Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone. The 05/14/2026, Loudoun County Planning Commission work session will now come to order. As is our custom, let's stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Okay. We have the minutes for the March 12 work session. If the commission's had a chance to review them, I'll accept a motion.

I make a motion to approve the meeting.

Second. A motion approved made by vice chair, seconded by commissioner Myers. Any discussion? No. All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed? That motion will carry. Okay, that motion will pass 7,011 with Commissioner Frank absent and Commissioner Banks abstaining from the vote. Alright. Let's go ahead and go through disclosures. I will start to my right. If you have any disclosures, please turn your light on. Commissioner Jasper.

But now I'm looking for the date. I sorry. It's telling me all sorts of stuff. I met with the applicants on the Tuscarora Bay project virtually last week, and I can't get this to show me the day. So somebody can go on, but last week.

Okay. Commissioner Combs.

Thank you, mister chair. On going back in time, on March 27, I had a phone conversation with Pastor David Pittman, a resident adjacent to the Tuscarora Land Bay for parcel. And then on April 27, I met virtually with Paki Crown, John McGranahan, and the applicant for the South Riding Intergenerational Community. And on April 29, I met with Bill Junda and Rob Ballinger regarding the Tuscarora 4 application.

All right. Commissioner Miller.

On Tuesday, May 12, met with John McGrani and Paki Crown and the rest of the applicant team for the South Riding Intergenerational Project. That's all.

Okay. There it is. Commissioner Myers.

On May 6 at the end of our ZOA committee meeting, I talked for a few minutes with Bill agenda in regards to our application that we have before us tonight. And then on May 9, I didn't get all their names, but I met with about 20 to 25 residents that live down there, in the community of the application that's in front of us tonight.

K. Commissioner Jasper, do you have a follow-up?

No. Because I can't pull it up on on his calendar and I promise you.

Alright. For myself, on April 29, I had a phone conversation with John McGranahan regarding the South Riding Intergenerational Community application. April 29, I attended the Chamber of Commerce meeting regarding affordable housing. May 3, I met on-site with several residents of the Tuscarora Crossing community regarding the Tuscarora Land Bay four application. May 11, I met with the applicant and representatives regarding an upcoming application this month Tech Park at Dulles Substation.

Also on May 11, I met with the applicant representative regarding Tuscarora Lambay 4. And on May 13, I met with applicant representatives about upcoming application this month, Dulles Technology Park. All right. So with that, we have our one work session item tonight, Leji twenty twenty five-twenty Tuscarora Land Bay 4, special exception twenty twenty five-thirty six.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is Tess Lynch with the Department of Planning and Zoning here to present the application for Tuscarora Crossing Land Bay 4. As of May 5, staff has received nine comments in opposition voicing concern with the presence of a warehouse near residential property, traffic, trucks, lighting, the safety of children in the neighborhood, and the number of parking spaces. The subject property is a 15 acre site. It is bounded by Cross Trail Boulevard to the South, the Washington And Old Dominion Trail to the East, and Natchez Drive to the West.

Access to the site is proposed from Natchez Drive. The site is located within the Leesburg JLMA employment place type in the Leesburg Election District. It is zoned PDH 4. The applicant is proposing a specs to permit the construction of a government building with office and warehousing facilities in the PDH 4 zoning district. Since the planning commission public hearing, the applicant has submitted updated materials with the following updates.

The building elevations now depict a front facade with increased fenestration and canopies over the four entrances on the southern facade and a brick style front exterior. EV commitment has increased from two to 10 charging infrastructure spaces and an additional commitment to 10 built out spaces. A meeting room of at least 1,000 square feet within the building is proposed for use by the public via advanced booking. The applicant has committed to provide a solar panel ready roof on the building. They have reduced the proposed parking from 520 to 425 spaces and eliminated the portion of the previously proposed parking area closest to Crosstreale Boulevard.

Hours of operation for deliveries have been limited to between 7AM and 6PM, Monday through Friday, excluding during emergencies that may necessitate operations outside of these hours. The applicant has provided illustrative graphics demonstrating the view shed on the northern boundary. Trucks will be limited to only the entrance closest to Cross Trail Boulevard, and parallel parking on Natchez Drive will be restricted for users of the building. Signage and marked spots for 9 Washington And Old Dominion Trail parking spaces will be provided on-site. Outdoor storage will be prohibited.

The applicant has revised the commitment for a screening fence on the northern portion of the site from chain link fencing to wood board on board fencing. Additionally, the applicant has added a commitment to provide a six foot berm along Natchez Drive. A security fence will be provided around the rear parking and loading areas and at least three security cameras will be installed in the parking areas. The applicant held a public meeting on 04/16/2026. Present on screen is the previous annotated specs plat on the left and the current annotated specs plat on the right.

The building footprint is shown in blue, parking and circulation in orange, open space in green hatching, and TCA in yellow. Visible at the south of the property is the location of the parking area that has been removed. Present on screen are the updated elevations. Staff supports a recommendation of approval to the board subject to the conditions of approval. Staff is happy to answer any questions.

Alright. Commissioners, questions for staff. Vice chair Monterey.

Can you explain the the traffic circulation part of it? It says restrict parallel parking for users of the building on the Notches Drive and also only trucks entering through the closest to the cross trail. Can can you do you have some kind of graphical representation of it, what what they're trying to do there?

Yes.

So this graphic shows the traffic going into the site from Natchez Drive.

Yeah.

So it's restricted to that bottom entrance there.

Okay. And where where the restricted parallel parking? What what what are we talking about there?

That's along Natchez Drive.

Is that not a Vedot road?

It is a VDOT road.

The applicant will do their updates as well, but sorry, Tess. They've agreed to a condition that their employees will not park on that road and they'll provide separate parking within the facility for people to use to access the trail.

Does VDOT has to agree for that kind of stuff?

Can self impose the restriction that their employees not park there. But you're right, if it's a VDOT road, VDOT would have to approve any no parking provisions along that length of Natchez.

Okay. Thank you.

Christopher Myers.

I asked this question during our Zowak committee and couldn't seem to get an answer, I'm going try it again here. What's our definition of civic space?

One moment.

Commissioner Myers, could you give us more context for the question?

What is the definition of civic space?

In the context of this application,

it was In the in the zoning ordinance as in the zoning ordinance, what is the definition of civic space? Is Nope. That is not the definition. There's a definition do you see the definition of the zoning ordinance? Can you read it for us, please? One moment. It's loading.

Can we we come back to that question once she looks up the deck?

Sure. I'm moving on to the next one. Yeah. I'd also like to know the exact wording if and maybe if not tonight. I'd asked about it before, but the wording as it related to that proffer of that dedication.

I have both of those for you, commissioner. The definition in the zoning ordinance of civic use is public or quasi public uses in residential or nonresidential areas that are accessible to the public and primarily serve as gathering or meeting areas for the immediate community or reserved as open space that provides a community amenity or promotes environmental environmental or ecological functions. Civic uses may be public buildings, defined space in residential, commercial, or mixed use buildings, or outdoor space constructed to accommodate community gatherings. Such uses typically include churches, schools, libraries, community centers, amphitheaters, and owners association meeting space or clubhouses. Civic uses include active recreation open space, packed passive recreation open space, and community open space.

And commissioner, your other question was about this specific site. It's it's long, but the port the part that I think is the most operative, it says the public use parcel may be used in the county's discretion for any public civic school or county use or for open space. K. Thank you. I also wanted to ask the question in relationship to, I know you say that you've they've decreased the hours of operation,

but it's really not that they've decreased the hours of operation. They've decreased the hours of deliveries for operation. They've not decreased the hours that are open. Is that not correct? So they can there's no restriction on how late this is open. This building is open.

The operation outside of those hours would be restricted to

emergencies. Okay. The there's a there's an issue here because b says hours of operations for deliveries. It doesn't say hours of of operation for opening. It says just for deliveries. And it says deliveries are limited to Monday through Friday between 7AM and 6PM, excluding periods of local emergencies, which may necessitate necessitate after hours deliveries to support public safety operations. That's simply about delivery of good. That's not about hours of operation to be open.

The the intent let me can look pull the intent is to also it's in the present or, I mean, in the report to limit the hours of operation for the building on the site as well. So both the building and then the use of the site kind of distinct, but the building being restricted to business hours outside of other county functions and the use of the site being restricted for deliveries and excluding emergency. But what you're saying, I believe, is correct that there is other interpret there's other options for using the site that are outside of those very specific perimeters. Right.

Because all this is is limiting deliveries when they can deliver stuff, not when they're open and when they close. And, also, I would suggest, especially especially if if this this is is about about deliveries, deliveries, I think the 7AM and the 6PM are too I think 7AM is too early. I think 6PM is too late because one of the issues you're gonna have is this this this little group here only it's a it's it's like a half of a horseshoe or it's a horseshoe actually from one point to the other. So all the school buses and everything and all the people going to work, people going to work are gonna be going to work at 07:00 in the morning for the most part, which is exactly the same time they could be taking deliveries. And then people coming home from work, you would expect them to be in there for that five to six period of time.

So you're gonna have a conflict right there with the deliveries, I believe, with this. And then secondly, if this is supposed to be open to them for the be using for, which I think is a stretch of imagination. If this is how we're trying to get around, say, it's civic that we're gonna give them a thousand square feet. If the building's only open till 06:00 and it's not open on the weekends, when in the world would they be able to use the building? And I know that's a rhetorical question, but to me, it's like the hours that somebody would use it would be if they were gathering would be in the evenings for a meeting, would be on the weekends.

But this building supposedly is not gonna be open on the weekends or they're not gonna be open in the evenings. So I just think that that is also a concern. And I'll let it I've got other things, but and it and it says it again about the hours of operation. It talks about the lighting. It says lighting shall be extinguished from 10PM to 5AM except for exterior lighting that is determined necessary for security or emergency purposes.

I mean, I could see where you could make an argument that all the lighting in that back and all that lighting in the parking lot is for security because it would be dark. So I don't think this this this doesn't create a dark sky moment or anything because all you've gotta say is that you've got this huge fence. I mean, no fence, but this three sides of this building looks like a data center to me. I mean, there's no windows. It's concrete slab type of looking thing. You've got the front and a little bit on each side. It's got some brick to it, but it is and it's got 13 bays on the back of it. I mean, it just doesn't fit in a residential community, But I'll let other people ask questions to staff.

Great. Commissioner Jasper.

