in the four work sessions and
throughout the process, intends to prohibit the phasing of projects based on his understanding.
He said he was still trying to dig into where that concern came from. He said if the concern is a
reality, it is a concern for his organization, but that he hadn't found it yet. He said there is a
recognition that phases are how things happen, and they need to allow for the development to
happen in phases. He said if it was required by an entire superblock, it was not going to happen.
Mr. Williamson said from his discussions with staff and others, he believed the intent was phasing,
but that he wanted to make sure this is what they get to when they codify it. He said he sincerely
appreciated the outreach staff had put forth in meeting with several groups that were not all
sycophantic regarding planning and being open to the often -critical critiques of centralized
planning. He expressed that the project had been successful thus far.
Mr. Morgan Butler (Southern Environmental Law Center) said he would start by picking up with
where Mr. Williamson left off, which was offering kudos to staff. He said the point he wanted to
raise was that the clarity of the information that had been presented was very impressive. He said
form -based code is a complicated topic and one that is hard to get the average member of the
public to engage on to understand. He said that though there was much work still to be done, the
way that staff went about the project was impressive and easy to follow.
Mr. Butler said he also wanted to add one point regarding the building standards section of the
draft. He said that building standards are very essential in trying to accomplish many of the goals
the County has with form -based code, particularly in the Core areas where walkability, urban
vibrancy, and human scale are important. He said one component of this that the SELC believed
was worth considering was the size of the building footprint. He said the County has very large
buildings that sprawl across a wide area, making it much harder to achieve that walkability or to
have that human scale.
Mr. Butler noted that in Places29, there are land use charts that apply to the Center, as well as to
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the areas around the Center. He said that depending on the category (whether a community
center, destination center, in a center, or an area around a center), those include maximum single
building footprints that range between 25,000 and 80,000 square feet. He said SELC wanted to
suggest that as part of the building standards discussion, considering some sort of maximum
building footprint might be worthwhile. He said that perhaps there was an argument that the block
size in the building standards section starts to get at this, but based on the block sizes that were
being presented, these would be far beyond what Places29 had recommended for areas like this.
Mr. Butler acknowledged that there was still much to work out and that SELC looked forward to
being involved in the process. He expressed his appreciation for the work and clarity that staff
has provided thus far.
Mr. Keller asked the Commission if there were questions for staff before going through the
discussion questions.
Ms. Riley said she would be interested in the staff response to Mr. Williamson's and Mr. Butler's
comments regarding the ability to do phased development as well as having a standard for
maximum building footprint.
Ms. Falkenstein said that with regard to the question on phased development, it was staff's intent
that phased development be allowed so that if there was a large multi -acre property that only
wanted to do a portion of the property under the form -based code, that this would be allowed to
happen that way. She said staff understands that there are very large parcels in the area that may
not all develop all at once. She noted, however, that staff's recommendation for the form -based
code being optional is not so that the developer can pick and choose pieces of the form -based
code to apply to their property. She said a developer could pick a piece of their property to apply
the form -based code to, but not the other way around.
Ms. Falkenstein said regarding the second question about the building size, staff's intent was to
get at this by capping the block sizes. She said if this was a topic that there is interest in staff
looking into, they could see if it would make sense to have a building size maximum there. She
said staff did not think it was necessary in their work so far with the required street network and
the maximum block sizes with pedestrian passage breaks. She said there would be architectural
requirements along the street frontage to ensure there is not a feel of a massive building. She
said staff has not included a footprint maximum so far.
Ms. Falkenstein said the first discussion question was about building height. She said the question
for the Planning Commission is, `Do you support staffs recommendation of a by -right height of
five stories in the Core, with up to seven stories for bonus factors and special exception? If not,
what revisions do you recommend?"
Ms. Falkenstein said in the Core, there is a three- to five -story by -right building height, six stories
with bonus factors, and seven stories for bonus factors and special exception. She said the reason
for this was due to the strong response staff heard from the development community, property
owners, and the Steering Committee about general building code and construction and that 5-6
stories was the natural building cutoff. She said if they cut it off at 4, it would be limiting the
redevelopment potential and could potentially prohibit people from wanting to redevelop.
Ms. Falkenstein said the recommendation was also due to the current zoning allows a building
height of 65 feet, which was the current underlying commercial zoning that exists today, so there
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was concern about taking away potential developability with a form -based code, and especially if
it were optional, it might be a disincentive.
Ms. Falkenstein invited the Commission to offer their thoughts and if they support the
recommendation.
Mr. Keller asked how the process was moving along with the affordable housing policy and plan.
He said the reason he was asking this question was that within the Commission, there were
several different feelings about whether there should be bonus density given for affordable
housing or not, and whether this should be a separate issue possibly with an affordable housing
overlay to the whole area as opposed to allowing for density bonuses. He said he had also heard
from the commissioners about being able to target more distribution, and about revisiting the cash
payment in -lieu -of and whether this should be an opt -out.
Mr. Keller said that if the form -based code project was going to be concluding while the housing
is coming towards a conclusion, he had no problem with answer the discussion questions as
written. He said if not, he would take a more conservative approach.
Ms. Falkenstein replied that both processes were tracking concurrently, and that form -based code
was slightly ahead of the affordable housing policy and where they are with recommendations.
She said she believed they would have preliminary recommendations in early 2020 but wasn't
sure when they would have final recommendations. She deferred the question to David Benish
(Chief of Planning).
Mr. David Benish said he did not know the exact date for the affordable housing policy but that
the projects were tracking at about the same time and within one year. He said there would be
time to monitor housing as it moves forward with the development of the ordinance.
Mr. Keller asked if the affordable housing policy comes in with points that could be incorporated
with form -based code, that there would be enough of a correlation in the schedule to take this into
account.
Mr. Benish replied that the Housing Director wants to come back to the Planning Commission
after her initial round of public input in February. He said she would be reporting back to the Board
of Supervisors in January and then back to the Commission. He said by that time, staff will have
a better sense of what the schedule is moving forward.
Mr. Keller said the reason he brought this up at this point was because, given the interest in
affordable housing the community, getting the bonus points for that would allow for a higher
building height and could sway himself and others on their answer on that. He said this was why
he was interested in how those might coordinate.
Ms. Accardi noted that staff was working directly with Stacey Pethia on this portion of the project
and that she would help bridge the gap, if there is one, between the housing policy and the form -
based code.
Mr. Dotson said that on the question of height, he was willing to support the staff proposal. He
said that, in some ways, it was academic, recalling back to the 1980s and West Main Street. He
said the City conducted many studies and programs trying to achieve higher density there. He
said it had not been until recent years that this has happened, pointing out that this was 30 years
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later, and that the City has UVA and the UVA Hospital there. He said he supported the proposed
heights and that though he hoped it wasn't academic, it could be in the short term.
Mr. Dotson said he had a question about what the staff proposed. He said he supported six
stories, and perhaps seven by special exception, but that he wondered that stories five and six
(two stories) for bonuses was worth at least considering in the sense of the County wanting to
provide more opportunity for people to volunteer to do good things. He said he couldn't truly
advocate this because he hadn't thought it through entirely, but that he merely wanted to put the
idea forth.
