Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

We always like to welcome any news media that may be attending our meeting. Are there any representatives of the media here today? Seeing none, I will turn over, our first agenda item to our secretary, mister Joe Armisen.

Thank you, mister chairman. I will note that we are absent two members, but we do still have a quorum and can conduct business. Also, I'll join with you in welcoming everyone to the Henrico County Planning Commission public hearing for 03/12/2026. This evening, it is requested that all public comments be provided from the lectern to the rear of the room. For everyone who is watching the livestream on the county website, you can participate remotely in the public hearing by following these guidelines.

Go to the planning department's meeting webpage at henrico.gov/planning/meetings. Scroll down under planning commission and click on WebEx event. Once you have joined the WebEx Event, please click the chat button in the bottom right corner of the screen. Staff will send a message asking if anyone would like to sign up to speak on an upcoming case. To respond, select Molly Mallow from the drop down menu and send her a message.

She will place you in the queue to speak. And with that said, Mr. Chairman, the first item, as you noted, our agenda this evening is the public hearing on the capital improvement program to consider the fiscal year twenty twenty six-twenty seven through the fiscal year 02/2006 capital improvement program. And joining us tonight is the county manager who always comes down to visit and presents important document to you. Mister manager.

Thank you, mister chair, members of planning commission, mister secretary. It is an absolute honor to be here, to present this capital, both the capital improvement program and the capital budget to the Planning Commission. I do have all of the agency heads that are involved here this afternoon. So let me just dive right into, if you will, the ten year capital budget. And what you are seeing here is basically an exercise in long term planning that is matched with growth patterns of the county, needs for water and sewer infrastructure, a number of other efforts that the county has entered into over the years.

You'll see one of the largest areas in public utilities. You'll also see a significant investment requested for public works transportation. A good portion of that comes from our Central Virginia Transportation Authority. You'll also see a heavy investment requested for our education, our public safety agencies. And then something that we have delved into in recent years and that is environmental efforts of the county.

When you add it all together, you'll see a $6,900,000,000 list over ten years. I will tell you that all of those projects, the likelihood of all of those projects being funded is pretty close to zero, just like it is in the capital budget. Requests will outweigh available resources. And then as we go through the review process, some projects really quite frankly don't rise to the level where they'll be recommended for funding. So what we are here to talk to you about is the proposed capital budget which is a one year request for funding from the Board of Supervisors which will undertake, they will review both the operating and capital budget next week.

And so if I can, I'd like to start with on the general fund side, our largest expenditure is within the area of education. It is our highest priority countywide. And within this capital budget, you will see $84,000,000 being recommended for a number of projects, a new Fairfield area elementary school. You will see a significant investment in mechanical improvements. That number is an increase, dollars 20,000,000.

You will see the use of what we call a meals tax reserve where the school system will come in later in the June timeframe and present a list of projects that the Board of Supervisors will then approve on a project by project basis. You'll see the beginning of a new Holland Springs Elementary School planning and design. School bus replacement, we've been pretty consistent in replacing buses coming in at $6,000,000.2000000 in technology improvements and then some miscellaneous playground replacements. Within public safety, 41,800,000 is requested for investment in public safety. We do have a new $27,000,000 public safety training facility that will be built on the same site as the replacement of Meadowood Firehouse 1.

The tactical training facility compound that is depicted here is an early stage mock up. This is a 2022 bond referendum project. Adjacent to this site also will be some infrastructure. Actually on the Richmond Raceway property. You will also see, not included in this capital budget, but some infrastructure coming in for a pipeline that we are building to Eastern Henrico.

The county is in the process of acquiring that property and you'll see some water towers on that property. You'll also see within public safety $8,800,000 for vehicles and apparatus. Fire apparatus in particular. We're looking at two plus years as far as lead time to be able to get that apparatus. So the approach has been for many, many years to have the funding in place so that we can continue to place orders and maintain those replacement cycles.

New this year, the sheriff is here with us, is $6,000,000 for what we're calling jail facility maintenance funding to uphold the safety and security of both of our jails. And the intent here is that will be a multi year approach where just like we did with the courthouse on campus both General District and Circuit, the intent is to add dollars over time to continue to improve both JL East and JL West. Those are older facilities and incredibly expensive to not just replace but also locate. Within the area of recreation and parks, nearly $11,600,000 within the 3 CHOP District. We have a new park internally.

We're referring to it as Mayberry Park. It will probably have a different name, Mr. Witty, but that is a property we acquired adjacent to Mayberry Elementary School. Significant investments in facility rehab and maintenance. Maintenance.

