HomeMy WebLinkAbout12 19 2017 PC MinutesAlbemarle County Planning Commission
December 19, 2017
The Albemarle County Planning Commission held a public hearing on Tuesday, December 19, 2017, at 6:00 p.m., at
the County Office Building, Room #241, Second Floor, 401 McIntire Road, Charlottesville, Virginia.
Members attending were Tim Keller, Chair; Daphne Spain; Pam Riley; Mac Lafferty, Bruce Dotson, Karen
Firehock, Vice Chair and Bill Palmer, UVA representative. Absent was Jennie More.
Other officials present were Scott Clark, Senior Planner; Elaine Echols, Chief of Community Development; Rebecca
Ragsdale, Senior Planner; J.T. Newberry, Senior Planner; Sharon Taylor, Clerk to Planning Commission; and John
Blair, Deputy County Attorney.
Call to Order and Establish Quorum
Mr. Keller, Chair, called the regular meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. and established a quorum.
Mr. Keller said he would like to thank Mac Lafferty for his eight years of service as a long-term member of the
Planning Commission. He said Mac has been helpful and has advised me as a new chair that he very much
appreciates. Mr. Keller said Mac has brought a lot of knowledge as a lifelong member of Albemarle County to this
body and his particular interest in transportation planning and more specifically cycling and multi -modal has really
been of great value to our body. Mr. Keller thanked Mac for his service and wondered if others have some words
they would like to share.
Mr. Dotson echoed what Mr. Keller said since he has enjoyed working with Mac during the past six years he has
been on the Commission and has relied on Mac for his expertise in the area of transportation. Mr. Dotson said Mac
has always provided his advocacy for not forgetting the cyclists and it has always been important. He thanked Mac
for his role on the MPO as our liaison and the many reports he has given us on the progress of work on the long-
range transportation plan and other things and that it will be hard to fill the gap you will leave.
Ms. Riley said she also wanted to wish Mr. Lafferty well in his retirement from the Planning Commission and thank
him for supporting those of us that are new to the Commission. She said it has been a real pleasure to work with
Mac over the last two years particularly for his expertise in transportation after having come on to serving on the
Citizens Transportation Advisory Committee. She said Mac having been on the committee has helped her
understand those issues. She said Mac Lafferty would be really missed.
Ms. Firehock agreed with everything said and that she is going to have to bone up on transportation now that he is
departing. She thanked Mac for his good humor through many contentious decisions whether we agreed or
disagreed and thinks we all got through everything and usually made the right decision in the end. Ms. Firehock
thanked Mr. Lafferty for all his service.
Ms. Spain echoed Ms. Riley's sentiments about Mr. Lafferty's generosity with the newcomers and hoped that he
will be available to us occasionally if we have some questions.
Mr. Palmer said it has been a pleasure working with Mac and that we will miss him.
Mr. Keller noted it was his understanding there will be a recognition from the Board of Supervisors in February or
March that we will be invited so we will have that opportunity to interact with Mr. Lafferty again. Mr. Keller said
he would again thank Mr. Lafferty very much.
Mr. Lafferty thanked the Commission and said he would like to commend Tim for his excellent leadership this year
since he thinks he has pushed the planning commission further than he has seen done during the last eight years. He
said Tim's involvement with the community has been good and he appreciates everything he has done.
Mr. Keller thanked Mr. Lafferty.
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The meeting moved to the next agenda item.
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.
Neil Williamson, Free Enterprise Forum, said he has been doing this job going on 15 years, 8 of which have been
with Mac Lafferty on this body. He said on the scorecard that Mac and he probably disagreed as much as agreed,
but it has always been in good nature and with the community's best interest at heart. He read a fractured fairy tale,
Rudolph the Form Based Code with an apology to the author. (Attachment 1 — Testimony to Albemarle County
Planning Commission December 18, 2017 — Created by Robert Lewis May; Adapted by Neil Williamson, President)
There being no further public comment, Mr. Keller said the meeting would move to the next item.
Consent Agenda
a. Approval of Minutes: September 5, 2017.
b. SUB-2017-00093 — Crozet Court — Jamestown Road Extension
Request for variation to the planting strip design on the northeast side of the proposed interconnection and a
request for exception to the sidewalk design on the southwest side of the proposed interconnection. Associated
with this request is a preliminary subdivision plat for 20 single-family detached dwelling units known as Crozet
Court. (J.T. Newberry)
Mr. Keller asked if anyone wants to pull an item from the consent agenda. Hearing none, he asked for a motion to
accept.
Mr. Lafferty moved, Ms. Firehock seconded to approve the consent agenda, which was unanimously approved by a
vote of 7:0.
The meeting moved to the next item.
Regular Item
SP-2017-00017 Greenmont Hopworks Processing Facility
MAGISTERIAL DISTRICT: Samuel Miller
TAX MAP/PARCEL(S): 12100-00-00-09200
LOCATION: 1463 Plank Road
PROPOSAL: Construct a hops -processing facility, including a 10,000-square-foot structure.
PETITION: Commercial fruit or agricultural produce packing plant under section 10.2.2.23 of the Zoning Ordinance
on a 5.75-acre parcel. No dwelling units proposed.
ZONING: RA Rural Area - agricultural, forestal, and fishery uses; residential density (0.5 unit/acre in development
lots)
OVERLAY DISTRICT(S): Entrance Corridor
COMPREHENSIVE PLAN: Rural Area — preserve and protect agricultural, forestal, open space, and natural,
historic and scenic resources; residential (0.5 unit/ acre in development lots)
(Scott Clark)
Scott Clark presented a PowerPoint presentation and summarized the staff report. He said this is a special use
permit request for an agricultural processing facility located in Keene, which would be a hops -processing
facility that would include a 10,000 square -foot structure or up to that size. He noted the use is under the
commercial fruit or agricultural produce packing plant use permitted by special use permit in the zoning
ordinance. He pointed the location on the slide that was just west of the Keene intersection of Plank Road and
Route 20 and reviewed the details of the proposal.
DETAILS OF THE PROPOSAL:
• Proposed agricultural processing facility located in a structure of up to 10,000 square feet.
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• Facility would process and store freshly grown hops for beer use in brewing. All processing activities
r would take place within the 10,000-square-foot building.
• Seasonal use — This is a highly seasonal use for about two months out of the year; it is very intense and
could even be 24 hours a day but will take place inside the building where the fresh produce is being
processed. The rest of the year is a low intensity use with mostly office and low -volume shipping
occurring.
• Up to 24 hours a day - July through September. No outdoor work (such as transportation and
unloading of goods) from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m.
• October through June — office and low -volume shipping
Mr. Clark reviewed the conceptual plan for the use. It is about a 5.75- acre property and the envelope outlines
the use. There is a new entrance and a general outline of where the parking and the structure would be. He
pointed out the line that is measured 500 feet from Route 20 and that the building would be west of that line.
Mr. Clark said he would quickly run through some of the standards for special use permit approval.
No substantial detriment. The proposed special use will not be a substantial detriment to adjacent lots
Noise:
• All processing equipment would be located indoors, so the noise impacts are expected to be
minimal.
• Some noise will come from air conditioning units — but this would allow the building to be
run with the doors closed at night so the nighttime noise impacts could be reduced further.
• By condition, there will be no use of refrigerated trailers parked on the site for outside
storage. All cold storage will be contained within the building. This means no outdoor
generators running for keeping those trailers cold so that reduces the noise level further.
• The envelope has a minimum 50-foot setback between the processing facility and adjacent
properties. This would increase the distance between the use and the adjacent uses.
...and with the public health, safety and general welfare.
Transportation: The transportation demands of the use are small.
• Approximately six trailer loads of hop vines per day during peak activity. About four employees would
be on the site.
• The Virginia Department of Transportation has reviewed this proposal and had no objections.
Water:
• Unlike other agricultural processing uses, this one has very little or no water impact because it is
mainly a drying use. There is not a lot of washing or other water use going on; they are trying to get
rid of water.
• Storm water impacts will be managed during the review of the site development plan. There will be a
site plan following this review that would deal with the State storm water requirements.
• The 100-foot stream buffer is shown as a "Wooded Area to Remain"
Emergency Services:
• The Fire/Rescue department had no objection to the proposed use.
Consistency with the Comprehensive Plan
• Strategy Id of the Rural Area Plan states that the County should "[c]ontinue to assist Rural Area
property owners to diversify agricultural activities, including helping to connect local farms with local
consumers."
• The proposed facility would help to make a perishable crop more viable for local growers by
providing a nearby packaging and storage facility, removing the need to either use the crop
immediately or quickly transport it long distances. Staff felt this was supportive of our
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Comprehensive Plan goals for agricultural protection.
• Route 20 Entrance Corridor — Structure would at least be 500 feet from Route 20.
SUMMARY:
Staff has identified the following factors favorable to this proposal:
1. The proposed use is supportive of the County's goals for maintaining and protecting agriculture in the
Rural Areas.
2. The impacts of the use on the surrounding area are minimal and can be managed through design
limitations.
Staff has identified no factors unfavorable to this proposal.
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Staff recommends approval of SP-2017-00017 Greenmont Hopworks Processing Facility with the conditions in
the staff report and he would be happy to answer any questions.
Mr. Keller invited questions for staff.
Ms. Firehock asked when they are doing 24-hour processing will the outside lighting be on at night or will it be
a motion detector.
Mr. Clark replied that from his discussion with the applicants he thinks they plan for the lighting to be on in the
building so they would not spread the lighting out all the time.
Ms. Firehock asked there would be lighting on the entry door or something like that.
Mr. Clark replied that was correct, but we are requiring full cut-off fixtures. He said the applicant can probably
answer whether or not they want to have motion detectors or not, but he would think if they are operating all
night they will probably want to have those lights on.
Ms. Firehock said she just did not know how much lighting there would be and whether it would be staying on
all night.
Mr. Clark said his sense is if there is lighting all night it is going to be down lighting on the building during that
active period of the year. He said the rest of the year there would be no need for it except for a door light or
something else because there is going to be very little use especially at night.
Ms. Spain said as a point of information if this is the first such facility like this.
Mr. Clark replied yes, this is the first fruit packing or agri-processing special use permit he has reviewed in 18
years.
Ms. Spain asked specifically for hops.
