Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Right. We'll call to order the May 14th meeting of the McGomery County Plan Commission. Listen, we'll determine a quorum. Mr. Croll here. Mr. Miller here. Miss Sharp Robinson here. Simkins here. Mr. Waltz here. Mr. Workman here. Winkas here. Vice Chair Foster absent. Chair Rice here. And you have the agenda in front of you. Looking for approval. I've got approval. A motion and and a second for approval of the agenda. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Those opposed likewise. Uh let's see. Public hearing. We don't have any public hearings. We still have. Okay. And then uh under public address at this time, we'll open up the floor for anyone that would wish to speak to the commission. Seeing none, we will close the public address portion of our meeting and uh entertain a motion to enter work session. I got a motion to second to enter into work session. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. Those opposed likewise. And so we are now in work session. Miss Wright. Good evening. For our work sess session item tonight, we have a request by Black Diamond Resources LLC. The agent is for sight designs for services and John Neil is here to answer any questions that you might for a special use permit to allow a clean earth fill area exceeding 15,000

cubic yards and a request for a contractor's storage yard. Outlined in yellow on this aerial map is the area in which the both special use permits would take place. And in just a second, I'll show you the fill area. This area does border the town of Christiansburg. It follows the line. And you can see right here is 460 and over here is Hubble Lighting. And um this area is bordered by the Norfick Southern Railroad. We do have two separate requests. The first for a clean Earth field area exceeding 15,000 cubic yards. The parcel itself is 65.727 acres. The site is currently being used as a byite inert field site which is less than 15,000 cubic yards. Excuse me. The inert field will be from owner's project sites and then they will also accept select fill from others by appointment only. It will not be open to the general public. Anticipated total fill volume expected is approximately 2 million cubic yards. That also allows 419.63 acres of open space and storm water management areas. Contractor storage yard portion of the special use permit request will include an equipment storage building eventually and include outdoor storage for equipment. Here you can see the site plan that is proposed. Um in the blue area on the left is what's being proposed as phase

one. On the right area is what's being proposed as phase two. The green areas are the open space and storm water management areas. There's also a pond right here identified. Excuse me. This hatched area here in the corner is the contractor storage yard portion of the plan. So, tonight we're looking to um address any questions or or you address any concerns that you may have that you want included in our staff analysis and report for the next month public hearing. and to um go ahead and schedule for a public hearing for next month's meeting. Okay. Do we have any questions for Miss Wright? I have one. Yes, sir. Where's the entrance? And and I apologize. I wasn't at site visit today to this. It's okay. The entrance is um right here. If you see Village Lane, there is a private street that goes to the left that serves some apartments there. Okay. It also um is a driveway that goes to the home that's located down here. And then if you go in that entrance way to the right is where the uh contractor's storage yard area would be. And that's all residential in the town. I'm assuming it is from the entrance. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Mr. Chairman, I I have a question, too. Um, I'm still not clear on the current use of the property. Is in your report you mentioned that it's currently being filled as part of the uh clean fill by right under 15,000 cubic yards. But when we were on site today, I think somebody

mentioned that there was a a permit and approved plan. Is that approved plan just for erosion and sediment control, but it's limited to the 15,000? That is correct. cubic yard area. Yes. So, the previous owners of the property obtained storm water and erosion sediment control permits um to do a field project for an agricultural operation on the property. And so they have permits for that to allow a limited amount of fuel. Once they no longer are using it for the agricultural purposes on the property, um then it would then require the special use permit, which is why the owner is coming in now. Um so this is a new owner um from the former owner that had the the permit by right is is the um the 15,000 cubic yards by right in addition to what was done as agricultural use prior or does the 15,000 include what was done prior? I will have Mr. Neil answer that question since he's he's got that data. I don't have that data. No. Um, so we never really actually defined like what was 15,000 cubic yards and what wasn't. When we did the original plan for Shaw for agriculture, um, it was more than 15,000 cubic yards. And so that's kind of the plan that's been been going uh forward. Uh, and then when Rick bought it, like I said, a year and a half ago, he cleaned up a lot of stuff. He he got the u uh the pond. Um, so not to get too in the weeds here, but the original owner when they built the pond, they did

not build it where it was designed to be. Um, and so we kind of was working through that with them. Then when Rick purchased it, he went ahead and corrected the pond, got it all where it was originally designed to be, um, and has been filling there. And that's under that original plan that was an agriculture that was more than 15,000 cubic yards. Um, so I guess the 15,000 cubic yards is in that original. There's not like Rick isn't is not adding 15,000 cubic yards to what's ex what's there today is what I I guess I'm trying to explain to you. Okay. And doing a pretty poor poor job of it. But well, I I guess the reason I'm bringing it up is the the way it's being presented. It's like there was an existing use on the property, a byright use for 15,000 cubic yards, but that's really not correct. It was just a an approved plan that was being executed by the prior property owner. So I think just for the purposes of clarity and especially for the public hearing the next meeting we need to be careful about how that language is presented about the by right and agricultural use because this is all superseding what's happened in the past right all of that correct is all going to be encompassed under this new special use permit so it's kind of a a moot point but right and we'll make sure that language is clear in our staff report thank Sir, Mr. Neil, would you like to stay for a second? We'll see if there's other question. I was gonna say I'm happy to answer any other questions you have. We have any other questions from Mr. Neil at this time? And there there was a a question about the buffer yard and I think Kim had this up here. Um so we're proposing a type four buffer uh in all the areas uh adjoining uh adjacent

