Town Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening everyone. Welcome to town hall to tonight's meeting, Monday, December the 1st. Um, good evening and it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. We got a packed house in here today. Glad to see all the faces here today. First and foremost, please note that there will be opportunity during the meeting for citizen citizens to address town council when the mayor, me, declares public comment open. We request that anyone addressing the council sign up, approach the podium when called, and state your first and last name. Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Quedge, here. Miss Pion here. Vice Mayor Austin present. And Mayor Anderson here.

Let the record reflect Mr. Web is absent. Now, if Mike Cochran will lead us in the pledge of allegiance, pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Now, if everyone will please remain standing, I have uh Miss Barbara Farmer from Pleasant View Church here to say a prayer for this evening. Thank you, Mayor Anderson. Shall we pray? Father, I thank you so much for the privilege of of appearing before this body, dearly elected and and here to represent the the town of Abington. Father, it's a it's a privilege I don't take lightly. And I would ask tonight that that you instill in these who represent us, the citizens of this beautiful little town in Southwest Virginia, that you would instill in them a sense of of uh dedication, a sense of of urgency, a sense of of doing the right thing for for the right reasons and not the most expedient reasons. So, Father, guide them with with with wisdom and and fill their hearts with justice so that they might um might give attention to the least of us as well as the greatest. It's in the name of the one we serve that I pray, Christ our Lord. Amen.

Amen. Thank you. [clears throat] Now we have the approval of the agenda. If someone would like to make the motion for the approval of the agenda or shall we changes

first? First first I have some changes that we're going to be making with our agenda. Um, I need a motion to amend the agenda to hear items L-2, second reading of ordinance to enact an emergency management program for the town of Avenue to be considered after items G, public comment and table items L-1, second reading of ordinance to repeal, amend, and reenact chapter 18 business article 6 peddlers, fiddlers, canvasers, solicitors, and food beverage vendors, including fair and Festival until next meeting. If I have someone would make a motion on that. I'll make that motion. Do I have a second?

I'll second that. Any other comments? Further comments? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Qu. I. Miss Pion. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson. I. And now we have the approval of the minutes from our last meeting, November the 3rd, 2025. If someone will make a motion to approve those minutes. So move. Do I have a second? Second. Any further discussion? Kim if you'll please call roll. Miss Quetch. I. Miss Pion. I. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson. I'm going to have to step back from that one because I was not here at that meeting. Thank you.

Yes, ma'am. Now we're going to move on to public comment. Um, and it looks like we have two people signed up for public comment. And just remember when I call your name, if you'll come state your name and your full address. The first person signed up for public comment this evening is going to be Miss Julian Miles. [clears throat and cough]

Good evening. I'm Julian Miles. I live at 384 Oakmont Drive in Abington, Virginia. and I'm here to speak to you this evening about the item that was on the agenda and I realize it's been tabled but there are still a couple of issues with that second reading of the ordinance regarding soliciting and canvasing specifically the two things that I would like to bring to your attention um on first of all I want to say thank you so much because I have been here to talk to you about this a lot it is very clear from reading this that you listened and that you've made a lot of really good changes to it and I I think so far it's it's a good document except for just a couple of things that I would like to bring up to you. Um on page 33 in paragraph 4 where it talks about canvasers, there is still a concern that I have. Um in the last part of the description of canvasers, it includes a requirement to have a means of identification provided by such organization. Um and I do have concerns about what would qualify as identification. Do you just need to have your driver's license to identify who you are? Or do you need identification from the campaign? And I'm speaking from the standpoint of somebody canvasing for a political candidate. If I'm out canvasing for you, do I need to have some type of identification from your campaign saying who I am? You know, that's a that's a a somewhat burdensome requirement, particularly for small town politics, to have to provide an identification thing. Maybe I just need a campaign button. I don't know what is that identification. Is it just I need to be able to provide identification for who I am? I think that needs some clarification. On page 38, you've added a paragraph there about a citizen's right to privacy. And I recognize that your purpose there, you state that the section affirms the right of residents to privacy and to limit unwanted commercial non-commercial solicitation. And of course, um, people have a right to put up no soliciting, no trespassing,

even no canvasing signs. And by doing so, the homeowner or the HOA can limit what they want to hear. But the town should not be able to limit what people hear through this ordinance. Of particular concern is the subsections paragraph 7 and 8 operating only between the hours of 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Friday and not on state or federal holidays. You have almost certainly all knocked on doors. And if you cannot knock on doors except between 9:00 and 5:00 Monday through Friday, you are not going to be talking to people when they're at home. And that's your whole purpose in going out to campus is to talk to people when they're at home. So this restriction, I think, is an unreasonable restriction. I think that it should be more in the neighborhood of maybe up until 7 p.m. or when there's hours of darkness or um but Saturdays should be available for canvasing and holidays should also be available for canvasing. I have serious concerns about that piece of the restriction and how it restricts political speech. Okay, that's all. Thank you.

Thank you, Miss Miles. Next signed up for public comments will be Miss Cindy Green. Evening. Good evening, Miss Green. How are you? Good. How are you all? Fine. Cindy Green, 1075 Clark Street, Bristol, Virginia. So, while I am a Bristol native, I am [snorts]

uh was also a candidate for House of Delegates this past um election. So, this is near and dear to my heart. So, uh, I'm here today to speak because I care deeply about open government, civic participation, and the constitutional rights that protect every member of our community, no matter their political views. The proposal to restrict political canvasing to Monday through Friday from 9:00 to 5:00 is not simply a scheduling issue. It is a serious first amendment concern and it would have major consequences for our community enga for how our community engages in elections. First, I want to be clear. Political canvasing is one of the most protected forms of speech under the US Constitution. The Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed that going doortodoor to talk with voters, share information, and distribute literature is fundamental to our democracy. [cough and clears throat] It is not solicitation. It is not commercial activity. It is a core political speech. Under the Constitution, any regulation of political canvasing has to meet a strict legal test, and it must be contentneutral, narrowly tailored to a real public safety interest, and it must leave open ample alternative channels for that speech to occur. A restriction that limits canvasing to business hours when most people are at work, picking up their kids, or simply not home does not meet that test. In fact, it eliminates the only times that when many voters are actually can be reached. Evening and weekend canvasing isn't optional. It's the only realistic opportunity to speak with working adults, seniors caring for grandchildren, shift workers, and families who are not available from 9 to5. Removing those hours effectively shuts down the political outreach for grassroots campaigns that depend on talking directly with voters, especially in rural communities like ours where reaching people takes time and distance. There's also a very leg real legal risk

to the town. Municipalities across the country have been forced to resend similar ordinances after being challenged for violating the first amendment. Enacting a rule that is overly restrictive, especially one that eliminates evenings and weekends, exposes the town to be likely uh legally challenged, which could be costly and unnecessary. But beyond legal concerns, there's something deeper at stake. We want a community where people feel heard, where candidates of all backgrounds, not just the well-funded ones, have a fair chance to talk with their neighbors, where voters are informed, engaged, and welcomed in the democratic process. This proposal will move in the opposite direction. Uh it makes in political engagement harder. It reduces transparency and communication and it sends the message that civic involvement is an inconvenience to be squeezed into business hours. And that's not who we are. Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Miss Green. I don't think we have anyone else signed up for public comment, but I'm going to ask Chief Estus and the town manager Mike Cochran to present the second reading of ordinance to enact of the emergency management program for the town of Avenue.

Good evening. Good evening. How are we doing tonight, Chief? Fine. I hope you're all doing well. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving. Yes, sir.

Uh, as you know, we're here for our second reading of the ordinance that would allow the town to establish its own emergency management plan and department within the fire department. We have found that we're already doing it. And so, this basically would codify and allow us to do that and we would be recognized by the state. There's so many things that we would be allowed to do that now we have to go through another entity to do certain things. And this just allows us to be more efficient and effective in protecting our citizens, our visitors, and our businesses here in town. And it also makes it available for some additional funding. A lot of grants become available directly to us instead of having to go through another entity. So be happy to answer any questions if you have any.

Does anyone have any questions for town manager or chief? And this actually is the first step of like a sixstep process. if you pass this and there's you'll see me a few more times tonight. Well, I I've got total faith in you and and the fire department. Me as being the mayor here in the town of Admin, I trust your judgment. We follow your lead. You do a wonderful job and everyone at the fire department does a wonderful job as well. And with, you know, talking to Mike Cochran, I feel like this is a step in the right direction. I don't know how the other council members feel [clears throat] about that, but um I feel like that you are doing a wonderful job and keep up the good work. Thank you.