Mr. Clark replied or for any other use. He said there are some out there that are long standing uses that are
probably considered existing nonconforming uses like fruit sheds and things like that. He said this is the only
one of these we have seen and as far as he knows the only hops processing facility in the entire region, the
closest one being somewhere in northern Virginia.
Ms. Spain said that was what she was trying to get at is that this would specifically help the breweries that are
depending on hops.
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Mr. Clark said it would help the growers and the brewers both because there is a much reduced travel time from
the farms to the processing plant.
Ms. Spain said she knows there has been a shortage of hops.
Mr. Keller opened the public hearing and invited the applicant to come forward
Andrew Cox, Director of Business Development for Greenmont Hopworks, said he was here this evening in
support of our company's special use permit application for a hops processing facility. He said he put together
some slides that may answer some of the questions around the quality parts of our presentation and application.
He said first he would go through the Virginia Hops Market and then a quick operational overview and that will
answer some more of the questions and give some more color to what the facility will actually look like during
the operational season and then impacts of Virginia Industry both the growers and brewers.
Mr. Cox said the Virginia Hops market unbelievably they have been grown here since the colonial times but it
is an increasingly prevalent crop in Virginia mostly because of the craft brewers. As you know, we have had a
huge increase in craft brewers over the past five years and seen a 65 percent increase in planted acreage of hops
between 2015 and 2016 with that information from a survey the Cooperative Extension puts together each year.
He pointed out the 2017 information is being gathered and expects to see between a 40 and 50 percent increase
again in 2017. Therefore, it is becoming a more prevalent crop as local brewers are looking for a truly local
crop rather than sourcing out to the Pacific Northwest, Michigan or Europe. He pointed out brewers are looking
for local products but they are also looking for quality products. So with the immaturity of the Virginia hop
market so far they have been mostly using fresh hops so that would be hops that are just directly pulled and
have about a 24-hour life span before they will start to really significantly spoil and not be good to use in beer.
So what this facility will allow us to do is provide quality processed hops products whether it be dried hops or
whether it will be pelletized hops, and he would get a little more into those different products.
Mr. Cox pointed out the hops processing cycle as, seen on the slide that the hops are cultivated on an irrigated
11%W trellis systems roughly 18' tall from April through September with harvest dates ranging from late July to late
September. The hops vines are harvested using a mechanical stripper that separates the vines from the flowers
or cones, which outputs fresh hops. From there we can sell to a brewer or they need to go ahead and be dried
using a hop oast. What that allows us to do is take it from roughly 60 percent moisture to about 10 percent
moisture, which really stabilizes the product. From there we can sell that product directly to a brewer or we can
pelletize that, and brewers prefer pelletized hops since they have a much longer life span and more easily used
with traditional modem brewing. The difference here is that Virginia has really only had fresh hops and a very
small percentage of brewers can actually use those in typical modem brewing system. In addition, you do not
have to schedule the brewing since it is time and labor sensitive and for them they do a lot of their hop ordering
on line so it is much easier to go with pellets.
Mr. Cox said the 2016 survey of Virginia growers done by the Cooperative Extension and this map shows in
green dots the growers that are greater than 400 plants. He said that is about %2 an acre and to give you an idea
of the difference in volume maybe between Washington and Oregon your small grower would be about 100
acres. He said the small growers would grow between 100 plants and 400 plants, but below %2 an acre. He said
the blue dot demonstrates where the facility would be located and this kind of shows what our sphere of
influence would be. The other processing facility is located in Loudon County and they service more of
Maryland and Pennsylvania growers actually as well as some northern Virginia growers. It is very difficult for
a grower in Richmond or even into Tidewater to get to that facility in any amount of time without facing some
serious spoilage issues. He noted that someone from Richmond it was up to a 3 to 4 hour drive potentially.
Therefore, it would really be helpful to growers in the south side, in the Shenandoah Valley and in the east side
of Virginia.
Mr. Cox said the next information was pulled from the Virginia Department of Tourism and shows the location
of craft breweries in Virginia. He noted that 66% of all craft breweries in Virginia are located roughly within
75 miles of this facility. This would allow them to source in a quality of local hops products to use in their
brewing.
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Mr. Cox said in the operational overview he mentions harvesting; the plants are cut down manually in the field,
stacked on a trailer and then they would be brought into the facility as such.
• Harvesting
• Hop Vines are transported to the facility via truck/trailer
• Vines are then fed into the harvester
• Cones are removed and weighed
Drying
• Cones are then loaded into an oast and dried to 10% moisture
• Packaging
• The Cones are weighed once more and packed into mylar bags if they are to be used as a dried
hops product or either into bales if they are going to be pelletized later on. However, at that
point everything is packaged.
• Storage
• The Bales are then loaded into refrigerated storage
Operational Period
Hop Harvest
• Begins in mid -July and runs through September
• Different cultivars mature at different times
Order Fulfillment
• Fresh hop orders fulfilled during harvest (July and August)
• Dry hop orders fulfilled from October — January
Facility Dormancy
• From October — June no harvesting occurs
• Largely internal administrative and repackaging activities. We would be shipping some small
orders to brewers probably using the post office that is in Keene. However, really, everything
is internally conducted at that point.
Day -to -Day Operations
Harvest Vine Deliveries
• Harvest deliveries will be received from 7:00 am — 7:00 pm as Mr. Clark mentioned 6
deliveries a day.
• Other external activities will be conducted during this period.
Harvesting, Drying & Packaging
• Harvesting, drying & packaging will occur 24 hours a day during harvest.
• From 7:00 pm — 7:00 am all activities will be internally restricted. They would likely
continue running the harvester if we had the volume but then we would be drying the hops.
The process takes a substantial amount of time to do it correctly so we would still be drying
and then packing in there between 7:00 p.m. and 7 a.m. both of which really do not make any
noise and it would be completely internally confined.
Mr. Cox said the next slide is a visual representation of the trips per day throughout the year. The blue area
shows the facility's dormancy period, which would be mostly administrative trips myself going down there to
work in the office and ship things out. He pointed out May and June show a ramp up period that would be
starting to bring in core rope for hanging the plants themselves and bringing in other materials. He said then in
October and November that ramp down period where we still have a fair number of orders that we are filling,
but there is no actual harvesting going on at that point.
Mr. Cox said finally he had some notes on the Impact to Virginia Industry as we mentioned that this is from a
horticultural perspective it allows growers that were not able to focus fully on growing or marketing to brewers
they would be able to market their crop to us and we would be able to bring it in and that provides them a
guaranteed place to off load their crop. It also allows them the ability to turn their crop from a wet very
perishable product to something that has a life span up to about 3 years in refrigerated storage. He said that
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allows crop diversification and we actually have had some farmers in our area especially on Plank Road that
came to the community meeting that indicated interest into getting into hops because this is something that
11%" would be nearby and an opportunity for them to get into the industry. From a brewing and distillery product
perspective, most brewers will look at me and say they have had that nightmare where somebody showed up
with a black garbage bag on a hot August day full of rotten hops and they say do you want to brew with these
and they have said no. That is unfortunate that there is almost a stigma with local Virginia hops there. He said
that brewers are looking for a quality hop product that they can use that would rival the quality of what they are
used to seeing out of Oregon and that is something that we would be able to provide from a local perspective.
Mr. Cox said tourism is very similar to vineyards and wineries and you go to a winery and you see the vines but
you go to an area of breweries you can drive through an area of hops and it kind of plays hand in hand. He said
they have done their research so we are actually partnering with Virginia Tech on our two current yards to do
testing to look at how our hops compare to similar varieties from other locations from a chemical level and then
also looking at in our practices how do we do weed management and how we do fertilization management. He
said that allows them to have increased quality data, lets them make better decisions and lets them get that data
into the hands of additional growers and farmers. He pointed out that Virginia State and NC State also work
very closely with Virginia Tech and they would benefit from that additional data as well. Mr. Cox pointed out
that is all he has.
Mr. Keller invited questions for the applicant.
Ms. Riley said she was trying to understand what impacts there might be to any residents or potential new
residents. She asked if the harvesting will all take place in the interior of the building or does the harvesting
take place outside.
Mr. Cox replied that there were two parts to the harvesting. There is the field harvest where the farmers
themselves are cutting the vines down and then transporting them to the facility. The harvesting machine looks
very similar to a combine but it is a much smaller machine but it is a much smaller machine that runs on very
r,, small electric motors and it is completely on the inside of the building. So the only harvesting that would go on
outside the building is moving that product from the trailer inside and staging it to be set onto the harvester and
pulled through. Mr. Cox said that is the only harvesting at the facility that will take place.
Ms. Riley asked is the business plan over time to expand to some other uses like hop growing or some other
related business.
Mr. Cox replied that Greenmont Farm has two acres of hops currently in the ground. He said a particular
business scheme the way hops works is totally focused on being that sort of middle market for locally grown
hops. That would from a business perspective expanding into other places like hops distilets or distilling it into
a liquid form for some brewers who prefer that, but really that would be the real business diversification. He
said we have allowed enough growth within the facility that if we were to add maybe a larger harvester
internally that we would have the space for that and plan for enough cold storage that we could continue to
grow and bring on acreage without having to change the building or change the special use permit.
Mr. Lafferty asked how the hops are dried.
Mr. Cox replied that we dry them in an oast and what we did this year we essentially built a forced air oast that
uses sort of your garage heat pump and an inward blowing fan. He said the moist air leaves through the top and
we use a hay probe to test the moisture and we will test it until it gets down to around 10% to 12% and then we
pull them off and package from there. However, it is sort of a big hot box and it has trays with metal screens
that passes the air through. It is both a manual and an automated process.
Mr. Lafferty asked is there any odor associated with the process.
Mr. Cox replied that there is and it is contained almost completely to the building itself. He said the current
building that we have processed in is two rooms, one in which we dried and one in which we packaged and
refrigerated. Therefore, the dried one was not air-conditioned and the packaging and refrigeration was air-
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conditioned. He said you could not smell the product in between the two even with an open wall, but if you
went into the other room, you could. He said it is a cousin to cannabis so there are certain varieties that have a
very similar odor, but what we found is even standing outside the building you cannot smell that and it would
dissipate inside the building because of how large it is. He noted they were looking at a building with about 20-
foot ceilings to accommodate the machinery and it would dissipate mostly inside.
Ms. Spain asked how many employees you would expect during those peak months of production.