We have quite a bit that we are doing in our parks. We have 1,000,000 also in a new effort to maintain and improve our trails throughout our parks which are pretty extensive. Believe it or not, it's time to start replacing some of the synthetic turf fields that we have in the county. And so there's $4,000,000 that is allocated for the first wave of replacements. And we also I'm sorry.

I misspoke. So the three chopped area park, that is planning and design for Cane Road, Tuckahoe District Neighborhood Park, Mr. Winterhoff, that is the Mayberry Park. So both of those are design dollars. And then Verona Farm, we have one of the county's oldest homes on that property.

Very historic site. So that million dollars is intended to with some dollars that were allocated in the current year to begin the improvement on the outside of and shore up that property so that we then could delve into getting into that property. Are there any questions up to this point? Because I saw some looks when I was referencing 3 Chopped and speaking Mt. Tucker.

Sorry it's been a long day. Okay. So next we have $27,500,000 in transportation. The Central Virginia Transportation Authority was created a number of years ago using some additional sales taxes. Largely they come from Henrico. This is a regional entity, has benefited us immensely. So we have $31,500,000 of CVTA local allocation. Again, that money comes from us. It goes it is apportioned through this transportation authority. 27,500,000 of that of those dollars are allocated for transportation projects.

And then the balance is pedestrian and sidewalks. Correct, Mr. Crawford? And street lighting. Thank you.

So here it is right here. 2 and a half million is for pedestrian and bike improvements and another 1 and a half million to continue street lights. So in addition to all of this, we also have additional general fund dollars that we have allocated over time for sidewalks that continue. And so we are looking at a total of $8,000,000 for walkability in the county in this proposed budget. So 5.25 will come from the county and our reserves and 2,500,000 will come from CVTA dollars.

We have a lot of facilities that largely Jamie Massey and General Services are responsible for. We have $10,000,000 in core facility improvements that are being put forward. We also have $3,000,000 for fuel sites throughout the county that have to be maintained. These are where our school buses, our fire trucks, all the apparatus is replaced. And then an annual allocation for our energy management program which continues in this budget.

Technology, every year there are investments both in the capital budget and the operating budget. This capital budget includes $3,000,000.3600000 for technology infrastructure maintenance including upgrades to the county's GIS system as well as identified upgrades to the county's community development system that your secretary was instrumental in working with a team of county employees in bringing forward. Heavy investment in public works on the environmental side, nearly $16,600,000 Environmental action continues to be central to our county's ethos to provide a safe and sustainable community both for the present and future generations. And this vision wouldn't be possible without sustained investments in environmental efforts. So the budget includes $1,800,000 in wetland and stream mitigation efforts, dollars 2,300,000 in storm water improvements that are funded entirely by the general fund.

A number of years ago many localities in the commonwealth came forward and they said we need to impose a storm water tax on every building in that particular locality. So we are the only locality in the commonwealth that does not impose a storm water utility tax that has to abide by Chesapeake Bay regulations. A number of years ago we also got into BMP maintenance, even private BMPs because of the benefit again to the environment and the Chesapeake Bay, stream restoration projects, dam maintenance and repairs. And then we have 10,000,000 that is included in this capital proposal whose authorization came from the last referendum. New this year, we are calling this the Steve Yab, Deputy County Manager for Community Operations, a stream bank program that is funded with $1,500,000.

This is a unique effort where we're securing wetland credits because they are very expensive in the private market. Sorry. So we are creating our own and we will use those for county projects. We have Bentley Chan and the Dream Team from utilities who has so this year, where is Bentley? There he is.

So this year Bentley was actually able to obtain a quad triple A rating. He was the first in the nation. We were the third on the general government side but then Bentley came in and one upped us and became the first in the nation to have the highest bond rating of any utility in the nation. So our largest project is really this Eastern water transmission main. This will be the second year that that project is underway.

And with the water crisis last year, we realized we had to improve the resiliency of the system, particularly in Eastern Henrico so if there ever was a disruption of water from the city of Richmond, water would flow. And so this is a 13 mile pipe, second year of allocation. You'll see various sewer infrastructure projects, water infrastructure projects. Those are annual. Fairly routine because, again, we maintain our system.

And then a large project for the Newmarket and Buffin Road force main area and a number of miscellaneous projects. So you will see in the capital budget that you have or was sent, the letter that came to you identifies initially the overall capital improvement program but then we delve into each of the areas that has been recommended. The takeaway as we were concluding this capital budget is that we continue to have a myriad of funding sources. We are blessed. We don't just issue bonds for capital projects.