So I sent my question a little earlier today. I'm curious. I understand that that this this building building was was initially initially designated designated for for LCPS LCPS use. Use. And what I'm curious about is the process whereby this particular parcel of land was when it was no longer needed for LCPS use, how was the determination made that in terms of county needs, this DGS warehouse was more important, for example, than something like attainable housing?

So from our review, our review started at the acceptance of the application. We were not involved in the site selection. We were simply reviewing the application. So I will have to defer to our counterparts to be able to answer the background on how the site was selected, how the uses evolved over time and how they ultimately came to the application that's in the door. But we would have not have been the point that we took it over and processed the application, how it evolved to that particular use we wouldn't have had access to or would have been part of our analysis.

In your opinion as the county's land use advisers, would this be a suitable site for attainable housing?

So right now, we would have to look at the place type. I think the place type right now does not anticipate additional use. When Tuscarora was first developed, it was industrial and it was converted to residential use. So it would require a zoning concept plan amendment. Right now it's limited to only the uses that are described. For it to be an attainable housing, the county would have to go ahead and submit an application to change the zoning designation of the property to allow for that use or change the concept plan to allow for that use at this site.

And given the way we analyze those kinds of applications, would it be the context and the complementarity when other factors be suitable you know, in your general?

And that would be the context what's already around it today. That would be if we were to come to the commission that we would ask the commission to evaluate. The Ashburn Park And Rides project is also an attainable housing project that the county is in a public private partnership with, and that application should be coming to you later this year.

Okay. Thank you.

Commissioner Barnes.

Yes. I have but not to the staff and the applicant. I will talk to him. So, I'm going to wait until then. Okay. I'll wait on.

Commissioner Frank?

I'm going to go back where we were just

a moment ago. Figure four in

the staff report is the 2019 ZCPA for the site. This is Land Bay 4, correct? Yes. This is labeled on that as public use slash civic slash school slash open space slash PDH 4 as our eight ADU. So I don't know that we do need a ZCPA for it to be affordable housing, do we? If it's already got a ZCPA that labels it r eight a d u.

That's what it's zoned and administered as. That's not the use that's, proposed. That's the zoning

I know it's not what what's pre proposed right now, but I thought if I'm maybe I misunderstood commissioner Jasper's question. I thought she was asking if as it is now, could it be affordable housing?

It would require a ZCPA application because the CDP designates it as public use, not as not as residential.

So the CDP would trump this 2019 ECPA that calls it ADU?

It doesn't call it ADU. That's the zoning district.

Okay.

That land bay is zoned PDH 4 administered as R 8 ADU.

Mhmm.

That's the zoning district.

Okay.

I'm I'm

You're referring to the go ahead.

Go ahead. Try commissioner. Sure. So various zoning districts permit a range of uses in them. Right. That that R 880 U is the district that permits among among residential uses also things that are listed here. This site was specifically designated, you know, in the proffer for the use that we've described.

So the proffer is going to trump the long list of possible uses.

That's right.

It's also in the ZCPA that was approved at the same time. Only we confuse ourselves, don't we? All right, thank you.

Commissioner Combs?

So if it has to comply with the proffer which allows for public use, wouldn't we just look to the definition of public use in the zoning ordinance?

If it I mean, you'd look to the proffer and the specific language of the proffer first. And then to help interpret the proffer, you would look to the zoning district or zoning ordinance, yeah.

And so public use in the zoning ordinance is a use that includes any area, building, or structure held, used, or controlled exclusively for public purposes or deemed essential for a public purpose such as housing at affordable prices for the workforce?

That's correct. The language in the proffer expands upon that. So the proffer is more broad than the zoning ordinance definition for what it allowed to be on this site.

So couldn't affordable so couldn't the county advance an affordable housing play here without a ZCPA?

It's and the ZCPA in 2019

It's broad in that the uses for public, civic, school, or county use or open space. It is those five, So it's broader then than we just one

would just look to how those terms are defined in the ordinance to see what's considered that use, right?

That's one it's a proper determination to determine, that's one thing you'd look to.

If that would be an option for this site, that's the we would go through the same process that you've just gone through. Look at the definitions, look at the proper language and what specifically is depicted on the CDP. But I understand where you're going with the question. I just don't know that we could affirmatively say that tonight. I'm looking for

an official determination on this, but I think the question was

Could we alternatively happen here?

The county have advanced an affordable housing play here on this site? And I think the response was without a ZCPA, no, they couldn't do that. But it seems to me that perhaps this was a bit more open to that than maybe interpreted.

I looked by the proffer and by the graphically how it's represented on the CDP that it would limit it to this. But I understand your point and that is we've limited to the use that's being requested. But if that was an alternate that came to the site, would go through the same exercise.

And just I think for the record, the public use definition then goes on to say, or by any department or branch of the federal government, Commonwealth of Virginia, the Loudoun County government. So then this use would obviously qualify as public use. I think the question was would the county's town

So the exercise that established this use here would probably be the same exercise that would look at an alternative under the same definition. Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Myers, go ahead.

Follow-up. So I find this very interesting because we're talking about it has to be civic and what civic is and isn't. And if you look at a staff referral that was done by department plan and zoning by Joshua Peters, Number eight, civic use. This applicant indicates they are willing to allow community use and meeting space within the proposed building. The place type designation for this property does not include a public slash civic component.

However, QD 6.1 encourages the provision of public slash civic gathering spaces as a means of creating a sense of place community planning supports the revisions as consistent with the QD policies of the 2019 general plan. So the staff themselves in reviewing is saying this building is not being designated for civic or public use. And this ref I mean, read it. It's number eight under civic use, another referral. I'm not making it up.

So what that referral is saying is the overall place type of this application, the employment place type that it's in, does not look for public and civic because it also does not look for residential necessarily. However, at the time that this was approved, this is the specific designation. Does that help?

It makes my point. My point is it was supposed to be a civic or public use to this this this quad no matter who got it. And they've said that this particular use, this warehouse does not meet the definition of civic and public use. There is no public coming into this. It's not a county building where you come to pay your taxes. It's not parks and rec. It's not health services. It's it is a warehouse building with security. Okay? It is not a public use. It is not a civic use. It does not it does not have a gathering place for for the public to come. It is not civic. It is not public. It is a let's call it what it is. It is a warehouse built with all due respect. I know you guys need space in.

Commissioner, but do you have a question?

But so my my question is how do we get around that there is no civic or publics generated in this building?

I think if this was to come in as a new residential application and we were evaluating if it had no previous entitlements at all and we were looking to like, is this a public and civic component? Likely not. But this proffer does specifically say for county use, which this is.

It's a stretch, but okay.

Commissioner Miller.

Thank you. My question would for mister Hobby. I don't necessarily disagree with Commissioner Myers, but that this is a public facility. But because the definition in the zoning ordinance says it is, can we make a determination contrary to that?

I would follow the definition in the zoning ordinance.

The commission could find it incompatible with the surrounding development, but that's not the same as I think your question.

So just for my clarification, based upon what Commissioner Combs read, a building for county use falls within that category. Correct?

Yes. I think. Yes.

Right. And just so we can clarify the hours of operation thing, what are the stated hours of operation of the building and what are the stated hours of operation to the deliveries? It was stated 7AM to 6PM. Correct. That was mentioned in the presentation. Is there separate line that says the hours of operation for the building in general?

We don't have that but we could write a condition.

Okay, so we can talk to the applicant about that. Yes. What the plans are. Okay. Alright, we'll go to the applicant for the applicant to have a presentation.

I got on my knees for you, Bill. Thank you. We could take a pause for a second, Mr. Chair. We need to download it to the K drive.

Is there anything you wanna address while we bring up the presentation? Okay. Hours of operation. Ready? Yep. That's alright.

Yep. Good evening. For the record, my name is Bill Junda. I'm a civil engineer with Gordon, and I'm representing the applicant, which is Department of General Services. With me is Ernie Brown, the director of DGS.

So we were before you back in in March for a public hearing. Following that, we had a community meeting where we invited all of the surrounding neighborhoods on April 16 back here in the Dulles Room behind us and had a really good conversation. We're going to walk through the changes that we've made to the application, both the feedback we received at the Planning Commission public hearing as well as from So we received a lot of commentary about the number of parking spaces, and we have gone back and looked at the programming for DGS both currently as well as in the future for their ultimate build out. I'm sorry, can you hear me okay? Can you hear me okay now?

My apologies. I'll it over over ratio. We have restricted the hours for deliveries as has to been discussed. I think what's also important to note that maybe we didn't clarify enough previously is that this is not your typical warehouse use like you would see like a for profit flex warehouse. Those types of uses at this size would anticipate 37 to 40 truck deliveries per day.

DGS anticipates four to five deliveries per day arriving on box trucks. About half of those will be on like what you would receive from UPS or FedEx at your house on those types of box trucks. So I want to make sure that we're understanding the volume and scale of these deliveries. We have also agreed, as Steph mentioned, to increase our EV chargers from two to 20, both 10 that are EV ready and 10 that are EV installed. We are agreeing to solar ready building construction.

And the community meeting space, what we thought was important was that this currently, this community does not have an HOA provide more overview provide of security and site selection, and we're going happy to answer any questions. We did provide provide a detailed responses that are contained within the staff report, but if there's further elaboration needed, we can help with that. To the north against Kincade Forest, we were asked to provide some additional detail of the type of screening that will occur there as well as to look at the fence. If you recall, we were proposing a chain link fence with slats. We were asked to maybe revisit those materials in that design.

We've changed our commitment to a eight foot tall wood board on board fence that's more compatible with the residential community. And we've also upgraded the buffer along the back parking lot to a type b buffer with additional evergreens. And what the graphic on the bottom shows is that we have our building and then our parking, and then we have that eight foot fence that's opaque that you can't see through. Then we have that 25 foot wide buffer planting. Then we have a proffered 25 foot tree conservation area.

And then on the other side of the property line, Kincaid Forest has a large open space parcel before you get to the first lot, which is 50 feet wide. So there is 100 feet of either existing or proposed vegetation plus the security the privacy fence. Additionally, for scale, you can see that the height of our building at about 35 feet maximum is a similar height scale to the houses that are behind us. Then along Natchez Drive, we have further enhanced those buffers. Zoning ordinance requires just street trees for this type of project on this type of street.

That's one tree per 50 feet, not really that much screening at all. We had previously proposed a type two buffer, which is 15 foot wide, fully landscaped. We have since enhanced that to a type three road corridor buffer, which is 20 feet wide. That is the heaviest buffer road corridor buffer that exists in the zoning ordinance. And then coming out of the community meeting, have also agreed to add a six foot berm along Notchaz Drive that will be fully planted.