Mr. Cox replied that we mentioned about four employees with myself, essentially a production manager or
process manager and several part-time employees.
Ms. Spain said the economic development benefit is more than the multiplier effect of the types of people who
will benefit from having the hops grown here, and Mr. Cox agreed.
Ms. Spain said you said you would possibly be attracting new growers and then she assumes the brewers you
said could make different types of beer.
Mr. Cox replied from the brewer's perspective it is a quality and there are certain varieties of hops that grow
better in our area so they have better access to those. He said it was also from a marketing perspective; it is sort
of that buy local movement or eat local movement and it is moving towards a drink local movement. He said if
it was a local brewery that sources their grain from Iowa and sources their hops from the Pacific Northwest and
buys their yeast on line; it is a local product made with foreign ingredients. So that allows them to say we use
grain from Copper Fox Granary and in Sperryville, Virginia we use our hops from Greenmont Hops Works in
Keene to allow them to bring it a little bit closer and that is a great marketing tool for a lot of local breweries.
Ms. Firehock said she attended the community meeting and thought he did a great job explaining. She said she
really liked your handmade poster and wish you would have brought that since it was good understand how it
worked. Just a question on the lighting again Ms. Firehock asked when you are operating 24-hours a day she
understands that it will be down cast but will it be on all night. She asked how much lighting you would have.
Mr. Cox replied that we have talked about this in our community development meetings that the way we
situated the facility itself would be that the main ingress/egress the garage doors would be on the back side of
the building away from the road essentially and so that is where the majority of the lighting would be. He
would say that lighting we would likely keep on as long as there was someone at the facility and if there were
no one at the facility, we would turn it off and have it on motion detection. He noted that anything around the
side of the building they would likely just have a motion detection at that time. He said any lighting that would
be on would not be visible from the road; it would be downcast on the backside of the building.
Mr. Keller thanked Mr. Cox. He invited public comment. Hearing none, Mr. Keller invited the applicant back
up and invited questions for the applicant.
Mr. Dotson said this is a very interesting proposal because of the kind of proposal it is where it works with the
local agricultural industry with the local brewing industry and he thinks the staff has done a very good job of
analyzing it and he intends to support it. He said but he has two facetious comments that occurred to him
during the presentation. In the 1800's in England where they were raising hops the way they would do it is poor
Londoners would come out to the hops farms and stay for a week or two, bring the family and pick the hops. It
was the way that they could get out of London and get a vacation. In light of the tourist -lodging item later on
our agenda, he assumes you are not intending any Londoners to come out and stay on the site while working
there.
Mr. Cox replied no.
Mr. Dotson said the other facetious thought is more of a comment that I am glad your service area includes
Roanoke because he understands there is a brewery down there that is looking for quality hops.
Mr. Keller said, building on the London comment, my experience in the mid -west in Door County up above
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Milwaukee is that there was a three or four-year period when everyone decided that they were going to grow
hops for the beer industries down south of there and they overproduced. He noted that we have a shortage now
but it is fascinating (whether it is the grapes or whatever) how that balance or imbalance occurs.
Mr. Cox replied totally and he thinks a lot of it is finding products that work really well here that brewers also
like because Cascade is a variety that grows well anywhere but a lot of brewers won't want it because it is not
new or pretty. He said it is definitely finding those products that work well and that we can grow well here that
brewers will be excited about so there will be a little bit of balance there finding that.
Mr. Keller said you brought up its relationship to cannabis and asked, if we see in the future a time when
Virginia is like a number of other states in allowing cannabis, is this a facility that could lend itself to the drying
aspect of cannabis so that it could be a center of a coop operation for small growers of cannabis.
Mr. Cox replied that it is very similar, on the distillate side it is actually even closer because if it were to be
medically deregulated that is what most of the medicinal use is, the THC distillate, so that would actually be
something that could go very closely hand in hand, yes.
Mr. Keller said that means there is the potential on this site for either a hops area and/or a cannabis area for a
larger operation in the future.
Mr. Cox asked under this special use permit?
Mr. Keller replied no, this would take an SP amendment.
Mr. Cox replied that he could not say there was not the potential but he would say that is not in our current
plans.
Mr. Keller closed the public hearing to bring the matter before the Commission for action and discussion.
Ms. Firehock said since it is in my district she will note that she attended the community meeting and they did a
great job of answering everyone's questions and concerns. She thinks they have made a good effort here to try
to limit any impacts from the site including thoughtfulness about the entrance to the site, how it is buffered and
it is a highly appropriate use for the rural area. She said that we finally have something that she feels is non-
controversial and she knows there are hops already being used at the James River Brewery in Scottsville. Ms.
Firehock said she was prepared to make a motion unless there were other comments or questions.
Ms. Spain pointed out this is the sort of case that she wished we saw more. She said this is actually a pleasure
to be able to vote for this and so you did a good job.
Ms. Firehock moved to recommend approval of SP-2017-00017 Greenmont Hopworks Processing Facility with
the conditions outlined in the staff report.
Mr. Lafferty seconded the motion.
Mr. Keller invited further discussion. Hearing none, he asked for a roll call.
The roll was called and the motion was approved by a vote of 6:0:1 (More absent).
Mr. Keller said the Planning Commission's recommendation for approval of SP-2017-00017 Greenmont
Hopworks Processing Facility would be forwarded to the Board of Supervisors for their action in the future.
He thanked the applicant.
The meeting moved to the next item.
Work Session
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ZTA-2017-00001 Transient LodeinS
Work session to identify key components of ordinance changes to broaden opportunities for transient lodging in the
County. (Rebecca Ragsdale)
Mr. Dotson asked if he could procedurally ask the Chair to clarify whether there would be an opportunity for
the public to speak.
Mr. Keller replied that he would poll the commissioners but his sense is that they should because they have
people who have expressed an interest in speaking. After polling the commissioners, Mr. Keller replied to Mr.
Dotson's question that yes, there would be public comment.
Ms. Ragsdale summarized the staff report in a PowerPoint Presentation. She said we would like to pick up
where we left off in October; we provided the Commission a staff report and summary of the discussion in
October and a recap of the public comments. She said staff would like to focus this evening on a refinement of
the recommendations for zoning text amendment changes. As a quick recap, as you recall this was Initiated in
March as part of the Community Development Work Program to accelerate a study of transient lodging for a
number of reasons; it is a strategy in our Comprehensive Plan and it is a very timely topic.
Ms. Ragsdale noted we discussed transient lodging with the Board in a couple of work sessions to set the
parameters for the text amendment scope; there were some tax updates that happened in June and then in
September right before the October Planning Commission meeting, as we had a series of public meetings to ask
a questions and get general concerns and feedback on the table from the public. She noted she had mentioned
the Comprehensive Plan strategy; obviously, we are in the study process now and distilling what we might want
to consider as a text amendment change. Then also at the same time, we are working on bringing people into
compliance so we will give the Commission a little more detail this evening on that side of things since there
were a lot of questions a couple months ago. Of course, we mentioned that we are trying to strike a balance
with these regulations in allowing an economic activity that is supportive of tourism but preserving our
development areas quality of life and our rural area resources that we wish to protect.
Ms. Ragsdale pointed out the two items that we have been studying are this concept of whole house rental
where an owner does not reside or is not present during tourist lodging rentals and we have also studied whether
to allow the use in other dwelling unit types. She explained the current terminology in the ordinance as:
Transient lodging: Lodging in which guest rooms are occupied for less than thirty (30) consecutive
days. (Added 6-6-12)
Tourist lodging or Accessory Tourist Lodging - Residential Zoning Districts
Bed and breakfast - Rural Area Zoning Districts
Ms. Ragsdale pointed out that could be a range of one -bedroom AirBnB to a traditional bed and breakfast,
which was sort of a broad category in the rural areas. She said it was consecutive rental for less than 30 days at
a time is what we are talking about in a residential setting and staff has recommended the term for both as
homestay. She said staff have found a few things to improve the definitions and the terminology during the text
amendment process; therefore, we just wanted to note that. This is a timely topic since we can continue the
process and get more inquiries weekly for bed and breakfast uses. She thinks part of that is people wanting to
come into compliance, the word spreading about that and it continues to be a popular use in the county. In the
next slide, Ms. Ragsdale pointed out the current numbers and noted we continue to see more in the rural areas
with 35 this year than in the development areas with 12 in the residential zoning district. She pointed out that a
lot of these are simply for one guest room for people who have extra space in the basement or above the garage.
Ms. Ragsdale offered, a recap of what you can do and then summarized where we are with what staff has
recommended. She explained this use is associated by right now with a single-family detached dwelling in the
residential zoning districts and the owner or manager must reside in that structure. Then what we are clarifying
in this process as we discussed a lot in October is this concept of residing and being present during rental and
right now, we expect both. Therefore, the concept of whole house rental is someone is still residing in the
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structures, the primary use is still residential, but we allow a certain amount of rental over the course of a year
where the owner is not present. Ms. Ragsdale said that brings us to the proposed, as shown on the slide, in a
1%W refinement of the recommendations based on your input was no more than seven (7) days per month and no
more than 45 per year and that the applicants would keep track of the number of days that they are conducting
whole house rental and they would report that to the county. She pointed out we talked about that before as a
way of tracking this and helping with compliance issues. One thing we proposed last month that we did not
really talk about in depth was the concept of notice. She noted staff had it in the chart but did not clarify what
we meant by that so when we were talking about the enforcement concerns and the nuisance impacts in what we
have seen with some of our other zoning text amendments we meant that the neighbors would receive a notice
that would provide an emergency contact. She explained it was a notice that comes from the applicant if there
is something that needs to be addressed after hours or on the weekends so they have a number to call. This is
something that we did with farm winery's events as part of that zoning text amendment, so it is something that
staff thinks would be good to implement with this one.
Ms. Ragsdale said then last month we talked about whether we should allow this use in multi -family units. Staff
has refined the recommendations to limit it to townhouses and single-family attached units and then clarifying
that would be in units where they are used primarily as someone's residence and during the guest room rentals
the owners or managers are present and so there are no whole house rentals in those unit types. In the rural
areas, we have a lot of flexibility already that we added to the ordinance in 2012 and we wanted to try to clarify.
There are a couple of slides to give examples to clarify what you can already do in the rural areas.