properties uh that are residential or in the comp plan residential as well as we have to put a type four buffer up against the bypass which is unfortunate but but that's the way we have to do it with the rules. Uh, and so a type four buffer is 20 feet in width, three canopy trees, four understory trees, and 10 shrubs on the front. And so that will be all the way up against the uh the houses on the front. The side would be 20 ft with two canopy trees, three understory trees, 25 shrubs, and four evergreen trees. Uh, and those are on the two sides that you can kind of see the sides of the page as you're looking at them. Uh, there. And in the rear, uh, which is just a small portion back on against Norfolk Southern, uh, is 25 ft, two canopy trees, seven understory trees, 25 shrubs, and eight evergreen trees. Right. And I'll note that that's um per 100 feet. So those that he gave you is is per 100 feet. I may take one more stab. Um so the previous person owner was doing some work under agricultural and and now the current person has bought it continuing to fill under the by right under 15,000. Do we have a soil and erosion control plan that is covering what is happening on the total site? Yes sir. Yes sir. And that was that's really that original plan. Okay. uh because it's all still on that same kind of defined limits of disturbance that's on the right hand side kind of the right hand side of of the yellow portion that you see on your screen. Okay. Um so all that was covered under that original design plan that's approved and is approved ENS and storm water. Uh all that's approved and so everything Rick has been doing is still within the bounds of that existing approved plan. And so we're we're having

regular regular inspection by the county to come out to make sure that the the soil erosion Yes, sir. Okay. Any further questions? And do you have any further comments, Mr. I? I don't think so. Happy to answer any questions. Okay. Thank you, sir. Thank you. So, so I guess we're looking for um u consensus to move forward with public hearing. Consensus to move forward with the public hearing. Um we'll make sure in our staff report that we clarify the existing approvals. I'll actually try to get copies of those so you can actually see them and um should be ready to go. And I might mention um the applicant was telling us that this this may be a 40-year project. I mean, it's going to it's going to be multi-year, big project over, but it would still be under a special use permit. Correct. So, it would still be subject to review, ongoing review. So, so if they were to start getting outside of what was approved or or if there's problems within that special use permit would would be looked at. It's not like we we're given permission today for them to have a free hand for 40 years. Right. Correct. So, what will happen once the special use permit is approved, they will have to then come in with their plans to get their permits um for storm water erosion and sediment control. And then our Department of Environmental Services actually inspects. I want to say it's every two weeks. Um I know it's routinely they have a schedule. Um, so they will be out there inspecting and then once if they were to get outside the limits of the area that they've shown on their plans, we basically do a stop work until we get a field revision plan and we're able to review that.

Um, if there were other unforeseen things that came up, would they be addressed as part of this special use review or or special use permit once that permit's issued? So once the special use permit is issued, whatever the conditions are have to be met for the entire time. Um if they are not met, then we of course bring it to the owner's attention and give them the opportunity to rectify that situation and to bring the property back into compliance. Um if not, then there's other legal remedies that we would have to pursue after that time. Rarely does it get to that point. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. anything further. Okay, that's okay. That's any further I'm sure we're going to have quite a bit of discussion about this one when it comes forward. Yes. So, is everyone okay with us advertising that for the June public hearing? Awesome. All right. And then uh McGomery Matters update. Mr. Sanders. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Rice. Um so, believe it or not, we are almost a year into the McGomery Matters update. Um for a reminder, we estimated this to be about an 18th month process. So, about 3/4 of the way through. Um as we move through the process, I just wanted to give you an update on where we are uh and where we're going in the next several months. Um so this is from the original schema that we were given by the consulting team of the steps of the process. We are in the middle right now of step four which is the development and evaluation of recommendations. Um as you'll note we have done engagement throughout all parts of this process. So

what I'm going to be sharing with you this evening has been vetted by the public in in multiple different ways. Um and that input that we have received from the public has led us to the development of the goals that we'll be discussing this evening. Um and we're moving into the recommendations phase on how we're going to achieve those goals. So just uh an overview of the public engagement that has been done to date. Um we have done a multi-pronged approach to community engagement. Uh we did a community survey that we received over a thousand responses on. We also had a a GIS map survey that we received 300 unique responses on. We've done at this point two open houses, one in June and one in November. Uh where 70 citizens uh attended those open houses. Uh we've got over 600 comments um on the goals as they were in development. We've held over 20 stakeholder meetings where we've spoken to 80 80 plus stakeholders and then last summer and fall we did 11 public intercept events where we spoke to over 850 citizens. So the result of that process uh was a countywide vision and then what have been identified as core matters. These are going to be themes that are going to go across the entire comprehensive plan. And when we are looking at strategies and recommendations on how to achieve the goals, they're going to fall into these larger themes. So the the vision as it has been presented and crafted by the community, McGomery County is a vibrant and resilient community where forwardthinking collaboration and initiatives empower all residents to thrive. Um the words that are highlighted there are words that came up over and over again throughout our engagement efforts. Um people um particularly in November after we had dealt with Hurricane Helen, uh people were really complimentary of the way the

county responded to that challenge. Um they also felt that this is a vibrant community and that we do well at working together with our partners. So that collaborative spirit uh really stood stood out to our residents. Um and this idea that we want to give people the tools to be successful in their lives through empowerment. So all of those kind of came to the surface um and shaped that countywide vision. Um and then we have four core matters. Uh the county is intentional, the county is resilient, the county is accessible, and the county is collaborative. Um these are sort of those uh aspirational goals that we want to have throughout the entire plan. Um and we break those down uh through the various chapters uh in these recommendations. Um, so as we were thinking about how we wanted to organize Montgomery Matters, these three sort of buckets sort of emerged for the various chapters. We're calling these our areas of focus. So we have culture in the outdoors which will handle our environmental resources chapter, our cultural and historic resources chapter, and our recreation chapter. Community development focusing on land use, housing, and economic development and how those those all intersect with one another. uh and then health and services which will cover education, health and human services, public infrastructure, and public safety and welfare. And while we've broken up the chapters into these these three areas of focus, we don't want to think that these are going to be siloed. Obviously, many of these will inform the other. Um and as we've seen throughout our engagement efforts, um what we do with economic development obviously will impact housing. what happens with education obviously impacts economic development um and then infrastructure obviously is very important to land use. So even though we've put them in these areas of focus there's going to be cross collaboration uh amongst all the chapters. So what we want to do this