This was the elevation that we presented at the public hearing. We got your feedback on that maybe we needed to make some improvements to make it more compatible with the neighborhood. So these are the new elevations that we submitted with our revised application. The architect actually we did a Google Street View drive through of the community, looked at the building materials, the style of construction, tried to match that with the different gables, the brick materials, the awnings, those types of things. We got a lot of comments.

This actually looks like an elementary school, which was originally planned for this parcel. This graphic was already shown by staff, but this shows how we are restricting movements out of the facility so you cannot turn right and go through the community to cut through it. This forces all the people leaving the entrances to turn left. So then we got to the community meeting. There was discussions about how trucks enter and exit the site.

And so this was what we had originally presented, which was a turning analysis analysis showing an 18 wheeler going in and out of the site. Again, we expect 99% of deliveries to come via box trucks and including the UPS and FedEx trucks that you would normally see. But on the rare instance where an 18 wheeler does have to come through the site, this is how it shows that it would safely enter and exit without crossing lanes. But at the community meeting, we heard additional feedback that there concerns because people park on the streets. So Natchez Drive is a public road wide enough to allow parking on one side, and so there is existing street parking on the other side of the road.

And they the citizens were worried how how are trucks gonna navigate this. They also noted that closer to Crosstrella Boulevard, there are people that park there that don't live in the community, but they wanna access to the W And OD Trail, which is nearby. So there are lots of cars that park near that intersection creating a sight distance issue that are only there to park on the trail. So we've agreed to some additional changes to the program. The first is we are now going to limit trucks to enter and exit just from the first entrance.

So trucks will not be allowed to enter or exit the second entrance to keep that the area where they're involved as close to Crosstell Boulevard as possible. And then the second change we are making is we are proposing to not allow parking on the street between our entrance and Crosstrella Boulevard that would remove the ability for nine cars to park there. Primarily that's being used for W and OD users, not the community. But what we are proposing to replace that with is we're putting nine parking spaces right at the beginning of our entrance that will be signed and designated for W And OD trailhead parking so that the general public wants to use the trail. They can park right in those blue parking spaces, and we've shown the ADA accessible route to get out to the trail.

That still leaves 14 spaces on-site on street for the community to use to get to their playground. And this shows how someone would park in those blue parking spaces and then have their ADA accessible route out to the W And OD, which is the green trail on the right side. And with that, we're happy to answer any questions. I know there's probably a number of things you wanna ask us.

Alright. Thank you. Questions for staff. Commissioner Barnes.

Yes.

How high the building was before you brought it down a little bit? The

building height? Mhmm. So we have not changed the height. It was it was originally proposed as 35 feet, and we're still at 35 feet.

Still 35 feet. Yes. You didn't change the height?

We did not change the height. Just the design of the building itself.

Okay. And how much room did you do close to the homes? Did you move your building or give them more room between the building and the properties around them?

So when we looked to adjust the parking, we removed some of the Parking in the front? We removed the less efficient parking in the front. We also moved there was parking along the W And OD Trail in the back, which we removed, which was kind of in conflict with the loading areas anyway. And we also loosened up some of the parking lot and provided bigger parking lot islands so we had better canopy tree coverage inside the parking lot.

How many facilities do you have in a county of this kind?

This kind?

Of a warehouse kind?

Yeah. Repairs where you take the automobiles and trucks and all get it repaired. It's like a garage door, right? Isn't it what it is?

Thank you, sir. So this is not a repair facility And it is not a maintenance facility. It is a warehouse for our maintenance equipment. I'd have to actually go back and give you the exact number of warehouses that the county owns or leases, but it's in the realm of five to six. And now those are exclusively warehouses. They're not warehouses and administrative offices. So this is probably the

yes, of the

150 buildings that the county owns, I do not well, with the exception of I'm sorry, I apologize. We have several on Miller Drive that actually are flex industrial that have both administrative and warehouse on them. So we have a few there.

So you say don't do repairs, you do maintenance on

the We do not do maintenance on facilities or equipment here except as may be necessary for routine preventive for like our generators or our lawnmowers and that's all done indoors for our public works facilities, but we do not bring any of the county fleet to this facility for maintenance or repairs that is done today a separate facility that is zoned general industrial.

So you're not gonna repair anything there, trucks or anything up there except the small like mowers and all that?

That that correct. That's So, everything that is would be repaired there is considered mobile equipment, but not vehicles. So, when our public works crews go out, they put their mowers on the back of a trailer, just like you see the landscapers that come into the residential communities and mow the HOAs. So they'll come in there and they may replace belts, do oil changes, that kind of stuff, but it's actually in the building itself. It's not done outside of the building, but that's not fleet maintenance or repair per se.

And we're not bringing in anybody else's equipment for servicing. And it's only specifically general services stuff. It is not parks and recs. Parks and rec has their own maintenance facility and they do their maintenance work on their equipment at that location.

So how many trucks or vehicles you said about every day, seven or eight coming in and going out?

So we have on average about four to five box truck or Amazon, FedEx vehicles that would come into this location. So at this location is our surplus facility and we are top five in the nation for public surplus auction. And so people will come, the public will come to this location to pick up their auction material if they won the auction. It with the exception of vehicles, the vehicles are stored at a different location. So if you have a vehicle that you purchased or won on auction, they would go to a vehicle site, storage site where they would then pick up that vehicle.

But for example, desks, books, computers, things of that nature that we surplus on behalf of the county that is in this location. And then the public would come to this facility. It is a publicly accessible facility. The public will use this facility for services directly at this location, not only for our transit front office, not our transit facilities, but we will be receiving the public to receive transit and commuter services here, mobility services and advice and counsel as well as storm water advice and counsel for that. And as I mentioned before, surplus.

So where are you going to do the auction? The auction is not going to be at this place, is

So the auction is a virtual online auction and all the material is stored in the warehouse with the exception of the vehicles that are auctioned and they are at a storage lot outside of this location where we currently have them up near the adult detention center.

Someplace else?

Yes, sir. Where it's zoned for that purpose. So we don't store vehicles and we don't bring the vehicles for auction to this location.

If they were building an elementary school up there, how many buses would you expect every day coming through there driving, bringing the kids?

The number of buses for an elementary school?

Yeah. If they have a school. I'm not

sure I have the bus count. I know that from a traffic perspective, we're 43% less traffic than a school overall, but definitely more than four to five buses if you're comparing them to our four to five delivery trucks.

Okay. Thank you. I got the idea.

Thank you.

Commissioner Jasper?

So I just I think when you just described it, Ernie, and thank you for doing that, it gave me a ton more context because I didn't realize how much, public traffic there was potentially coming into the community. I mean, we've been so focused on trucks, but not generally public use. So that changed my perception generally. I'm gonna ask the question that I asked the staff and that they deferred to, which is, you know, what's the process that county staff went through when LCPS said they didn't need the site, and it was determined to make it a DGS combined office warehouse and now apparently public, you know, kind of pickup facility.

So that process is managed through proper management specifically. So the proffer was offered I'm not going to use the right nomenclature because, again, I'm not in proper management. So when they proffered a school there and it went through the special exception process back in, I think it was 2019, and that was the approved proffer. So the schools came in and basically rescinded their right to that because they didn't need that anymore. So then at that point, proper management reaches out and say, okay, what are the priority needs for this?

What under this public use civicwhatever the case may be? And they will solicit through the capital needs assessment process and through the county space planning and infrastructural prioritization process what are the current demands for that. So the current organization that does that now that manages that inquiry would be the Real Property Asset Management Program, RPAMP, which is housed in the county administrator's office. And they I know it's not the best acronym. So yes, that's Jackie's Jackie is the director of that Jackie Marsh.

So they will then evaluate that and determine what are the greatest needs in the county, whether a fire station, whether there's the capital needs assessment calls for a park in that location, whatever that is, right? And they identify those things and then they will bring to the board their recommendations and the board will determine what they want to for staff to move forward on that proffered site. And this and that is exclusively within the board's purview to decide what they want at that location. So when that information was presented to the board in about 2023, the determination was the DGS headquarters warehousing site was the highest priority for that location. And at that time, they directed staff to pursue the appropriate legislative processes to accomplish that end.

So staff here does not have authority or the responsibility to offer up or entertain any other use other than what the Board of Supervisors has directed us to do.

Okay. That was a perfect answer to exactly question I was asking. So thank you.

Thank you.

One more question. I'm gonna go on to community space. So one of the things that Bill said and that I've I've heard multiple times now is that, this this community space is needed because, there's currently one of the communities doesn't have space. Their HOA community building is not yet built, but it's expected to be done in a couple of years. So it means that the proffer or the condition of approval that's being offered will actually be not useful to the community in two years when that space space is finished.

And so from my perspective, and you know I've been harping on this when we've met separately, you know, is enough room on this site for something meaningful to the community to be provided as is expected. That is not just a two year, you can use this this office because you don't have any other place to meet now. So I'm the the that's more in the I mean, you didn't I I mean, I have asked you to consider it, and we haven't gotten anywhere yet. But is that something you would entertain at this point?

So we did have a conversation. And where I am now is that is something that I would defer to the Board of Supervisors to make a decision on that if they chose to add that to their offerings. I'm not in a position to make that as a recommendation or offer up. But if the board chooses to do so, then that is something that we would implement.

Okay. That's the answer to my question.

You. Thank you.

Vice Chair Modiarty.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. A couple of questions. The first one with the traffic, the same question I asked the staff, Will. The road in front of it is a VDOT road. You can self impose not to park there, and you can tell, oh, there are nine designated places for the people to go onto the WOD Trail. But people can still go park unless you tighten up the language or work with the VDOT or do something to restrict the parking there. So I think that issue is not resolved unless you guys do something else here. Do you agree with that?

I think that's part of the reason why we were hesitant to go below 425 parking spaces is that we didn't want the parking to be short on-site where the employees felt like they had to go park on the street. Short of doing permit parking, which I don't think anyone wants to do in that community, I think that the way we've set this up is that the employees will park in the parking lot. They will be instructed as employees that work in that building to not park on the street.

Yeah. I mean, I don't think it's tightened enough for me to understand that issue is resolved. Just a comment. The second is civic space usage. Again, I think you guys have a restricted timings when this building is going to be open, when it's for the deliveries.