Mr. Dotson said that he thought it was ironic that when staff met with developers, one of the
problems they brought up was the high cost of land. He said that by allowing six stories, the price
of the old suburban land goes through the roof. He said the landowner would see this and try to
capitalize on it. He said it would be popular to those who own the land and less popular to those
who would have to buy the land. He said that nonetheless, he supported it.
Mr. Dotson said he had somewhat of a fear that, looking at the Core and Flex area, they could
end up with a "donut" because the Core has a few more requirements than the Flex area, but both
of them offer much more density than will be needed for quite a few years.
Mr. Dotson expressed that he felt there was a mismatch between this staff work on form -based
code and Andrew Knuppel's work on residential holding capacity. He said staff was talking about
having six stories, and five stories in the Flex area, yet when Mr. Knuppel projected residential
holding capacity, he is very low and anticipating little to no redevelopment in the same area. He
said he wished a conversation could take place about this to reconcile the two.
Ms. More said she agreed with most of what Mr. Dotson said. She said she had a separate
question about the incentives, acknowledging that the chart that staff had presented was for the
sake of discussion. She said she thought she had read that if there are points, one of the
incentives would be to take away the need for a stepback. She asked if this was correct.
Ms. Falkenstein replied that it was.
Ms. Accardi said that staff recently went to a form -based code training in between their two work
sessions with the Commission and reflected on whether architectural standards could accomplish
the same things as a stepback in terms of making a building more in a human scale in its design.
She said this was something that hadn't been fully developed at that point, but that staff had
proposed the idea of being able to no longer have to do a stepback and perhaps being able to do
fagade articulation or a higher degree of transparency (i.e. more windows) to avoid blankness and
towers. She said sometimes a stepback doesn't accomplish this either and was related to
incentives, but that staff had more work to do on this.
Ms. More said this was the only thing that stuck out to her other than some of the things Mr.
Dotson mentioned, such as incentivizing for allowing more stories but then potentially take away
some things that might make that taller building not appear as looming over pedestrians. She said
she otherwise supported why staff was headed the way they were in that section.
Ms. Firehock said that she was all about height, expressing that height was a positive thing
because the County needed to have enough density to make this area vibrant and thriving.
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Ms. Firehock said she wondered about Mr. Butler's comment about massing and the block size
(not just the height). She said a situation where there is a lot of height by right, and long blocks
with big chunks of buildings, could create a more intimidating landscape. She said she hoped that
within this district, they would end up with various heights along the road so that there would be
diversity along the streetscape instead of just giant massing. She said that some on City Council
have complained about what West Main Street turned into, but that it looked just like what the
City put in their Comprehensive Plan many years ago. She said it was as if they got what they
asked for, and that she was cautious to find some way to not allow all the buildings to be one
giant monolith.
Ms. Firehock said that one thing that struck her was that there were some topographic changes.
She asked if it made sense to allow taller buildings in places that are already dipped down more.
She asked if staff could investigate this, because a taller building in a dipped -down place wouldn't
have the same effect as a shorter building closer to the rise where Rio Road and Route 29
intersect.
Mr. Keller said that Mr. Dotson had summed up his feelings. He said he would be more
comfortable if everything was a story lower to begin with and then the County could see what the
success is over time. He said he could be convinced that one story was not worth fighting over.
He said there were several cities around the world that have kept themselves to six stories and
that they have a great deal of density from having six stories. He said if the County were to build
out a significant portion of the area at six stories, they would be able to allow for many people.
Mr. Keller said he could see the thought process that staff went through. He asked staff to remind
him what the developers were saying about two stories of concrete with four stories stick built on
top. He asked if this was the break point and why there was talk about six stories or less and then
higher than that, one would use a different construction technique.
Ms. Accardi replied that staff had heard that the first story could be podium structured with four
stories on top of stick built and, in some cases, five stories. She said the argument for a more
natural mixed -use environment would be a first -floor podium built and then four stories above it,
which is where the five -story to six -story range was advocated to be crucial for a mixed -use
pedestrian area.
Mr. Keller said that if staff hadn't already done so, it might be worth looking at some of the
apartment building standards that have been coming out of Germany for the past decade in which
every unit has light from multiple directions. He said he was thinking about what Ms. Spain was
talking about with views, which brought the Commission to the other discussion of shorter views
versus longer views. He said there were many psychological studies that have shown the
importance of daylight coming from different directions, depending on the climate and orientation.
He encouraged staff, in thinking about the block size and building form, to do a quick search for
Munich and Berlin because he believed that this, along with a zero -run-off standard, would be
worth looking into.
Ms. Firehock said they could consider a green rooftop.
Mr. Keller said Germany had figured out many ways with cisterns and didn't have to only be green
roofs. He said he knew that they were discussing buildings but that those things he mentioned
did have some relation to size and possibly other things that one may want to consider for bonus.
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Ms. Riley said she appreciated many of the comments from other commissioners and that she
didn't have anything to add. She said she supported the staff recommendation.
Ms. Spain said when she initially saw the seven -story recommendation initially, it was a knee-jerk
reaction against it because of her concern about the viewshed. She said she could see the
reasoning behind it and appreciated Ms. Firehock's comment about the topography being figured
in. She said she didn't know how this would be included as far as directions to the developer (e.g.
a way to tell them they can build a seven -story building if it was below a certain topographic level).
Ms. Falkenstein said if they were doing seven stories by special exception, they could develop
some criteria that they would look at, and that topography could possibly be one of them.
Ms. Spain said she agreed with her colleagues' comments.
Ms. Accardi said the next question was about amenity spaces. She said Ms. Falkenstein had
shared earlier that staff revised the Regulating Plan, and the question was, "Does the revised
Regulating Plan and associated framework address the Commission's desire for additional and
connected amenity space in Rio-29?" She said the recommendation was that staff added
additional amenity space in the southeast and northwest quadrants in order to achieve a more
distributed network of greenspace across the four quadrants. She said that there are site
requirements for amenity space and in 2020, staff anticipates working on standards for each of
the types of amenity spaces so that they are programmed according to their use.
Ms. Spain asked where staff mentioned taking cash -in -lieu contributions for the greenspace. She
asked if this was part of what was being discussed.
Ms. Falkenstein replied that it wasn't part of the discussion question, as staff felt there was strong
support for this at the last work session. She said within the framework recommendations, staff
included that, within a certain radius, properties could opt in to pay some funding to develop
amenity space rather than putting it on site.
Ms. Spain said her concern was that developers don't all put their greenspaces together to create
something large and unmanageable as opposed to having the smaller pocket park spaces
distributed throughout the area. She said she thought this was the only possibly drawback of
allowing the in -lieu contribution.
Ms. Riley said she appreciated staff adding the additional amenity space and distributing it. She
said it did seem counterproductive to allow a cash -in -lieu that would work against this. She
recognized that this was also hypothetical, expressing she was unclear as to if they were requiring
that a certain amount of amenity space be provided. She asked if staff for clarification.