evening uh through the work session is really start to brainstorm some objectives and some actions that we can attach to these goals. Um we're going to be having an open house and we're going to be asking the community to do the same activity uh on May 29th. Um but we gave an example here. Um this is uh one of the goals is to pres preserve the county's rural landscape and in thinking about how we might achieve that through some objectives. Further drilling down and saying that we want to preserve the natural areas and environmentally sensitive resources. And then another objective would be to support small family farms. And then you can see we go further down into actions. So these are actual programs or initiatives that the county can undertake to meet those objectives and the goals. So that's kind of the framework that we're going to be working under this evening. So instead of going goal by goal, um what I've done for you is I've uh provided you all the draft goals in each chapter. And I thought I would open the floor if anyone had any strong feelings about any goal and a way we might achieve that through an objective or an action. Um we'll take those notes this evening. We're going to be putting uh all of that back to our consulting team. Um we'll be using those as some draft uh statements that the community can look at when they meet on the 29th. So we'll start with environmental resources. You can see here just sort of the the larger themes. natural hazards, natural resource stewardship, um talking about water quality, our flood planes, our car soils, high-risk features in the county, and then uh a green footprint. Those are sort of the the goal themes that have emerged from all of our community engagement. Justin, what what do we mean when we say manage the car terrain? How do you manage that? So, that and again, that ties into when we think about land use.

there are certain uses that can't occur on car soils because they're more prone to sink coals, underground caves and carst. Um so we particularly think about that when we're looking at where our parks are planned in the county. Um our walking trails and open space. Those are areas that we need to be very sensitive with how we plan those areas for public safety. Um but also just to ensure that there's not erosion and runoff from those soils. Okay. So that's more more have having to do with managing it for for public uses as as opposed to private use. Correct. Okay. But there there's a piece there and I think this has come up with a lot of folks. A lot of folks don't know what karst is. Um they may have karst that's present on their property and they're they're not as familiar. Um, so one strategy potentially there could be to better educate the public about car soils and those uses. So that could be an action or a strategy that we could look at. Yes, sir. So in that example, we're talking about solar panels on on farms and having grazing underneath the panels or having crops under the panels. So I'll go back to our environmental resources. Any thoughts? I I think this is a wonderful goal and theme. Um and I don't know if any of you are on LinkedIn or anything and whether you like it or not. Um the nature consery showed an illustration of the country and our the Appalachin is listed as quote the virtual superighway of

nature and I don't know if anybody has it. It shows a map of it on there and it really is it's climate change. I can show you guys later but it's the routes of migration. It's where bird like the shift that has happened and we are we are the hottest path across the entire nation going from north to south through the Appalachins. Yep. So I think as this becomes hopefully more important in sustainability um more people will understand the importance of this goal in outdoors but it's I think it's pretty cool pretty needed or to be gone. The the article from the Nature Conservancy did it talk about any strategies or any threats that had been identified? honestly have not read the article, but it was the Nature Conservancy and it shows the migration shifts of plants and animals in which they describe Appalachia as the quote virtual superighway of nature as the climate changes because I wanted I saw it I think Sunday is when I saw it posted. So, okay, we'll have to take a look at that. Yeah, it's very cool. So, any thoughts on even existing programs that folks are aware of that are in these areas that we want to highlight through the comprehensive plan? Yeah. Um, Justin, if I could just weigh in on I think that it's important to keep a balance because some of these goals and objectives are going to become mutually exclusive to one another. And so I think as we're developing these we need to be cognizant of um you know for instance

um maintain and protect high-risisk prone environmental features and sensitive species from further disturbance and negative human impacts. One could argue any development is going to have a negative human impact on what could be broadly described as a high-risisk feature whether it's prime agricultural land or even forest or or other types of of natural environment. So, I think the wording is going to be important because this plan is going to guide future decisions um when we're looking at um resoning requests and future land use and compliance with the goals and objectives of the updated plan. So, we need to be careful that these aren't used as as nails to prevent smart growth within the county in the areas that we as a community have determined that we want to direct where in the type of future growth to support the economic development objectives and the housing objectives. So particularly with environmental resources, I I don't want to downplay at all the importance or significance of it. Absolutely not. But we need to understand that it does create that um that potential conflict when we're using this as a guide to evaluate the future path. I I agree. And we're already seeing that and and as I said, while we're looking at these individual buckets, we know that they're all going to interrelate to one another. Um, and it's it's already challenging. I think particularly when we look at our stakeholder groups, um, those are people