But I think the true community space should be available for longer because residents are going to still do things weekends or the holidays or what's not. So I think something needs to be done on in terms of the when the people can use this facility, and it is not tied to the your office hours when the warehouse needs to be opened. Again, I'll just request staff to just work with the applicant to just make this thing better because I don't think if it's going to be restricted to nine to seven, nine to five, what's not when their warehouse is open, I don't think it's a true use of the Civic space or the community space, I mean. So those are my two comments. I just want better agreement and better restrictions on these two items.

You.

Commissioner Banks. Just one one quick clarification and then I guess one comment or question. In the report, there's an indication that the hours for deliveries are restricted from 7AM to 6PM. Yet in your oral presentation, you said 7AM to 5PM, which is the accurate one.

I I actually had a typo in my presentation, so staff was correct.

So 7AM to 6PM. And have you agreed for hours of the actual, opening of the building building when it would be open for business? Because, I following up on commissioner Myers, I only saw in the report the restriction of hours for deliveries.

I think the reason that we focused on the hours for deliveries is that those are the hours of the warehouse component. And it doesn't mean that someone gets into work at 06:55. They're not in violation of a proper because they're going into the office to work or their pet there past 06:00 working. I think the other component is that that public meeting space, not just for the community, but Loudoun County will host, meetings and public input sessions there after hours as well. So we're trying not to limit the hours of operation for the office component.

I'll an example of what the civic space could be used for as well. When we held our first community meeting, we didn't have a place to meet, so we met at Cool Springs Elementary School. But it would have been much better to have it at this civic space that holds a 100 people. So this is an opportunity the county is always looking for space to hold public meetings, public input sessions, things like that. So this is an opportunity for those type of civic engagements in this space, not just for the HOA but for anything else going on in the vicinity.

So even though the hours are not specified for, HOA use within the the the proffers, as I understand it, they would be able to access it by what process?

And so we're actually coordinating with staff right now on fine tuning that language to give after hours access, but making sure that it follows county policies like no alcohol is permitted, things like that. But that it would allow it after 06:00, but it has to be reserved. So there there's a reservation platform where the community can reach out and say, we would like to to use your room next next Thursday night at 06:00. Can you put us on the calendar? And that room would have accessed, un unsecured access to bathrooms, things like that, you know, where where it keeps them still the public still segregated from areas need to be secured within the building, but they would have access to, you know, you know, bathrooms and things like that.

Thank you. Mister chair, if I could follow-up to that too. Commissioner Banks, so the question about hours of operation, just our assessment of the the largest impact, noise, sound, or same thing, right, would be the trucks. Right? The delivery, just the the sheer volume of trucks coming through, the noise generated by the engines, the backup alarms going into the loading bays.

I think restricting the deliveries was by our assessment the largest noise impact associated with the facility. Employees coming back and forth in their personal cars to the office space wouldn't necessarily would have a traffic component but not the noise necessarily associated with the truck traffic. But, again, if the commission wishes to put different recommended conditions on the actual operation of full facility, that's certainly part of your recommendation. And if we need to specify specifically when the hours of the community center is open, we can work with the with the DGS staff to figure out the best way to identify that. So I assume you do not want the community space open till 01:00 in the morning or something like that.

Commissioner Myers.

Yeah. I'm a little confused because you keep saying it's gonna be community space, but then you keep saying it's for the HOA, which are two completely especially what I've gotten to know these 67 homeowners. I mean, there is no relationship for most intents and purposes between their HOA and them. Like, they haven't even had an annual meeting this year that they've had in person. So there's no dialogue.

They're they can't get a fence done around the top lot. So, I mean, if they've gotta go through the HOA in order to use the space, that's not a community space. That's an HOA space. So is the intent that it's an HOA space or it's that if you live there and you want to have a group of people there or you wanna have a community neighborhood meeting, they can use it, or is it or is it the HOA? Because those are completely different.

I'll clarify that we were using the HOA as an example of someone who might wanna use that space, but it's not limited to the people of that neighborhood or the HOA itself. The general public can reserve anyone can reserve it for a public meeting or or a HOA meeting or whatever they wanna use it for as long as it fits within the parameters that we're gonna define the conditions

that gonna have this thousand square foot space that anybody in Loudoun County can just I mean, it's not been for this community. I mean, it's not a civic space then for this community. I mean, they're gonna be competing with the board of directors of every little league and everything else that's looking for a space to meet and all. So, I mean, to me, it still doesn't it's there's still not a civic public space that's being designated for this community. All we're doing now is bringing even more traffic off hours for them because now we have a 100 people coming from Sterling to come to a meeting or from Leesburg to come to meeting. So we've just drug it out and made it even even worse. And, Bill, tell me if I'm wrong, but what we're showing that red arrow there, right there across that, that is the tot lot. Right?

The the tot lot is just just below that where their right turn sign is. Yes.

And I think it's important for everybody to realize that the top lot the only top lot in this community is literally right across from where all the traffic's gonna be going in. And to and I know that is one of the big concerns when I met with them out there that they're very concerned about. There's no fencing. It is the only kind of recreational civic place they have in that entire area, and it literally sets right where all the traffic's gonna be turning in and turning out. And people had strollers there.

Saturday night was there and everything else. So I know that's also a concern. If if we could look at doing some kind of, I don't know if you can cooperate with maybe trying to get them some kind of fencing or something so at least there's a barrier on on that top lot or something, but I think that's a real concern. On your hours of operation, just so we're clear, the intent is there is no restriction on the hours of operation. People can be in there working twenty four hours a day. Correct? The only restriction we're talking about is on hours of delivery. People could be having meetings twenty four hours a day in there. There's no restriction on the on that.

We've not we've not provided a condition that would restrict outside the deliveries. No.

And then in regards to the lighting, it says that the lighting can stay on as long as it's for security. I mean, I think you could make the argument, especially with 13 loading docks back there. Those lights need to be on all the time. So with the the ideas and they go off from ten to five unless it's for security or emergency, I could see where you can make an argument there's lights needed to be on all the time. So that's that's a concern because that's especially as it gets back closer to the residential area, I think that that's not I just don't think that that's that's good.

The other thing is I think that and I brought it up before. I think the hours of delivery having them be at seven in the morning, now you're competing with the people that are trying to get out of there to go to work. And then at 06:00 at night, you're competing with the people that are trying to get home from work, and they don't really have a choice. I mean, as you well know, there's there's two points in that in that to get into that subdivision, and that's it. So, I I mean, I would I would say that if you're looking at deliveries, I would rather see it be something like nine to four because then that's off hours of the people trying to get to work and get home from work, and it would be more compatible with the the way the transportation network works with. Would you guys be looking at doing something where you decrease the delivery times?

I think that might be challenging only because Amazon delivers after 04:00 and, like Well,

they deliver they let me tell you. They deliver before seven too. I mean, if you're worried about Amazon, I mean, I get I get deliveries on my Ring camera at one in the morning. I mean, when they're out, they're out. They deliver. So, I mean, if you're really not gonna restrict them, then you're not gonna restrict them. Your deliveries are gonna be anytime.

I I think what we were looking to restrict was when we have, like, non FedEx deliveries where it's an actual delivery coming on a a truck, like a box truck, that we would have those scheduled and they would have restricted hours. But, obviously, we can't limit what FedEx and UPS do when when a pack a package is being delivered.

So we're really not limiting deliveries with what you just said.

We're like, bulk deliveries.

But the things

that come on,

like bulk deliveries and with the bigger trucks could be limited so that they wouldn't be in until nine to four.

I would tell you at this time operationally we would not be willing to commit to that.

Any more questions?

Question Frank.

I wouldn't want you to limit my Amazon deliveries either because sometimes those 5AM deliveries are pretty clutch. You know, well, I mean, they come down my road in big boxes. Do you have the graphic that that you guys had that shows the four sides of the building, the new proposed facade? Yeah. That one. Okay. I have to get south exterior elevation, that's what we're going to see facing cross trail or facing

Maybe I can help explain.

Yes, please. I'm looking at long ends, short ends, and they're not matching the way I'm looking

at direction.

Architect had we we had, like, two days attorneys around before resubmission deadline. The architect got some of the the directions wrong.

Okay.

So the bottom elevation, the nice looking front one, that is what Fajes Natchez Drive.

Okay. That's what I was hoping.

Thank The east elevation, which is the middle right, that is what you will see from Cross Trail Boulevard.

Okay.

And the west elevation, I don't think anyone will see. It's that's the one that faces Kincaid Forest, but it's

also screened by a 100 degrees. Yeah.

I don't

know anyone will see that.

Okay. Thank you. I was I was sitting there going south is not matching south in my mind. So I appreciate that clarification. You know, we're looking at ways for this to be maybe a little bit more public civic use friendly feeling.

I will tell you as somebody who was in an office park that had an access point onto the W And OD Trail, you get a lot of overflow parking from trail users, nine spaces. I almost I mean, I wrote down, can we get more parking? We took it away from the side cross trail side is where you took the parking took some parking away, right, on this version. And the block that you've got those nine spaces, they're really the nine spaces. How I guess I'm not familiar with that section of the trail.

How are people accessing the trail? Are they they're not able to get to it on the other side of this property or do they there is an access point there. So why isn't the parking on that side of the building? What just

So we wanted we did want to keep the parking away from the loading and warehouse component in the back.

Fair enough.

We we also in talking with the community, we we got a pretty good sense for the usage of people that are parking there now, and it is pretty much, you know, five to 10 cars. Yeah. Maximum that that generally parked there for the trail. Once you aligns with what we're trying to limit approximate to our entrance.

Once you put something on this parcel and label spots, W and OD trail parking, though, I suspect you'll have more users, which is a good again, this is a civic public that's a good use. You know, go ahead and label a few more spots for the trail as far as I'm concerned. You've limited the truck hours. I'm fine with your limits now that you've clarified some of the kind of trucks we're talking about. But could we limit would you be able to limit the daily count outside of emergencies?

I mean, what you're describing your use is very different from what I think a lot of us think of as industrial warehouse. So their typical use is 40 some trucks a day. Could we limit to? I mean, you're talking four or five. I don't want to commit you to that low, but something a lot less than 40. Was that something that's even possible?

We would probably have to do an analysis of what the projected long term use for that in order to come up with a safe number that would not constrain county operations. And right now, the information that we provided you is what currently happens at the three combined locations that we have that receive deliveries is four to five a day on average. And frankly, a lot of that is interior to our county operations. For example, when we several times a month, go around and pick up material from this building and other buildings and then we aggregate them into this location. So that's the box trucks, the eureka trucks that we use.