And for for those on council, would anyone like to make a motion to uh to amend this? I'll make a motion. Do I have a second? I'll second. Any further discussion? [clears throat] Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Quetch, I. Miss Pian, I. Vice Mayor Austin. Hi. And Mayor Anderson. I.

And with that, we will close public comment and we'll move on next to proclamations. We have two proclamations this evening. The first proclamation will be honoring the first sergeant Michael Willis, Virginia State Police. And I'm going to ask I think Amanda has that one. I'm going to ask Amanda to please read that proclamation. And if we could have officer [clears throat] Willis come up forward front, please loud and proud. If you'll just stand at the hostess stand. Amanda's going to read something and we'll go from there if that's okay with you. Officer Willis.

Yes, sir. Whereas first sergeant Michael Willis began his distinguished career with the Virginia State Police in 1998, dedicating more than 25 years to the service and protection of the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. And whereas within 5 years of joining the department, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant and served with honor in both Vakier County and Shannondoa County earning the respect of his peers and community for his professionalism and leadership. And whereas in 2008 he was promoted to the rank of first sergeant and assigned to the Bristol, Virginia area office where his supervisory responsibilities encompassed Washington County, Scott County, the city of Bristol, and most notably the town of Abington. And whereas throughout his tenure, First Sergeant Willis demonstrated an unwavering commitment to public safety, law enforcement collaboration, and community engagement, providing invaluable support to the Abington Police Department and its leadership. And whereas his professionalism, integrity, and community-minded approach have strengthened partnerships among local law enforcement agencies, enhancing coordination and cooperation across jurisdictions. And whereas the town of Abington, its police department, and neighboring law enforcement partners have benefited greatly from his mentorship, guidance, and dedication to the safety of all residents. And whereas upon his retirement in January 2026, the town council of Abington wishes to express its deepest gratitude and appreciation for his years of faithful service and the positive impact he has made on our community. Now therefore, be it proclaimed that the town council of Abington, Virginia, does hereby recognize and honor First Sergeant

Michael Willis for his outstanding service, leadership, and commitment to the town of Abington and surrounding communities. Be it further proclaimed that this proclamation be presented to First Sergeant Willis with sincere appreciation and best wishes for a happy and fulfilling retirement. [applause] [applause]

And I'm going to have Chief Hullbrook from the Abinham Police Department come up and say a couple of words as well too, please.

Thank you, Mayor, members of the council for that wonderful proclamation. And I just want to reiterate, I want to thank you, Sergeant Willis, or excuse me, First Sergeant Willis, for all that you have done, um, becoming a chief in 2020. He's always been there. Um, I've called him when you're off. I've called you on weekends, on Sundays, when you've been out sick, and he's always answered the phone. I'm sorry, Miss W. [laughter] U, she's put up with some of the the evening phone calls, but um, he's always been there. He's brought the resources whenever we needed them. He's helped us out. I'm sure you all have seen him on Valley Street where we partnered together on that project to try to reduce some speeding there and various other projects. He's he's always been there for our agency. So, on behalf of our community, on behalf of our agency and myself, I want to thank you and wish you a wonderful retirement, SIR. [applause] AM [applause] I supposed to say anything?

If you would [laughter] like to, first sergeant. Thank you very much for this honor. Um, Chief Hullbrook and I have had a wonderful relationship ever since he became chief and even before that. Um, you've got some of the best public safety people in the state of Virginia or I would say across the country in this town and in this community. You are very lucky. Um, and I am lucky to have worked with them. So, I appreciate this honor very much. I thank my family for being here [snorts] and my co-workers. Yes.

Came. Um, and I'll leave you with this. I'm ending my career in the town of Abington in 2026. Uh my dad's in the audience. He started his career in 1961 in Abington. So, uh he was with the state police for 35 years. I'm only doing 28. So, [laughter] he he wins, but uh it's ironic that it happens this way. So, thank you all very much and I appreciate it. Well, thank you. And we would like to ask your wife and your father. We're going to take some pictures if it's okay with you. We'd like to have you and your whole [clears throat] family and people up while we present you with your proclamation if that's okay with you. Absolutely. Yes, sir. Guys, if you all state officers

and the state other state police officers, if y'all like to come join as well, too. Officer Willis, I don't really know. This lady right here, I know very well. She represents this community well as as well, too. I'm a slight excuse me. How are you? Nice to meet you, sir. Nice to see you. Thank you all for your service. How are you doing, sir? Good. Thank you for kind words.

Well, no, sir. Thank you for everything that you've done for this community, son, and your daughter-in-law. How are you doing, ma'am? All right. I see you. [cough] [clears throat] This chair is very big. Okay. Yes, sir.

He was here a long time. Yes, sir. Thank you again. Thank you for everything you've done for this community. We really appreciate

[laughter] Yes, sir.

He says, "I wish you could have seen me before. [cough and clears throat]

The next proclamation tonight will be a proclamation proclamation honoring life-saving actions of the Aven Fire Department firefighters. Um, and I'm going to ask Donna Quetch to read that one for me, please.

Yes. This proclamation honoring the life-saving action of our fire our firefighters. Whereas the safety and well-being of our community depend upon the unwavering dedication, courage, and professionalism of our five firefighters. hand. Whereas during a residential fire in November of 2022 and another similar fire in November of 2025 of the Abmbers of the Abington Fire Department demonstrated extraordinary skill, swift judgment, and heroic action in response to life-threatening emergencies. And whereas through their coordinated efforts, composure under pressure, and steadfast commitment to the highest standards of public safety, they succeeded in saving the life of a community member in grave danger. And whereas their actions exemplify the finest traditions of the fire service and serve as a powerful reminder of the bravery and sacrifice firefighters display each day. And whereas these incidents further highlight [clears throat] the critical importance of fire safety practices such as maintaining working smoke alarms, developing home escape plans, ensuring proper use of heating equipment, and remaining vigilant during the winter months when residential fire risk increase. [snorts] And whereas the Abbington Fire Department continues not only to respond to emergencies, but also to educate the public on fire prevention, helping to safeguard lives, and reduce the likelihood of future tragedies.

And whereas the entire community is deeply grateful for their service, compassion, and willingness to risk their own safety for the sake of others. Now therefore, the Abbotten Town Council do hereby recognize and commend the firefighters of the Abington Fire Department for their heroics life-saving actions and for their continued dedication to protecting the people of this community. Let this proclamation stand as a testament to our profound appreciation and enduring respect for their courage and service. and witness whereof, I have here unto set my hand and caused the seal of the town of Abin to be affixed this first day of December 2025. Dwayne Anderson, Mayor.

Thank you, Don. Now, if I could have Chief Estus come up and say a couple of words, please before we do some photos. Thanks. I'm not retired, but I'll be cry because y'all know me. The wind blows, I cry just the way I am. So, for those watching on online, it you just get what you get with me. So, uh I want to ask my firefighters to come up here and stand with me. That's fine.

Y'all come on. Y'all big part of the group. Come on. And they'll be leaving over. So, you're going to lose most of the crowd. So, sorry. You know, it's it's important to understand that in our great country, we lose about 3,000 people a year to house fires. It is rare to be able to go to a houseire and be able to go in someplace you can't see that is hotter than an oven. You know, at the floor it's 3 to 400°. Up ceiling, it's 1500°. And then you're able to crawl in and go in and find somebody and bring somebody out. That's that's rare. In my 40 plus years, I can count on both hands how many times that's happened in my career. Not very often. We have the greatest fire department, bar none, period in this country. We're small, but man, they're awesome. And so tonight, with your permission, Mr. Mayor, uh, I have a unit citation and this is for I really messed this up back in 2022. I was a new fire chief and I been an assistant chief, but we really didn't do awards and things for that type. But we had a fire in in the middle of town and this is right after town council had approved and we had added two more full-time firefighters and one worked from 8A to 4p and one worked from 4p to midnight and this call happened right at shift change so we had extra people. So the first is this citation is awarded to the members of rescue engine 205 tanker 207 and utility 210 for outstanding acts and devotion to duty in response to an apartment fire on November the 1st 2022 located on Stone Mill Road. It's here in town. On Tuesday, November the 1st, the fire department along with Washington County life saving crew and county fire and rescue were dispatched to a structure