who are focused in these areas. And I think it's it's important for us as we communicate with citizens and as we communicate with our stakeholders that we have to find that balance. Mhm. Um, and we're not going to necessarily be able to go 100% on everybody's idea. We're going to have to find that middle ground and that compromise. I I think the other thing that we keep in mind, too, is the comprehensive plan is a guiding document. Um, and I know staff has talked about this extensively. We're going to be using those 5-year updates much more intentionally um to make sure that the plan stays current. Um, I think you all have seen over the past several years. Our existing comprehensive plan, I don't know, was as forward thinking about what technologies might be on the horizon and what changes we might be seeing. Um, so we want to make sure that we're being really intentional to your point, Mr. Carroll, about the language that we choose that we don't box ourselves into a corner. Um, and also that kind of is a good segue. You know, and I don't mean to back up too far, but as far as the, you know, this, there's a lot of stakeholder input and community outreach, and you guys have done a phenomenal job of reaching out to the community, but at the end of the day, the board of supervisors needs to approve this document. And what level of involvement have they had in helping to vet or um embrace these overriding goals and visions and objectives? Is is are is are we on solid ground there moving forward? And I maybe it's a naive question on my part, but I I just want to make sure I mean some of this language is is pretty specific on the direction for the county and it's in some cases going especially if there are actions that it's going to affect budget. Um you know there are things that if there are

objectives you know the plan is not developed to sit on a shelf. It's supposed to better the community and provide direction for it to meet the majority of the the goals and objectives for the the citizens of the community. But at the end of the day, some of these things are going to cost money, right? We need to have have everybody on board. I I'll say, you know, that the charge when we originally were kind of determining what our process was going to be, um the charge we got from the board was this needs to be a citizen-driven process. Um but we wanted to also make sure to your point that the board of supervisors was aware at every step of the process uh how we were proceeding forward. So when we established the citizen steering committee, um both Supervisor King and Supervisor Gravski sit on the citizen steering committee and are part of all of those meetings. Um obviously the board uh has participated in our our outreach, so they've seen the development of the goals. We're also giving the board periodic updates like we're giving to the planning commission on where we are. Uh we met with them, I believe it was in February, and discussed the goal themes and how the goal the draft goals were coming along. So, they've seen all of that throughout the process. Um, and we are continuing to get thumbs up from them. I think to your point though, as we sharpen the edge of the pencil and we start talking about specific programs, um, I think we're going to need to engage the board more on what those potential impacts are going to be. Uh, the other piece of that, um, and really where kind of the rubber hits the road is the capital improvements program. Um and over the past several years, we've worked very closely with administration and the board um to ensure that the capital projects that are being um done by the county are in alignment with the comprehensive plan. Now, we're using the old plan for the that analysis, but I think as we move forward, the county has been doing a much better job and is

encouraging the schools to also think about what their capital needs are going to be over the next 20 years. um so that we can make sure that the actions that we're putting here are in alignment with the county's future goals. So I think the the short answer to that question is that they are involved in the process. Um but I think the board has maintained that they really want the citizens to be putting out what their vision for the future is and then we're going to continue to rectify that with the reality of the budget and the reality of those capital projects as we go forward. Bri, did you want to add anything to that? Um, I did have something to say, but you covered it like normal, so I do not. Now, I have something I would like to a ask about, too, to follow up on what Mr. Cole was saying. So, some of these leading words um made me start thinking about um what you're saying as far as like maintain, maintain, maintain, and then at the end reduce. So, do you we have a benchmark or measurable starting point that we can actually show what we're if we are achieving this. So, especially like reduce, do we know our green footprint where we are and and are we just going to be like looking at things that come our way and say, "Oh, that might impact that. We're not going to do it because it would not reduce it or so I guess my point is are we having a way to monitor and measure any of these results?" So, so some of the choice of the maintain is some of these goals are a continuation of existing goals that are in mcgomery 2025. Um, so we didn't reinvent the wheel completely on every single goal. So there is a continuation of the work that was already done. In terms of the data and where we're building from, a lot of that was contained within that state of the county report. Um, really the first six months of the process was data gathering. Um so we worked very closely in terms of some of our environmental

data with the New River Land Trust. Um they were a huge resource for us. They had a lot of documentation on where we are in terms of current levels. If you get into the state of the county report that gets into water quality as well. So there are some measurable metrics um that we can use as a basis. Um what our our choice was to make that a separate document and use that as an appendix for McGomery Matters. Um our existing plan if you start reading the plan it's very clunky and all that data is in there as along with the goals. Um so uh the state of the county report will serve as an appendix and we'll continue with the plan and our goal would be when we do those five-year updates that would be when we are measuring against that baseline that we established in the state of the county report. So along the way when we're making decisions about projects and things um to to kind of get a feel for if it's going to impact any of these, we just need I think we need to be mindful of this while we're thinking about that. Is it going to actually um meet these as we're going along in our day-to-day work. So and the great thing about that state of the county report, we'll be able to pull those data metrics out and include those in reports for you. Um it's it's challenging. I mean obviously we would love to have data that's fresh every single year. Um but we're sometimes then relying on the organizations or the institutions that are creating that data. So we think uh in talking with the consultant if we're if you're continuing on that 5-year increment at least your data is not going to be 20 years old. It might just be 5 years old at that point. Okay. Yeah. And I think the other thing to remember too is you know you're talking about that how how do you review it and what are the actual measurements? So what you're seeing on the screen now, this this is truly more of a theme. But when you get into the action, that's where we're going to get into those more detailed. Okay, so to maintain and and protect, you know, these systems, what does that actually mean? So an action