That's currently driven by operational demand. As the county grows, we may see a slight increase in that. But I wouldn't be able to necessarily constrain that without doing a full analysis of what the projected long term demands are. For example, we've got four new buildings going up across the way from here Yes. For the new government operations buildings.

Be curious what that analysis looks like. I don't know if that's a reasonable undertaking, but I'll lodge my request. So so when you move the building and we took out some of that parking on the I'm gonna call it the cross trail side. Forget directions. I'm I'm now, like, left at the corner by Burger King. That's how I'm gonna do directions tonight. So the Cross Trail side of the building,

I guess, is the south side.

When you move that parking, it didn't move where the building was. Right?

Correct. The building shifted maybe a little bit. What we looked at was there was really inefficient parking on the plant South near Cross Trail Boulevard. Was a single loaded drive aisle, which is really inefficient, extra asphalt. There was also parking along the back, which we removed. And then I said like I said, there were some areas where, we had some really small parking lot islands. We made those bigger. There wasn't like an exact count on the original plan. So once we got to the actual 425, this is kind of how it looks.

And there was no way I understand you have to have room for the occasional semi to make their route through there, especially if we don't want them using the other exit entrance. They've gotta be able to make all those turns and navigate, but there was no way to pull that back. You know, if you lost 20 feet of parking, we can't pull it. I would rather be closer to Cross Trail than and pull it away from the back residential line a little better the north the north side there where you've got the residential folks closer to you and lose a little parking there. Anything to create space back there, there's no way to do that.

You hit the nail on the head with kind of the truck route. And if that entrance is fixed, the entrance on Notchaz can't move any further closer to Cross Junction, it's at the minimum separation already.

Okay.

And if we were to pull the building down, then we get this jog with the trucks. It makes it very complicated.

Okay. And and is there any way we could get some help with them putting a fence around that top lot, which I'm gonna make the comment that that's not you didn't create that problem. Whoever thought a top lot at the corner of a street, as big as Cross Trail was a good idea anyway. That would be the the issue. But is is there any way you can help with the issue we now find ourselves with? Because as you point out, the be to that. Do

that. We're that.

Problem?

So personally Yeah. I am very much in favor of being able to provide that assistance to the community. Yeah. I just think it's a good thing to do. Yeah. I am not able to proffer that because it is on private property and it has to be something that the board would have to be able to legally improve private property for that benefit. I would have to bring that to our board and see if there was a way to do that and make sure that legal could do that. I can tell you that I actually think it's a great idea. Yeah. Regardless of the county's presence there, I think it is a very wise decision to have fencing around tot lots for a lot of really good reasons. So I would have to defer to legal on that, but I do know that I cannot commit to that.

Okay. I again, I think the original folks who who put a toddler there and didn't near a street and didn't see a need to provide a little bit of that buffer for stray toddlers and preschoolers, which happens all the time that's that's a little frustrating because they should have fixed this problem. But I'll I'll encourage the board, I guess, to to take a look at that. Alright. I guess that's all. Thank you.

Okay. This is going back to this combination of the parking on Natchez. That section that you're proposing to make a no parking zone, That's all in fact, some of the community members told me regardless of this site, they would like to see that happen because it's mostly people using the W and OD. When I met with them out there, there was about five cars parked down there and they weren't using the tot lot because some top lot families came and went most walk there. I think one was in the car.

All the rest of those cars were not from people using the top lot. The top lot itself is pretty far removed from the road. There's an open there used to be a pond there, I think. The tot lot is at the back end of it and then you have a large grassy bowl like area before you get to the road. So the tot lot isn't actually up against the road. But so in order and I like this idea. If you eliminate those parking spaces between your entrance and cross trail, you're you're making the situation better. I think even after you come in there by eliminating that. And if essentially making the road wider through that stretch. I'm assuming you can't do that unless VDOT grants you that approval. Correct? So we absolutely can. You can?

Yes. So unlike any developer or any other entity that comes into requesting special exceptions, the county by ordinance has the authority to place signage in the public right of way. Now VDOT, we have to get a LUP to do so, but we do this all over the county, all the time, but the board has to do that. So we would be soliciting that request to the board to make the decision to do that, but we are absolutely legally authorized to install them. Should the board approve that installation, we would just need to go through a land use permit with VDOT and they just basically say no problem. You just have to agree to maintain it, which I maintain thousands of signs like this across the county.

Great. Okay. So in my view that resolves a lot of the problem between your entrance and cross trail. Also, I'm assuming when you have, let's say you average five deliveries, they're not lined up waiting at seven a. To go and they're probably spaced throughout the day, which is several hours. So they're going to spaced out and most of the time they'll probably be coming in as when people are kids are at school and people are at work. Let me I think going back to commissioner could you could you show the going back to the parking along Kincaid, you had a blow up that kinda showed that section.

Is this the one you're looking at?

Right. So what my question is that we just to eliminate some of the yeah, it looks like one row of head in parking between the main parking lot and the drive aisle. If you were to take those spots, put them back in front along Cross trail and and just make that an extra 15 feet of of open space, you still have you're not changing the width of your drive aisle at all. Would that not be possible? So

what what that would do is it would create two one side loaded parking stalls both in the back and in the front. We would have a drive aisle that didn't have parking on the other side on the back and then the same thing would happen in the front. We'd have an extra drive aisle with only parking on one side of it. Yes, it's feasible, but it's it's an inefficient way to to construct a parking lot.

I get that.

If that

makes sense.

Yeah. But I'm just trying to look at impact to the neighboring communities and that front area which we're going to do some W and OD parking and if it becomes no, you can you can end up seeing more and more people which I think is a good thing. It adds to the community benefit of of this site to make more parking available. I mean, I think that would be a better that'd be a better swap even if it's not the most efficient. You get more parking up front, you move parking away from the rear.

Yes, you're right.

Yeah. We already did

that. What Ernie and I were just chatting about is during staff review before we got to the public hearing, the areas that are that are in the back that is purple, that's the now the tree conservation area, if you can see it in the top right corner. Yeah. We actually had parking all the way back there to the setback line. And so during staff review, we actually pulled all the parking out of that corner, pulled it further away from Kinkade Forest to establish those tree conservation areas.

Okay. All right. Okay. And then also this is more of a staff. So correct me if I'm wrong but any time the county has a public civic use, whether it's a school, a park, a library or whatever, it's never for the community it's within, it's for the basically entire county's use. Correct? You don't build public and civic spaces. The county doesn't build them just for a community's use.

Correct. Open, not specific to a community.

Would be open to the larger open.

I think that asked my question. Alright. That is all I had. I'll go for one more round if there's any other Commissioner Mike Jason, your light's been on. I'm assuming you didn't. Yeah.

I just wanted to ask a quick question because they were talking about like the pot. You know, getting your name into the pot for the different uses when the property is given back to the county. Is attainable housing in that pot?

So, yes, it is. And for example, with the sheriff's parking lot, whatever the

Ashburn Park.

Yeah, Ashburn Park area. They came to us as the transit facility transit operators and said, is this still required for transit operations? And can we use this for a higher priority use if you no longer need it? So which was the affordable housing. So it is in that consideration process, and I cannot attest to the deliberations that transpired, but affordable housing is in that conversation as part of the use of county owned properties.

But I'm not talking about the lie tech concept. I'm talking about true single family and townhouses initiative. Is there it seems like all we think about is the lie techs and everybody can rent for life. I'm I'm just saying, do we look at really attainable housing as a pot when we're looking at at at land coming back?

So I'm definitely not the right person to answer that question All at

right. Appreciate you attempting to answer it. I do. Thank you.

Right. So, do you have another question or you're ready to make a motion?

I'm ready to make a motion too. Have a question first. And I was just wondering how many people would be coming down daily basis to pick up their things? Or is it going to be like designated day and during the week what time they come and pick it up?

Yes. So we do an auction once a month on average. Sometimes we don't do one in a month. And then there is once the auction closes, there's a designated day or two or three days that people can come pick up their winnings. So and I would encourage you to go to public auction website and go into louden.com and you'll see some great, great deals. Just saying if you want to. I encourage you to do so. And you can get some right now I think you can get some great deals on really old computers.

No, thank you. I'm doing pretty good. Right. What I'm asking, so it's not going to be every day of the week

No, picking sir.

It's only open for pickup one or two days. There may be an extended period, but it's a very defined period during the month, one time a month for them to pick up.

Thank you.

Because we got to get them to clear it out quickly. Okay.

Thank you.

Yes, sir. Okay. So Commissioner Barnes, this is in Leesburg District. If you'd like to make a motion.

I move that planning commission forward L E G I 20250020 Tuscarora Land 4 Land Bay 4 SPEX 2020 6 to the Board of Supervisors with the recommendation of approval subject to the conditions of approval dated 05/01/2026 and based on the findings of approval for approval as attached one and two to the May 2026, I'm still nineteen, twenty twenty six planning commission book session memorandum. Second.

Motion made by commissioner Barnes, seconded by commissioner Banks. Commissioner Barnes, do you have an opening? No. No? Any other commissioners have comments? Commissioner Myers?

I'm surprised, surprised. I won't be supporting the motion. I do think that this is well, I have total respect for everybody sitting at this side and I understand the need. I I absolutely think this is the wrong use in the wrong spot. I think this would have been a grand opportunity for the county for after twenty five years of talking about doing an attainable project to actually do the first one. But we we well, actually, I go back. We've been talking about this since 1993. That's how long we've been talking about it and setting up the trust fund. And here we go again and and not doing it. So I think the citizens that are there have made it very clear their concerns about this facility.

It doesn't fit in in with 67 homes. While the use is not the when we do community and civic use, it is not usually done in a rezoning for the countywide need. It is done by a regional aspect where you look at the needs of that area, that planning area to see what needs to fit, and correct me if I'm wrong, what needs to be fit, whether it's schools, whether it's parks, or whatever. It is not a countywide look at. It is what is needed in that geographical planning area.

So it is meant to serve that community and the surrounding area, not the entire county. So with that being said, while I have a lot of respect for the commissioner from the Leesburg District, I will not be supporting the nation just based on the principle. I think it's the wrong use of the wrong property and there was a better use. Thank you. Commissioner Miller.

So I can appreciate Commissioner Meyer's concerns. I think a lot of them are unfounded to a degree. However, to me, this is the compatibility issue. I understand we need this facility and I'm not worried about traffic for the facility traffic itself. It just seems to me to be a compatibility issue with the neighborhood and the coming neighborhood also along the trail and behind this. So for that reason alone, I'm not going to support the application.