Again, this use in the rural areas is in association with single-family detached dwellings and they must be to
dwellings that have development rights or you can have your guest rooms in accessory structures. In the
development area, the guest rooms must be within the single-family dwelling. In the rural areas, we also allow
a second bed and breakfast use. That second bed and breakfast use requires that a parcel have a second dwelling
and a development right. I hope that the examples will be helpful.
Ms. Ragsdale said what we have proposed in the rural areas is the same as far as whole house rental as the
"Aft, development areas, which was something that the Commission raised in October. Again, it would be whole
house rental limited to 7 days per month and no more than 45 per year with the required notice to the neighbors
and the reporting just as we have suggested for the development areas. There was a lot of discussion last time
and we put this concept out there of allowing an abutting property where there are two properties under the
same ownership allowing the guest rooms in the bed and breakfast to be sort of on both properties, but still treat
it as one bed and breakfast or a set of two as we allow now. We have studied that a little further and because
that would be an ownership based regulation and because of some other legalities and lack of enabling
legislation, there is not a way to tie that into this bed and breakfast use. It cannot be tied in either through new
supplemental regulations or definitions and it cannot be something that we can allow as a special exception.
There have been a number of inquiries for this specific provision. We did talk a lot about this recently so we
feel like there isn't a way to do it that fits within still allowing this use as an accessory use and in association
with single-family dwellings. It starts broadening things into something that is more commercial and we would
have concerns about such as the ones you had last month as far as incentivizing and increasing this activity in
the rural areas.
Ms. Ragsdale reviewed examples of the different scenarios that tourist lodging can happen in the rural areas
now. You can have one parcel with one dwelling, you can rent guest rooms in the dwelling or they can be in
accessory structures. In the slide, Ms. Ragsdale pointed out the diagrams staff put together after the 2012
amendment. She noted you could sort of mix and match these things depending on whether you have up to two
single-family dwellings on your property and whether you want to have the guest rooms in accessory structures
or in dwellings. Therefore, that is what this is meant to illustrate. She said parcels that have a second dwelling
on them may have guest rooms in that second dwelling and our ordinance only requires that one owner or
manager reside on the parcel. That is the first green example shown.
Ms. Ragsdale noted there is still not more than ten (10) guest rooms, an owner or manager resides on the parcel
and present during rentals. Therefore, we somewhat already allow whole house rental in the rural area in this
scenario and we have brought that up before. We just would not be able to allow it where there is a property in
between those dwellings. The example on the bottom is just that you could have a parcel that has two single-
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family dwellings and accessory structures that they would like to use. What we have seen so far since 2012, as
far as the use of accessory structures for tourist lodging, we have seen people use only one; the room above a
garage being the most common or on some properties that had older structures they have rehabbed them into a
guest room like something that used to be a summer kitchen. We have not seen new construction associated
with B & B's so far. There was one application where someone had proposed new construction, but they did
not pursue it. On the right of the slide, there was a simple example of a larger rural area property that has
development rights and the configuration of guest rooms that they could have already done without changing
the ordinance.
Ms. Ragsdale said switching gears here as far as our recommendations that we have mentioned the short-term
rental registry in a number of our work sessions. It was an item that we did not focus on last time we talked in
October, but it is important when we talk about ongoing compliance and some tools for us if we get into
situations where there are zoning violations or enforcement issues. What the short-term registry allows is an
annual registration of applicants for this use. It would be administrative in nature and staff would try to make it
as seamless as possible and sort of dovetail it into the other requirements that applicants would have to comply
with on an on -going basis. However, what the guest registry does allow is what staff is calling the "three strikes
you are out" feature. If there is a property that has repeated violations or multiple violations up to three then
their permit can be revoked or that activity would be prohibited going forward. What that really leads to as far
as the process that we are recommending, we mentioned last time that this use requires an application that is
made to Community Development primarily it is an inspections process; there is not a whole lot of staff review;
and we just do some quick inspections that do not take very long. We mentioned that it requires fire marshal,
building inspector and then if necessary a zoning inspection. Most of these applications that we have seen
since they have not been providing foods, been one -bedroom and have not required health department approval.
Ms. Ragsdale said staff are recommending as far as the neighbor notice that notice go out to the neighbors at the
time that the application is approved so there is no confusion during the process; it would still be an
administrative process and people would be provided the emergency contact information and aware that activity
would be happening in their neighborhood. Therefore, once the application is approved there is the transient
occupancy tax requirement on a monthly basis. Therefore, at the same time folks that are submitting their
transient occupancy taxes they could be reporting the number of days that they are doing whole house rental and
then yearly we are suggesting the annual registry. Staff has refined the recommendations to the three
recommendations regarding upgrading the terminology in the definitions to use homestay; allowing whole
house rental in both the development areas and the rural areas no more than 7 days per month/45 per year; and
then the number of days being reported and the local emergency contacts provided. Also, allowing up to two
guest rooms for homestays in townhouses and attached units. Therefore, we have already indicated there are
some legal issues with limiting the number of homestays that someone has to one and then regulating based on
ownership as noted in the abutting property example given earlier; and so we are no longer recommending
those.
Ms. Ragsdale said we have talked throughout this process about the compliance gap, the online activity of
rentals that we are seeing versus the number of applications that have been processed. This is an ongoing
discussion. We have a little staff team together and we are talking to the other departments to try to figure out a
way to make it easier for people.
Obviously, we are looking at ways to better publicize the information. We have a new interactive tool that staff
is trying to make it easier for people to figure out which application they need and whether their rental scenario
is something that is allowed or not. We have contemplated making a public education video so people can see
what the requirements are and not to be overwhelmed by them in any way. She noted we have said before they
geared towards the basic safety requirements like smoke detectors, fire extinguishers and that sort of thing.
Therefore, we get many detailed questions so we could just cover that in a video and use some examples for
people. Then we have talked about once we get through the ZTA process hosting a workshop or two where
people can come and meet with all of the representatives at once and get information face to face. We know
there are a number of different ways to communicate and people have their preferences. We want to have those
opportunities available for people. We talked about reaching out to the hosting platforms and then sort an initial
compliance effort to be proactive in letting people know that there are these requirements. We are aware of the
different consulting firms that are out there; however, we have not contacted them to get any cost estimates at
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this once because we wanted to get a little further down the ZTA process and find out what the Board and
Commission wanted to do before we contacted those companies.
Ms. Ragsdale said we are not suggesting that enforcement be proactive for this particular use or when there is a
violation that is complaint driven; but we feel like, for the initial compliance efforts, that we should have a level
of being proactive. We have already talked about the additional enforcement tools that come with the short-
term rental registry. With the annual registration, we would have the "three strikes and you are out" tool;
reporting on the number of days per month and then having the emergency contact information.
Ms. Ragsdale said included in the packet was the complaint data. We only have it since 2012, a five-year
snapshot. She said we have had 18 since then with 12 of those this year and that might be because the word is
getting out about the use itself. She pointed out that six of those were in townhouses; and four of the townhouse
complaints were actually all within the same subdivision. She said that various developments are being
proactive in letting us know when people are renting and their covenants do not allow it. Ms. Ragsdale noted
she just wanted to recap that data for the Commission.
Staff proposed the next steps after the discussion and questions, if we are ready, would be the public hearing at
the earliest opportunity with the Commission and then going on to the Board of Supervisors for a work session
and public hearing based on the timing of getting the draft ordinance together, legal advertisements and other
ZTA's in the works. She said that would put us into spring.
Mr. Keller invited questions for staff.
Ms. Firehock asked if right now you are not allowed to have short-term whole house rentals, and Ms. Ragsdale
replied that is correct.
Ms. Firehock said there are a number of houses that rent out short-term weekend rentals, a week at a time, here
a month, there a month, and those are all not currently in compliance with our Code?
Ms. Ragsdale replied right, and then we have talked about the rural area example where you could have
potentially the whole house rental; but, yes, that is the issue.
Mr. Blair said there could be a whole house rental in the rural area so long as one of the dwellings is occupied
by an owner -manager on the same property.
Ms. Ragsdale said the house that no one lives there and then they are rented out periodically for tourist lodging
is not currently permitted. So you saw in the list of complaints that we have gotten that we have had some of
those where we have contacted the property owner and then they have gotten the permit and had someone to
live in the house.
Ms. Riley said she understands that when staff summarized the comments last time from the Planning
Commission in both the rural and development areas it looks like we just all supported the change to whole
house rentals. She wanted to be on record and clear that she was not in support of whole house rentals and was
surprised to see that we supported that.
Ms. Firehock agreed with Ms. Riley and noted that the Commission did not go line by line and reach agreement
on each point. However, the summary was just comments that the Commission made and there were some
places that the summary said the Planning Commission all thought "such and such" and so that particular
meeting summary was a little disappointing and we are not all in agreement on everything that is written there.
Mr. Dotson questioned the parking requirement particularly in the development area or in suburban areas
outside the development area. He asked how the parking requirement would come into play.
Ms. Ragsdale replied that we have not proposed any changes to parking since it is one parking space per guest
room plus two per dwelling. She said that is part of our review process and we verify that there is available
parking on site.
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Mr. Dotson said that within the development area he guessed that screens out the vast majority of possibilities.
He asked are there situations where people could have three guestrooms and be able on site to provide three
additional parking space, which seems unlikely.
Ms. Ragsdale said there are scenarios that could be possible. There has been one instance of that where we
could not approve the application where they did not have the parking spaces; they only had one.
Mr. Dotson said on -street parking would not count towards meeting the parking requirement and Ms. Ragsdale
agreed on -street parking does not count. (Note: at the following Planning Commission meeting staff clarified
that, under some conditions, on -street parking could potentially satisfy the ordinance).
Ms. Spain said this seems to be getting into the weeds in even more detail than we have had. She asked if the
owner is on the premises is the neighbor notice still required.
Ms. Ragsdale replied no, we are only proposing the neighborhood notice for whole house rental because in that
case the owner or manager would not be there to speak.
Mr. Lafferty asked if staff has been coordinating this with the off -ground housing at UVA. He said they have
an inspection type of things for major events and where they can rent houses or guide people to housing.
Ms. Ragsdale replied that she thinks that would be something we would do during our compliance efforts.
However, we have not reached out to them yet.
Mr. Lafferty suggested reaching out to them before staff gets into the details might be worth it.