We have everything from a meals tax that's dedicated to our school system to CVTA revenues to pay as you go funding, pay as you go funding for environmental efforts that we set up over a number of years. We have the gasoline tax that aids in certain ways. But over a period of time, we have been able to build a capital budget that is funded with revenues that are not going to go away. So and infrastructure, if there is one story for localities throughout the nation is that the older they get, the more population it comes in, the denser they become. Typically if you don't stay on top of that infrastructure, you are going to fall behind.

And once you fall behind on infrastructure, it is nearly impossible to catch up. That is not happening. With our county. Again, a significant investment requested in the capital budget within the county's existing tax rates and abilities to pay. So that's what I have as far as overview for the Planning Commission. This evening I have all the agency has here and if there are any questions that members of the Planning Commission have, we are here to respond to those. Mr. Chair?

Thank you, mister manager. And I will, give the gavel back to our, to our chair. But I do have one question, for you if I might. So when you put up that one of those first slides about, you know we have this many requests and we but we don't have funds to to cover all of them. We understand that. It's always true of anybody I think. I did notice that the biggest delta is on that transportation line. Is there anything on that line that we should know about in terms of, you know, just 36,000,000 granted out of the much larger request?

Yes, sir. And good evening, mister chair, members of the planning commission. My name is Justin Crawford. I'm the county's budget director. And what I would note about the delta that you pointed out as far as transportation projects, the 30 so the 36,000,000 that's largely from the Central Virginia Transportation Authority and other local funding.

And all of that local funding allows the county to be able to provide that as matching dollar to state and federal grants for larger projects. I'm thinking of Saddle Road is just the example that pops up into my head right now. 3 Chopped Road improvements is another where those are larger projects where we put in local dollars to kind of leverage VDOT and federal resources in order to complete those. So yes, you see 2,800,000 over a 10 period, but a lot of that we anticipate at some point will, you know, would be, you know, could be funded with the same federal dollars. Just, yeah, we need the awards before we would put them forward.

Makes sense. Thank you.

And we will amend that budget throughout the year if those grants come in, those matching resources. Mister chair?

I would also like to thank you for sharing about you with everyone here today. Really appreciate that. Yes, sir.

Mr. Manager, just a quick comment and question myself. The work is so impressive. The care, the dedication of all the department heads and your teams, is greatly appreciated. And as I've been able to go through this, is overwhelming to see the amount of work that it takes to run a county as great as Enrico.

I love seeing, to your point, the focus on the maintenance, the continued support and ensuring that we continue to take care of these different areas. But I also love to see the investment in our, communities, the parks. And I was just curious if you or if someone could help maybe speak to pedestrian safety and a little bit more around the investments there. I think you know I love seeing the lighting but are there additional plans for bus shelters for other areas like that?

Yeah. So, gentleman that is coming up, we've had a number of public works directors throughout the years who have done phenomenal work for the county. Mister Hughes is, has transformed our county to years ago, we couldn't even say the word roundabout. Could not. I mean, mister Schmidt will remember. He had the first one in his district. And what we are seeing now, not just with lighting, not with not just with sidewalks, but with all of it. You wanna speak to it? Mr. Major.

Commission. Good evening. Thank you for having me up here. But no, happy to answer your question. So this is where I I'll just say this year's funding. You know. So we're we've been working over a number of years on pedestrian safety. I actually think if you look at just pedestrian dedicated projects and Mr. Crawford just mentioned we go after state, federal, local and what we've been able to do with CVTA. We actually currently have over 70 just pedestrian safety projects that are active here in the county that will be built over the next few years, and they value over $500,000,000.

So So by having these local funds available, we've been able to leverage and as well as CVTA every grant opportunity whether it's federal, whether it's at the state level. And then we also compete for a number of grant opportunities. So we're we're no rock unturned to to try to meet some of our our needs as as we've gone from a rural suburban or locality to more of an urban suburban locality where we have transit. We've also done well with bus shelters. So, like I think one of our most recent additions was one on Broad Street at Stillman.

I know Mr. Schmidt was working for that one. And we've got a we have a number of bus shelters. We've multiple projects on Broad Street, nine mile Williamsburg Road, Airport Drive, and any of those roads that have sidewalk projects with transit. We're going to include the transit accommodations as part of it. So, yeah, we've been pretty active on the safety side over the last few years. We still have a lot of work to do. You know, we don't hide from the fact that we've had some pedestrian safety challenges over the last few years and we'll continue to work to make the infrastructure safer and help Henrico become more livable.

Well, thank you and thank you for the comments. And I'd we appreciate that work. And I think sometimes within a program as large as this, we may lose sight of sometimes I think 70 projects is not small. 500,000,000 or whatever the number was is not small. But it's a continued dedication. So thank you for your work.