Ms. Accardi said the Regulating Plan has the greenspaces that are the areas staff determined
needed to be there. She said they could potentially move, depending on a site plan, but that this
portion and type of amenity space needs to happen in addition to per -parcel requirements. She
said what the Commission was seeing on the Regulating Plan was scaled back from actual
buildout. She said the cash -in -lieu option would not take away the amenity spaces but would
simply provide money to develop those spaces on site.
Ms. Falkenstein referred to page 15 of the framework, pointing out that the cash -in -lieu was
drafted so that a maximum of 50% of the required gross acreage of on -site amenity space may
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be substituted. She said if there is a property in the Core, there is a 10% amenity space
requirement, and only 5% of the requirement could be provided as cash -in -lieu -of so there would
still be a 5% requirement on site for amenity space. She said one couldn't opt out of all of it the
way the requirement was drafted.
Ms. Riley said the question staff was asking the Commission about wasn't approval or
recommendation of the approval for the table on page 15, but if they were asking something much
more general. She said she was asking for clarification about what staff really wanted feedback
on.
Ms. Accardi replied that the discussion question was responding to feedback that there wasn't
enough amenity space shown in the area. She said staff wanted to check in about that. She
encouraged the Commission to share their perspective and input on the other components of
amenity spaces, as staff could incorporate those in the next draft.
Ms. Riley said she was in general accord with the staff recommendation in the area. She said she
now understood that the cash -in -lieu wouldn't be counterproductive, so she was in support of that
as well.
Mr. Keller said he was supportive of the recommendation as well. He said he would be interested
in how staff develops cash -in -lieu across the board. He said that reflecting on Ms. Firehock's
earlier comment, he wondered whether the cash -in -lieu could be used in conjunction with Parks
to have something that would be a way to keep the system alive.
Ms. Firehock said she was in support of the recommendation but that she had a question for staff
to consider. She said the map showed chunks of greenspace and that she was wondering how
the County could thread some pathways across the landscape. She said by that, she was not
talking about skipping through the woods. She said in very urban areas where pathways have
been created between two buildings with benches and plants, it gives enough of a park -like feeling
and gives pedestrians a way to traverse the landscape without having to walk on the road. She
said there were nice sections in the draft about the streets, and that she was not asking to have
greenways everywhere, but that there should be some ways to thread between the buildings,
which would get at the massing problem.
Ms. Firehock offered the example of the Chicago River, where they required that buildings provide
access to the river, and that no one could build right to the lot line. She said one hotel did and
was made to take down part of the hotel and put the access in. She said she didn't want to
mandate that everyone has a passageway, but perhaps the green passageway could be an
example of a linear park.
Ms. Firehock said she works in an office building that is two stories, located about a block from
the County Office Building. She said there is no place for her staff to take a walk, sit on a bench,
or get under a tree. She said they tried to figure out a way to walk to the park that is far behind
them and determined it was a far and dangerous park. She said in thinking about luring people to
the area, finding greenspace or an "oasis" was very important.
Ms. More agreed with most of what had been said, as well as with staff's recommendation.
Mr. Dotson asked if the area the northwest of Berkmar Drive, adjacent to Agnor Hurt, was a piece
that was added, or if it had been there for years.
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Ms. Falkenstein replied that this space had always been in the Small Area Plan and is a piece of
property the County owns. She said it is currently undeveloped wooded parcel. She said that
Schools owns it and she wasn't sure what the plan was for it, but that staff thought it made sense
to have as a greenspace.
Mr. Dotson said all the other spaces are central or connected and that this space seemed like an
island. He said he questioned its utility in terms of contributing to the kind of place being
discussed. He said if it was to be used as expansion for the school, this was fine, but that it
seemed like a big piece of land in a poor location for being central greenspace.
Ms. Falkenstein said the next discussion question, relating to architecture, was, "Does the
framework and revised staff recommendation capture the Commission's desire for increased
flexibility in architectural standards?" She said staff was recommending a new category of County-
wide Certificate of Appropriateness that would apply to Rio-29 Entrance Corridor parcels. She
said it would provide architectural guidelines on the topics of transparency, materials, color,
fagade articulation, lighting, parking structures, and equipment service areas.
Ms. Falkenstein said staff recommended that parcels that front on Rio Road be given one round
of ARB review under the revised Certificate of Appropriateness, with final approval by staff. She
said this was in response to the concern from the Commission of losing the expertise of the ARB,
and that these were the high -profile properties in the area. She said all the other properties interior
would be reviewed and approved by staff in this proposed process.
Mr. Keller asked if Route 29 would still be under Architectural Review.
Ms. Falkenstein replied that the portions within the Rio-29 Small Area Plan would not be.
Mr. Keller asked if Rio Road would be, but Route 29 wouldn't be.
Ms. Falkenstein replied this was correct.
Mr. Keller asked for the rationale behind this.
Ms. Falkenstein replied the rationale was that Rio Road is the more walkable, pedestrian corridor
and that Route 29 is more of an auto -oriented corridor and will likely continue as such.
Mr. Keller said that this was under the Amenity category and so one would think it would be about
what someone is seeing as they are driving into the County.
Ms. Falkenstein said that staff could amend the recommendation.
Mr. Keller said they can think about it.
Mr. Dotson said in terms of the description that speaks about the Steering Committee's view that
the process of the ARB was too subjective, uncertain, and lengthy, not all members of the
committee shared that view. He pointed out that he believed it was the case that the ARB has a
member who is required to be a developer, which offers a certain kind of perspective on the
decision making whereas if it was simply one staff architect, that component would be missing.
He said that those people who were beating up on the ARB perhaps won't like the result if it is a
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single staff architect doing the review
Mr. Dotson said the compromise to have Rio Road be under the ARB the first time felt, to him,
like a "camel." He said they either keep the ARB, or they get rid of it, including on Rio Road (which
he noted used to be the "Urban Core" and that he was glad they were no longer using that term).
He said he would not support having ARB on Rio Road because the whole area should be treated
the same.
Ms. More said this was discussed in the last work session and asked staff to remind her what, at
the time, the ARB suggestion was.
Ms. Falkenstein replied that the ARB supported a Certificate of Appropriateness that was simply
staff approved, but staff felt there was pushback from the Commission on doing away with the
ARB. She said staff's compromise was to keep the ARB on some properties and not the others.
Ms. More said she felt that, with the exception of what staff was suggesting that was specific to
Rio Road, this was what was discussed last time where the ARB would work with staff in
developing what the expectations would be so that there would have been something the ARB
would have had a hand in to serve as a guide.
Ms. More expressed that she would still very much like to see the ARB involved. She said she
could understand the feelings about the lengthy process and though she didn't know what the
turnaround for everyone was, she knew that for some, it has been too long of a process. She said
perhaps this was because applicants weren't coming with the things they needed to have, and
thus they had to keep coming back. She said she has heard other stories where the process
moved swiftly, and so she wouldn't say that this was the fault of the ARB process itself. She said
she supported staff's recommendation.