fire and we were told everyone was out. Uh, Chief Estus arrived on scene and and advised dispatch of initial findings. Uh, I then came back across the radio and told rescue engine 205 that we still had someone trapped inside the building. I told them we would have to force entry, which means we have to break the door down to get in. It was a really tough door. It was a metal door with a metal frame. It's not like that wood door. That door is easy. Metal frame, metal frame, metal doors, metal frame are difficult to get in. The door was forced. Uh, Chaplain Steve Vaughn and Lieutenant Bobby Fields went in and they found the victim sitting in the floor. Uh, Chaplain Vaugh was able to pick the victim up and remove her uh, from that structure. Engineer Field, he was in Engineer Fields. He's Lieutenant Fields now. uh helped him get the the person out of the house and then extinguish the fire. The collective effort is a testament to the department's dedication and professionalism and for outstanding performance of duty. This unit citation will go to Deputy Chief Ray Osburn, Captain Samantha Johnson, Lieutenant Bobby Fields, Lieutenant Tim Estus Jr., Chaplain Vaughn, Engineer Mark Gobble, andostumously uh Cameron because Cameron was at that fire as well. with that because of that action. We don't issue medals ever. But tonight, uh, Lieutenant Bobby Fields, based on actions from response to an apartment fire and principally involved in saving the life of another person and whose personal actions were directly

responsible for this life-saving act. I present you with our life-saving medal. The medals that we wear go on our uniform. uh in our class A uniform when we put our coat and hat and all that stuff on, but that goes above our badge. Congratulations, BOB. [applause] And this is to Chaplain Steve Vaughn based on actions from response to an apartment fire and principally involved in saving the life of another person and whose personal actions were directly responsible for a life-saving act. I present you with your medal. Thank you, Chap. Thank you. [applause]

The second call was our most recent call. If you haven't [clears throat] seen my fire my report to council yet, you will. Uh November was extremely busy for us. We had eight fires in November. 14 buildings on fire within those eight fires. We were super super busy. On November the 9th, uh, we had a fire and we had a rescue at that fire. And this citation is awarded to the members of Chief 202, Chief 209, Engine 204, Tower 203, and utility 210 for outstanding acts and devotion to duty in response to a house fire on November the 9th, 2025, located on Heritage Drive. Heritage Drive is located in the county. Used to be our first due, then we had the restructuring. That's now our second due. Uh but that fire we were able to respond and be there first. It's not a race. It's never a race, but we were able to be there first because we're closer. On November, November the 9th Avenue Fire Department was dispatched for a structure fire. While units responded, Lieutenant Estus, who went in his personal vehicle, because sometimes that's what we do because we have to respond because sometimes we don't have as many people. We have people go in their own vehicles to fires and it it's it's a very good advantage for us to have. Lieutenant Estus advised 204 of the house having heavy fire involvement and unknown if any victims were present. Engine two 204 arrived on scene. Lieutenant Fields and engineer Philippy pulled a 200t hose line to the front door, forced entry into the house and began suppression efforts of the fire. They use a thermal imaging camera. That's our camera that looks through heat and used to search the rooms adjacent to the fire and they did not find anything. Deputy Chief Barry while doing his we call it a walkabout walking around the building to see what is going on to let everybody know what was going on at the fire advised over the radio that he had found the victim over on the right side of the structure. Lieutenant Estus

entered and removed the victim. Lieutenant Fields, an engine injured in Philippi, left the hose line and did a another search of the rest of the house to search for more victims. And we were fortunate that the man's wife was not home. The patient was removed from the structure and taken uh to personnel from the Washington County life-saving crew for medical treatment. That person left our local hospital, went to the burn hospital over in North Carolina, and he is he has some burns, but he's still here. The collective effort and is a testament to the department's dedication and professionalism. And for outstanding performance of duty, this unit citation goes to Deputy Chief Ray Osborne, Deputy Chief Marty Barry, Captain Samantha Johnson, Lieutenant Bobby Fields, Lieutenant Tim Estus, Lieutenant Johnny Purdue, Engineer Jeff McVey, Engineer Jeremy Philippy, Engineer Mark Gobble, Engineer Jonathan Smith, firefighter Joey Stanley, firefighter Cody Pilington, and firefighter Logan Stanley. and Deputy Chief Marty Barry based on actions from response to a house fire and principally involved in saving the life of another person and whose personnel personal actions were directly responsible for the life-saving act. I present you with your

Thank you, MR. BARRY. [applause] [applause]

LIEUTENANT TIM ESTUS JR. based on actions from response to a house fire and principally involved in saving the life of another person and whose personal actions were directly responsible for the life-saving act. Tim, THANK YOU. [applause] I'LL SAY THIS AND I'LL SIT down because I got you got a whole lot more important business. I'm going to I'm going to say something just [clears throat] to add on to what you said. Not to hold up a lot of time, but

I didn't know the the people whose house was on fire, the second one that we were just talking about, but I knew their neighbors. I work with the lady that is neighbors adjacent to the house that was on fire. Miss. Yes. It actually brings me to tears almost to to say she said, "You guys showed up to show out.

Y'all done what y'all supposed to do in a nice neat orderly fashion, no one was injured." And she says, "By the way the house looks now today, like not that much damage." And that was all on the account of you all getting there, solving the problem, and taking care of the problem. So, I just want you all to know that the community speaks very highly of the Abon Police Department and we know that you all work diligently in the county as well as the town and chief man you've talked about this. No one's unanswered. If you get a call, it doesn't matter if you're here in the town of Admin, Washington County, you guys respond. And I want to thank you all for for y'all's presence and you all's response to to this community, the town of Avenue and Washington County.

Thank you. I appreciate that. In November, we ran from the Russell County line to the South Holston Lake. Now, way before I started, when Crow started, you crow our senior man. Crow's been here for 58 years on the fire department. They had fire trucks back then. [snorts] They [laughter] they like look like Fred Flintstone. But back then when he first started, your fire department ran from the Russell County line to the Sullivan County line. It was the only fire department in the center of this county.

That's before Green Springs, before Clinch Mountain, before Brumley Gap. And they ran the whole center. There was only like five fire departments back then. And you know, and I'll say what I said at the beginning, you have the best fire department. I think we have things that we need and want and we'll come and ask you through the right channels one of these days for those things and we'll see if we can get them and if we can that's great. If we can't we'll we'll still be the best fire department period and I believe that. So uh thank you for your time and attention and thank you for allowing us to have these awards here and uh don't forget Friday if you're coming Friday just you got an invitation come on. Thank you. All right. Thank you all.

Thank you. We'd like to take a little picture with everyone if that's okay. I know you Gina keep up the good work [laughter] been in my life since second grade everything basketball, football, baseball, fire. This is the man, sir. Thank you. [cough and clears throat] Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you all. Good to see you. Good to see you. Thank you. Hey buddy, hello. I'm sitting here thinking 1980 that [laughter] pie. [laughter] like that. [laughter] Yeah, it's a little hard, but you know. Yeah. Yeah, I know. [laughter] Chief, good to see you. Thank you. I know. I saw that. Let's do that. Yeah, I like that.

Yeah. [clears throat]

That's more fun than a lot of stuff we do, right? [laughter]

Next, we are going to move on to public hearing. Seems like we're back down to the norm now. The crowd, the suspense has made everyone sick. They had to leave. So, um, we have one thing on public hearing today, and that's going to be a public hearing to propose zoning map amendment to reszone tax map ID 126-1-12A, split zone, low density residential district R-1 and high density reg residential district R-3 to high density residential district R-3. three TBD CM Street Avenue, Virginia. And I'm going to ask Gabe to come up and explain this to us. That's okay. [clears throat]

Good evening. Good evening, Gabe.