I may add one thing I will give credit to the Planning Commission as well. You know, as new developments have come in, you know, we've also seen sidewalk and trails and some of those things have become a standard part of those projects. And it's a lot easier for us to connect segments of sidewalk that are there versus completely having to build everything. So credit you all and your group as well for what you do with making the community more walkable and safe as well. Absolutely. Anyone else from the commission have any questions?

I didn't have a question.

I had a comment. Comments. I mean,

haven't said on a lot of boards, but I've said on enough that I've heard a number of different budget reports and they're they're quite always quite boring. But if if I'm being honest, I do look I do look forward every year to this because it it really speaks to the dedication of our leadership of this county that they they are really dedicated to wanting to make this one of the best counties, you know, in the in the entire nation and I can't say that it is but I I think you would have to look very hard to find one that's any better. I really was pleased with the amount of money that's looking to be spent on education, pedestrian safety,

and

the water and sewer infrastructure. Those are very important to us. I know they're very very important to the county as well and and we understand that like you said, everything can't be funded but just to have the opportunities of the many different streams of income that come into the county. That again speaks to the job well done by this leadership. I just want to as a member of the county, would like to say thank you.

Absolutely. I like to second that as well. Definitely being an Eastern Henrico member and having to deal with the water situation first hand but I think the county has made a focused effort to to shore up some of the gaps that we've had. It's been a collective part played by a lot of folks in this county. So we truly appreciate that.

Thank you. It's and it really is a testament to the men and women that are really behind me. And not only who worked the water crisis but then once it was over, how does this not happen ever again? Bentley

and his

team found a way, an engineering solution, and we're working towards it. So Absolutely. Thank you.

Thank you again, mister manager. Mhmm. At this time, the additional comments from the floor will open up the public hearing portion. I know it's a lot of county employees that I see before us but in the event just don't want to glance over or gloss over that part. Yes also to WebEx. We can't forget any potential WebEx attendees that we might have.

Mister chairman, there is nobody on Webex for this item.

Alright. Thank you. At this time

chairman, I wanna pile on the accolades for this document. It's it's it is overwhelming. Think someone said earlier, but in a really good way. It's my third year reviewing this document, and it's just, it's just such an impressive piece of work. Our job as a commission is to review it and judge its consistency with the comprehensive plan. And I find that it is consistent. Have a motion if it's appropriate this time. Second. So I move resolution PCR dash two dash 26 finding

that

the capital improvements program fiscal year twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven through fiscal year twenty thirty five two thousand and thirty six is consistent with the county's comprehensive plan and recommend its approval. Alright.

We have a motion by mister Shippey. I believe I heard a second. Yes, Okay. By mister Mackey. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Glad to see this is moving forward. Motion passes.

Mr. Chairman, we now move on to the next item on your agenda, which is consideration of approval of your minutes of your regular work meeting and work session on 02/12/2026. Alright.

Do we have a motion at this time? Motion

to approve.

Second.

Alright. Motion and a second by mister Shippy. All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Any opposed? Motion passes.

Mister chairman, with that that last action, it would be appropriate to recess the meeting and then reconvene at 6PM for the well, you want to, Mr. Chairman, I'll restate that. If you would like, we could move to page two of your agenda and cover some of the discussion items that are not public hearing items advertised for six p. M. If you'd like to move forward. Yes, we can

move forward in that direction.

Okay. With that said, then we will return to the public hearing item at six p. M. Or somewhere thereafter. And we'll move on to page two of your agenda for the discussion item, an overview and introduction of key planning influences chapters of the 2045 comprehensive plan update. And that will be presented by Ms. Rosemary Demer. You probably wasn't expecting that I would do that here.

Ms. Demer, we appreciate you being on standby and ready to go. Thank you.

Fred, can you call up the presentation?

Rosemary, you can hit escape and go to the screen and pull it up. I believe all of you also have a handout in your folder that follows with what Rosemary will be reviewing with you.

Let me go back and check with Fred. He's got the full presentation, but I sent him a separate one this afternoon and I'm not sure that he has that. If you don't mind if I check with him.

Sure. Sure it's not. It should be right right there. There it is.

Sorry about that. Didn't have my glasses on. So I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you this evening about our progress on the twenty twenty five two thousand and forty five comprehensive plan. Tonight I'll be introducing a new chapter of the plan as well as providing you a brief recap on one of our previously discussed topics. And then I'll update you on our latest round of community engagement followed by some next steps.

As I'm sure you know, the purpose of the 2045 comprehensive planning process is to build on the county's long range foundation and create a renewed vision for Henrico County. The introductory chapter, which I believe has been passed out to you this evening, contains an executive summary of the plan, details how the plan will be used. It also provides the legal context behind the document, the process that we used to create it, and of course an outline of the main components of the plan. You may have seen this wheel many times in different colors. The comprehensive plan serves as an important role in determining the future of the county.