Great. Commissioner Combs.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. In deference to the Commissioner from Leesburg, I will support the motion. I agree with the compatibility concerns. I do think a general services warehouse right in the middle of this community isn't the most compatible use.

I think the error was made at the proffer stage, right? The proffer is calling for any public civic school or county use or for open space, which just leaves it wide open. A school, I think, similarly might even be less compatible than what we have here because of the traffic and noise impacts. So given what the proffers say and the other uses that could also be compliant with those proffers that could be included here, this to me seems to be less intrusive. And so for that reason, I don't see the compatibility issue as being prohibitive.

I do appreciate the applicant and all you've done to work with the community to try to address their concerns, even listening to mine. For that, I appreciate it. I think the application's come a long way since we had a public hearing and so happy to support the motion.

Commissioner Frank.

I'll associate myself with many of commissioner combs comments this evening. And again, thank you for bringing it along as far as you have and listening to the community. Limiting use of the hours of large deliveries, the second entrance, fixing the parking spots along the road, a lot of different things. Really changing the facade of the building is probably what gets me over the compatibility issue. Because candidly, if somebody, private user came in here and wanted to put a last mile distribution facility or something of that nature in this spot, I would I would think they'd lost their mind.

So, you know, I kinda go, are we sure there's no other place we could put this? Don't deny there's a need. And this whole area is a little problematic and that a lot of it didn't grow up as I think we all thought it might have years ago. You know, we have some uses and things across the street that we're now competing with with the residential that wasn't supposed to be there and all kinds of things. So I I hate making that situation worse.

But, I mean, you've you've I'd really like to see a few more of those back parking lot spots shaved off and put them back up front if if it if it makes sense. But aside from that, I mean, you've you've there's not a traffic issue with compatibility. I mean, I've lived near I'm two blocks from two different schools, and I can tell you what a traffic problem those can create. But they're necessary public needs. So and people pay more to walk to the school.

We are. I don't love this use and I use that term in a non planning way, but this particular use in this particular location. But I think because of the way the proffers are written and the way the zoning ordinance defines public use and all kinds of other things, it it can go here. So, please make it as pretty and nondisruptive as you can, I guess, and we've come a long way in that? So that's all.

Mr. Chair, can I interrupt for a second? Maybe it's not the appropriate time. If for the motion to approve, was there any additional considerations for conditions or any other recommendations as part of the discussion?

I haven't heard as far as in addition. I haven't heard of any additions to the actual motion.

Okay. Or to change conditions or

I think like commissioners Frank comment which I was going to I agree with is to consider that whether we're gonna make it a requirement. I haven't heard anybody say to request a required change

Okay. Thanks. So far.

Just chair, would you wanna have added on to the recommendation that we encourage the boys of supervisors to do the one way street that he talked about. If the board asked him to do it, he could do it.

To do the one way street?

The I'm sorry. The the no parking.

Oh, that will I don't that it's actually part of the what they're

No. But I'm just saying, would you wanna make that also as a thing that you would like to see them do from the planning commission that the that you also encourage the board to work with the applicant to do no parking on that side?

Yeah. I can make that amendment.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I It's not in my mind, it was already part of of what they've applied. Is that not something that's actually part of what staff has on their package? Or I guess I should clarify the things they came to tonight that showed such as that did you staff already have that in the report?

That is part of the application. I believe commissioner Myers is asking about endorsing that.

Right.

So, and the only thing that I would caution with that is that is expressly and exclusively the discretion of the board. We have proposed that in the application and I do so with great confidence because we have processed those on many, many occasions when the board brings it forward. So if it's part of this application that the board approves, by default they are endorsing the concept. They will still have to go through an actual application process that we bring to the board and request them to do so. But DGS is the maintainer and installer of those signs all across the country. This is

a major issue for me. Is there some other way to enhance that language on the motion? I've my understanding if it's if it's part of the package that's gonna go to the board, with that recommendation that we are sending to them. Is there anything else

part of the application?

Because their thing is that their employees won't be able to park out there. What he took it to the next step of saying is and then they could do a separate thing with an endorsement of the board that would prevent anybody from parking there. So it's two separate things the way I thought I what I was hearing is

only No. The other the Graham, your proposal was to create a no parking zone for those first nine spaces. Yes. Not like nobody can park there. Not not nice. That is what is in the application. Correct?

Yes. Okay. We'll need to clarify that. I thought you had said earlier you were only restricting that the employees wouldn't there.

No. Our proposal, to make it very clear, in the application Removed. Is to put no street to ensure there's no on street parking in that those nine parking spaces there. Now, that does require an action of the board. However, when this application goes to the board, that is going to be part of their consideration and they will not make that decision at that time, but they are agreeing to that in concept. They'll have to make another action of the board procedurally. That's what they have to do by ordinance to then approve that and then my staff will go out and install them and, well, get the permit through VDOT and install them.

What's that?

Right now it says county employees. No.

It says remove nine existing parallel parking spaces on Natchez Drive for safety reasons, period.

Let me see about what I heard Ernie say is there's two actions. Right. Moving this up to the board is the first action expressing their intent to do that. The board will separately by another board action at a later date do the application to request that VDOT allow that to happen. So I don't see in between those two where the board would say no, if they're approving the application then they're in my mind committing to making that request to VDOT and from what was said earlier, there's not there's a high chance of success that VDOT would approve that. So, we just wanted to confirm that that's we support that and we'll work with the applicant to confirm.

So, was my understanding. They are removing parking along there for anybody. It's a no parking zone.

Okay.

Right. So Thank you for clarifying.

Did that clarify your concerns, commissioner Myers? I know what you were saying initially. There was no parking on one there already was no parking on the one side. So when them by saying we're not restricting them from parking on the street on the other side, that might I could just yeah. Okay. Alright. Where was that? Commissioner Banks.

I almost forgot what I was going to say. I will be supporting the motion, and I associate myself with the comments of commissioner Combs so that we won't have to repeat them all again. Thank you.

Vice chair Maherudhi.

Thank you, mister chair. I think the applicant and as well as the staff worked on this very diligently from the last planning commission meeting. I think I believe applicant did work with lot of recommendations the community made in terms of the traffic and the buffering and the building designs and the public space, WRE trail access. I think this is one of those applications. I've seen a lot of work being done on this thing to be a good neighbor.

I think that that does prove to me that you guys would like to work with the community there and be a good neighbor. And for for those reasons, I think I will be supporting the motion today. So thank you.

Good. Commissioner Jasper.

Okay. So to me, this is a very difficult one. And in large measure because the applicant has got a real need and has made a really good faith effort and worked hard to improve the application. And the application, given what it is an application for, looks good. On the other hand, I agree with commissioner Myers that this, you know, this both might have been a good location for the county to really take a stand on attainable housing, a very good location.

And I also agree with commissioner Miller that there's a there is a real compatibility issue with with the use and the surrounding residential neighborhood. I'd also understand that this is probably not adding more traffic to the area than having a school. Right? It would be less traffic in all likelihood. But I would also say, I I it kind of when commissioner Combs was making that point, I it occurred to me that this isn't only about traffic.

This is about character of the neighborhood. And I remember when my kids were buying houses, you know, and they were looking at first homes near a school. And I thought to myself, well, what advice and would I have given if they were saying, oh, well, I'm gonna buy my first home next door to the county government warehouse. And so I think they're a little different even though they may be it may be an improvement in traffic per se. For that reason, I'm I'm gonna oppose it, that set of reasons, but not because you guys haven't tried and what you're doing is important.

I just, you know, I think we could find a better place.

Okay. For myself, again, this is relatively in my mind a close consideration either way. When I when I look at the changes that were made in in the intent of this site, it it does meet the to the letter of the criteria for the public civic use. Although this I will It's still not what I would generally consider of is that type of use, but it does meet the criteria. The issue with the volume of traffic and the parking, I think is been in my mind pretty much eliminated with the clarification of what type of trucks and how often they actually will be coming in and out of this site.

If this was just an unknown entity building and they threw a number out, you'd have to, you know, take it on faith if that number is correct. We have a case now that they're operating this facility. They know how many trucks they have on a daily basis. And that number to me is far below the threshold that raises a concern to me, particularly that they pull in this street and they turn into this facility before they even get close to the first residential unit. And the vast majority of this building is an office building.

It does have the warehouse component but the majority of its use is an office building. If anybody was concerned about moving into this neighborhood, they're not going to say, am I moving next to this two story office warehouse building? It's am I moving across the street from all that metal and concrete across the street with data centers and substations and all the electrical infrastructure there. I think that's a far greater deterrent than what is essentially a two story office building on the site. I would ask request that you do consider I'd bring it up that one row of parking that backs up to Kincaid.

If you could move that or just eliminate it, possibly put it in front. I'd be more concerned about just because you can eliminate that as opposed to reissuing or recreating it up here if that financially or it doesn't make a lot of sense. But I do think it just provides that little extra buffer for that community. You still have your full drive aisle back there and I think it would actually make less potential impact to the residents that live behind there. And also moving forward to the board, if you could consider some type of a berm on you have to work with the HOA, the developer there to allow it.

But the way that is cited, the top lot sits kind of high. There's a big open bowl grassy area, then you come to the road. I think just a berm that would help contain like if kids are kicking a ball, the berm will help contain things in that bowl and they'll be less likely to run out into the street. So if you could consider that and as you move this forward. But also in deference to the district commissioner supports it, so then I feel comfortable supporting it as well. All right. So we have a motion to approve made by commissioner Barnes, seconded by commissioner Banks. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?

Nay. Nay.

Thanks. That motion will carry six three with commissioners Jasper, Miller, and Myers opposed.

Thank you all very much. Have a great evening.

It wasn't I'm looking at it.

You didn't Okay. Say

we're just For clarification, the slide we're looking at that imposes the removal of that parking, that is part of the staff report. You have that. Correct?

It is not something that staff could add as like a condition to memorialize because it requires a separate board action, but it is in the materials as their intent.

So that's why I was telling you you need to do that because it is not the condition right now.

So it is in our application and I believe our statement of test.

Yeah. We can work on clarifying that. That condition is part of the the mechanics of what that condition would mean.

We can't bind the board to it.

I I get that. So I I I commissioner, I think what you're getting at is we wanna make sure the board know. In my mind, that's if the board was to say, well, no, we're not gonna do that, that would have changed my opinion.

Right. A condition where they recommend to the board.

Yes. I mean, we I will be recommending this to the board. So but if you wanted to make a secondary motion that said you endorse that or mean, you can't bind the board either, right, to a legislative action in that respect?