Town of Edmonton, senior planner. Uh, so yes, Derek Lester, applicant and Biscom and Anne M. Ray owner have requested approval of a zoning map amendment uh to reszone tax map number 126-1-12A from lowdensity residential district R1 and highdensity residential district R3 to just solely highdensity residential district R3. Uh it's located on Coming Street. There's no building there. So that's why it's to be determined. There's no address and it's within the town of Abington. The request to reszone requires a zoning map amendment, therefore requiring recommendation approval from the planning commission and final approval from town council. Uh some background, the zoning map amendment application was submitted uh to reszone tax map number 126-1-2A. Currently, the undeveloped property consists of non-forested and forested areas. Uh the parcel is split zoned between lowdensity and highdensity residential and the applicant wishes to reszone to solely R3 to allow a uniform set of standards throughout. Uh access to site will continue to be uh coming street. [clears throat] So when we wanted when somebody wants to do resoning staff we have to look at specific variables and if that meets it. Uh so currently the undeveloped property consists of non-forced enforced areas. The parcel is splitz zoned with R1 and R3 and the applicant just requests to solely be zoned R3. Uh the the findings are the following. One, consider the proper relationship of such amendment to the entire zoning plan. A reszone of the parcel from R1 and R3 to solely R3 would eliminate any existing split zone parcel within the town of Abanon and extend the already existing R3 uh district further south towards the town limit running along Street. Two, consider the integrity and validity of the zoning districts described in this chapter. Uh, the parcel will be subject to to the required R3 minimum lot area, minimum

frontage, minimum side uh minimum yard setbacks, open space requirements, and all other applicable requirements set forth by chapter 44, land use article 8, which is the community design standards uh for any future development that may happen on that property. Uh tax map number 126-1-12A has a square footage of approximately 119,790 uh square feet uh meeting the requirement for square footage for all dwelling types allowed in the R3 district and uh has a frontage of approximately 368 square ft uh meeting the requirement for frontage for all dwelling types allowed in the R3 district. Three, avoid isolated unplanned spot zoning changes in the zoning district map. The adjoining parcels to the northwest are zoned R3. So this is not spot zoning. Again, it's just a extension of the already existing R3 district. Uh four, recognize that a certain element of stability is desired and land use controls, but conditions and standards will change. If reszoned, uh tax map number 126-1-1 would no longer be splitz zoned, creating a more stable parcel governed by one set of standards instead of two. Uh if reszoned, it may become developed depending on the type of dwelling or dwellings proposed upon official submission of plans. Uh however, a large portion of the property is steep and financially could be uh undevelopable in a sense. It would require a lot of money to take out a big portion of the hill that's right there. Uh the the existing forced area will remain na a natural buffer for any future development to properties adjacent found to be less intensive in use. Five, consider the right of citizens to be treated reasonably. A public notice was made for public consumption. Adjoining property owners were not notified of the applicant's request via certified mailer. A notice was posted on the tax map uh on the parcel a week before the meeting date and all other requirements pursuant to Virginia code section 15.2-2204 were adhered to. And the sixth one is just to make sure it conforms with our

comprehensive plan. It does. Uh we did and the planning commission approved the request as presented uh six to zero and we had one absentee at that meeting. Uh we had one person put in a document against the reszone. Uh that was heard by the plan commission and that's in your packets. If you have any questions about that, I can answer them now. And the applicant's also here if you have any questions for them. Does anyone have any questions for Gabe or the applicant? I didn't have anyone that was signed up for public hearing. Um, so if no one has any questions for Gay or

just for the record, Mr. Mayor, just go ahead and open it for public hearing and close it if nobody comes forward. All right. I'd like to now um open up public hearing. If anyone would like to come forward, please state your first and last name and your mailing address, aka your nickname, too. [laughter]

Yeah. So, I'm Derek Lester at 152 uh East Main Street in our office out there. Uh aka Gator, but uh yeah, so we me and uh uh Rob's got this property under contract. Uh uh like just to reiterate what Gabe was saying, he does such a great job, but it's split zoned right now. The developer part of the property is zoned R3, [clears throat] but those zoning maps are not like surveyed in any type of way. So there's not like there's there's not pins out there or anything that can like define that this is the line that's R3 and this is the line that's residential. So just doing a uniform zoning of the parcel just you know gives us one set of rules to follow and there's no you know gray area as far as the density use because each each zoning classification as you know has its own kind of rules as far as minimal lot size frontage etc. So just reszoning it all R3 would just make it a cleaner project. So that's what That's what we're aiming to do. Y'all got any questions?

Anyone have any questions for Thank you, Gator.

Would anyone else like to come present or come forward for public hearing? If not, we will close public hearing now. Now, we'll move on to resolutions. We have a couple resolutions this evening. Um the first resolution being a resolution for zoning map amendment to reszone tax map ID 126-1-12A split zone low density residential district R1 and high density residential district R3 to high density residential district R3 to be determined coming street Abington Can you someone like to make that motion or do you think that we need further assistance on this?

I'll uh I'll make the motion to uh adopt this reszoning. It was considered by the planning commission and uh as Gabe told us, it was unanimous of those present at the planning commission to approve it and recommend it to council. So I'll make that motion here. Do I have a second? I'll second. [clears throat] [cough] Mcdana second that. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Quetch. I. Miss Pion I, Vice Mayor Austin. Hi, and Mary Anderson. I

Next will be a resolution adopting National Incident Management System, Chief Estus, the Abin and Fire Department.

Just let the chief set up here.

Yeah, I know. We just made [laughter and snorts] Hi again. Um thank you mayor. So this is just another step in becoming an emergency management town. Uh we are required uh the town is required to adopt a resolution where we adopt the national incident management system as the way we operate for emergencies. This came about after 911 a few years after and so the fire department we've been doing it since that started. The police department does it. We have trained almost all of our department heads already in this. Mr. Cochran's already had this. He painfully sat through it. He didn't have to do it again. So, he's very thankful for that. But this is just another step uh to become the emergency management town, which and this will be included in the emergency operations plan if you adopt this resolution.

Would you like me to read it? I don't think you have to read it. I think everybody's familiar with it. Okay. Are we Amanda? Are you familiar with that? Vice Mayor, you familiar with that? I am Donna as well. I don't think that we Thank you. We're gonna spare you on this. All right. But um someone would like to make I would like to make that motion to adopt that resolution. Second. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Quetch. I. Miss Pion. Vice Mayor Austin. Hi. And Mayor Anderson. I.

Third. Again, we got Chief Estis on the hotspe. This is going to be a resolution adopting an emergency operation plan for the town of Avenue. And we have the police chief Tims is here to explain that. Fire chief. I'll take police. Excuse me. Excuse me. That just makes me We haven't got enough Indians. We got too that makes me just a few points. Not as I can't get cheap added to my really status.

So, uh, in your in your packet, you had a copy of the proposed emergency operations plan. It used to be emergency operations plan were inches thick, really really thick because it was a all hazards plan that tried to cover everything. We now don't we don't do all hazard planning anymore. We do riskbased analysis and we determine what plan we need. So that's why our plan is small and concise and to the point in what we need to do and it gives us a lot of flexibility in how to handle emergencies. So this is the last step before we send a letter to the state is the adoption of the emergency operations plan. And you'll notice in the resolution um it does say that you by adopting this resolution, you appoint the town manager as a director of emergency management because we have to have a director and there's only two localities in Virginia that a fire chief can be director and that's by state code. Everywhere else it's the chief administrative officer or chief elected officer and most of people most localities take the chief administrative. to the town manager and then it also uh allows him to uh appoint the coordinator of emergency management which the town has done that already before. So this just codifies that. So it's really the same thing you just did. Happy to read this one too if you would like me to. I think we're well aware

at least this this one is shorter but uh it and what this does every four years if you adopt this every four years I'll be back with the emergency operations plan as we revise that and then you you will have to adopt a plan every four years that's part of the process being [clears throat] emergency management town being an EM entity so someone like to make a motion to this resolution adopting an emergency operation plan I'll make that motion Do I have a second? Second. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Qu. I. Miss Pion I. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson. I.

Thank you. And And so what this will allow us to do, Mr. Cocher and I will uh the letter is already drafted and we will sign the letter and we'll send that letter off to uh Virginia Department of Emergency Management to to get officially recognized. and and thank you for your trust in us, allowing us to do this because it really is it's it's it's a good thing for us. It really is. Thank you. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. We have we've been working on this for like a while. Yeah, about two years or so, I guess. I think that Mike Cochran, you do a wonderful job and Chief Ess does a good job as well, too. So, he can spot.