It's the first phase of the planning cycle that looks twenty years out and answers three critical questions: What is Henrico County today? What is the county's vision for the future? And how will we achieve that vision? As the primary long range planning document or policy document for the development of the county, the comprehensive plan includes goals, objectives, policies and actions that guide the operations and work priorities for the county, decision making on development activity, and sets the stage for future public investments that are determined through the annual budgeting and capital improvement planning process. So how fortuitous that your other hearing was about the CIP.

Over time the county can evaluate its achievement of comprehensive planning goals. And then as the cycle continues in another ten to fifteen years, the process will commence again with new conditions and issues and opportunities to consider. The plan is expected to be used by a number of individuals and entities. First, the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors will consider the plan's guidance related to the physical planning in the community including capital investments. County staff will use the plan in evaluating development proposals.

The vision, goals and policies will be assessed and referenced in staff reports related to development applications and then other related studies and projects. Landowners and prospective businesses can gain a better understanding of the county's plans for the built and natural environment and make individual property investment decisions in consideration of the plan's objectives. The Code of Virginia requires that all localities adopt a comprehensive plan for the physical development of land within its jurisdiction. I don't know if you realize this, but we're required to have comp plans, but we're not required to have zoning ordinances. So they are important.

The plan must provide long range recommendations for general development, incorporate strategies that promote affordable housing, include a future land use map, and a transportation element that identifies infrastructure needs and recommendations for new and expanded transportation facilities. Upon adoption, we'll post that plan to our website so that it is accessible for everyone. The process for developing the plan included a lot of community involvement to date. And so we feel that that's going to be a success for this particular plan. To date we've engaged approximately 9,000 residents through surveys, 1,900 people in our community visioning exercises, two seventy in our twenty twenty four listening sessions on the vision and goals, and 130 people at our twenty twenty five future land use suggestion sessions.

And then throughout we reach community events such as Glen Allen Day, Earth Day, Plant Native Day, and community wide farmers markets, we've had at least another thousand people engage directly with planning staff to talk about the comprehensive plan. Through the various input sessions we've identified new issues and opportunities to be addressed in the plan. Using the feedback we've received, we've established a cohesive vision to guide the county's land use and infrastructure decision making over the next twenty years. We've updated and created new goals and policies to ensure they reflect both county wide and area specific priorities and develop implementation strategies to achieve the vision in the plan. The chapter also includes our framework.

The framework of the plan contains components that describe the intended policy direction and implementation of the plan. It's organized in a hierarchical manner moving from broad far reaching issues to more specific topical items. Our plan has four components: our environment, managed and sustainable growth, safe and connected spaces, and high quality livable places. These components each contain goals that create a linkage between the vision and more specific policies within each chapter. They will cover natural resources and environmental considerations, future land use, public facilities and services, transportation and mobility, recreation, parks, open space and cultural resources, and community character.

Finally, the document will include strategies aimed at implementing the plan. Now I just wanted to briefly go over Chapter two. One Chapter two is called Key Planning Influences and the Community Vision. This chapter will document the various factors that influence the overall direction of the plan. While resident and stakeholder input is necessary so that the plan reflects the long term vision of the community, it's also vital that we address other realities many maturing communities across the country are facing.

These include changing real estate markets and shift from greenfield development to infill and redevelopment. We also need to expand mobility options for our residents while maintaining the county's fiscal health and prosperity. We shared the first part of the chapter that addresses the first three topics: the aspirations of the community, the changing real estate markets, and then the planning shift to infill and redevelopment with you last spring. It summarizes the feedback of the community engagement reports, identifies specific local trends based on collected and analyzed data, and then considers future residential and non residential development from an infill and redevelopment approach. The remaining sections of the chapter, the expanding mobility, maintaining the fiscal health and prosperity, and the community vision will be influenced by our land use transportation and fiscal modeling which is currently underway at this time.

And we anticipate seeing that in the next two months, we hope. Finally, we wanted to also give you an update on a recent engagement activity that was undertaken at the request of visor. This past Monday we held a community event at the Henrico Theater. To get the word out about the meeting, staff undertook a large scale mailing sending out nearly 29,000 postcards to residents and businesses specific to Vorana. Approximately 115 residents attended the meeting.

Our consultants gave a presentation about the Henrico Next process, the purpose and role of the plan, and outlined the key components of the document. As part of the presentation, attendees were asked to participate in a live online polling activity. So these are just some snapshots of the program that we used. The audience was asked whether they supported or opposed the goals for the various planning topics, and the results are displayed on the screen for you here. So you see that we have the do you support the future land use goal, do you support the transportation and mobility goal.