may be, you know, we have this much area, we want to maintain this. So that'll be more in the action versus in the actual overall theme. Okay. And that raises a point back to Mr. Kroll's point, you know, we we try to we try to envision actions. We try to envision programs, but we're we're working from the knowledge that we currently have. I don't know that any of us two years ago would have thought about federal funding being cut as much as it has been. And programs that had been around for decades maybe not being around in the future. So, I think it is challenging for us as we sort of figure out where the rubber meets the road in terms of funding. I ideally the county's funding will stay consistent and we'll have available funds to be able to fund these programs, but I think we're going to again have to give ourselves some flexibility that if those conditions were to change like what happened in '08 um and what is currently happening that we aren't using all of the arrows in our quiver at the same time. You're muted, Mr. Miller. You're muted. Sorry. Now you're good. You're good. Say a word about our interface and interconnection with the two towns. Yes. And as I said, we were it was really important for us as we designed our engagement to make sure that the two towns were included. So um they have appointed a member uh it's the chair of their planning commission sit on the citizen steering committee. Um the town of Christiansburg is finishing up their comprehensive plan update. So we're making sure that we're in communication with them to make sure we're not proposing something um that is going to be contradictory to what they're proposing. The town of Blackburg uh is constantly updating their comprehensive plan. They generally look at a couple of chapters every year um and we make sure

that we're in alignment with what they're doing as well. um particularly when it comes to some of these shared resources like the environmental stewardship piece. Um we've got great relationships with the town staff and they're involved in our stakeholder groups as well. Um so we're making sure that they're included at all steps of the process and we're getting a perspective from the towns as to what they would want to see particularly as it relates to their borders with the county. Thank you. So, any any thoughts on environmental resources before we move on to the next chapter? And you don't if you don't have something this evening, if you want to send us some notes before the 29th, we'll be glad to take that via email from you as well. I'm going to go ahead and move on out of the sake of time. Cultural and historical resources. So this again is some of these are a continuation of the existing comprehensive plan goals um but also taking into account what we've heard from our citizens and our stakeholders. Again major goal themes here historic preservation viewsheds cultural facilities and fine arts and then a collaboration again that that theme that we're going to be seeing repeated throughout the entire plan. Justin, would um under the historic preservation, it says preserve historical and cultural integrity of individual structures. Would that would they be public structures or private structures? So, I think that's where we start getting into objectives. Um I think public structures obviously are much easier for us to control through programming, right? Um but I do think that the county could propose strategies to assist private owners with their structures as well. Yeah. See, I'm I'm kind of sensitive to taking away land owners rights. You know, if if they have a structure on their property, then then we should lean to the owners as to what they want to do with their structures as

opposed to, you know, uh another group of people saying, "No, we don't want you to do this with your property." So, right. And I think that gets to uh you know, there's a strategy that it could be for public structures. Maybe there's a standard or an ordinance that's enacted that would protect that structure, but opposed on the private side, if it's an education program or if it's a recognition program for work that's done, that could be an objective or a strategy to achieve it on the private side. Right. Okay. I just like I say, I want to preserve homeown or land owners, homeowners rights, and I don't want to take their rights away by, you know, passing plan. I'm going to single out Mr. Miller here to see if he has any thoughts in this area since he is the resident expert on our county's history. None. None. Oh, you're off. This mic is really am I on now? You're right. Thank you. Um, it's really a thorny issue because we have lots of history in this county and lots of interest in our county's history. We have lots of private land owners who I certainly respect their rights. But when we when we deface or tear down u an 18th century structure for example that we're nibbling away at a little little bit of the heart of the county and I think we we must be careful. We some many years ago when we were discussing the villages, the good people of Prices Fork said, "We don't want a four-lane highway through our historic village, and they don't have it." And there are other solutions. We're not

there yet, but but we also haven't destroyed the village. Andrea, do you have some thoughts on this area? I'm not the resident historian, but um I mean I I'm going with they're all themes right now, right? And we start getting into specifics and objectives and goals that matters. Um I hear Mr. Rice, but I also know Mr. Miller, too. And um it's like you said earlier, it's going to be a balancing act, right? Is it it is we've already faced that. We're facing that. We all know, right? Elliston farm. I mean Yeah. I mean, what do you do? Yeah. When the family doesn't live here anymore, yet it's a historical piece yet they don't necessarily want to keep it that way. you know, growth is hard sometimes. And I'll say again going back to that this is a guiding document, right? Um just because a policy or a program is proposed in the comprehensive plan, it doesn't mean and it won't mean that we're going to have completely vetted all of the impacts of that program or that plan. Um again, it's it's a guide for us if that's something that the community feels is important. And I'll because historic preservation is also my passion. Um something that that we've bounced around a little bit with staff is is there some sort of a local designation that we can uh offer to property owners who might want to locally designate their property? It' be something of their choosing. Um and there have been questions of that. Does that mean that there's a a tax incentive that's associated with that? Does that mean that we restrict if your building is locally

designated, can you demolish it without permission of the county? Those get into those very specifics that we can't vet every possible program. Um, but again, if it's a strategy that we can look at, it gives staff some guidance to look more into a program and what those mechanics might look like. Here's an example. a forwardthinking developer made a beautiful affordable housing out of an old elementary school in one of our villages. Correct. And in another one of our villages, that school was torn down and it pretty well ended the heart of that village. My daughter says, "I went to school in that gravel parking lot right there." Mhm. So I think there's that kind of leads us into the direction of is that a strategy that we want to recommend? Encourage redevelopment of historic buildings for new purposes, adaptive reuse. That could be a recommendation or a strategy under the historic preservation umbrella. So that's kind of the stuff I want to sort of maybe parse out a little bit or no ideas are too big or too small. Um it gives us a starting point again to begin to vet these with the public. So any thoughts in this area? Again, if you have thoughts, you can send those to us after the meeting. We'll get those integrated. Um, but again, out of the interest of time, I'm going to move on. Recreation. So, this is an area that we have received a lot of public feedback on. Um, as I mentioned to you or Bri mentioned to you at our last meeting, um, this has actually led, uh, the county to also partner with our same consulting firm to do the parks master plan. Um, which is a a more short-term vision for parks and recreation here in the county. Um but again, we had a lot of folks that had some strong opinions about uh not only our parks and recreation programming,