Ms. Firehock said she agreed with Mr. Dotson's comments. She noted that part of the point of
form -based code is to make it easier to do what the County wants people to do. She said she
would like to see more innovation and diversity of architectural styles in the area.
Mr. Keller said he thought they had worked this out the last work session. He said he didn't think
they were talking about having the "camel" continuing after a year or so, but that it was a short-
term transition period in which he believed there was still merit.
Mr. Dotson said the "camel" was cobbled together to assuage competing points of view and that
it didn't necessarily fit or make sense.
Ms. Riley agreed with Mr. Dotson's position that they should treat the whole area similarly and
Rio Road would not be given one round of ARB review. She said otherwise, she agreed with the
staff recommendation.
Ms. Spain said she concurred with what others said. She reminded everyone that they worked to
get the area of Rio Road around the Meadowcreek Parkway declared an Entrance Corridor so
that ARB review would apply. She asked if there would be a significant gap between the edges
of the Small Area Plan and the beginning of where the Entrance Corridor is. She noted she didn't
know where the Entrance Corridor begins or whether it even matters.
Ms. Falkenstein said ideally, the criteria in the new Certificate of Appropriateness would reflect
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the current design guidelines, or that perhaps an updated design guideline category might allow
for different, more modern types of architecture. She said this had not yet been vetted. She said
there was some potential that it could look different in other portions of Rio, but there would still
be a level of architectural control.
Ms. Accardi said the next discussion question, regarding incentives, was, "Are the proposed
incentives and corresponding bonus categories appropriate for Rio-29?" She said staff was
recommending bonuses be provided for several categories including affordable housing units,
public and cultural amenities, underground parking facilities, bicycle storage, low -impact
development, or green infrastructure features, additional amenity spaces or trails, pedestrian alley
improvements, and green building design. She said that for those provisions, recommended
incentives include an additional story of building height, reduced stepback requirements, reduced
parking requirements, or reduced application fees.
Ms. Accardi noted that further work was needed to refine the specific point allocations. She said
staff wanted the Commission's feedback on the different categories for incentives and what they
would be able to accomplish for additional development features.
Ms. Spain said the plan looked good to her and that perhaps she was overlooking something.
She said the affordable housing units would be the most controversial, and the more time that is
spent on this, the better. She said she didn't think that the other incentives were particularly
controversial, although she would assume that low -impact development was simply part of the
development plan. She mentioned seeing green infrastructure as part of amenity space and that
she saw this as summing up the other topics that were already discussed.
Ms. Riley said she agreed with the staff recommendations on incentives. She echoed Mr. Keller's
earlier comments about the importance of the timing of the development of affordable housing
policy so that it is in step, or correlated with, whatever the definitions of the affordable housing
strategies are.
Ms. Riley said she knew that staff presented some general approaches to what percentage of
housing might be required (5, 10, or 15%, based on the level of AMI of the target population), but
that there were likely other areas that the County would be addressing in affordable housing
regarding longer terms that those properties are held affordable. She said they could be looking
at housing typology or some other ways that the housing strategy might impact what the ultimate
output is and what the incentives are regarding affordable housing.
Mr. Keller said he supported the staff recommendations and echoed Ms. Riley's statements about
affordable housing. He acknowledged that staff was thinking about this and that the "devil would
be in the details" of all of it. He said staff was giving it a good first shot after looking at many other
places.
Ms. Firehock said she didn't have a problem with any of the incentives. She said she knew there
was an advisory group for the project. She recommended that staff has a focus group with many
different developers and ask if these were truly incentives. She said as a planner, she has created
what seemed to be appealing incentives only to meet with developers and hear that they were
not good enough. She said the incentives should be vetted to see if they would move the needle.
Ms. More said she supported staff's recommendation. She agreed with Ms. Firehock about vetting
the incentives. She said she knew the points system was only presented for the purpose of
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discussion and would need much more work, but that when she looked at it, she didn't know what
it meant or how many points a developer would need to get another story on a building.
Ms. More suggested the points system be approached very carefully because although she liked
the idea of a very direct and clear points system, she wondered how easily it might be to do some
of the extra things and how many extra stories a developer would get, or if there would be a
situation where a developer got so many points, they couldn't even use them all. She asked staff
to consider all the scenarios and how they would translate.
Mr. Dotson said he supported the staff recommendation and that he had three things for them to
consider. He said there was mention of underground parking and asked if "structured parking"
should also be included, as this was preferred to surface parking and perhaps should be
incentivized.
Mr. Dotson said in terms of affordable housing, an interesting point to consider would be what he
calls "employee housing" as the County wants the area to be a place where people live and work.
He asked if there was some way to give incentive to provide housing appropriate to the wage
structure of the business going in so that someone could live upstairs over the store they work at,
for instance.
Mr. Dotson reiterated his earlier thought about building height, which could mean that stories five
and six are bonus stories, which would give more opportunities for bonuses.
Ms. Accardi said that, following up on Mr. Dotson's comment, staff has "live work" included in the
Residential Use category and could look at ways to incentive those that live above the work space
because theoretically, a live -work space was the style of the unit and wouldn't have to correlate
to the business owner being on the first floor and the person above as the employee, as they
were traditionally developed. She said staff would investigate this further.
Ms. Falkenstein asked the Commission to provide any other feedback they wanted to share
before going into the last discussion question (regarding the type of zoning), as staff would be
taking the draft to the Board in December. She said these discussion questions were targeted
ones where there was some disagreement between staff and stakeholders or that involved more
work as requested by the Commission. She said one thing that staff hadn't engaged the
Commission on yet was the type of zoning. She said the discussion question was, "Should the
Rio-29 Form -Based Code be implemented as an optional overlay, or should it replace the current
base zoning in Rio-29?"
Ms. Falkenstein said staff's recommendation is that Rio-29 be structured as an optional overlay
district, meaning that the County would create a new overlay for the entire area that would be
optional. She said the base zoning would stay and that most of it is currently commercial zoning
or planned development (i.e. shopping center) zoning. She said when a property owner wishes
to develop their property, they would have the choice to opt into form -based code or develop
under the current underlying zoning.
Ms. Falkenstein said staff was recommending this for a couple reasons. She said firstly, as heard
in the public comment from that evening, there is strong support from the development community
and property owners for the overlay to be optional to allow for flexibility. She said staff believes it
provides some incentives so that people may want to opt into it, and first and foremost is the
additional use and development rights being allowed with the recommended form -based code.
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She said currently, most properties cannot be developed with any residential without going
through a legislative approval process, so the proposed form -based code would allow for
additional uses and heights.
Ms. Falkenstein said that mixed use on site was something that most of the County's by -right
zoning doesn't allow for as it is separated by uses, so this was also an incentive. She added that
with an optional overlay district, the County can require a percentage of affordable housing in the
optional overlay because it is something that is enabled by the state legislation if it is optional and
not mandatory.
Ms. Falkenstein said lastly, an optional overlay is consistent with the project goal of development
that works for the current conditions of today but allows for transition over time.
Mr. Dotson said he was persuaded by the optional overlay.
Ms. More agreed, expressing that it would be a terrible mistake to not have it be optional.