I have no problems with that. So, we have no first reading of ordinance. We do have a couple of uh well, you've already

we've already taken care of that. So, we don't have any second readings tonight. We've channeled that till the next meeting. Um no considerations of bids, which moves us now to new [clears throat] business. Um, we have a presentation of the 202425 financial audit from the town of Admin and we have Brown Edwards and Company here to present that. Hello. Uh, my name is David Elkins. I'm with Brown Edwards and Company. I'm a director out of our Bristol office. Um, and I believe in front of you, you all should have the annual financial report. Um, we've just recently concluded the audit of the year ended June 30th, 2025. Uh, and I'm just going to kind of go over a little bit of the highlights of it. Won't get into a whole lot of details of the report, but just kind of hit some of the highlights um that you may have uh want to look at and then answer any questions that you may have. Um, but in the actual financial report, page one is the most important part of it. That is the independent auditor's report. Um it states that in our opinion these financial statements are materially correct um and that they represent the financial standings of the town of Abington. Uh we have issued what's called an unmodified opinion, a clean opinion. Um you're always looking to get an unmodified opinion when uh when it comes to these audits here. Um it goes through uh the auditor's responsibilities, the management's responsibilities of the financial statement. Um and just there there's a lot of lot a lot of technical wording in there. Um one thing it does mention that I'll talk about a little bit further later is there was a change in accounting principle this year related to a new standard that came out uh from the government standards board. Uh that's not anything that changed related to Eur's policies or anything. That's just a an accounting change that some new

additional rules came out this year that had to be accounted for in a slightly different way than they had been in the past. Um if page one is the statement of net position. Uh this is presented on the acrual basis. This is the type of accounting that you're used to seeing if you're looking at a for-profit company. Um, inside of that, uh, you've got 80.5 million in total assets for the year. That is down about 3.8 million from last year, but most of that relates to [clears throat] last year you had the unspent ARPA funds [snorts]

uh that were about $3.8 million. Uh, there was an asset and a liability for those. Uh, the cash has been spent on projects this year and the liability has also went away on those. Uh so um the net position is um up about 7.2 million from last year. Uh the total net position this year is $56.3 million. Uh so that's that's a that's a solid net position of that amount. Uh you've got about 43.8 that's sitting in net investment capital assets. So kind of a non-spendable amount. that's your infrastructure, your buildings, equipment, that type thing. Uh net of any outstanding related debt that that exists related to those. Um but your unrestricted amount is $12.3 million for this year. So overall, I think that you got a really really solid net position and I think everything's kind of going in the direction that you would want to expect it to. Um like I said that there was a $7.2 million increase this year. About $3.8 8 million of that was also recognizing the revenue from that ARPA fund. Um, typically this report would have what we call the schedule of expenditure of federal awards which would show that amount being expended. Um, I I'll when we have to do what's called a single audit, it is guided by [clears throat] the federal compliance supplement which typically the federal government puts out pretty close after like in July, August. They actually released it the day before Thanksgiving. Uh so our report will be coming related to testing the federal grants. Uh we've actually done the testing. Uh it's just got to go through our review process now, but our firm's probably got 100 plus of those lined up in a queue. Uh and until that federal compliance supplement was released, we were not allowed to issue a single audit. The

federal government said you just cannot until a final version is out. Um so that is a compliance report that is typically in here along with the schedule of findings and question cost that is not in here. Um we will be issuing that at a later date. Um be happy to come and meet with the board again if there's if if that's something you all would want. Uh I don't anticipate any issues coming from that single audit. Uh but until it gets through the final review, we can't say for for sure that that would be the process. Um but it is it is our the testing is mostly done. It's just got to go through the review process. Uh but it's mainly the that big ARPA grant uh that had been there the last couple years. The remaining parts of it getting spent are what triggered having a single audit. I don't know what the town's plans are going forward as far as federal funds, but the the all that ARPA funds is going to fall off next year. So you all may fall below that threshold of being required to have a single audit. Uh currently that threshold is $750,000. it is going up to a million dollars. Uh so if you don't have at least a million dollars in federal expenditures next year, then you wouldn't need a single

Yeah, we've got a couple like trust repairs and things that will exceed that amount. So we'll probably have for a year or two. We'll see.

Okay. So, uh but that's just kind of that's like I said that is something that's typically in this report that is not in there, but it will be coming. Uh we'll definitely uh make sure the council I [clears throat] said I'd be happy to come discuss that if it's something you all would want or I can just get it to the finance department and they can pass it along to you all. Um page six is the governmental funds uh statements there. Um the general fund had an overall unassigned fund balance of 12.9 million roughly. That's about a $ 1.9 million increase from last year. So I think that's always, you know, good good to see that unassigned amount kind of going forward there. Uh you will look you will see that that that American Rescue Plan Act fund has a has zeros in the balance sheet this year. So that fund will go away next year as all the amounts were expended in it this year. Uh on page 10 is exhibit seven that is your budget to actual for your general fund. Um, as you can see, uh, the revenues came in a little bit below, uh, budget, but overall everything kind of came came in with a solid amount related to what your what your budget to actual was there. And I think, you know, you're in a healthy position there as well. Uh, exhibit eight and nine and 10 are your information related to your water sewer fund. Um, always like to look at the cash flow related to that one. You see that on page 13. You had net cash provided of a little over 1.7 million from your operating activities. Uh, and you had net cash used of about 2.1 million uh related to capital and financing. There was some additional uh debt funding coming through uh in in the

the sewer fund. there was a new debt slashgrant portion coming through there. Uh but overall you had a net decrease in cash in the super fund of about $365,000. Um but again I still think um that overall that that fund is doing well. Uh as well you did have a change in net position of about $2.1 million overall. Uh there there's some pretty large receivables sitting out there for some grants that were coming through there toward towards the year end. Um but beginning with page 14 are the footnotes to the financials. There's lots of detailed information about capital assets, about the debt, about your pension plans, [clears throat] your other post-employment benefit plans there. I won't get into detail of the notes, but there there's a lot of information in there. Uh there's also some required supplementary information uh in there which relates to the pension and oped plans as well. But our other report related to this is on page 79. That is the independent auditor's report on internal control. Um like I said as I mentioned we typically have an independent auditor's report on compliance with the major programs which will be issued in a separate report. Um and but we had no no findings uh related to the internal control of the the town. Uh no uh no adjustments were made. Uh no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies. Uh but overall I said it's a very clean audit. Uh I think that you know the town is doing doing well. Uh I think your your finance department is is great to work with. uh Steve and Amanda always quick to answer any of our questions that we do have. Um but be happy to answer any questions

specifically on the report if anybody has any. No sir, thank you. Um you have and then I will quickly touch on just the other document that you have here the

uh required communication with those charged with governance. uh accounting standards require that we communicate [clears throat] with those charged with governance at the beginning of an audit and at the end of an audit. Uh you would have received the other communication at the beginning of the audit if you have any questions or concerns to reach out to us. Um but at the at the end of it um I said we just note what we think are the significant aspects of the accounting principles. It does mention that u implementation of this Gatsby 101 which is the new standard. Basically what that standard did is previously you were only recording amounts that were paid out if an employee left. So it was mainly vacation time. Sick time was typically not incorporated into that. The standard said that even if they don't get their sick time paid out when they leave, if they're going to take it at any point in time and you're going to pay it out while they're still employed, then you need to factor it into the liability. So overall, I think that increased liabilities [snorts] between $4 and $500,000 uh this year just implementing that standard. But again, wasn't anything that changed related to the town uh or your policies or anything. It was just a implementation of a new standard there. Um uh says that we encountered no uh difficulties when we were performing the audit. Um it does list out some uncorrected misstatements and one of these is just related to the implementation of that Gatsby 101. We just flowed the change through the current year. Um you could have done a prior period adjustment and restated the beginning balances but we deemed that it was not material to the current year financial it was just flowed through the current year. It the ending numbers are exactly what they would have been whichever method would have been taken. Um uh there was also an entry related to some credit amounts in AR. So if a customer had overpaid, uh technically you would owe them money. Again, no bottom line effect. Uh just balance sheet style presentation. Um and then there was something that was related to

construction in progress and a payable. Again, no no bottom line effect there. Um we had no disagreements with management. Uh again, I said I think you know your your finance department was was a pleasure to work with. We we did some work remotely. We did we were here on site several times. Uh they were always good to work with no matter what time. But we will get this filed with the apa and the uh the transmitt uh information will be sent over to the finance department. [cough] I think tomorrow we should be sending that over so they can get that signed. We can get all that information flowing as well. Donna,

do you have any questions? [cough] No, sir. Amanda, do you have any questions? I do not. Mike Cochran, Cam, do you all have any questions? No, I just uh we had a finance does a great job for us. We appreciate everything they do. I don't know what it was like before Steve got here, but he retires in what, 40 days. He's only countdown. I know. Yeah. Give or take a couple hours. [clears throat] Yeah. He uh Yeah. certainly has has helped usher in some really clean financials. So, yeah, it's good. Thank you. Yeah, I do do wish him well in retirement, but I think with him I think you all are still

I think he's going to consult with Ron and Edwards. We'll find out. So, um but uh and I think you all will get the form filed that says we were here. Uh get the the did the presentation and the notary and that everything will get submitted to the state. Um, and we will get that uh compliance report out. Um, I said it's just there there's there's a backlog of triple digits kind of lined up throughout the whole firm and there's only a handful of people that specialize in that compliance work. I don't mess with the federal compliance stuff myself.