but the natural resources that we have in this area and encouraging those for recreation and tourism. Um so again, just some general themes here, regional access, regional collaboration, uh recreational programs, environmental and cultural resources, and then community health. And that was something that we heard a lot from our stakeholder groups that encouraging active outdoor recreation is good for the public's general health. Um, so we wanted to make sure that we included that goal theme here as well. Um, so I'll open the floor to any questions or any thoughts on strategies for this section. Um, one of our stakeholders is actually Susan Vanatton, uh, who's in the recreation and tourism program at Radford, and she gave us some really great connections with the university there. So, we're going to continue to work with them on that. DJ Preston, that whole outfit over there, um, have done a phenomenal job. Carner runs the outdoor programs and yeah, I mean that's youth talking it up and I think I would say in all of these goals um we need to reach across all ages. Yeah. One of the things that that came up uh when working with our parks and recreation staff, we we don't have a lot of access along the New River in terms of land that's not privately owned. Um but what we do have we're not utilizing wells. So there's some conversations about some goals or strategies that we can have about better using the river. Um but we also have you know within driving distance a lot of access to trail networks that maybe aren't under the opices of the county but again it's that collaboration piece and working with the owners of those properties. Um

the nature conservancy being one of them. Uh the appalachin trail obviously is just hop skip and a jump away. So making sure that we're better promoting those resources as well. Okay, hearing none, we're going to go ahead and move on to community development, something that you all see quite often. Um, our land use goals. Again, some of these goals are carryovers from our existing comp plan. Um, and then, uh, Mr. Croll that that second goal there to to your point of how do we uh balance fiscal planning infrastructure investment with our land use strategy. Um so again balance growth fiscal planning collaboration and coordination innovative technology scale and sighting and then resilient and inclusive communities are the goals that we have established um under land use. So I'll pause there for questions and and thoughts on maybe some ideas that we can implement. We're talking about the whole the whole chapter here on land use. Yes. Okay. You know, I like the last one says create resilient communities uh through intentional development patterns that include um but the neighbors don't want that. Then, you know, then we get we get these developments that are that come before us and and they're they meet these goals. Mhm. And they check all the boxes, but the neighbors want no change. No change. Anytime you ask your neighbor, it's no change. And so, it's going to be real hard for us to sell the sell that. You know, this you know, when we plan for growth, you know, this is what it looks like, right? and and that's the ch and again that's the challenge and that's the balance that we

have to face. Um at the end of the day the the recommendations that this body makes are rooted in the comp plan. Um and I don't mean to pass the buck to the board of supervisors but they get to worry about the political implications and the citizen comments. Um, so I I do think it's important though that we're very strategic with how we word these goals and how we establish what our precedent is going to be. Um, because at the end of the day, we we do want to make sure that we preserve open space. We do want to make sure that we're providing a variety of different housing types, which is something that we continue to hear. Um, and then, uh, again pointing out what the citizens really were, uh, focused in on, they want to make sure that we are accounting for all abilities, all ages, and all income levels. Um, and so I think I'm going to take an example from Blackburg. Some of the the sentiment that was heard with some of the affordable housing communities that were proposed, there was a lot of that that trope that we hear of, oh, it's going to bring those kind of people into the community. And I think if we're designing communities that are at various price points, we're not singling out one type of housing or one type of community next door to those neighbors. So, I think it's just being really intentional and I think this will also and we do have some representatives from uh the New River Builders Association. We have some uh real estate professionals that are involved also in our stakeholder groups. Um, so this could also help us to maybe change the mindset of developers and what kind of communities they're proposing in the county. That would be a hope of ours at least. Well, I think that last comment to your point really gives us a little more background with the plan to say because I, you know, nobody wants anything in their backyard, but to your

point a diverse and, you know, we've seen those the Elllet Valley is a is kind of I read that is that's it's a variety of housing. And so if we were to approve or recommend approval of something like that, it's kind of that last point. It's we're we're telling developers that that's where we want you to develop and we need diverse housing. Um and then to your point as well, it's on the board of supervisors, but from a planning standpoint, that's kind of where my head goes is that look, we're driven by this document and we have a development that may not be popular, but it's meeting these checkpoints that we say that we want to have growth for. So that's kind of so to your point, I agree with you, but I think that last comment is fairly appropriate for that. I have however am troubled by when we talk about a variety of housing types and affordable housing in our community then they say well an affordable house is $300,000 and so firefighters and teachers and lots of people live at the far end of Giles or Floyd or somewhere else and it's a thorny issue that I don't know an answer for. Right. And I think and we can talk about this more when we get specifically into the housing chapter. We we've tried to address that with some of the goals and also changing our vocabulary. Affordable is a very loaded term. Um so that's why you'll hear us a lot talk about workforce housing. It's why you'll hear us uh we reference in the document in the next chapter attainable housing. um housing affordable housing strategies. You can't just build units that are subsidized. You can't just we we have to be building along the entire spectrum because the idea is people will move up. People will vacate that starter

home that they maybe got 25 years ago that wasn't so much a starter home. It ended up being their forever home. Um we have to provide options for people to continue to move through the market. Mr. Rice, I know you can speak to this being a realtor. Um, we want to get people in the housing that is right for them and the right for their family circumstances. The issue that we have in the region right now is we just don't have that supply and we have a lot of missing middle housing, which is why you're seeing a lot more developers that are proposing town homes and duplexes um that are more attainable, but they might not necessarily be affordable. And that affordability is only going to come when we increase the supply. So it it's it's not as simple as just doing one thing. We have to be doing all the things simultaneously to to make the market look better um so that we can improve our housing conditions. Thank you. Yeah. And I I want to note too a lot of these areas here and I've said this a lot lately given what we have had in front of us recently. Um, all of these areas provide us an opportunity to educate those citizens who may come out and say, "I don't want this here." Um, I actually had the pleasure of meeting with a citizen just last week and um, I sat down and explained some of the things. I explained our process. I explained what we considered when we evaluated development. And by the time she left my office, um, she gave me a hug. She was like completely happy. Um, I also talked to her about some things that we could work with the developer on. Hey, if if this does happen to come forward and and this does get built near you, here are some things we can suggest to the developer to help mitigate some of the impacts that would be to your property.