Here's what we can do. The intent is stated here. The support of the commission is stated here. We can account for in the staff report that this commitment will require an additional board action just so that it's documented that this is the nature of the conversations. And along with your support, the board will know the intent and we'll make sure that's a point made during the board hearing. So I think that's enough to memorialize the commitment.

Okay. Okay. Alright. One thing I wanted to mention to commissioner Myers point. There's I would give me a try. I rather see another use on this site. I would I think would be a great place for an attain attainable housing project. But the county is coming forward to us with this. I can't look at every parcel every application say, well, I'd rather have this on this. I've got to evaluate it based on what's being proposed.

At the end of the day, the board of supervisors is gonna make that final call. And if when this gets to them, they also think this is a better place for affordable housing, workforce housing site, that's where it'll get changed. So I just have to act upon what is presented and do I feel does it fit in going with the plan. Alright. So now we have a briefing on the public hearing items coming up.

Okay. Let's find the briefing items. Okay. I will say I do appreciate the commission engagement. You guys keep us on our toes. We do appreciate. It's good questions, helps us better organize our I don't know if you guys know this. We do peer reviews. We call them murder boards where we actually we evaluate each other's PowerPoint presentations and we try to anticipate the commission's questions. We know we try to figure out your interests and the types of questions that you'll ask and hopefully we're getting better with each presentation.

Okay. This is a very sensitive mouse. Five or five supposed to have five items down to four. The Loudoun County Adult Detention Center has been deferred to a later date. First off is your Loudoun County Public Schools. What happened?

The irony, maybe. The storage building.

Touche. Is part of the larger We can get that up, please. This is the public service center, special exception for a public service center. This is part of the larger campus over by Boland Park. So first, a special exception for a public service center, and then also have a minor special exception for modifying perimeter screening both for this center and also the outdoor storage that's associated with it. So where'd the laser pointer go? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. So a number of buildings.

First, application is it's hard to see in this picture here, but this is an existing public service building. They want to extend that building for a small engine repair. That's in this general location. And this is the outdoor storage associated with that small engine repair. The buildings in orange and purple are a series of outdoor storage and containment areas. This is let me back up by saying LCPS needs an area to store all their equipment associated with inclement weather snow removal. So you would have undercover material storage for salt. You would have sort of your I would call them the equivalent of run-in barns in these areas here. There's some outdoor connex. I call them connex or steel containers and dumpsters.

And then there's the storage areas that are in between. So they range about 20,000 square feet of utility building, about 50,000 square feet of outdoor storage building and material storage, and then we talked about the small engine repair noted here. That's it.

Is the

green supposed to be floodplain?

It is a tree conservation area and the floodplain associated with the creek that rings the site.

Okay. So so when we look at this, can we understand, like, the the purple cream that you said was gonna be, like, salt and sand containment. How is that gonna be contained so it doesn't run off down to because you can see it sits higher.

Yes, ma'am. The what containment to keep it from contaminating or going into the River. River. Run off. Okay.

Can we get any yeah, can we get any more the previous slide showed the tree stand that's there, you know, and you do see that creek in there. I don't know if it's a risker, but whatever is running through that. But the space between that creek and Tavistock Farms and then the larger space to the I'm thinking that's the east towards Kinkade Boulevard, all that tree, who owns that? What's planned for it? Will it be left?

So I think part of this is our, I think our county expansion as well.

I think you got four buildings going in there.

Yeah, so we will outline where the future campus is expanding.

It would be helpful to know that just because it impacts how that residential is buffered or not buffered.

Yeah, think they just did the groundbreaking for that campus.

One of them, yeah.

Yeah. Well, I'll be moving there from here.

Okay.

Okay. Thank you. So relationship to the larger expansion and the campus I want

know what's going in the treat area.

Yeah. In the treat area.

Generally, that's what I want to know.

Of the salt storage and defining the open space shirt. Any other questions on this? Okay. This is the adult detention center, which is on this graphic, the adult detention center is right. Oops, almost got you in the eye there, Commissioner Frank. This right here is the adult detention center. They're wanting to do some improvements to that campus that's coming back to you later this summer. Okay. Golden Substation. This is part of the Mars Golden Aspen Reliability Corridor.

You may this is the part of the Paragon Park. I'm most of you know Paragon Park. It's on the East Side Of 28, just north of the Dulles 28 Center. All your car dealerships are down in this area. The one Auto World substation is in this general location.

You just reviewed that a short time ago. There is an existing substation in this location up here that does, and there's some WOD access right here. The larger part of Paragon Park is planned for future data center development, but this has been identified as part of the reliability project for the corridor or transmission line. So three special exceptions that are associated with this project. There's a special or a commission permit for the utility substation, special exception for utility substation in the IP District, and then a minor special exception wanting to eliminate the northern buffer here from the future data centers.

This is a GIS. The orange buildings that you see is a GIS facility, and there are some enhancements that are being proposed along the W And OD Trail. The entire facility will you'll see the red line. The entire facility will be enclosed by a 12 foot I'm sorry, 20 foot screen wall. And then along the south and the green is the W And OD Trail.

But 20 foot, you said? Yeah.

20 foot. Yes, sir. So the current, you know, the current corridor comes, you know, obviously down the W And OD Trail. So you would see sort of the superstructure here in the corner that would pull up to the W And OD.

So the whole thing is gas insulated 20 foot wall? Yes. Except they want to we're running it, they want to eliminate it, the buffer Yeah. Or

So yeah, the other substation on Paragon Park had the same things. Want to eliminate this buffer yard here because it's being screened by the future data center buildings. And then they're doing the supplemental vegetation down in this area. And there are some existing vegetation already along the trail, but that's, you know, sort of bordering the property boundary. Is

is this being done for current needs, future needs? Is it just for data or is it also for regional?

This is the current and regional need, the reliability project. So

Do we know that that those buffers are what would the buffer normally be required there that they're asking for the removal on that side?

It'd be a type C buffer, so that's the berm or wall with more evergreen plantings and shrubs and understory Okay.

I'm just curious as we look at all these. I understand that maybe for a site, you know, for it may not matter because the big giant buildings next to it, but we're taking away more green space. I'd be curious, you know, how many square foot of green space does that take out and where else can they put it? So I guess the question for staff is, can we have that calculation if it's a 100 foot stretch and it's supposed to be 25 feet deep, then obviously that's easy math. Even I can figure that one out.

But, you know, I'd be curious how long is that stretch of buffer they're asking to modify and what essentially is the square footage of planting we lose when they take that out? Because at this point, I get it. You know, the data center folks with no windows aren't going to see it, but it's other people will see it and there's still a loss of green stuff and we are losing green stuff everywhere around these things right now.

A part of it here is and this was on the other one too where it allows them to go farther north to be pulled away farther from the trail.

And that may be a trade

making up some of the things. But we'll have the numbers to off to know the offset.

Yeah. I'd I'd just be curious. Okay. Thank you.

No problem. Anything else? Any questions on this substation? Okay. Next is another substation. This is an air insulated substation, north side of the airport. You'll see Old Ox Road, Dallas Trade Center West to the West, and Dallas Trade Center to the North. And there's future Digital Dulles. There's future applications for data center that you'll be seeing in the next couple of months. So that's the site as it exists today.

A lot of outdoor car storage. The substation in this location, it is also exceptions. Our our two special exceptions and a commission permit. Commission permit for the use, special use permit or special exception for the use, and also a special exception to modify the buffer along, I would call it, the northern side. So this area right here, they're offering to to do some reforestation areas. It's only these locations right here that they want to eliminate the buffer, and that has to do with the underground lines that'll be extending from the substation to the data center campus that's not part of this particular substation. So this is Old Ox Road. You would come up through here.

What's that? Only those three purple sections you said?

The three purple section? Yeah. Yeah. Right here, here, and here is the limitation of the the buffer modification on this side of the substation. This has a 12 foot wall, masonry wall that that surrounds it, and it will otherwise meet the buffer requirements of the ordinance. The data centers are, I think, part of a a by right application that's already underway.

The perimeter is it perimeter road there?

Yes sir.

Where does that go? Is that dead end into the airport property somewhere or? Yes. So a is VDOT Public Road right now?

It's a shared road with the airport and with the property owners. So but we can So it's

not a public road?

I don't believe it's a public road. Used by the airport.

Okay.

But there's shared access by the by this property owner. So but we can confirm that when we're coming back. So so this site, I'm sorry that it didn't really didn't really orient you. So the the substation's right here. It's a sub it's part of the larger parcel, but it comes in and then it's in this general location.

Old car auction site.

Yes. Okay. Cliff. Okay.

Oh, yeah. Go to this.

This is a request for not just this application but all other applications. Can we make the aerial shot and the illustrative directionally the same? It makes things a lot easier.

To the

left, to the left, to the right, to the right. Yes, We can we can orient it to match. I caught it. That's why I said, well, wait a minute. That looks much larger than the boundaries of the application. So or at least get a north arrow on there. Right? Any questions on Tech Park at Dulles Substation? Yeah. There is a north arrow on here. But understood, yes, we will orient them the same. North is relative. Okay. Yes, sir. Okay.

The last application for May will be Dulles Technology Park. This is on the East Side Of 28 and South Of Sterling Boulevard, which I believe on this, it changes over to this is where Shaw Road meets Sterling the South Sterling Boulevard. Hopefully, you're generally familiar with the locate the area location. Most of you know the Holiday Inn that's here with the Irish bar.

From

Alley. Was the Irish bar gone? So, flex warehouse, the hotel use, conference center use, I believe there's some office use here as well. This is a zoning conversion where they're wanting to convert to the IP district under the new zoning ordinance, and they are proposing three data center buildings as part of that application in the layout that you see here. Commissioner Miller, again, feedback on orientation. 28 is now along your of the screen. So

the West.

Hotel Motel. The hotel is right here. So

Is this in the 28 Tax District?

Yes, ma'am. Okay.

So I thought I guess it doesn't anymore.

Well, not we haven't disposed of it yet.

It's still there.

It's still money. But it's still

doing what they can to get rid of it

in an hour. Yeah.

Know, being a zoning conversion, the the same analysis the zoning conversion, the limits of our traffic analysis and other types of things has to do with the fact that it's a simple zoning conversion. They have asked to identify their potential for data center, and that's what they're showing in this layout here. There's design guidelines and there's some other commitments that the applicant has agreed to as part of it. But this is a little different than your standard zoning map amendment.

So is this just a zoning conversion request or is it an actual data center application?