Mr. Keller said he had several clarifications. He said in a rural area it would not be considered a whole house
rental if there is an apartment in the building where either the owner or manager resides.
Ms. Ragsdale replied that is correct.
Mr. Keller said that would be for the rural or the development area. He said in the rural area if there was an
auxiliary and in a few places where we have carriage house units in the developed area if the owner was in the
apartment does that mean that it would not be construed as a whole house rental.
Ms. Ragsdale said in the development area the owner must reside in the structure that is being rented. There is
not the on -premises allowances.
Mr. Keller noted that it would be in the rural areas.
Ms. Ragsdale said that was one of the distinctions that in the development areas there is the limitation that the
guest rooms must be in the residence. She said you cannot use carriage houses or accessory structures in the
development areas and the owner or manager must reside in the dwelling.
Mr. Keller said that a number of the Commissioners last time asked the question about rural subdivisions and
villages because of the closeness of parcels. He asked are those being considered the same as the development
area.
Ms. Ragsdale replied that you could only have up to five guestrooms in association with one single-family
dwelling so the whole house provisions are the same in the development areas and the rural areas. Then if you
wanted to have additional tourist lodging opportunities that is not allowed in the developed areas because you
do not have the larger parcels with that.
Mr. Keller said but it would be allowed in the villages and rural subdivisions. He said that is what they were
asking about before whether they could be treated the same as the growth area.
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Ms. Ragsdale said that in those instances they are two -acre lots that are very similar to the development area
provisions, which would not have second dwellings on them because they are only two -acre lots. She said they
would have the accessory structure provision.
Mr. Keller noted he was not talking about whole house, rather he was talking about the homestay component of
it and the issue of close by. He said that in many of the villages there are lots less than two acres.
Ms. Ragsdale said there are many less than two acres throughout the rural area.
Ms. Echols noted you would need to have a development right in order to have the second set of five rooms and
in effect, they are the same. If you have a large lot subdivision in the rural area chances are, you do not have a
second development right in order to put another dwelling plus five rooms on that parcel. The only distinction
is that if you were in the rural area and had a two acre lot your guest rooms could potentially be in an accessory
structure and do not all have to be inside.
Mr. Keller said he understands the point being made, but he thinks the feeling among the Commissioners was
that the villages because of the closeness of units and rural subdivisions that might have 8 or 10 houses and the
closeness of the units that they needed to be considered in the same light as the development areas.
Ms. Ragsdale said many of the villages are zoned Village Residential like North Garden and that residential
zoning district would follow the accessory tourist lodging provisions.
Mr. Keller said that is where we were going with it and he just wanted that clarification. Then the final one that
is something that is starting to happen in a number of areas and just recently it started happening in
Charlottesville gets back to this parking issue. He asked staff to remind us what the rules are for how much of a
front yard can be turned into parking or in other words, if a house in a subdivision has two parking places if
there is a rule that says no more than a third of a front yard can be parking. He said for some small lots a third
of that front yard would be parking instead of having parking down the side and then it begins to affect the
visual character of the neighborhood.
Ms. Ragsdale replied there are no setbacks for the parking in the residential districts.
Mr. Keller asked could we have happen what he has seen in other areas that somebody could come in and put
gravel down across the whole front yard, pay for a curb cut and the whole front yard become a parking lot so
they can meet the number of parking spaces they need for the five units in the house.
Ms. Ragsdale replied we do not have a maximum limit on single-family in the ordinance now.
Ms. Echols said the answer is yes; it is not regulated.
Mr. Keller noted that public comment would be taken.
Ms. Firehock said there are four people signed up to speak. She asked the first person signed up, Neil
Williamson, to come forward.
Neil Williamson, with the Free Enterprise Forum, said he appreciates the depth of this conversation thus far.
He said he was very concerned with some of the challenges other localities are bringing forward about transient
lodging and he anticipates once again, there will be an Airbnb bill or five in the General Assembly this year.
That being said he appreciates conversations with staff regarding the potential limitation of ownership. He
understands that is no longer a recommendation and was glad since he thinks that would be a gross violation of
property rights. As an example, if he owned five parcels and rents to a full time renter and that renter sublets to
an Airbnb there is no reason why they cannot do that unless I have a contractual relationship that says they
cannot. He said the county should not get in between that relationship. He remains concerned about parking,
especially in the development area; however, that may be a function of numbers. When you go through your
exhaustive planning for the development area, you have planning for parking allowed. The number of cars
involved may not be as great as you think. He believes you will see more cars parking on front lots during the
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UVA game rather than after the UVA game at Airbnbs. He anticipates that this will continue to be an area for
refinement in state code even before you get to your ordinance and he wished them luck.
Bob Garland, Secretary of the Canterbury Hills Association, said he was here to speak on the proposed changes
to the tourist lodging ordinances in the Development Area. He said he will not speak to the proposed changes
in the Rural Area or those affecting multi -family dwellings since those are not applicable to our neighborhood.
Canterbury Hills is an older single-family R-2 neighborhood just off Barracks Road in the urban ring. We
bought our homes in a single-family residential neighborhood and do not wish to have any further expansion of
business operations in our neighborhood beyond that which is currently allowed. We believe these changes
have the potential to be detrimental to single-family residential neighborhoods such as ours, where no protective
covenants exist and residents depend on the existing zoning ordinances of Albemarle County.
Mr. Garland said specifically, the Canterbury Hills Association is opposed to the expansion of the applicable
ordinances to allow for periodic "whole house" rental with no owner present in residential zoned areas.
Additionally, we support a requirement under the current owner that an owner must be present during the rental
period rather than a tenant manager. Further, we would proposed some tightening of the current ordinance as
follows:
• Change the wording of the "Tourist Lodging" definition under 3.1 from allowing "not more than
five (S) guest rooms" to "not more than five guest bedrooms less one" to allow one bedroom for
the owner.
• Change the wording under 5.1.48.a to "Residency. The owner of the parcel shall reside on the
parcel", and should be added "and be present during the rental. "
• Place a limit on the number of adults per rented room or number of bathrooms.
• Require periodic (e.g. annual) safety inspections, paid for by the owner, to make sure the property
remains safe for guests after the initial inspection. He said everyone here should probably
remember the Clifton Inn fire that took two lives — they were faulted for having a "no overnight
staff on site, having mal-function smoke detectors, having second floor windows painted shut and
having a mal-functioned fire alarm system."
Mr. Garland said even though there is an off-street parking requirement we are not convinced that the county
staff has considered that in some situations such as on the eight cul-de-sacs in our neighborhood the inevitable
use of on -street parking by guest will crowd out permanent residents.
Mr. Garland said lastly, this is yet another example of the county relying on residents to spy on their neighbors
and report violations because there is insufficient staff to monitor for violations. He said you have already
heard that staff is aware of multiple violations of existing ordinances but has not taken any steps to notify
violators who are advertising tourist lodging on the internet that are not registered with the county. He urged
you to vote against further expansion of these ordinances. Thank you. (Attachment — Planning Commission
Presentation dated December 19, 2017 submitted by Bob Garland, Secretary of the Canterbury Hills
Association)
Jim Donahue, President of the Canterbury Hills Association, said he was here to say he completely agreed with
and supports our esteemed secretary Bob Garland in what he has just presented. We address the proposed
ordinance that you are looking for at our annual meeting recently and it raised many concerns for virtually
everybody in attendance. In the past few years, we have had several young families with children move into the
Canterbury Hills residential subdivision and they are concerned as to the negative impacts due to non -family
occupancies, turnover of residents, more traffic, and potential of more noise. Sometimes we liken the potential
of these families that would come in on a temporary occupancy as to being next door to a fraternity where
parties could occur, loud noise would occur and it would be very detrimental to our neighborhood.
Mr. Donahue said therefore as Bob has pointed out the Canterbury Hills Association is opposed to the
expansion of the applicable ordinances to allow for periodic whole house rentals with no owner present in the
residential zoned areas. He said regardless of the approval of this ordinance we would like to have a provision
for an annual inspection of the homes for safety needs and every two years that the owner applies for a license
renewal. Thank you.
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Susan Smith thanked the Commission for their work and for the opportunity to create input. She said
regulations are always going to mean that some people have to sacrifice for the greater good. She understands
and would like to discuss that balance in regards to the proposed regulation changes to see the negatives are
truly necessary to achieving the desired outcome. One of the intensions of this review process was to broaden
opportunities to allow for whole house rentals. Without a host present the need for nearby management is clear
but she questions what protection is added by requiring that the rented structure be someone's residence who
would then have to leave the structure every time a guest came and move back in and back out. She said if
residency continues to be enforced this impracticality would disqualify most current hosts leaving to a
significant loss of family friendly rentals, which is bound to cause a decline in tourist related businesses. The
vast majority of short-term rentals were started because someone had an unoccupied structure due to either a
death in the family, a marriage or divorce, transfer or possibly, they have a dependency with a carriage house or
a cottage that might be fixed up. Putting these buildings to good use by allowing visitors to stay in them saved
them from being dormant and created some unique and personable spaces. This benefits both the owner and the
surrounding community. She pointed out she was really speaking more here on rural areas than dense housing.
Ms. Smith said that houses that are feasible to rent long term generally are because it is less work and more
money. However, not all buildings are appropriate for long-term rental. She said buildings that she is referring
to started as vacant and therefore by definition they are no one's house. She said people who have space in their
own house or on their own lot can benefit from a little extra income, but anyone who took the initiative to
breathe new life into vacant property intending for it to be self-supporting both to whose income is most vital
would be denied the ability to recover their costs. The residency requirements results in a serious hardship for
those who are excluded and discourages the rehab of existing vacate structures. If the intention of requiring
residency is no longer for the purposes of monitoring visitors as in whole house but to primarily, minimize the
number. Limiting the number of licenses for each house, one house, one building accomplish the same thing of
limiting vacation rentals without inflicting the losses on individuals on tourists to appreciate whole house
rentals and on the tourism that relies on them. Thank you.
Travis Petriela, with the Southern Environmental Law Center, thanked the Commission for the chance to
comment tonight. As of the last work session, he wanted to start as recognizing the challenges involved with
this issue. We understand homeowners wanting to be able to rent their homes to earn a little extra income or
help defray housing costs and expanding the homestay allowances could help with that. He said our concern is
that if the ordinance is not carefully done it could undermine other key goals of the Comprehensive Plan. In
particular, it is critical that the effect of the ZTA is not make the home stay business so lucrative that it
encourages the construction of new houses in the rural area that otherwise would not be built. If this were to
happen, it would be directly contrary to the County's growth management policy.