Ms. Firehock agreed and said she had more comments about general topics after discussing the
last question.
Mr. Keller agreed with the optional overlay, adding he assumed that everyone was following what
was happening in Austin with form -based code and it being pushed back and out. He said that
thanks to TomTom, many people in the area like to think of Charlottesville as the "baby Austin,"
so it may merit thinking about this. He said when he reflected on much of what was heard that
evening, and Mr. Dotson's concern about the Center, the thought was around having transition
zones with height being considered. He said there were two ways to approach this, and staff was
choosing the optional overlay. He said the other thing to think about was different density zones
within this, and as they are exploring it (and depending on whether they get pushback on it), they
may want to reflect on this one last time.
Mr. Keller acknowledged that staff went through much of this when it was a Small Area Plan, but
since it has come up in a big way in another city, it may be worth staff going back and reflecting
on this.
Ms. Riley said she agreed with the staff recommendation of an optional overlay.
Ms. Spain said she also agreed with the staff recommendation.
Mr. Dotson said he agreed with what was described earlier, that the form -based code as an
overlay would be County -initiated. He said the landowner, developer, or builder would then not
need any further legislative approvals but would opt in to either the basis zoning or the form -based
code. He said they could do this for less than the whole parcel, but they could not cherry pick
provisions on the form -based code and combine those with standard. He said he wanted to be
clear about what the other features of the staff proposal are.
Ms. Falkenstein said this was correct.
Ms. Firehock said that Arlington has done a good job with in -fill development and increasing
density, but they also have some very tall buildings jarred right up against single-family structures.
She expressed that she felt for those people who lived in a neighborhood that is now
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overwhelmed. She said staff should consider adjacency and what some of the tall structures
would do, depending on where they are located, to adjacent communities. She said even if it was
a view from someone's backyard of a large tower that was not touching their property line, it
should be considered.
Ms. Firehock said there were interesting standards in West Palm Beach regarding their thinking
in terms of the lifecycle of buildings and trying to make it so that buildings can turn into other uses.
She said she had two examples of how they did this -- one being that with parking garages, they
required the heights within the garages to be at a certain height in the design such that structured
parking could be turn into residences. She said the County has dreams about alternative
transportation and though they were not there yet, down the road if there were structured parking
and the standards for how it was built such that it could be turned into a condo without having to
tear it down, it would complement the new transportation infrastructure later on.
Ms. Firehock said that West Palm Beach required hotels to have a higher height inside the rooms
because that meant that a hotel could be turned into condos later and give the building a greater
lifespan. She said considering standards could allow the zone to be a truly transitional one,
expressing that it would go through many iterations in her lifetime and beyond.
Mr. Keller said these were good ideas and were the types of things that could be bonus points in
trying to incentivize developers.
Ms. Accardi explained the next steps for the project. She said staff would bring an updated draft
(with the Commission's input incorporated) to the Board of Supervisors on December 18, and that
staff would be working through a draft scope that refines the January to July timeframe that they
have shared with the Commission. She said pending the Board's feedback, if staff hears they can
move forward with the draft framework, staff will move into drafting an ordinance.
Ms. Accardi asked if the Commission had any final comments that staff should incorporate to the
Board.
Mr. Dotson said he had a comment about the term "Flex" and about the description of that area
on the Regulating Plan. He said they have the "Core" and "Edge" areas, which give a mindset,
and what they need is a term that says it is in between the Core and Edge. He said "Flex" was
talking about something else and was a different vocabulary. He said that while "Flex" is frequently
used in New Urbanism, he thought it was weird, and that he would prefer a term such as
"Transition Area."
Mr. Dotson continued that "Flex" seemed out of place, and that the description says it is the
highest amount of flexibility in building form and use. He said this description partly gives him
concern regarding his "donut" fear. He said he would rather see it described as being the link
between the Core and Edge, and less intensive while still allowing mixed uses, rather than
deeming it to be the "Wild West."
Ms. Spain suggested "Burgess Zone" due to it being a zone of transition.
Mr. Keller thanked staff for their work. He said when he speaks to his fellow commissioners about
things they are working on, every time form -based code comes up, people have smiles on their
faces and express that this has been one of the most fun parts to be able to provide input into
something that is as well -organized and as well -directed as staff has done with this.
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Recess
At 8:15 p.m., Mr. Keller announced there would be a five-minute break.
At 8:21 p.m., Mr. Keller resumed the meeting with Old Business.
Old Business
2019 Growth Management Report Revisions & Findings
Mr. Andrew Knuppel (Community Development) said this item was pursuant to the prior meeting
on September 24 at which staff first introduced the 2019 Growth Management Report. He said he
would briefly recap some of the topics that came up the last time, walk through the revisions that
were made to the report, and then present recommended findings as requested. He noted the
information was in the staff report and would not be any new information but would help start the
discussion.
Mr. Knuppel recalled that on September 24, staff presented the Commission with a draft report
for its review. He said they received a lot of feedback from the Commission about clarifications to
language, improving the clarity in the report, and helping better communicate the methodology.
He said there was some discussion of the report methodology and potential applications of the
data, as well as how to use the information in the future for other planning projects and considering
capital planning in a way that is consistent with the report.
Mr. Knuppel said that later, staff requests return for discussion about the Commissions' desire to
establish some findings from the report and talk about next steps. He said staff did outline some
proposed recommendations and next steps as far as continued performance reporting for the
Commission, which also includes the annual report that staff has been creating as well.
Mr. Knuppel said he would run through some of the revisions staff made since the last meeting.
He said the report was substantially the same and that staff had not made any tweaks to the
methodology, stating that that "ship had sailed" as far as staff capacity and their ability to re -run
the model. He said they added some background information about the statistical area in
response to a concern that was raised about the nomenclature.
Mr. Knuppel said Neighborhoods 1-7 have been used since the 1970s in the Comprehensive Plan
and that Pantops has its own name covered in the Master Plan. He said otherwise, staff uses
these terms to refer to the neighborhoods as statistical areas. He said there were some slight
boundary changes over time, but that these were intended to stay static in what it serves.
Mr. Knuppel said staff added some additional letters to table columns in the report to help add
some clarity about how each column was multiplied or added, which would help people do the
mental math about how units and population multipliers are added.
Mr. Knuppel said for the Crozet text, there were edits made there around concerns that were
heard, and staff added an additional estimate. He said later, they received confirmation that Old
Trail is looking at closer to a 1,200-unit buildout, and there has now been a second estimate
added to Crozet. He said that system wide, they had an estimate that removed 1,000 units from
the pipeline in Crozet, but because this was a significant chunk of development capacity in the
area, a second estimate was added to look at this scenario as well.
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Mr. Knuppel said staff added notes throughout the document to make sure that it was clear where
they received the pipeline project information from and where they used an adjusted estimate to
account for a lower potential buildout. He said this was specifically noted. He added that there
were some minor stylistic tweaks made throughout the document.
Mr. Knuppel said the recommended findings were found in Attachment B of the staff report. He
said he pulled some takeaways from the report for consideration in the future that were identified
as potential applications or in other words, how the data can be used to plan more effectively.