And she was delighted. Um, I have said and and I'll say it here publicly, you know, we want people to come out all the time and talk to us when we're doing Montgomery Matters and we're doing citizen engagement. And then a lot of times we we get worried and we get upset when we think they're going to come out and speak against a development, but at the same time, that's an opportunity for us to educate those people. At the end of the day, are they still going to have the same opinion? Maybe. So, but if they walked away with just a little bit more planning knowledge than what they had when they come in, to me, that's a success for our department. So, I think what you're going to see come out of a lot of these themes might just be educate the public on how we can balance the growth. You know, one of one of the things I I showed this this person was a map. Um, I pulled up our comprehensive plan map and said, "Look at the areas we don't want growth. And here's why we don't want growth in these areas." Yes, these areas we're that we don't want growth, we're still protecting the majority of prime farmland in the county. We're still protecting our most environmentally sensitive areas. um these growth areas are the areas that have the infrastructure to support development and that's why we want to that's why we're putting them here. Um I understand you know that it it is a huge impact in some areas when you add a large development. Look at Prices Fork. We've had 900 new homes are are currently being constructed there and it has totally changed prices fork but what would 900 new homes do in Childris? That's a totally different feeling. And so when you start to compare that and you start to educate, then those citizens start to understand why you all as planning commissioners and us as planners make the decisions and the recommendations that we make. Now again, it's ultimately up to the board and they

have to look at the political impacts, the tax impacts. um they have way way more things to consider than what the planning commission and the and us as planners have to look at. So the other piece that's not included here that we've also begun having conversations about is what our future land use map is going to look like. Um we agree uh and the consultants evaluation and and staff we've been talking about we probably have too many future land use designations on our map. It's not an easy map for the public to understand. I think we have found particularly with the resource stewardship designation. Um that's been a hard hard one to talk through and parse out with the way the county's continued to grow. Um so we're going to be looking at those land use designations, those definitions, where we're where we're placing those on the future land use map, and we'll be bringing that draft map back to you all to discuss those in more depth and detail. But I wanted to touch on that while we were on land use. Yeah, I've often said that we should change the resource protection areas to land held for development because that's pretty much what's happened. You know, we when people come to us and and they say, "Well, it's resource protection." Well, no, it's stewardship and it's good good for buildings. Did you say that? I'm saying that um through the years our our our comp plan speaks about resource stewardship and people think that that's conservation but it's not. it's not conservation and and uh and some of that land that's located within that resource stewardship is land that's suitable for housing and and that's kind of created some confusion with people and uh jokingly I've said that we should call it land held for development. Um the other the other

thing that we're going to be looking at, particularly as it relates to proximity to the town of Blackburg, um when McGomery County 2025 was adopted, we were still able to connect to the town of Blackburg's public water and sewer system while being county residents. Um that agreement has lapsed. So if you are going to connect to the town of Blackburg's water and sewer system, you have to be within the town limits now. So that's going to definitely change our urban expansion areas outside of Blackburg. um that will directly be tied to where we have existing public service authority utilities or where planned expansion is. So we'll be looking at that as we we move forward as well. All right, we'll move on to economic development. Um again, we had have a lot of public feedback on this area. We also received a lot of great feedback from our stakeholder group. Um, so looking at economic development and quality of life, workforce development, uh, again, location and land use that tie in to land use here in the county, attraction and retention of business and industry, local revenue, diversification of the economy, um, and then higher wages. Um, so those are the themes that have been identified. Um, again, um, we have been relying very heavily on our partners in the area, specifically Virginia Tech, Ratford, and New River Community College. Um obviously understanding that those are huge drivers of our local economy. Um we've also been able to engage with both Curillion and Lewis Gale as the healthcare providers in the area um and their needs for future recruitment of people in the healthcare industry. Um our hope is as we continue through the process we'll be able to engage with some more industrial uh leaders uh some other large employers in the area um and get their feedback on these goals as well. Um, but I will open the floor for you all to give us any thoughts you have on this

section. One thing that we've been talking about with um our economic development department, um they have a a strong identification of need for more industrial sites in the county. Um where an a new industrial park might go. Um as you can imagine, that's a challenging conversation. um because some of the areas that are most primed for that are going to be areas that we've also identified as places for residential development and commercial development um on a smaller scale. So again, that that balancing act that we're going to continue to have to to find. Okay, seeing none, I'm going to move on to housing. Um again, this was an area that we've had a lot of discussion about obviously in the past several years. Um, if you'll remember in our existing comprehensive plan, we had one housing goal. Um, and it was basically have I can't even remember how it was worded, but was basically promoting livable neighborhoods, and that was that was pretty much our only housing goal. Um, so again, themes here, livable neighborhoods has continued, but we've expanded that goal uh to include uh things that we're hearing from the community. Um again the idea of safe housing and this really pulls in some things that we've been hearing from citizens of supporting the maintenance of existing housing stock um particularly as people are aging in place making sure that they're living in safe conditions um and then in that what I was saying earlier talking about attainable and diverse housing um and that's again by size type tenure and cost um to provide a variety of options for our residents. So, I'll open the floor for any housing. When we say insurance safe features and new construction, wouldn't that be the building official building department? A lot of that will fall to the building department. Um, a lot of that also falls to property maintenance codes and that's a conversation that we've begun having in