It is a zoning conversion which would allow them to any use under the revised or not, I keep saying the revised '93, under the new zoning ordinance what they have asked specifically to be allowed to do data center specifically. My

question is under the revised current ordinance for this parcel, would it allow data center?

Are they grandfathered for this one? Are you asking whether or not it require a special exception?

I'm just curious, sir. They want to go to the most current zoning ordinance. Correct. Correct. In the most current zoning ordinance, would this parcel of land allow data center? Allowed Go ahead. Nothing's by right. I get that. But there are some there are some categories that they're just flat out.

By special exception.

Not even by so it's so it's by special exception. It's a lot. It's not. So when they say they're coming, this is why I get there. Hey, we're coming here with this zoning conversion for three data centers. We're not approving any data centers. All we're doing is approving a zoning conversion.

Okay. Time out for a second. Back up. This is one of the applications that was grandfathered to the special exception ZOAM for data centers. So this application was submitted before the not the ZOAM, the CPAM ZOAM was adopted. So they're asking to do data center. And if they did do data center under this application, they would not require a special exception. If this were approved, that's the only entitlement that they would need to move forward with data center.

Okay.

Does that make sense?

This is a zoning conversion to the grandfathered way prior to making all data center specs. So if the board approves this, then they can build data by right as being grandfathered under the Okay. Can

you give us our strict scope of review with this zoning conversion when the application comes before us? Sure. That would be part of the

staff presentation. So under the 72, IP would be a special exception. So if they were to try, that may be a reason why they're not doing data center by right today. The new ordinance obviously has an expanded list of uses that could be done. But the timing of this application did not subject to its special exception. The reason why most applicants are wanting to not have that special exception requirement is because it has a period of validity. It's over in five years. The preference to have it committed to through a zoning map amendment so that way it can run with the land and not risk that period of validity. Does that make sense?

So if this zoning conversion is approved, they fall into that category of a grandfather data center without a specs. Correct. But all we're saying is they're just doing a zoning, going to the most current zoning ordinance. Correct.

So I think the difference here, the fact that they're showing a specific plan, and Jason can correct me if I'm wrong, if they're showing a plan, then you have the ability to comment on it. If it was a standard zoning conversion, say, hey, like your standard zoning conversion, any the uses allowed under the zoning ordinance, then that would be one thing. The fact that they're coming in here and asking specifically for a data center campus, that does allow the commission to provide feedback on that data center campus. Does that make sense?

Yes

and no. It's like if they have to come before us for a data center application, then that's what they'll do. This is just the zoning conversion.

Except the fact that they're specifically showing a data center campus. So there's a nuance here that is a little unusual, but I think Concord was another application where Concord was technically a zoning conversion. However, the point that we had had applicants say, well, we expect to be able to develop data center as a result of this conversion without restriction. And the feedback we had gotten from zoning administration, the county attorney's office was, No, if you expect to develop a data center use in the future without restriction, then you need to be able to show that concept on the plan rather than just leaving it a standard bubble plan under most zoning conversions. So this was just an open ended So without we an approved

the zoning conversion. We're also approving the data center use.

That's what they're asking you to do, yes. And if you were to do that, that means that they if there was a change in most zoning conversions are subject to future amendments of the zoning ordinance. By showing this campus, if there were to be future amendments to the zoning ordinance regarding data center use, a zoning conversion would be subject to those new standards. In this case, by showing this layout, they would not be subject to future zoning ordinance.

That's why

they're showing their hands. Okay.

And then, so the other question I mentioned in the break room there is they're showing three data centers, buildings, and no substation.

I don't

know how many substations are going to need to power these, but they're not actually showing them on their property.

I was going to ask if we could see where there are any substations existing their near proximity.

Because they had mentioned, oh, there's another application following this one up by a month or two that's just going to show where the data centers are that are going to power this, But it's not part of this application.

No sir. And this is, remember the Prologis applications that came in? There's some other Prologis applications on the, you can see by the label here on West Side. So there's a number of applications in this area that we're doing something similar. This is not a Prologis application. This is a separate effort.

I get it.

But we can prepare this. We can prepare a graphic with all the existing and pending substations in the area.

Can't base our approval to not based on

Cliff. Cliff. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry. I I thought the question was what what substations are in the area.

Well, I'm I'm trying to split that. Right? Okay, I understand why I can't say yes or no because you have to get power to the site, but a substation, which is a large facility of its own, can you say, well, you need to show where that facility is?

It's a land use question.

I think the the commission is typically and chair Kears, you said this when you're on the commission don't

wanna see a data center application unless you show me on your property where you're gonna put your substation. We have a chance to voice where on your property it's gonna go.

Mister chair?

Yeah.

Last July, chair Randall and supervisor Takroni had a BMI that asked planning and zoning to explore ways to convey that information in staff reports to both the commission and board when we are, evaluating data center applications. And so we have an item going on May 19 to explain that the, the two providers, Novak and Dominion, have indicated that most of the information that the board wanted to see is proprietary. But we will include a graphic, in future staff reports that shows a one mile boundary from the property and will show the status and location of substations and major power lines that are either existing or approved. So that will be we we're proposing to, respond to that BMI in that way. So Hold on for this year.

This is a week later. So

yeah. Yeah. We can we can do it. We have the the ability to do that for that for that one item.

I'll add the point for you. It's just me. You wanna post data centers I wanna see on your property. Now say somebody else find it somewhere else to put the substation if they don't want to provide that I guess or they have an application coming what they said which is where the data centers are going to go to power these or where the substation is going to go to power these but they don't want to make it part of the same application. To me, it's

So, two things. One, if they don't show it on here now and they need to do it later, they're going to have to come back for a commission permit. Second, I think the commission has in the past said, well, if you don't want to tell us where it's going to go, proper to know where it won't go. Do you remember that? We did that with Loudoun Center saying you're not going to put it up. We talked about ultimately where it ended up was probably not the best spot, but on Loudoun Center, the corner of Wax Pool and Loudoun County Parkway, they had wanted to put it up on the road and when the commission talked about it, they said, Okay, we agree we won't put it in these certain locations. So if that's something to think about here, if there's areas in here that would be less desirable for a substation to go, then maybe that can be part of conversation.

And what's the height of the buildings?

It's not proffered but in this area you could go up to 100 feet.

They haven't said what they're going

to do. They've not committed to a height, no sir. They're asking to go up to district limit unless it's negotiated down otherwise.

Commissioner Miller?

So to that extent, because this is a zoning conversion and because they are showing data centers on their plan, we can address those issues with the applicant. Correct. So to that end, we can discuss with the applicant height and we can discuss our thoughts and opinions on design standards.

Correct.

Okay.

They have made some attempt to address those already. Height, not necessarily, but the building design they have offered building designs.

And we can continue to discuss building designs with them we can continue to discuss a height at which may or may not approve of a zoning conversion. Correct.

Okay. Thank you.

One last question. You're good.

So with them explicitly asking for a data center on the conversion, would the would it be ruled in the future that the only thing they're getting the right to is a data center, or is it other things? Or, really, they're locked into the only thing they can now do on this property if we agree to this conversion is a data center.

I think correct me if I'm wrong. The way they've written it right now, they're committing themselves to data center.

And no other use on that list? Correct.

I misspoke earlier. I thought it was one that option with all the other uses, but I'm incorrect. They're wanting to just do the I thank you for asking the clarifications now.

So if we don't like the data center, then we're denying the zoning conversion.

Correct. Or they can remove data center from it. And say just the straight zoning conversion. Conversion and you'll be subject to any future amendments that are

So let's say that was the case. Okay. Okay. Does the zoning on this parcel, does that zoning, would it allow for data centers on this site, but only now by special exception? It does. So the county has said this is by special exception, this is an appropriate area potentially for data center.

Correct. But the special exception would mean you would have another opportunity to comment on the application. Okay. So

I just want to speak real quick. I'm not involved I haven't been involved in discussions, but what it sounds like to me is currently data centers are special exception use. The applicant's conversion application is grandfathered, under the version of the zoning ordinance where the data centers are by right use. By showing the specific the specificities of the data center use, I believe what the applicant is trying to do is get a significant affirmative governmental act by approval of the, zoning conversion. That way, I guess, in the future, I guess, that's probably done in anticipation of the abolition of the Route 28 when this is all gonna come under the current zoning ordinance and data center will be a special exception use.

That way they can claim a vested right to the previous or to their approved zoning conversion and the data center use shown on that.

I'm as we're all needing clarification, be prepared please to help us clarify on standards and all that since we can address the fact that as data center, I'm already in my mind going, so wait, which set of standards is going to apply? Is it going to be the current one, the nine I mean, I know it's not the '72, '72, 9393 revised current. You know, I'm already trying to connect the dots and missing a couple. So I think you're going to need to hold our hands a little bit more than normal.

Would a graphic oriented correctly help?

That never hurts. How about that? That never hurts. But as far as, like, standards and things like that, setbacks and all the everything, I mean, is they have really wedged these pieces into that little plot. So I'm just curious what exactly they're gonna do to mitigate some of that. I just think we're gonna need clarification as we go through this because my mind's already mixing up different standards and and such we've had over the years.

Alrighty. Well, that was the last application.

Okay. One last thing when for the presentation. Could you show that area the heights of the buildings around it? Sure. So they come in with a 100 foot buildings. I wanna see how many 100 foot buildings are in that general vicinity.

Okay. So I don't think there's There is a data center just to the south here so we can get to the

Yeah.

There's Yeah. Right there. Right there. So Alrighty. Thank you, commissioners.

Thank you.

Anything else? Alright. I think we're done with you, Chad. Alright. Brian? I

do have some updates for the commission. The first update is that we're monitoring the projected agendas for the next few commission public hearings. In June and July, you can expect about seven or eight items. Yes. The July agenda, two are AFDs.

Those are pretty quick. And two are cases that are coming back to you after being heard at the board. So that agenda shouldn't keep us here until 2AM like it did last July. We are also monitoring the September agenda. And should that agenda look to exceed seven or eight items, we're exploring the possibility of having a hearing on August 25 to relieve the commission and public and applicants and staff of being here so late at night.

On each of these agendas, there are one or two cases that are likely to have several speakers. So my question is is is just looking for feedback on that. Are any commissioners aware that they might be out of town on August 25?

Yeah. Okay.

We're not scheduling it. I I just wanna know in case.

I'm pretty sure I'm good.

Starts the

prior one bit.

Yeah. Okay.

I'm subject to, whenever the opening of Virginia Tech University or Virginia Polytechnic Institute is.

Before that.