Mr. Petriela said for today's work session, staff has proposed changes that could help discourage that concern
such as limiting whole house rentals to 45 days per year and requiring monthly reporting and limiting each
homeowner to one home stay use in the county. These limits only work if they are enforceable and the first step
is making sure that each of these requirements is clearly spelled out in the ordinance. Mr. Petriela said perhaps
the most important requirement to flush out in the ordinance is one that staff says is already in place today for
tourist lodging and B&B's for that sort of requirement that the homeowner or the tenant must have must have
their primary residence on the property and must reside there at least one-half the year. Making that crystal
clear in the ordinance, which is not the case today, to greatly diminish the incentive to build new houses in the
rural area for the main purpose of renting them out, particularly about folks living out of town or out of state.
He said that being said given the difficulties in enforcing these limits we still think it is worth considering
limiting whole house rentals in the rural areas to parcels with existing homes or at least having a waiting period
before a new house built on an undeveloped parcel would be eligible for a whole house rental, for example, one
or two years after a certificate of occupancy is issued. He said that waiting period would reduce the financial
incentive to build new houses mainly to serve as rental properties.
Mr. Petriela said although staff has noted that not many new structures have been built for B&B uses in the
rural area following the recent relaxation of the B&B standards whole house rentals that do not require an
owner or caretaker on site are a very different animal. He said that past experience may not be a good predictor
of the effects this change may have going forward. In short, developing safeguards that will allow whole house
rentals to occur without generating pressure for new residential development in the rural areas is crucial to this
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effort. Those safeguards need to be included in the ordinance, clearly spelled out and they need to be
enforceable. Thank you.
There being no further public comment, Mr. Keller noted the matter was before the Commission for further
discussion. He invited further discussion.
Ms. Riley said she had really been doing a lot of research on this. She thinks it is a very complex issue and
primary concerns are the public nuisances that could occur with a lot more of this and the removal of rental
units from long term. She said it would create more shortage of housing and create not just an availability
problem but an affordability problem as well. She said if you really look at what has happened in many places
in the county it is hard to interpret since there is not very clear data that shows there is a direct correlation
between short-term rentals increasing and affordability. However, she thinks there is a pretty good sense in
many jurisdictions that it is absolutely exacerbating the problem and that is why you have a lot of jurisdictions
that are trying to go back and create policies that are more restrictive now.
Ms. Riley said having said all of that; she thinks it is important that we do allow owners to rent their primary
residences in order to earn income. She said they have to balance property rights as well as protect the
residences, families and the neighborhoods from nuisance. She thinks parking, particularly in the development
area, is a big concern. She thinks noise and parties in this event college town; it is a tourist designation and is a
real concern. She said they need to preserve long-term rentals. When she tries to look at where the balance
would be she thinks we have to restrict rentals to owner occupied, as they have done in Cambridge and a few
other places.
Ms. Riley said hopefully our new UVA President from Boston will bring some experience on the issue and will
be working with us on that where we look at a way to provide incentives for owner occupied rentals. These are
both college event heavy areas and tourist destinations. In Madison, Wisconsin one of the things that they have
done is they are essentially trying to incentivize owner occupied and so if you had an owner occupied unit you
would not have a limited number of days that you could rent it out. If you did not have owner occupied they
allowed full house and you would limit that to 30 days of the year so that incentivizes owner occupied. Ms.
Riley said those are two approaches that potentially are worth discussing.
Ms. Spain said she had a follow up question for Ms. Riley about when she says it is an incentive to owner
occupancy does that mean by using short term rentals the housing was more affordable for the owner.
Ms. Riley said it was an incentive to be able to rent it more often because it is owner occupied; however, if the
owner does not stay there, it is limited to 30 days of the year.
Ms. Spain said it would be for neighborhood stability.
Ms. Riley said that personally she thinks we should be encouraging owner or manager occupied short-term
rentals. She said we could accomplish the goals of allowing income to property owners while minimizing
nuisances and potentially minimizing the number of short-term rentals that are removed from market because
these are already owner occupied units.
Ms. Echols noted that she had a question since right now that is allowed since you have unlimited ability to rent
up to five rooms if there is a resident manager or the owner is present. She said that already exists.
Ms. Riley added in single-family detached homes, and Ms. Echols agreed, but she is missing something.
Ms. Riley said she was saying she did not want us to take away the owner occupied and she did not want to do
whole house because it was not a good idea.
Ms. Firehock said last time the Planning Commission did a work session she expressed a comment that she is
not that concerned with whole house rental in the rural area because the house had to be on their property.
Since she had seen a number of examples in the rural area, where the owner was located within a quarter of a
mile or a short walk from the property and managed it quite well. She asked that the Commission consider our
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last public commentator's note about not creating an incentive to go building more houses in the rural area
solely for the purposes of renting them out. She said for example if she has some vacant land, no one is living
on it and she is going to build five structures on there. She asked if there some way to say you can have whole
rental but you could not build new structures specifically for that purpose or in other words, you could only do
it to existing structures.
Ms. Ragsdale replied that there are two things she is mentioned: one is the limit to existing structures but then,
in addition, she is bringing up the concept of the primary use of a structure being just for rental. That is what
we were saying was problematic because this use is in conjunction with a single-family dwelling or properties
where people reside, it is structured as an accessory use and it becomes a primary use. However, she thinks we
are able to limit it to existing structures if we wanted to since we did it for special events in the rural areas. Ms.
Ragsdale said she could not think of any other examples off the top of my head. She said that sounds like two
separate things.
Ms. Firehock said she had seen in other nearby counties where somebody builds a whole bunch of tiny little
shack -like houses all close together, which is like running a little lodge. Therefore, she does not want to do
something that facilitates more building structures with more mini lodges all over the place. However, again,
she does not share the same concern about someone renting a whole house structure on a property on which
they do not reside. In the rural area, we have a hilly country in Albemarle County, so even on some smaller
lots, people are able to tuck houses away and you do not notice them. Therefore, that is something that she is
less worried about in the rural area and she would just note that for the record.
Ms. Firehock said Travis was making the point that if we allow this people will go out and build a whole bunch
of units on properties in the rural area and that they are only building for turning into little lodging. She said she
was not against whole house renting in the rural area and she was trying to figure out some way to allow that
without it being a facilitator. She noted especially out in the west, for example, she sees many places where
there are acres and acres of little houses everywhere just for tourist lodging.
err►, Mr. Blair said we are trying to work it through a couple of points initially. He guessed one way you could
approach that is to simply extinguish the use in the rural area and what you would in effect do is create
everything that already existed would be a non -conforming use. He said that is one way you could look at your
question and you would freeze everything as it is. He believed that Travis mentioned the idea and it might be a
little more feasible was the idea that any new homestay use in the rural area, using our proposed definition, it
might be a one or two 2-year waiting period after construction of the structure before it could become a
homestay use. He thinks that is another way you could look at that as a way to regulate because again to let a
structure sit vacant for one of two years. He was not sure there really would be an economic incentive. At that
point theoretically there could be.
Mr. Blair said a further point to this vested rights come to mind, but vested rights require some sort of pursuit of
the right itself. So let's say, for instance, your idea of simply freezing this use as it is, but if somebody had
purchased land and in some way was going through the development process to build a structure for B&B use,
then at that point he thinks they would have to be allowed to build because they would have a vested right and
also you start to tip toe into takings. At that point, if he had a business expectation, the zoning at the time exists
to allow the home -stay use, he submits a site plan or start to go through the process at that point those folks if
they exist probably would need to be allowed to complete the structure to avoid both the constitutional question
and the vested rights question.
Ms. Firehock said she would make one last comment. Ms. Firehock said she was more of the mind of "where is
the fire" in terms of the rural area and the whole house rental since she had not been convinced that the problem
exists. She said in the urban area absolutely because of the fact that we have UVA and many events that go on
such as the film festival and so she does not want to add to the destruction and disturbance to urban ring
neighborhoods. However, for the rural area we might be overreaching which was where she stands.
Ms. Echols asked for clarification. She thinks what you are saying about existing houses has to do with the fact
that anything other than another house being built is what is concerning you. Right now, we allow people to
build accessory structures and it is those accessory structures that are giving you the most concern; but that a
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second house would not give you as much concern because it is not creating something for the long term that is
like a little cabin.
Ms. Firehock replied right, and it only has one use with a one -room structure with one bed. It kind of can only
be that. However, if you have a house it could transition into something else in the future to a regular family
residence.
Ms. Echols said what you would be saying is you would like the Commission to consider recommending an
amendment to the existing regulations that would take that ability to have those away right now. She was not
saying it was good or bad, but you are looking to amend the current ordinance that would be something you
would like to see happen to remove that rather than do anything else related to restricting whole house rentals to
just owner occupied.
Ms. Firehock replied that was correct.
Mr. Keller asked for a restatement.
Ms. Echols said that right now you could have, in the bottom example, two houses and five little one -room
cabins that cannot stand alone as a residence.
Mr. Keller noted the cabin by definition would not have a kitchen.
Ms. Echols said it was the combination of cooking, bedroom, toilet and cooking facilities.
Ms. Ragdale noted that Mr. Keller was correct.
Ms. Echols said right now you could have five little cabins and that is of concern under the existing regulations
to Commissioner Firehock and so what she is saying is she has more concern about that and would like to see
that go away rather than have the current restriction of whole house rentals for only resident managers and
owners of property.
Ms. Spain said that staff and Commissioners are putting a great deal of thought into this trying to anticipate
consequences and hearing from the public and such. However, she is extremely frustrated that at present there is
no one dedicated to bringing places into compliance. She said Ms. Ragsdale mentioned a number of strategies
that the staff will try, but both the compliance issue and the enforcement issue are key to anything else that we
do or say here and if they cannot be brought into compliance and if the rules are not enforced, then there is very
little purpose in them. She asked is it possible to have at least as a start up some staff member once this goes to
the Board and such some staff member go through all the internet listings and go through everything that is
already there and contact people individually to get them to be in compliance. Then they could have someone
once a month to check somehow or maybe once a year. She said it was a lot to ask, but asked how else is it
going to work.