And then because at the time that we had last asked people's opinions on these, we didn't have the prime agriculture rural conservation designation. We brought that to this particular meeting, especially since it impacted Verina more than any other district. So the question there was do you support the prime agricultural rural conservation designation? And you can see the responses were four for strongly opposed, five for opposed, 11 were neutral, 25 supported it, and then 17 strongly supported it. So the majority of the opinion was support for the new designation.

And then it was our first opportunity to ask what they thought the minimum acreage requirement should be. When we went out last spring during the suggestion sessions and we brought out the various different land categories. This again was not part of it, but we subsequently had the PARC map that we're calling has been posted since this fall letting people see it. And with that was a presentation that we gave to both the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors explaining that the minimum acreage requirement at this time is scheduled to be one unit per five acres. So we decided to ask the community, you know, what minimum acreage do you support?

So their choices were three acres, five acres, seven acres, 10, other, and not sure. And you'll see that most of the answers were three or five. So ours, as it's printed and posted right now, has the five acre. There's an equal number of people there at the meeting that felt that three acres would be perhaps a better number. And then also we've got the seven, the 10, and then four not sure are others.

And then the meeting concluded with a very broad, long range question and answer period. So to wrap up, just thought I'd share the next steps in the process. We with the consultants are working on drafting the various sub chapters that will make up the plan. Once the drafts are complete we'll schedule work sessions with both the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors to review the information. Following those we'll schedule another round of community engagement to gather resident and stakeholder feedback which we anticipate will happen this summer.

Finally, after a review of all the comments and suggestions, there will be public hearings scheduled before the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors. And then implementation of the numerous action items detailed in the plan would follow after the adoption of the plan. So that concludes my presentation and I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have.

Well, thank you for the presentation. Excellent. Well done. Anyone on the commission have any questions at this time in regards to the presentation? Go ahead,

mister chairman. Hey, Rosemary. I was at that meeting. It was a very interesting dynamic with with the audience. And I think when you showed those those four questions that you chose to put on that slide, you can kinda see how at the very beginning, the crowd was just kinda getting warmed up. And so a lot of them didn't necessarily show that they were fully bought in. But by the end, I was really intrigued by the responses to that minimum acreage question. And I think it shows that I kind of expect it to be more skewed towards even bigger lot sizes. But I think, and we heard this with some of the Q and A, the folks really mostly seem to understand that there's a balance here and that we want to preserve this agricultural feel to Voraina. They all want that.

But that they know that there's enough of a balance that we really need to maybe think about three acres. I don't know where we land but I found that to be the most interesting kind of takeaway from the evening.

And I think that that will be our challenge as we move forward. Those numbers that you saw on the screen tonight represent the people that were there using their phones. We had a significant number of people who either had problems with their phones or chose to do a paper copy of the survey. We have those results but we aren't able to add them in. But they basically range in the same vein of the numbers that you saw on the screen.

There wasn't anything that was significant. I do recall that there were two or three who wrote in under the acreage requirement that they preferred the one acre that's currently required now. But that was just three responses in total with all the rest of them. It was certainly something that we'll be continuing to work on and discuss.

Absolutely. Any additional questions? Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

Chairman, we'll continue on page two. This was the first presentation of what there will be what will be many presentations regarding the comprehensive plan over the next several months and our goal to take it to public hearing sometime this summer. So, with that, the next discussion item is I am requesting the commission set a work session for your April 9 meeting to continue the 2045 comprehensive plan update discussions. And I would suggest that we schedule that at 05:00 if that meets your liking. And of course, we'll have some food available as well.

If you're going to tempt us with the food, then we might as well.

It's a bribe. Absolutely.

05:00 sound good to the commission.

Alright. I know those boxed meals are just so good. But anyway, thank you. We don't I don't need to vote on that. The consensus is good. Thank you very much. And the next item, Ms. Moore is going to discuss with you the revisions to the commission's rules and regulations. And I believe we're gonna ask you to go ahead and if you're comfortable with them, action to adopt them this evening. Sounds good.

Thank you, mister secretary, members of the commission. So, yes, in your packet, you have a clean version of the revised Henrico County planning rules and regs that you what that we went through in January and February. So, as you can see they were last revised last year in March, and this simply gives it a new format that you discussed. It also talks about mainly in 6.4, the order of business and procedures and basically expanding a little bit of detail on the order and also really landing on a more concrete and clear path for public participation. And this just follows what I think that the commission all agreed upon, which is more of a clear path for proponents, opponents, representative time limits, and also limiting speakers to two minutes and retaining, of course, the Commission's right to waive those time limits and expand those as they see fit.