But, uh, we will get that out. Steve said he'd like to be able to try to get it out before he leaves, ideally. So, I'll pass that on up the ladder there. So, Great. But again, we thank you for the opportunity to work with the town again. Uh hope to continue working with y'all. Thank you. Thank y'all. [clears throat]

Thank you. Next, we have a discussion regarding the reappoint of Kenny Schuman and Scott Wilson to the planning commission for a certain period of time to continue work for the town comprehensive plan. And we have uh Vice Mayor Wayne Austin speak about that. Yeah, thank you, Mr. Mayor. This came to uh the planning commission for discussion. I guess we've discussed it the last two meetings or so. Uh the members of the planning commission have been uh divided and assigned various tasks in in terms of reworking the town's comprehensive plan. Uh each planning commission member has uh two areas uh or or departments, whatever you want to call them, uh to review and to discuss any changes, amendments, or modifications uh that might be necessary for the town's comprehensive plan. uh Kenny Schuman who serves as the chairman of the planning commission and Scott Wilson who was planning commission member for a number of years. They have for lack of a better term timed out that is that they are no longer eligible to con or to be reappointed for a full term on the planning commission. They're ineligible in other words. However, the planning commission and particularly these two individuals have expressed a desire that if it is possible uh that for a set period of time they'd like to continue on the planning commission uh to complete the comprehensive plan review with modifications and we had asked Mr. Bale to take a look at that and see what the legalities of being able to do that are. Yes, sir. And

there [clears throat] there aren't any restrictions. I think what we found is that was just sort of uh the protocol and just what had always been done. I think probably to get more people involved and not exhaust people from reserving uh for too long. So there isn't any legal restriction on on reappointing them. Mr. Christophari and I sort of discussed about how long he thought that process was going to take. Looks like he's getting ready to tell you. [laughter]

I I think we should probably air on the side of caution if we're going to do if you guys are going to do that to do I think Gabe thinks it's going to take about eight months for that process but do it at least a year for them to re be reappointed and I I know that you guys had discussed a sort of limited period of time for them. I don't think there's any restriction to appointing them to full terms if you were so inclined or they were so inclined, but at the least probably would do a year and there isn't any problem with doing that if council votes. You think yes, please. I'm sorry.

I kind of let Cam just run with there. Uh but um so yeah, we're looking to update our comp plan and we have a good comp plan that was done in 2020. You want to update it every five years. we're going to be at that five years at the end of this year. Um getting u up to that before we contract with somebody to help us do the update. Each plan commission member was assigned a specific chapter in our comp plan. Some so some is infrastructure, some is history, art, and all that kind of stuff. So instead of having uh members get invested and meet with staff and the boards they're associated with those and then have to come off and then put new people in, it would just kind of hurt the the flow of the project and maybe even be detrimental to the project we get. Uh so that's why we thought it would be beneficial and making sure with CAM that everything was legally okay to do to have uh Mr. Schuman and Mr. Wilson be on there for probably another year. Uh because really it's just an update. We're not looking to do a full reoy. So probably eight months to a year would be would be adequate, I would think.

So to expire December 31st, 2026. Yeah, I would say so. That'd be Yeah, it' be about 13 months. You think that would be sufficient? Yeah, because at this point now I've we're getting the RFP ready to go out and everything. And you got and the plan commission members will be uh meeting with the boards and staff that are associate with those chapters. just kind of an intro to be like, hey, we're here to listen what's the needs are and then report those back and everything. So, I would say probably yeah, probably sound good.

I think that here is a nice comp that's okay with with you all. I'd like to make a motion then that we reappoint on an interim basis Kenny Schuman and Scott Wilson to the planning commission for a period of time to end on December 31st of 2026. Do I have a second? Second by Donna aka Mand. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Qu. I, Miss Pion, I, Vice Mayor Austin, I, and Mayor Anderson,

I. Now, we've got considerations of dates for January through July 2026 for council meetings. And we got Miss Kim Kingsley, the clerk, to take that one. Yes, sir. Apologize too many pages. Take your time, Kim.

Uh went through the uh started in January. We're looking the first Monday of the months. Um so we did those. I know Mr. Cochran said that he does have a conflict with the June 18th, 2026 date that I proposed. So were you most people okay with the other dates that was proposed? I'm good with all of them except January 22nd, but that's a midmon meeting. If there's an alternative, we can look at it. If not, I'll I just won't be able to be here that. But all the others are good.

I don't have any problems with any of the dates on there. Amanda, do you have any? I don't have any, but I just was wondering. I know we probably haven't looked at the school calendar, but April 6th is Easter Monday, and so I don't know if kids are out of school if that will be a problem for people traveling since it's right in the heels of that weekend. Um, I can Google school calendar quickly if that helps. Go for it, Amanda. I have no plans, but I just thought that might be conflict. Good observation. So, if you could check that out right quick and we'll see what we got. I am obviously.

Yeah. On the June 18th is my daughter graduates high school, so I'm obligated to take her on. You better believe it. [laughter] Yes. Would you like to look at uh January the 21st? It's a Wednesday or January the 20th for the midmon. 21st works for me. Does it work for you? Does that work for you, Wayne? Wednesday. He was trying to take me to Washington County. Another states. Oh, wait a minute. December. I think she's talking about you talking about January. January. Talking about January Wayne.

Yeah. Yeah. Um uh I I'm actually not available that entire week. January 19th through the 23rd, but again, it's a midmonly meeting. It's not absolutely urgent. [snorts] I could be if we moved it to the 28th, but that put us pretty close to February, the February 2nd meeting. Yes, schools are closed that Monday and Tuesday, the 6th and the 7th. So, there may be a lot of people out of town since that's a holiday weekend. Um, I don't know if we want to look at the next

the 13th. [snorts] That's in April, right? Mhm. What would they want to do? Or even move it to the 7th because people would probably be back. I don't know. The eth is Wednesday. Oh, Wednesday is a church day. So, I mean, we could leave it and people may not be traveling, but just to throw that out there. All right. So, so let's start with the top first. Let's start with January 1 and then work our way down. So, Vice Mayor Austin wouldn't be present for the 22nd meeting. Right. That whole week you'll be gone. Right. Right.

Um, do we want to change that date or do we want to Yes, we certainly can. We can look at the week prior to which would be the 15th. That'd be 10 days after the first meeting, but January 15th. Yeah, that works. Okay. Okay. Let's change that one to January the 15th if that's okay with everyone on the council. I know Derek is not present, but we we will get the word to him if that's okay on that one. Kim.

Yes, ma'am. The next date would be February the 2nd, the first Monday. Yep. And then the mid month, February the 17th. Yep. March the 2nd, the first Monday. Yep. And then March the 19th. Yes, ma'am. Uh propose maybe April the 7th instead of the 6th to give people additional time. I think that we should do that. Seventh's good. April the 7th. Can we change the 6th to the 7th? April the 23rd.

April the 7th. The 23rd. I don't think we have any conflicts with the 23rd. So, I think we're good with that. Okay. And then we would we've got something with the Mike Cochran and that is the 18th. June 18th. Yes. And how long are you going to be if you don't mind me asking Mike Cochran? Are you going to be gone for the week or? Yeah, it's Hold on. Let me get on my calendar. Um, sorry, my short eyes are Take your time.

Um, 18th to 24th and that's that's our sale date. So, it's uh 17th I'd fly down into the 20. Yeah, we go on to that 17th to the 25th. What's What is the 16th in that month of April? It's a Tuesday. Tuesday. Can is June 16th. Can we do June 16th? Mike Cochran. Sure. Sure. Okay. Yeah. I apologize, but you guys. No apology. You know how that goes. So June the 18th will be June the 16th, right? Yes. All right. It's four years of college payments.

Yeah. [laughter] I don't think we have any problems with the July the 6, 2026. And we don't have any problems with July the 16th, 2026. Right. Good. And and this is kind of all in regards to what Derek has going on as well, too. He's the only one that's not present that we'll need to get a revised schedule out to him if that's okay. Absolutely. Do we have any other questions for Kim or

the this mid wait a minute the midmon for December December it's the 18th if we have anything. Yes. Okay. It was one of those dates that if if we need it you'll let us know. Yes. And I saw the dates for I I guess all of them are for No, one of them is for Mr. Cochran. Yeah. But yeah, I think that's great. I encourage you guys to participate in all those things. You sat through them. You wish you didn't.

Better you than me. [laughter] So, do I have anyone that would like to make a motion on the consideration of the dates from January to July the 26? I'll second. 2026. Do I have a second? Second. Any further questions? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Quetch. I. Miss Pion. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson.