Mr. Knuppel said that staff's potential number one finding was that, in looking at the three
scenarios in the report, there are inconsistencies between land use plan scenarios and zoning
ordinance, and takeaways to consider as far as how the County can better align its zoning
ordinance with land use planning efforts. He said this was something that would take a couple
steps to make it happen, as the zoning ordinance did not line up with the Comprehensive Plan's
land use categories, and staff wanted to make sure they are considering other on -going efforts
such as the housing policy update, Climate Action Plan, and other equity/inclusion initiatives in
the County.
Mr. Knuppel said the County would need to update its land use designations to reflect the other
initiatives and current best practices. He acknowledged the difficulties in regulating a 6-34
dwelling unit range and creating a zoning code that supports this. He said in the long run, the
question was about what the update of the Zoning, Subdivision, and Water Protection Ordinances
look like.
Mr. Knuppel summarized that staff's first finding was about the need to align the land use plans
with the zoning ordinance, which was a takeaway that they could look at in the long run as a
potential implementation to a staff -added application of what they are seeing in the report.
Mr. Knuppel said the main discussion points from the last meeting was about how the County can
use this data to inform planning for future needs and capital investments. He said staff had just
identified a few potential uses of this, such as the Capital Improvement Program (CIP), which is
a major consideration of how the County prioritizes projects. He said the question was about if
the County is responding to where development is currently happening, if they were catching up
or planning for where those things happen. He said the Hollymead community came out as an
example in the last review in that the County knows there will be development there in the future,
and the question was if the County should be looking for potential there with the CIP.
Mr. Knuppel said staff discussed the Transportation Projects prioritized and that they used a land
use factor in this and the development tracking information to determine how many potential units
would be served in new development by the potential transportation projects in the most recent
prioritized. He said staff also looked at the Schools' long-range facility planning to ensure they
have school facilities in districts that are sized appropriately to meet the expected population
growth. He said to ensure the County has adequate recreational facilities, they know there will be
a certain number of people and there are current standards that focus on a service ratio based
on acreage per resident.
Mr. Knuppel said there is a transportation analysis zone forecasting as well, noting that the MPO
takes a lead on this process and that it was completed a couple years before. He said in the
future, this could be something that could be added into the model.
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Mr. Knuppel said the takeaway is that there is a great deal of data staff has in a more structured
way than before. He said the question was about finding ways to use this data and plan.
Mr. Knuppel presented on the topic of performance management, stating that staff will ensure
they will use the data to evaluate the effectiveness of their land use planning policies. He said a
performance management strategy could evaluate their planned versus actual usage of land area.
He said, for example, that a parcel could be designated for a certain number of units in the
Comprehensive Plan, but developed at a different number, and that the performance
management could provide a feel for how effectively the development community is utilizing the
County's land area and whether they are building out to the expected potential or losing potential
capacity.
Mr. Knuppel said that staff being able to use the data requires a strategy to ensure that they can
sustain it in the future as far as from a staff capacity standpoint. He said they would ensure that
the data is accessible to the public and that currently, a great deal of manual staff time is spent to
clean, sort, and process data. He said they currently did not have an open data policy, but that
some potential strategies could include looking at organizational data policies and providing staff
support and resources to have staff capacity to continue to analyze, process, and apply the data
in the future, as this was a concern.
Mr. Knuppel said staff had recommendations for future reporting and how they approach the next
iteration of their annual report. He said in 2017 and 2019, staff put together the longer indicators
of a progress report that accompanied the Commission's annual report, which is required by the
state code. He said this included the longer discussion of the metrics from the Comprehensive
Plan and that staff did these two years apart. He said they would likely like to continue to do this
again in 2021, noting that they were not yet at a point where they could do this on a yearly basis.
Mr. Knuppel said as staff looks to the next iterations of that report and of the residential capacity
analysis, two years apart, they believe it would be prudent to dedicate some meeting time in 2020
to discuss the desired updates to the reporting framework to consider this in the work program
and ensure that staff has the support to look at any updates to their methodology and to the
indicators they are considering for the 2021 report.
Mr. Knuppel said in the meantime, staff will continue to conduct analyses and include as many
performance management efforts in their ongoing plans as possible. He said they would make
sure to do more analysis of capacity when looking at the County's Master Plans, come up with
potential land use scenarios and then, in their plan recommendations, make sure they have ways
to track implementation and the performance of the strategies.
Mr. Knuppel ended his presentation, stating that this was an overview of the staff report and an
overview of the broad themes that staff had identified as potential findings, applications, and
takeaways for how the report is used moving forward. He reminded the Commission that no action
was required from it and that last time, the report was provided for information, they had a fruitful
discussion from it, findings were presented, and should the Commission choose to make findings
and communicate them, staff recommends considering the potential findings in Attachment B of
the staff report.
Mr. Dotson asked what the next stop was for the report and if it was the Board of Supervisors.
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Ms. Falkenstein said they did not yet have a date because they wanted to see what would happen
with the Commission. She said ideally, they could get it to the Board in December and that
typically, it is a Consent Agenda item for information with no action required from the Board.
Mr. Dotson said on page 12 of the report, under the heading, "Do We Have Room to Grow?" the
second paragraph under "Redevelopment" talks about the economic filters used in the scenarios,
which provide for limited redevelopment of existing commercial areas. He said a few lines later, it
indicates that the potential for redevelopment is significantly underestimated in the analysis. He
said before Mr. Knuppel had arrived that evening, the Commission had been discussing form -
based code and, at least at the Commission level, they agreed to six -story structures, many of
which will be residential above commercial or, in some cases, entirely residential. He said there
was a lot of holding capacity in this area and was something they were working on.
Mr. Dotson asked, if looking at Neighborhoods 1 and 2, if the numbers in the report reflected an
amount of redevelopment potential. He said from the earlier conversation, he had the impression
that very little redevelopment was reflected in the numbers. He asked Mr. Knuppel could comment
on how much redevelopment was reflected by the report in Neighborhoods 1 and 2 (the Small
Area Plan area).
Mr. Knuppel replied that the economic filters used for Neighborhoods 1 and 2 were conservative
and as mentioned, the methodology was found in the appendix. He said that for the properties
that were assessed as commercial or industrial users, instead of several dwelling units on the
parcel, staff used a property evaluation per square foot figure. He said staff had looked at the way
the Oregon Metro assessed the redevelopment potential and if the values of that property were
below a certain threshold, it was considered eligible for redevelopment. He said the rationale for
this was that if the property values are low enough, there could be an economic benefit by
redeveloping the property.
Mr. Knuppel said staff calibrates the numbers mostly based on what had come through past
capacity analyses as far as what they had identified as being able to be redeveloped, noting that
there was not a strong methodology to this but rather, an eyeball test. He said staff tried to adjust
the values they used based on market areas such as Neighborhoods 1 and 2 of the northern
urban ring, Pantops, southern urban area, western urban ring, Hollymead, etc.
Mr. Knuppel said staff used a conservative estimate because they didn't have a chance to vet this
externally. He said they also had a pro forma that was done as part of the Rio-29 Small Area Plan
and looked at this to add additional context and get a feel for some of the land values in the area.