So with that, if you have any questions, we hope that you will make a recommendation on this tonight and move forward on this item.

All right. Do we have any questions before we have the recommendation?

Thank you for your continued work on this. I just wanted to make sure I understood six dot four b. Appreciate the inclusion of allowing the commission to extend the duration of time. But I just noticed that it's a commission would vote on that. Is that a shift from, I think, previously where the chair would be the one to make the decision on that?

Let catch up with you on being

I think it's always Mr. Winterhoff referred to the commission as a whole. The I think it's been accepted over time that the commission allowed the chairman to make that decision. Certainly, can, you know, we could remove that and just we could just say that the chairman has the ability discretion to do that. Certainly the chairman always looks to his commission members for input if it's in their district I believe if there's a question. So we as staff don't really have an opinion on that. So it's however you'd like to handle it. Got

you. I would actually say are we going to make that change in this, you know, in the wording right now before we a motion to accept it or accept it with the proposed before we

Well, we would make it before if you voted on it tonight. Right. If you want us to redraft that, we can there's real honestly no rush on these. We can bring it back to you next month with that change.

Let's just do that then with the change so that we can accept it appropriately at that time even though I was looking forward to moving forward with this piece.

Okay. That's a great suggestion.

Is there anything else that the commission I mean, again, there's no rush. We can we want to get them in place. I will I'll update the commission real quickly on the timers and and the potential changes to this room. I along with county attorney and the clerk of the board and the director of IT went over to Hanover, looked at their system. It was quite impressive honestly.

They had the timers. They had nameplates that you could their LED readout and they're nice nice LED. You know, it's a it's a nice nice lettering. It's not a gaudy LED. On the name plates on the front of their lecterns and their diocin, you know, you can change that. You wouldn't see us out. You're sliding these things in and out. They can do that. Their room is much larger. They have multiple screens.

And they do have the timer. So right now our IT department is looking at But what we can there were several things that I found very well. The nameplates I thought were good. The timer, I know all of you would like the screens. In the audience, they have enough room to where they can it's almost if you haven't seen it, imagine yourself in a sports bar with televisions hanging everywhere.

That's sort of what it looks like in a way. But it also allows the commission and their board to not be sitting here doing this versus looking out and being able to, you know, you've got situational awareness concerns I think. But also I've always felt like sitting here and looking down makes people feel like we're not paying attention to them. That never has felt right to me. So we're trying to figure out just exactly what we could do in this room because the design is a little different.

But I expect something will be forthcoming to the county manager in the not too distant future with recommendations. I don't think it will impact what you do here, but it might. So it's I mean you've got that considered too. If you want to continue considering it, we can make these changes and we can wait to see maybe by next month we'll have the outcome of what we find and what we can do here in this room.

And just so we wouldn't have to have Mr. Mubak up here, mean she's already made a presentation so we could just accept it with those particular changes and everyone is fine with that. Yeah, I have

one more question. Section C also has unless commission votes to extend time with opposition.

We would look at both of those and make them consistent.

So we'll we'll continue this. Mr. Chairman. Sounds good. And we are we still have to wait till six Let me share with you some additional news and then we'll then I don't know if we'll still be at six. Mr. Ben Seal, some of you may have heard this. Some of you may not be aware. As you know, Leslie New's retired. I think all of you are aware of that.

She'd been with us for I think twenty seven years. That created an assistant director's vacancy dealing primarily with the current planning side of the office, design review and code. Mr. Seal has been appointed as the assistant director of DRD ENCODE. He began this job on February 21.

He's had twenty two years in planning in the Commonwealth and he said twenty years with Henrico County. So, he's bringing a great deal of experience to the position. He began with Henrico County as a planner too and he worked his way up through the system. I've enjoyed working with him over that period of time, and I guess I had the pleasure of offering him his job when he began here. He steadily climbed the ranks.

He's been very instrumental in what we've accomplished in this department over his tenure. He does hold a Bachelor of Arts in Public and Urban Planning from Virginia Tech. And I just, you know, I think all of you know him, but I was very pleased to be able to promote Ben and just wanted to let all of you know and congratulate him again.

Mr. Secretary, thank you for that. And Mr. Seale, congratulations. Congratulations. Up until your new position from the commission, we are excited for you. And yes, we've enjoyed working with you as well. So just a new role moving on up the ladder. Congratulations once again.

And with that, Mr. Chairman, if you'd like to recess your meeting for five minutes to 06:00, we can do that. I've done my best to heat up that time.