I. Next, we have a consideration of propose proposed revisions to the town's Freedom of Information Act, fees, schedule, and associated cost recovery practices. And we have Laura and Mike Cochran to discuss that. Hey, Miss Laura, how are you doing? Good. How are you? Good to see you. You here as a play officer today? Yes, ma'am. Yeah. this

just the introduction of it is one of the things I try to do is let's see what people you know the time people take on stuff and the police department uh the chief's hiding in the back but uh they answer I just got their numbers today but you know they've done 615 requests so far this year doesn't include December u and they get hit a lot with them but they're dealing with now they get digital media and we're getting some incredibly expansive requests requests that come in and um uh it's u some of them are really long. I mean she answered one earlier this year that took,00 pages

and took like at least three days of town staff time to just complete everything involved gathering the documents going through and redacting the documents and such. Well, what was the cost of that to the person

that one actually? So, one of the reasons we're requesting this change is um the first originally the first five were free. So, that one uh was a free charge because it was one of their first five in the calendar year request. Um so, moving forward, we'd like to alternate a little bit. Um because if you after five, you would be charged for any of the foyer requests. But if we alternate a little bit the way we're looking, if you take 15 minutes to get one page of documents, it should be free. it doesn't take that much time, but if it takes us eight plus hours in the day, um we want to start charging the costs that are incurred the town um to be a little bit more fair and to get back the town incurred cost.

Yeah. And then so uh right now the because the way it's worded with five, well five is all if it's five and it's just a copy of a police report or a copy of a of a record. Um that's that would make more sense when you when you say it's five because the chief is dealing with one right now. But they're asking it's just a really overly broad open-ended thing and they want copies of video. Well, video will have personally identifiable information. It'll have stuff with juveniles in there. All that's got to get redacted and someone's got to watch it to know what to redact. I mean it it takes hours and hours and hours to do and then like some organizations the larger ones will have a full-time foyer person. That's all they do. Laura's primary job is grants. Uh and then she does this as a collateral duty and then the police station can speak on that but u chief can um you know he only has he has some some data.

Yeah. Um, for us, we have myself and and Carrie, who's our administrator coordinator. So, she gets a pretty lengthy request that takes her away from a lot of her normal duties. She has quite a number of normal duties, [cough] keeping up with all of our records, all of our data, and even answering the phone call during the day. So, she'll sit there and watch these videos. Um, we are fortunate and thank [cough] you to Mr. Cochran for providing us with some software that will speed up the process with uh redacting the videos so we can put the video in the software and it'll um help us blur out, you know, even their computer in their car. Well, it's a class one misdemeanor. Some of that data is released. So, we have to blur that out. Um so, that's helped us tremendously on speed things up, but overall it's it can be very timeconuming for us. Is it primarily insurance companies and attorneys or claims that we have to do this?

We get a lot of that. Um, one company will mail in requests on almost daily um for different reports. Okay. And we'll, you know, fill the request and we'll package it up. They'll send a prepaid envelope. We'll package it up and send it back to them. Um, those happen quite frequently. Um, you know, when people are involved in things, they like to come and get a copy of their report. Um, especially traffic crashes. Um, so those are a large quantity. Um, and then you'll have some that wants the incident report and all corresponding data with it with body cameras.

And we want to be transparent, of course, um, and we want to allow them to get this data, but we also, um, wanted to, you know, get our cost back for doing so, for taking that time to do that. and not take a loss of the town bike.

Like if you think about some of the incidents in in a car, you've got a you've got a body cam or an in-car camera and then you've got your body cams and you might have two or three cops on the scene. So now you've got force. I mean there's a lot more to it than just sitting pause and you know it's very very time consuming and we want to be transparent but we also have to make sure that we don't un [cough] release things that shouldn't be released and so it takes time. uh the current policy that we have in place uh it just is uh you know it's we'll never it's not a money-making venture. We're we're attempting to probably twothirds break even but we won't even break even because we're not really charging what the employee rate is or what their benefit rates are. We're just charging their hourly rate. Um, and you know, the downside is is um, like in in Laura's case, you know, she deals with grants quite a bit and there are grants that have filing and all this stuff and the you have to get that stuff has to get done. Well, if you spend eight hours on a FOYA or in one case 24 hours on a FOYA, um, the other work doesn't get done or you got to work overtime in order to get it done. So, it really puts us in an odd spot. But by modifying the policy, our intent is to make sure that if someone has a crash, they get a copy report. If you know they they lose an item, they need a report, they get a report. And in the first 15 minutes are free and the first five black and white pages are free. Uh and that way your average citizen that's going to interact and needs a copy report, it's for them. That's fine. U but we do have have ones where we get hit with these overly uh what I would call ownorous requests where I mean I don't know how many hours you've got in the one you're dealing with right now but they're they're quite lengthly uh and so you'll be transparency is there but we also u sometimes it becomes almost like a fishing expedition where you know we've had some requests that were really really long and based on subsequent requests I doubt the first request was even read and you

[clears throat] to be it's just a it's taxing on staff and so request would be is to uh is to revise the the uh policy uh as shown in your in your packet. Do you do you expect complaints when we put this in? Do you think that people will it's in it's in keeping with what a lot of other a well a lot of other organizations already do. Uh, I think ours was probably a far more generous than a lot of them were. Um, because we checked on that with Kim check with the clerk's folks.

Yeah. Let me ask the it looks to me like and I could be totally wrong but it looks like currently and you mentioned that really long one that you finished 1100 pages or so that the previous policy said that [clears throat] the individual got the first five free I believe that's so it doesn't matter how long those five are but now this new one it's only five pages that they get free in the first 15 minutes it takes us to

right but it goes from it goes from the first five being free to first five pages being free. So in that one that 1100 page document the fee would have been fairly significant it'll be [clears throat] printed as well. Um, if we send electronically, we won't char we don't charge for the paper, right? Just

the way the law is written, if it's going to be we do an estimate, and if it's going to be over $200, then tell the applicant it's it it may be over $200 and do you want it to continue? And the the foyer council has a lot of u literature on it. We've we've looked at all that in in trying to come up with the compromise on this is the first order is to try to negotiate with the requester and come up with something that they're looking for. A lot of times people don't know exactly what it is that they're they're asking for and so staff interacts with people every day on on those. But to your question, yeah, sure. It would if they wanted to get all 1100 pages, then it would cost a lot. My guess is if that interactive process had worked in that particular one, they would say, well, maybe a 100 pages and not

narrow your focus, maybe maybe start. Yeah. And that sometimes you get this really broad broad net where a lot of times if I get those questions, I'll be like, okay, what is it you're looking for? And then try and help them get what they want because that's our goal is to get them what they want. Um, but when someone comes in with a really really broad one and they don't really tell you what they want, then you have to answer what they get, you know, answer what they're requesting and u try and work with it as much as we can. I mean, because it's just it's in everybody's best interest to give them what they're asking for.

I didn't realize y'all had that many. Oh, it's a lot. And yeah, the police. So, in 2023, we had 636 requests and we released 692 documents. Um, 2024, we had 576 requests, releasing 637 documents. And in 2025, we have 615 requests and we've released 784 documents. That doesn't include December because we just started and that's that's without December. Yeah. So, Yeah, it's not slowing down is what it sounds like.

And when you say documents, that's not pages. That's a document that might have two or three pages with it. Yes. So like an incident report would have only five pages. That's one. Yeah. Gotcha. We we haven't taken the time to log every page, right? just just the hours that was spent on it.

And as the chief mentioned, we did uh we obtained some software that allows to speed up the process, but while it will be faster, um it's still not fast, you know. Um so, you know, technology is great, but you still need to make sure it was right. You know, it it'll do a lot of things automatically, but you also have to it still requires labor. And then the software wasn't wasn't cheap either, but neither is their time. So

I kind of think it's a step in the right direction if you ask me, you know, with with what we're spending taxpayers money, you know, people salary them doing that work. I just feel like that, you know, get compensated a little bit for I think it's a step in the right direction. I don't how you all feel about that. Yeah. You know, we're as Mr. says we're not trying to bank money on it. Just trying to to reduce our loss as to do it. I think code says a reasonable fee, doesn't it? Yeah. Not to exceed the actual cost, [clears throat] right?

And and they're they're charging sort of the the lowest base rate of somebody who's working on it. They're not even if the chief is working on something, we're not charging his hourly rate. As Mike said, we're we're not allowed to and and wouldn't charge fringe benefit charges and that sort of thing. And it's not to deter people either to say charge or maybe they won't ask. Yeah. It's not that. Yeah. It's not that. It's not that. And this is something all organizations do. Yeah. There's a long history as to why it got to what it was. But we're luckily well past that.