He said the report does not capture the fact that in the Rio-29 area, several large landholdings
there could be redeveloped and support housing. He said that because the threshold they used
was conservative, it did not show many results for this. He said staff knew there was capacity that
could be there, but that it was not counted in the report.
Mr. Dotson stated his opinion that the property value per square foot data that staff was using
was current data, and the report was about 20 years in the future. He said hopefully, this would
change and that redevelopment (or some of it) would take place. He said he would like for staff
to discuss this again. He said that given what is being done with the form -based code, there
should be some kind of "crosswalk" between the intensities the County is trying to achieve and
the forecasts, which basically deny this as a possibility.
Mr. Dotson said the solution could be (since staff has the Comprehensive Plan, low, and high
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scenarios) that "low" would be deemed what they have now and "high" would be what it could be
if the aspirations of the form -based code are achieved. He said he was troubled that the report
did not reflect the work that was being currently done.
Ms. Riley asked Mr. Dotson to clarify exactly what his recommendation was. She asked if he was
suggesting that on page 15, under the "Residential Capacity Estimate" table, the low -high under
Pipeline Units and Full Buildout have some additional notation and/or numbers changed to reflect
the densities that will be allowed under the new form -based code.
Mr. Dotson said that what he would like to see (perhaps under the "high" scenario under the
Comprehensive Plan) would be some figure that anticipates perhaps not full development in 20
years, but at least some share of it that is a realistic expectation. He said his concern was that
the filter that was used in the model is based on current data as if that same data will be true in
20 years. He said hopefully, it wouldn't be. He said this was a substantive request and comment
and that he was not saying this needed to come back to the Commission, but that he hoped that
staff would have a conversation on how to bridge between the two things they are working on
simultaneously.
Ms. Spain commended Mr. Knuppel for his last point about creating the databases and how this
requires extensive staff time and resources as in this case, staff is trying to institutionalize this
type of reporting and data -gathering. She said this would be an important point to make to the
Board of Supervisors because often, when people who aren't familiar with the data crunching see
reports such as this, they have no idea at all about what is involved in producing it. She suggested
staff develop estimates of staff time required (hours spent, number of resources) to solidify his
point.
Ms. Riley expressed her appreciation and excitement about the information being available. She
said she generally agreed with Attachment B ("Report Findings and Recommendations) and that
in addition to Ms. Spain's comments, it was important that the Board and the general public
understand what goes into doing the data work and the resources that are necessary to support
it.
Ms. Riley suggested adding an additional bullet under the last area regarding resources and, in
this case, other applications, expressing that there should be an educational program associated
with this. She said an obvious target group would be the CACs, but that the broader public should
be invited. She said this kind of information and reflection back to the communities themselves
needs consideration and needs to be identified as something that should be supported with
resources.
Ms. Firehock said she really liked having the information and thanked staff for it. She said the
maximum units approved, units built, and unbuilt units were included in Appendix B on pages 40-
41. She expressed interest in seeing the number of units that the Comprehensive Plan says the
County wants (e.g. in the future, a range of 6-36 units in an area), and the maximum of the Comp
Plan designated areas compared to what is getting built.
Ms. Firehock offered Crozet as an example, where someone would say that a higher density
should be approved because many develops are being built at a lower density than what the
Comprehensive Plan envisioned. She asked if there was some way to add up the numbers,
acknowledging that this could be cumbersome because there were so many ranges in the
Comprehensive Plan.
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Mr. Knuppel asked Ms. Firehock if she was referring to a number by land use designation.
Ms. Firehock replied yes and said that the Comprehensive Plan maps envision up to several units
and that she would like to have it compared to how the County is doing. She said she was curious
to track what the County said they wanted in the Comprehensive Plan and compare it to what is
getting built. She asked if that data was included in the report or if it needed to be aggregated in
some way or wasn't looked at.
Mr. Knuppel replied that he didn't believe staff looked at the numbers by specific land use
designations. He said with their methodology, they looked at the information on a parcel -by -parcel
basis, explaining that there are some parcels that have split land use designations, so they looked
at each specific portion of the parcel and aggregated it back together. He said the output the
report has is by each parcel as far as expected potential but that it was not a complete
minimum/maximum that could happen on the parcel, but a mixed factor that looks at everything
in the aggregate. He said it was not the same thing as the theoretical buildout of the parcel.
Mr. Knuppel said there was a field in the shaped file that would potentially be able to say what the
primary land use category is, and that staff could potentially look at that. He said the report does
not contain graphs about how the County is using each specific land use category.
Ms. Firehock said that when the Commission receives site plans that ask for more density, they
are almost always looking at them in a vacuum. She said, for example, they recall that anecdotally,
they recall another project not being built out to full density, or they heard that a developer decided
to switch to "by right" because it was too hard to go through the process to ask for the additional
density. She said she wanted to find a way to get a snapshot of how the County is doing -- if they
are overall, in the large game, failing to meet the density that the Comprehensive Plan, or if they
are somewhere in the middle, or if it all averaged out.
Ms. Falkenstein responded that the report does not retroactively look at the properties but looks
at unbuilt properties or properties that may redevelop. She said it sounded as if Ms. Firehock
wanted staff to look back to determine what densities have been left on the table.
Ms. Firehock replied yes, suggesting that perhaps the information of what the County wanted
versus where they arrived would be a different report.
Ms. Falkenstein agreed, stating this would be a different model and report, and if there was value
in seeing this information, staff could investigate adding this into their overall data program as
they become more sophisticated.
Ms. Firehock said she had a philosophical question to leave with staff. She said in thinking about
all the developments that people ask the Commission to look at the Comprehensive Plan in order
to increase their densities (all done one by one), she has repeatedly asked why the County cannot
be rezoned to be the density that is wanted and allow everyone to move forward by right. She
said in the past, the County wanted more proffers from developers. She said the proffer rules
have changed and tighten, and that it was harder than ever to get those done.
Mr. Keller disagreed, stating they had loosened.
Ms. Firehock agreed that they had loosened some, but in terms of getting what the County wants,
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it was not predictable. She said she felt like the County didn't want to go through this for a number
of reasons, but if they went through the Herculean effort to rezone the County to what they wanted
to see happen in terms of density and created standards that got the type of quality development
that they wanted, the question was whether that effort would have actually reduced time for staff
overall rather than doing piecemeal rezonings. She said this was not something she expected an
answer to, but that this was her "annual soapbox" about the way the County was going about the
zoning.
Ms. More expressed her appreciation to the adjustment made to the report to consider Crozet
and Old Trail. She said the report was very confusing to her because the Old Trail numbers had
seemed low and that she finally figured out that Old Trail Village does not consider Lower and
Upper Ballard and Creekside. She said this was all considered by the community as part of Old
Trail but that it was not part of their rezoning and is not part of the numbers that are left remaining
in the pipeline but was built by right.
Ms. More said she wanted to make sure that they have 250 in Lower and Upper Ballard, 100 in
Creekside still building, and that the Lodge units are still captured in the estimated current units.