Ms. Ragsdale replied that we do not go to that degree for any other land uses. We have a lot of supplemental
regulations and specific requirements for all of our land uses. Therefore, we would have to go to the Board
since there are a range of possibilities and we do want to be proactive initially. She said we have brought up the
idea of contacting people, but we have not recommended that ongoing and would have to figure out what the
budget impact would be and the staffing resources to do that, and then there would have to be Board support to
do that. She said we want to provide more information on that and have more definitive numbers and costs
associated with that once we have heard. It is a big policy issue for us — do you want to go to that extent with
enforcement and monitoring for this particular land use and do you think it is necessary because we have
historically been complaint based. She said it needs to be put together and quantified in a way, which is what
our Director does in the discussions he has with the Board as part of the work program. Therefore, that is not
too far away as we take it through this process — it definitely will be a component of the public hearings in what
it would take. However, it would depend on the degree of monitoring that we believe in going forward is
necessary.
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Ms. Spain said in relationship to the other types of violations. She said she would like to know if this is a high
enough priority for the Board to get it off the ground in a way that makes it clear that the county is taking this
seriously for the safety of the occupants, fairness to the hotel industry and tax revenues that would come in. She
did not know how many types of zoning issues are complaint driven and come to you, but she would like to see
this prioritized in some way if it qualifies for that.
Ms. Ragsdale pointed out we are proactive with sign enforcement right now, which was a topic of discussion
with the Board. Some other departments are making proactive efforts and as a result, we sometimes see an
increase in applications, such as home occupations are on the rise — less of a safety concern but still a land use
activity because of the work that the Finance Department has done. We can certainly continue this discussion
and try to quantify what it would take, but it would take us making that a priority.
Ms. Echols noted that we also know that there are companies that specialize in finding out who was doing this
so we are looking into what those costs would be. She said we have to report a budget impact to the Board of
Supervisors when we take it to them. She said it is how much it is going to cost and it depends on what level of
enforcement that they want to do. She asked if she was hearing you say that if we are going to open up the
regulations to allow whole house rentals you believe that a greater level in enforcement is needed. She asked is
that the connection you are making.
Ms. Spain replied that was correct.
Ms. Firehock said on that topic if she understood the presentation correctly, you were saying it was sort of a
three strikes you are out type of approach. She asked if that was what she was suggesting.
Ms. Ragsdale replied yes, that is one of the approaches and suggestions.
Ms. Firehock said it is difficult, as an example of a place where one neighbor does not like another and
complaints.
Mr. Dotson said he had some attitude things to say and specific things. He said staff mentioned the importance
of balancing the rights of the property owners and the neighbors. He said my attitude in this case was to say he
was concerned about allowing a few people to do things that could be at the expense of the majority so he is
giving greater weight to the neighborhood as we try to balance that. He did not think it was equal since the
neighbors were there first and came in with certain expectation for the enjoyment of their property and so forth.
He said my concern is that we not look for equal balance but we make sure that we protect the majority of the
neighbors. So that leads me to say what he would look for is we should do the least damage or minimize the risk
to the neighbors. The question is what are the smallest steps or the minimum number of steps that we could
take that would have some benefit but would try to control the risks to the greatest degree possible. That would
be an attitude that he would bring to this. In terms of some specific issues, he thinks parking has come up as
maybe an unexamined issue thus far so he would hope that some explication of the parking requirements and
possibilities could be part of the next round of analysis. Again, another specific is notifying the neighbors of
who they can contact he can just see this scenario unfolding — the property owner gave the neighbor the number,
the neighbor uses it and calls and they are angry and what we end up with is a neighborhood feud. He said
these things could go on for a long time and be quite disruptive and problematic. He said he still did not
understand exactly how the limiting the number of days would work. He asked staff to give a quick and simple
explanation of that.
Ms. Ragsdale explained they were talking about whole house rental in both the development area and rural area
with having the limitation of 7 per month and 45 per year, keeping track of it and reporting those number of
days as often as monthly. Since the transient occupancy tax is due monthly and reporting it to Community
Development the number of days that you are renting it at the same time you take care of your taxes is what we
had suggested.
Mr, Dotson noted previously Commissioner Keller mentioned the rental on football weeks as one scenario and
he would like to see some more scenarios of how realistically that might play out. He said one fear would be
there would be places that are not family homes, which would somehow be able to game the system even with
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that limit. He asked what would happen outside the 45 days with such houses the rest of the time and he would
suggest this be thought about. He said most of the presentation has been development area and rural, and he
thinks there should be a third category called outside the development area, suburban or village. He said it may
be as simple as saying that is no different from development area, but at least it would have focused the
attention on those kind of situations. Having had a lot of questions, he would just say why are we doing this.
He said the staff report says to allow more opportunities. He asked is that a direction from the Board of
Supervisors that they are looking to allow more opportunities; is it pressure from people who are currently
having these kinds of operations and they are afraid that they maybe can't continue them and we are trying to
bring them into legality. He asked if they were trying to keep up with the times because this is something new
and unfamiliar so it makes us nervous but it will be okay. He asked if that is what it is about. He asked if the
motive was the cat is out of the bag and now we have to cope with it, which then brings up enforcement issues.
With my concerns and with my desire to favor the existing neighbors over the one owner who wants to do
something that could be a problem, I say do the least damage. Therefore, he would like to filter all of the
proposals with that criterion in mind. At this point, it seems like what we have is a well -massaged laundry list
of possibilities — what is the minimum or least we can do and what is the consequence of that.
Mr. Lafferty said if this is going to be implemented, you should factor in adequate notice to the public and that
includes going through the internet and seeing who is now doing it and notifying them so the public is well
aware that we are changing the rules. He said that ought to be factored in as a budget item.
Ms. Ragsdale asked what it is he wants to get publicized. She said the public has a sense that the zoning
regulations are new and that maybe we do not allow this use or that sort of thing, so part of this effort has been
to just clarify yes, we allow it, this is our process, but that is what we would continue to do. She said that was
the idea with publicizing and the workshop for the applicants. There was a suggestion that we should be doing
more of that now than we are.
Mr. Keller asked staff when they see this coming as a final piece that would then have a public hearing. He said
we should really have another session like this and the Supervisors should have another work session before a
public hearing. He said there are a lot of things to think about.
Ms. Echols said we could not hold a public hearing until we know what it is we want. She said it may be you do
not want to change anything; it may be that you want to recommend changes only in the rural area; but she
thinks it would be good for us to know whether or not there is sentiment to recommend making any changes at
all to the recommendations to open up more opportunities. She noted she had heard from some that you don't
believe that opening up more opportunities is appropriate. She said staff would be interested in knowing
whether or not there are any different opinions for whether opportunities should be opened in the rural area
versus the development areas. That would give us a lot of guidance into what do we do next in terms of
bringing something for a public hearing.
Ms. Firehock noted that one of the difficulties in reading these different components of what we are going to
propose for the rural and urban area is that it is not to me clear in a way that this problem is occurring and
therefore this is the zoning fix that we recommend that will directly fix that problem. She said we heard the cat
out of the bag idea and she already said that apparently there are lots of violations going on. If she knows this is
the problem, then she can evaluate that yes that is the solution to that problem or that would actually fix that.
However, it is kind of a mishmash at this time. She suggested that it be framed like problem and solution
because we don't need to create regulations just to create regulations and sometimes we should have less. She
said that would help me evaluate this better.
Mr. Blair said with all due regard to the Commission he thinks one of your comments, Commissioner Keller, is
appropropriate because he thinks that Board of Supervisors input is also needed at this point. He believed this
did initiate with the Board and while he can respect that the Commission after studying this issue may say we
don't need any changes at all, he does think the Board of Supervisors also should have a chance during these
work sessions to weigh in. He said the Board can look at your work that you have done so far, but they can get
a flavor of that but if there are other opinions it is good that you would know that as well. He said for instance
if the Commission simply said we just recommend that we make no changes at all.
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Ms. Riley said she thinks a more iterative process here would be helpful, however, she thinks she has heard that
there is this potential for more revenue and that is one of the aspects that the Supervisors have been interested
in. But, she thinks that some of the Commissioners are saying is but with this if we expand these opportunities
and revenues, there should be expenses for compliance for staffing that we really are not comfortable with
expanding the opportunities and the potential risks without some really strong compliance approach. She said
there would be costs associated with that and she knows many of them have read the articles about whether you
can purchase software or companies to do that and whether that is as effective as just having your own staff.
However, we would hope that there would be some costs with the compliance. Ms. Riley said she asked at the
last session you do your first time unit inspection and is there ever another inspection in terms of health and
safety; and she thinks the response was at this time "no". She suggested that they need to periodically,
whether it is every five years or whatever, but we need to be inspecting these units and then there will be
complaints. Ms. Riley said the Commission would like to see a more proactive compliance approach.
Ms. Ragsdale pointed out that some of the things she brought up would involve other departments and we are
all on the same page as far as regrouping and checking in with the Board to look at the process and next steps.
She said there were two questions to clarify two things that keep coming up — parking and this idea of the
suburban village lots. She said we have a parking standard for this use of the minimum number of spaces we
review for that during the application process. There are a lot of townhouse developments and places where we
would never approve it because there is not enough parking. However, she also heard the concern on single-
family lots people would be paving their front yard just to do tourist lodging. So when you said we need to
analyze parking a little more or that parking was something we had not vetted or gotten into, she just wants to
know what the Commissioners need from us as far as parking. She asked does that cover the two concerns the
Commission had.
Mr. Dotson replied that it covered the two that he had; however, what he would be looking for are what are our
existing parking regulations and how would that combined with possibly creating new opportunities for
homestays what would the consequences of that be. He said we heard an example where maybe all or a
significant portion of the front yard could be devoted to parking and could that be done. He asked do we have
to look at the parking regulations that we have now since maybe they are not adequate given home stays and
possibly changing the. Therefore, it is kind of looking at the consequences of what we have, finding a problem
as Commissioner Firehock said, and proposing a solution.
Mr. Keller said in that particular case as we are going through these zoning text amendments and we certainly
have many examples given the urban design work that was done which was talking about side yards and the
side entry into garage, etc. He said there might be some other changes that have to occur in tandem with these
to protect the neighborhoods. He said it is parking, but it might be more than that.