So, anyone have any further questions for Laura, Mike Cochran, or the police chief? Would someone like to make a motion of the consideration of the proposed revision of the Town's Freedom Act information? I'll make that motion. Do I have a second? Second. If there's no further discussion, Cam if you'll please call roll. Miss [clears throat] Quetch, I. Miss Pion, I. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson. I.

That moves us to old business. We have no old business. Now, we're going to do miscellaneous business and communication from our town manager, Mike Cochran. Well, I just wanted to say uh this uh this month was extremely rewarding in that we got to open the playground. And uh if you hadn't been up there, uh it's even if you ain't got kids, you got to go up there and just watch. It is crowded and there's a lot of children there and they're having a blast. And uh it was really really nice because when we did the ribbon cutting uh you know it was like a bum rush of children. They were everywhere. We couldn't hardly get what we were saying done.

Oh yeah. It was it was amazing. And you know uh in talking with uh with Kyle and Alicia they had said you know a few years ago one of the they were trying to figure out like what could they do if they really wanted to. And one of the things was we'd love to redo the playground. And the answer was that's never going to happen. And it happened. And I'm telling you it's an amazing playground. So, uh, I think, uh, thank everybody for allowing it to happen and, uh, it just was really, really neat to see because there's kids from all over the place out there having a good time. Um, my kids are too small or too big, I mean, but I was up there just watching and it's just really, really neat to see. So, we go once a week. I've got two small kids. We go once a week, maybe twice. You got an 8-year-old that just showed up.

Yeah. We just Yeah. So, maybe there one extra day. So,

yeah. And then the uh the other thing was we got to pray this uh this Saturday. Uh so uh uh look for a good parade and it'll be coming the same way it did last year. So going down from Walgreens down towards the bottom of the hill that u push everybody a merry Christmas even though it's only J December 1st. We're there dude. We're already there. I'm just going to kind of follow Mike's foot steps and then we'll pass the torch on. But the Christmas parade will be this Saturday at 5:30. If you're not available to make it out in person, we are doing live feeds on Facebook and Abin and TV and that will be brought to you in part by Adambo and John Phelps. Um, and again about the playground, there's just so many people. I know that day I feel like I left out several people thanking for their their volunteer and their hard work with the with the playground. And I just want to give a shout out to public works the Rex department, every citizen in the town of Avenue, every construction crew that was there, uh the Wellsprings Foundation for the grant. It was just a nice collab of everyone in the communicate or in the community. Uh it was a nice come together of everyone and it just shows that when you have people things can get done. So, um the other I want to say I want to give a big shout out to the um Abid and girls volleyball team. Uh [clears throat] the last Saturday me and Chief Hullbrook got the pleasure of escorting them back through town and um nothing but good feedback from that from from from the vol from the volleyball players to the parents to everyone that just was out and about on Main Street and coming street when we came through. Um, and I know the day is going to come that we're

going to have that volleyball team in here and recognize them for that. I [clears throat] think this is something that hadn't been done since like 1983, if I'm not mistaken. So, big ups to the girls state 3A volleyball champs. Um, last Saturday we also did the tree lighting down at the information center. We had a nice turnout for that. Um, we still have the uh the decorated trees. We have about 25 decorated trees, I think. moment. Is that right? About 25 from local businesses and organizations. Um we're still taking votes. Those votes for the the best tree will go on till December the 30th. And you can vote by donating school supplies or pet supplies. And um all that information is inside of of the information center um to cast your vote and drop off your donations. Um and uh I think that you can you can cast your vote or drop off the donations. that is Monday through Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. And I think that like we've got some nice trees down there this year. So, you haven't had a chance to get out and check that out. Please do get out and check that out. And I think that's all I have today. Wayne Austin, do you have anything? Uh I believe it was uh Derek that had discussed here at council about trying to get some signage for recognizing uh state championships from the high school.

Yeah. And we all thought that was great idea. And I spoke with Miss Kumbbo, principal up at the high school and ask if they could get together the state championships and let us know what years so we get how many that we would have to have and she said that it would take a little while to get that together, but she would get it to me. I think that's a good idea. I think Mr. Cochran was going to look at some signage that we might be able to do with that. Yeah. Where would you know just throwing this out there? Where would we put that sign? Would we would we have two like you know like Well, you got four entrances. Uh but I would say probably exit 17 seems to be the prettiest of them.

Uh I mean as far as and also the most uh most used. Uh you could do it right there or you could do it uh at either end coming in. I mean on the signage we have the the u um the fancy signs uh coming. They're in production I'm told. Uh, and once once those come in, but I would think exit 17s, that's where we currently have the ones with all the other stuff on there. That seems to be the the the appropriate place. I think we'd have to have more than more than one. We'd have to have at least two. At least two. I was going to say, maybe all four entrances covered. I don't know.

Yeah, I'd have to take a look at it and see what see what they got. But yeah, that would be I mean because uh for a town this size uh to have state championship anything is pretty amazing. Um and I think we beat Christiansburg in volleyball and I think Yeah. Yeah. I was there like a year and a half, two years ago watching them and they're good. So the fact that we we won is really amazing. All we do is win win win. It's all good. All we do Mike Cochran, welcome to [laughter] Donna, do you have anything?

No. You know, I just encourage people to uh to look on the website and see everything that's going on. Seems like we have something going on all the time. So, just looking at my calendar this week. I've got a bunch of things. It's full. Yeah. So, but I enjoy it. I love that. And if we don't have our midmon meeting, I just want to wish everybody a merry Christmas and remember that Jesus is the reason for the season. Thank you, Don. Amanda, do you have anything to add to that? Nothing more. Y'all covered it.

All right, that's going to move us. Mike Cochran, do you have anything that you would like to add to that or No, appreciate it. Thank you. And and the parade will be the same way that we ran the parade last year. It will be the same way. It will be starting at the old um down by the ABC store running back to Tanner Street. Right. Correct.

And I think that you know anyone that has a business that will be operating or anything on Saturday, please be well aware of the the detours and you know time restraint that we're in. So I just want to throw that out there as well too. So, well, now we'll move on to appointments of boards and committees. We've got we've got about four of those. I don't know if we need to go into close session over these, but whatever y'all want. Whatever y'all want to do. I don't know if y'all had a a chance to look at the uh reappointments to the boards and committees, but if you all feel like that we need to go into close session, we can.

Most of them are just reappointments [snorts] except for tourism. Yeah. And that's the vacancy. somebody feels co confident enough with these three names to go ahead. I'm just What were the three names? It was Do you have someone on there that that you particularly know,

Amanda? Do you do you have someone on there that you particularly know? We know. Vice Mayor, [laughter] uh, let's can we do a reappointment of those that are eligible and then we could go into a quick close session, discuss tourism. All right, that work. I'd like to move we reappoint Taylor Bettis and Tyler Fencel to the infrastructure advisory committee to reappoint Michael Weaver to the uh board of building code appeals and to reappoint Mike Rush to the Abington Redevelopment Housing Authority.

I'll second that. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Qu. I. Miss Pion. I. Vice Mayor Austin I. And Mayor Anderson. I guess we will go into close session now. We'll need to read the read that. I think it Oh, Wayne. Go ahead. No, go for it, Wayne. Got it. Get it. Go for it, Wayne. [laughter]

If council so desires close session pursuant to the Code of Virginia 1950 as amended, section 2.2-3711A1 2-3711A1 for the purpose of considering applications for appointment for the position in the tourism advisory board. And that's all. That's all. Yes, we've heard. Yes. Thank you, Amanda. I'll second the motion. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call roll. Miss Qu. I. Miss Pion. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson. I. And with that being said, we are going to now go journ session.

call the meeting back to order. I'd like to make a motion to reconvene from close session. Second. Any further discussion? Kim, if you'll please call RO. Miss Quit. Hi. Miss Pian. I. Vice Mayor Austin. I and Mayor Anderson. I I move that the town council certify that in the closed session just concluded, nothing was discussed except the matter or matters specifically identified in the motion to convene in close session and lawfully permitted to be discussed under the provisions of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act cited in that motion. Miss Quest, you so certify. I so certify. Miss Pion, I so certify. Vice Mayor Austin, I so certify.

And Mayor Anderson, I so certify. Okay. I would like to make a motion to appoint Alicia Maris as the restaurant representative to the tourism commission. I'll second that. Any further discussion? Cam if you'll please call roll. Miss Qu. I. Miss Pion I. Vice Mayor Austin. I. And Mayor Anderson. I. And with that being said, I guess we'll call this meeting a journ.