She said she assumed there was a discrepancy of that they have 450 built in Old Trail Village,
which is subject to the rezoning, and the 2,200 assumption at buildout. She said she assumed
that they were building units faster than staff can make charts for the Commission and that this
was why the discrepancy was there. She said she and staff exchanged emails about Old Trail
having 450 built, 350 under active development, and a predicted additional 400 units. She asked
if this was the adjustment staff made to the report.
Mr. Knuppel replied that the primary adjustment made was adding the second estimate that took
the 1,000 units out of the pipeline and that instead of a 2,200-unit buildout, it was a 1,200-unit
buildout. He said Lower/Upper Ballard and the Lodge are counted in the current population and
current units, so staff was really looking at the increment of what could be built above.
Mr. Knuppel said as far as the number staff used for the units remaining for Old Trail, the units -
built figure that is used throughout the County comes from the building permit and Certificate of
Occupancy data. He said it was mapped out throughout the County of where a CO has been
granted or issued. He said they received a different number from this, and that they knew their
building permit was as of July 1. He said he went back the dates and COs to make sure the status
was correct in County View. He said there was a discrepancy there but ultimately, the report is
still looking at what would be built and that it would get captured, even if the units are further
ahead of where the report's number might be. He said the result is that the buildout is the same.
Ms. More said she appreciated Mr. Knuppel's attention to this because it led her to answer a
question she had always been confused by as far as the low number being thrown out, but when
driving through the area, noticing many houses built. She said she now understands that even
though the entire area is called Old Trail, there are two separate sections and therefore, there is
more density than what it looks like on paper.
Mr. Keller said he had several points for staff to consider for the future. He said staff met the spirit
of what the Commission asked for in terms of making the refinements. He thanked Mr. Benish for
encouraging the effort to continue as it was very important. He said it was the kind of information
that could easily be mined by people across political persuasions about what is going on in
Albemarle County.
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Mr. Keller said he was not attempting to get staff to make changes to the report and that staff had
been great with limited resources in doing these types of extra projects. He said if the staff had
an opportunity to build on the report, he had four requests to consider.
Mr. Keller said that with growth management, a major portion of it is keeping the rural areas rural.
He said on pages 4 and 5 of the report, there is a paragraph and graph that shows this. He said
it was known that the development in the rural area has been steady with perhaps a slightly
downward trend. He said it would be good to have that information included at an appropriate
place in the report, suggesting that it could be segregated out into rural areas, or could be another
component that is discussed. He said it was important to see what the graph on page 5 is
explaining about why the development area is growing in population in a faster rate than the rural
areas.
Mr. Keller said his second point was about impact and that this had been discussed before, with
the figures being plenty, at best. He said he had mentioned the FEAC and what was being done
with this in the past, and that there was a figure for what the carrying capacity of a housing unit in
the County is to support its taxes. He said this was in the $620,000 range. He said that this was
something that warrants being included in the report because when talking about what the cost
of a house was in some year in the past and what it is today, people who are big advocates of
growth need to see that there is another side to this in terms of taxes. He said they do not get into
the taxes because it was not in this realm but that it was still important because it relates to impact
and therefore, to growth management.
Mr. Keller said his third point was that once the County has the affordable housing data, and
because Ms. Pethia assures the Commission that there will be some kind of figure and some
collection of it (either through the regional study or what would happen in the County by querying
the assessed tax value of houses), they would have at least a simple figure of units assessed
under the percentage of AMI used. He said this would enable the County to say that they have
so many units of affordable housing in the development areas and rural areas currently and that
this was a more important benchmark needed to measure the addition of affordable housing units.
Mr. Keller said if the County has houses that are in these price ranges being flipped and going
out of those price ranges, they will experience a net loss of affordable housing that they need to
be aware of.
Mr. Keller said his fourth point was around problems with residents commuting to work, notably
in the 250-East area, and the amount of time they are held up in traffic. He said the County, with
VDOT as a partner, is attempting in many areas in many ways to have infrastructure
improvements. He said that it seemed as though a chart or line item that goes with each of the
development areas that shows what the infrastructure support has been in the a given year for
those areas would be helpful.
Mr. Keller said there was a lot of competition amongst the various areas as to whether they are
getting their fair share of dollars for those kinds of infrastructure improvements, whether they be
transportation, greenspace, etc. He said this was part of growth management because it helps
the Commission see trends, perhaps even in the future, for where they are more likely or less
likely to see more development.
Mr. Keller concluded his points, noting that this was not to try to hold up the current reporting
effort. He said staff had made significant improvements to what the Commission had seen before
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and that he hoped that each year, there could be further improvements.
Mr. Dotson said it was interesting that Mr. Knuppel had lamented that it takes an entire hour to
run the model. He compared this to doing the entire report by hand over the course of a year. He
said the model was a substantial improvement that gives lots of possibilities for the future,
including using the information for many of the tasks identified in Appendix B.
Ms. Falkenstein asked that when staff sends the report to the Board of Supervisors, if the
Commission would like them to include Attachment B (the findings), or if they should just send
the report.
Mr. Dotson said that they would be staff's findings.
Review of November 6 Board of Supervisors Meeting
Mr. Benish said there were only two items in this meeting that the Commission had previously
reviewed: the CPAs for the MPO Long Range Transportation Plan and the TJPDC Long Range
Transportation Plan. He said they were both adopted by the Board of Supervisors as the
Commission had reviewed and recommended them.
Committee Reports
Mr. Dotson said the Rio CAC met and adopted a resolution requesting that the Board of
Supervisors immediately provide the resources to update the Master Plan, which was adopted in
2011. He said this also meant that they would be coming to Ms. Spain's CAC asking for support
for that resolution because Places29 includes three CACs. He said he was not sure who the
Planning Commission representative was for the Hydraulic portion.
Mr. Keller said it was Mr. Bivins.
Mr. Dotson said that Ms. Spain and Mr. Bivins would be notified that they will be hearing from the
Rio CAC asking for their concurrence in the resolution to proceed faster with the Master Plan.
Mr. Dotson said the Long -Range Planning Advisory Committee for the School Division would
meet the following day. He said Mr. Knuppel would be presenting again to that group as they
consider projections.
Mr. Dotson said the CIP Advisory Committee was meeting the following afternoon, 2:30-4:30 p.m.
and that a report of that committee will be given to the Board of Supervisors that includes a
recommendation of an additional $55 million for CIP items, transportation leveraging, economic
development, Cale Elementary School, remodeling Crozet Elementary School and expansion,
and a small reserve.
New Business
There was no new business.
Adjournment
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At 9:03 p.m., the Commission adjourned to November 19, 2019 Albemarle County Planning
Commission meeting, 6:00 p.m., Lane Auditorium, Second Floor, County Office Building, 401
McIntire Road, Charlottesville, Virginia.
David Benish, Chief of Planning
(Recorded and transcribed by Carolyn S. Shaffer, Clerk to Planning Commission & Planning
Boards)
Approved by Planning
Commission
Date: 12/03/2019
Initials: CSS
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