Ms. Ragsdale said we talked about that the Village Residential zoning would fall into the more limited category
of this use accessory tourist lodging and she was looking at the zoning map while discussing that so places like
around Stony Point and that sort of thing. However, there is a range of lot size in residential subdivisions out
there and we might have things platted before we had zoning and they are one -acre lots or we might have a 2-
acre lot rural subdivision. She asked are you looking at something along the lines of a lot size and is it one acre
or two acres when you brought up this discussion of the villages and the suburban rural places.
Ms. Firehock suggested they need to look at lot sizes in villages but also in the rural area. She pointed out she
lived in Howardsville and zoned rural areas and there are a lot of small lots in close proximity that predates
zoning. So there are places like that in the county, which is what we are getting at, is that the character of that
area is more like an urban area in some respects.
Ms. Ragsdale said they are just talking about minimum lot sizes with this sort of concern that keeps coming up.
Ms. Echols asked is the concern right now on a smaller rural area lot that someone would want to have up to 10
guest rooms.
Mr. Dotson said it is not that specific in my case, it is simply that houses that "walk, talk or look" like suburban
developments though they might be zoned rural areas, have occupants that have expectations that are not
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farming or rural area expectations, they are suburban and residential expectations.. He suggested the first step
would be to look at the zoning map and where we have suburban development, such as Owensville Road, and
the developments off that and what is the zoning situation and how would that be treated.
Ms. Echols asked is it about the existing regulations that allow an accessory building to be used or is it about
having whole house rentals in those situations.
Mr. Dotson replied that probably it is both, but narrowly, if what we are doing is creating more opportunities,
what would be the consequences of those opportunities in that kind of rural suburban setting.
Ms. Echols said if you have anything less than 4 acres your only opportunity right now is one home stay.
Mr. Dotson said maybe the answer is simply to clarify the situation now or maybe it is not an issue. He said it
is a filter that he thinks needs to be put on the question.
Ms. Echols replied that staff can do that and it is helpful.
Mr. Keller asked for the slide show be sent to the Commission so they can review the examples.
Ms. Echols asked if there was some consensus around some little issues or those that they had not spent a whole
lot of time. She asked if there is a sentiment for opening up opportunities for townhouses and attached housing
in the development areas for home stays. She clarified it would be for someone renting rooms in a townhouse
for home stay while they are there. She asked if there was any sentiment for allowing that.
Ms. Riley replied that in the Scottsville District the only POA contacts she had are townhomes and they really
oppose this particularly because of the parking issue and the adjacency being so close that they feel that if there
is any kind of nuisance that they are going to be more likely to be affected by it. Ms. Riley said she has a
concern about it.
Ms. Spain said she would be against it because of the parking issues.
Ms. Echols asked if there anyone who would want us to renting rooms in townhomes.
Mr. Dotson asked if there were townhome situations where staff could imagine that parking would not be a
problem or prohibit the use.
Ms. Spain asked what has the city done about this and she would like to second Commissioner Keller's
suggestion that we look very carefully at their criteria and try to match it because there is very little difference
between our development areas and the city density and such. There might be a big difference in housing type;
there are going to be more single-family attached in the county. She asked does the city allow townhome home
stays. She suggested they check the website for the city.
Ms. Echols noted that staff could provide that information to the Commission on what the city allows right now
and what the county allows.
Ms. Ragsdale noted that staff provided that information before and she had talked to the city before this work
session and they are not monitoring it — it has to be somebody's house 185 days per year. She said the city is
not monitoring how much rental is happening. So in some ways the city is more relaxed from the climate she is
feeling here. However, staff can provide that information.
Mr. Keller said he thought a parallel effort would be worth the consideration. He agreed if they had the policy
as staff proposed that there would be ways to be able to look at the number of nights.
Ms. Riley pointed out she had called housing staff in the city and wanted to know if has there been any analysis
of the impacts of their home stay regulations on availability, affordability or other issues. She asked has there
been any analysis from the city because in addition to looking at what their current regulations are she asked are
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they monitoring or evaluating them.
Ms. Echols said she thinks staff should probably regroup before we come back to the Commission with
anything more.
Ms. Spain asked if she got the answer regarding support for townhomes.
Ms. Echols replied the answer she thought she got here was you were not ready because you wanted to get more
information about what the city does and also know whether we could identify any townhouses where parking
is not an issue. She said that was my take away from it and staff will do this.
Mr. Dotson said his view was "no, unless" -unless it could be shown not to create problems for neighbors
Ms. Echols replied that staff would work on this.
Mr. Keller noted this is the end of this work session.
Committee Reports
Mr. Keller invited committee reports.
Mr. Lafferty reported the painting of the mural on the exit ramp at Barracks Road was at no cost to the county
since there was a donation and people volunteered. In addition, he noted what came out of our CAC committee
was a sidewalk network that connects Albemarle High School with Greer and that whole complex which does
not exist now. He said we are trying to go after Safe Routes to Schools to help fund that because now the kids
have to walk out in the street.
Ms. Firehock said the Storm Water Work Group met and are working on the storm water utility fee
recommendations for the county.
There being no further committee reports, the meeting moved to the next item.
Review of the Board of Supervisors Report — December 6, 2017 and December 13, 2017
Ms. Echols said Mr. Gast -Bray sends his regrets and is ill and he was not expected to be absence tonight. Ms.
Echols summarized the actions from the Board of Supervisors action on December 6 and December 13, 2017.
The meeting moved to the next item.
Old Business.
Mr. Keller invited old business.
• CIP Oversight Committee Report back (Bruce Dotson)
Mr. Dotson said the Oversight Committee has held three meetings and intends to hold a fourth. He said they have
divided their efforts in terms of immediate items needing to be reported to the County Executive so that it will fit in
with the budget timeline and others under less time pressure. He said the fourth meeting will happen sometime in
January in order for us to step back and look at "process" questions and how the CIP may be approached differently.
He pointed out that there is not yet available a draft from the staff of the memo to the County Executive but once it
has been approved by the committee, a copy will be provided.
Mr. Dotson said he would tell the Commission about four things. The first is about ACE; the second is about future
bond issues; the third is about funding for studies and plans, and the fourth is process suggestions which is the
handout that he distributed that have not yet been discussed. He asked the commissioners to email comments,
thoughts or suggestions to him in case the CIP committee meets before our next meeting in January.
ALBEMARLE COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION - DECEMBER 19, 2017 25
FINAL MINUTES
There being no further old business, the meeting moved to new business.
New Business
Mr. Keller invited new business.
Tim Keller announced the following:
• No meeting on December 26, 2017, January 2, 2018 and January 9, 2018.
• Next Planning Commission Meeting on Tuesday, January 16, 2018.
There being no further new business, the meeting moved to adjournment.
Adjournment
There being no further business, the meeting
Auditorium, Second Floor, COB McIntire, Cl
(Recorded and transcribed by Sharon C. Taylor, Clerk to Planning Commission & Planning Boards)
Approved by Planning Commission
Date: 4-10-2018
Initials: sct
n., at Lane
ALBEMARLE COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION - DECEMBER 19, 2017 26
FINAL MINUTES
A A(A C k M() V+
P
Planning Commission Presentation
,,: December 19, 2017
(Bob Garland, Secretary of the Canterbury Hills Association)
I am here to speak on the proposed changes to the "Tourist Lodging" ordinances in the
Development Area. I will NOT speak to the proposed changes in the Rural Area or
those affecting multi -family dwellings since those are not applicable to our
neighborhood.
Canterbury Hills is an older single-family R-2 neighborhood just off of Barracks Road in
the urban ring. We bought our homes in a single-family residential neighborhood
and do not wish to have any further expansion of business operations in our
neighborhood beyond that which is currently allowed. We believe these changes have
the potential to be detrimental to single family residential neighborhoods, such as ours,
where no protective covenants exist and residents depend on the existing zoning
ordinances of Albemarle County.
SPECIFICALLY:
• The Canterbury Hills Association is opposed to the expansion of the applicable
ordinances to allow for periodic "whole house" rental with no owner present in
Residential -Zoned areas.
o Additionally, we support a requirement that the owner must be present
during the rental period rather than a tenant manager.
Further, we would propose some tightening of the current ordinances as follows:
• Change the wording of the "Tourist Lodging" definition under 3.1 from allowing
"not more than five (5) guest rooms" to "not more than five guest bedrooms less
one" to allow one bedroom for the owner.
Change the wording under 5.1.48.a to "Residency. The owner of the parcel shall
reside on the parcel and be present during the rental. "
• Place a limit on the number of adults per rented room or number of bathrooms.
• Require periodic (e.g. annual) safety inspections, paid for by the owner, to make
sure the property remains safe for guests after the initial inspection Remember
the Clifton Inn fire? "having no overnight staff onsite; having malfunctioning smoke detectors;
having second floor windows painted shut; and having a malfunctioning fire alarm system"
Even though there is an off-street parking requirement, we are not convinced that
County Staff has considered that in some situations, such as on the 8 cul-de-sacs in our
neighborhood, the inevitable use of on -street parking by guests will crowd out
permanent residents.
Lastly, this is yet another example of the County relying on residents to spy on their
neighbors and report violations because there is insufficient staff to monitor for
violations. Staff is already aware of multiple violations of the existing ordinances, but
has not taken any steps to notify violators who are advertising "Tourist Lodging" on the
Internet, but are not registered with the County.
I urge you to vote against further expansion of these ordinances.
P� 4014 .s r a -19-1
Rudolph the Form
Based Code
Testimony to Albemarle County Planning Commission
December 18, 2017
Created by Robert Lewis May; Adapted by Neil
Williamson, President
Rudolph the Form Based Code
You know Residential, Commercial, Industrial and Mixed Use,
Urban and Rural and Multi -Family and Historic
But do you recall?
The most hyped up zoning code of all?
Rudolph the Form Based Code
Had a most prescriptive, aesthetic design
And if ANYONE ever fully understood it,
They might even say it shined
All of the other zoning codes
Used to laugh and call him names;
They never let poor Rudolph
Join in any Euclidian Land Use Games
After a long, contentious, municipal meeting,
The tired elected official came to say
Rudolph with your building forms and street standards so tight
Won't you spark our anemic economic development tonight
Then how the other codes despised him,
As they shouted out with mock glee
Rudolph the Form Based Code
"The rest of us are history".
O
Respectfully Submitted,
Neil Williamson