No doubt about it. We got triple fives. We'll go ahead and recess and reconvene at 06:00. Alright. I know it was quick.

I'd like to call the order for the 06:00 portion as we reconvene of the meeting. I know we covered a lot of stuff right here at the beginning at the 05:00. So request for withdrawals and deferrals, we're jumping right into that?

Yes, sir. Tonight, mister chairman, that's exactly where we are. We have no request for withdrawals and deferrals this evening. We have no request for expedited items. We have already covered all the items on page two. You've approved your minutes. So the next item on your agenda will be the cases to be heard, which tonight you have one case. Absolutely.

I see Mrs. Hardwood making her way to podium now. How are you?

And before we move into the case, let me provide some guidance to those on WebEx. If there is anyone out in WebEx land. For those of you who want to participate remotely in the public hearing, you can by following these guidelines. You also will see them on your screen. Go to the planning department's meeting webpage at wenrico.gov/planning/meetings.

Scroll down under planning commission and click on WebEx event. Once you've joined the WebEx event, please click chat button in the bottom right corner of the screen. Staff will send a message asking if anyone would like to sign up to speak on an upcoming case. To respond, select Molly Mallow at the drop from the drop down menu. Send her a message, she will place you in the queue to speak.

Commission does have guidelines for its public hearings. The applicant is allowed ten minutes to present the request and time may be reserved for responses to testimony. Citizens who support the application may also speak in this timeframe. The opposition has allowed a cumulative ten minutes to present its concerns. What that means is everyone who wishes to speak in opposition must be included in the overall ten minute allowance.

Commission questions do not count into the time limits. The commission may waive the time limits at its discretion. Comments must be directly related to the case under consideration. The commission does maintain verbatim minutes of the meeting. Commentors must provide their name and address prior to speaking for the record.

And thank you for your participation and interest in your community this evening. With that said, Mr. Chairman, the case on the agenda tonight is REZ 2020113. It's Darren Smous for the Crossings at Mulberry Development Company LLC. This is a request to amend proffers accepted with REZ2022Dash00013.

The property is located on the east line of Chamberlain Road, north of its intersection with Azalea Avenue. The applicant proposes to amend proffer 28 related to alley served lots. It is a project currently under construction, and the staff report will be presented by Ms. Allie Hartwig.

All right, Ms. Hartwig. It was yours.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the commission. This is a proper amendment request to allow alley fed homes to be constructed without garages in part of the Crossings At Mulberry development. The R6 C Zone site is located at the east line of Chamberlain Road, approximately two fifty feet north of its intersection with Azalea Avenue. Most surrounding uses are residential in nature with single family subdivisions to the east and north.

The Richmond Judicial Line is located to the south. The site is designated urban residential and commercial concentration on the 2026 comprehensive plan. The subject property is composed of 160 townhouse lots, of which only one row has been developed so far. With this request, the applicant is proposing to amend proffer number 28, originally accepted with case REZ twenty twenty two-thirteen. Regarding the requirement for garages on alley fed lots.

As written, the existing proffer requires lots rear yards adjacent to the alley be improved with homes using rear loaded crouches. Only 59 of the 160 units in the development will be affected by this change. Although the applicable part of the community has been developed yet, the applicant is interested in this change to respond to recent market demand. I would also like to note that this proposed change does not impact parking because garage spaces do not factor into the parking requirement calculations. Parking requirements would continue to be met using the spaces in each driveway.

All other proffers accepted with the 2022 case would remain unchanged, including proffers related to setbacks and buffers, density, amenities, and scaping among others and all sections of the development will continue to comply with those proffers. Staff does not believe that amending the proffer would be detrimental to the surrounding community or negatively impact the overall development And the proposed amendment in continued residential use of the property are still consistent with the 2026 plan. For these reasons, staff supports this request. This concludes my presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions at this time.

Thank you, missus Howard. Real quick. Is there anyone in the audience or on Webex in opposition who would like to speak to the case?

Mister chairman, there is nobody on Webex for this case.

Alright. Thank you. Alright. Any questions from the commission? Alright. Well, thank you, mister Harwin. Appreciate the work that you and staff did on it and thank you once again for your presentation. For the crossings at Mulberry Development Company LLC, I move that we recommend approval of IEZ twenty twenty six-ten thousand one hundred thirteen, the crossings at Mulberry Development Company LLC with the proper amendments listed in the staff report. Second. Alright. Motion. Motion by myself. Second by mister Winoff. All in favor? Aye.

Any opposed? Ayes have it. Thank you. Motion passes.

Mr. Chairman, that now takes us to the final item on your agenda on page two which is adjournment.

Six zero seven. All minds clear. Meeting adjourned.