the county more. Um but again to your earlier point, there's the enforcement piece of that, but there's also realizing that there are a lot of folks who are on fixed incomes who maybe don't have the access and the resources to be able to maintain their homes. Um so again, a lot of that we're going to be looking to our partner organizations, community housing partners. Um there's a a local initiative on home repair um that the board of supervisors has heard um several presentations on. So that's a potential other strategy. Um but a lot of this is going to be ensuring that we're connecting people to the resources that are existing out there. Um Habitat for Humanity being another. Um but just making sure that we continue to support those partners and promote their programs I think is going to be a strategy that we'll implement to ensure that goal is met. So the the building official the building department does that fall underneath our comprehensive plan. It's kind of all-encompassing. So basically the anything county related would fall under the comp plan. So it's not just land use, it's you know it's it's other goals. So some of these goals may apply to other departments. Um parks and wreck for instance, they might have some goals. Their master plan is going to coordinate very closely with Montgomery Matters and McGomery Matters is going to coordinate very closely with their master plan. Um even the public service authority who is a separate entity um they're going to want their plan to to see where we're looking at growth probably occurring so they'll know where they need to expand their services and vice versa. We need to know where they need where they want to expand their services so we know where growth goes. So it it ties into everything. Um, a lot of safe housing. It has been a huge topic, especially on some of the housing trust committees that I serve on. Um, a couple of those we are actually looking at offering

grants um to go in and do house repairs. Um, so you can come and and get a grant to to do your house repair so you can age in place. Um, believe it or not, we still have a lot of people, not a lot, but there are still people in the county who use pit privies there. They don't actually have running water and sewer in their house. So, you know, this is coordinating with the health department to ensure that that as those folks do improvements to their homes, we can connect them with resources to allow them to to upgrade and and get that bath facility put in there or those type of things. So it it extends out through all departments technically. Okay. Thank you. All right. Before I move on, any other thoughts on our housing goals? All right. So the last uh area of focus is health and services. Um again looking at education, we've been working very closely with McGomery County Public Schools. We've been working with our colleagues at the libraries. Um and then again working with Virginia Tech, Radford, and New River Community College. They've been represented in our stakeholder bodies. Um when we talk about education, again, some of these are continuations of the McGomery County 2025 goals. Um but again, honing those goals a little bit more specifically. Um talking about educational facilities, educational programs, lifelong learning, childcare and early intervention, and the library system. Um I will say that as I mentioned the CIP is going to be very important for executing a lot of these goals. Um similarly on this the school side they're uh finalizing their capital needs assessment. Um there's a lot of conversation about um the elementary strand in Blackburg. Um those schools haven't been renovated in a number of years. Um obviously Christiansburg High School is currently undergoing renovation. with in the next several years, we're going to have to

figure out what we're doing with Shawsville Middle School as well. Um, so the schools are are involved in these conversations and and helping us guide. Um, again, we don't want to get so specific that we're calling out specific schools that need renovations. Again, that would be the capital plan for the schools. Um, but again, making sure that we have strong facilities for the schools is important. Thoughts here? I'm going to ask Mr. Miller again as a former principal. If you have any thoughts on this this section, not specifically, but I think we need to comb any document such as educational programs support diverse training and the following words and be cautious of of our language throughout. That's a good point. Thank you, sir. Other thoughts? All right, we'll move on to health and human services. Um, again, another area that we've gotten a really robust response from the public and our stakeholder groups. Um, and again, the understanding that uh a lot of what goes into health and human services is going to impact a lot of the other sections. Obviously, children learn better when they're wellfed at home or when they have access to food. Um, obviously we um we deal a lot more with people who are dealing with substance use disorder um and the impact that that has on their lives and how they interact with the county and the and larger society. Um so we've been really intentional on including them within our goal themes. So again, livable communities, regional cooperation, health and well-being, human services and facilities, and then food access. And that food access is something that we didn't have in our last comprehensive plan, but we have

heard a lot about from our citizens. So we wanted to include that. We'll pick on you, Andrea. This is really your your wheelhouse. It's education. Sorry. It's education. It's getting it out to everybody. Um, I'm currently reading, you don't care, but Lauren Sysler's book. Um, her parents both died of a drug overdose. Um, and so what comes to mind, the point in the book being you do not think of addicts, addicts can be anybody, right? We, you know, the image in the past or people still think of, oh, they're homeless. Oh, they don't have anything. They don't have jobs. These people worked, they had jobs, they got uh hooked on opioids, right? Uh raised two su raised a successful family and children and both took their lives. Um but it comes back to education and an understanding and appreciation. So, uh, lots of work to do, but I think it starts youth, right? But I mean, it starts in schools. And that's where your message is going to come through in all of these areas. And and there are already, and I think I'll speak for Bri and I both, there are already a number of existing programs that are being offered in this area that we weren't aware of. Um, and there's a lot I think there's a lot of resources that are available. We've uh through our stakeholder engagement. We uh were able to connect the community health center with McGomery County Public Schools about the possibility of opening a clinic in the schools. Um, that

conversation happened because those people were in the room together. Um, and so I think uh for a lot of our strategies in this area, we're going to be looking at highlighting those existing programs. Um, and to our earlier conversation, many of those programs were funded through state and federal grants. Um, and so if those programs are having an effect and are going to be sustained in the future, again, that could be something that the county might have to step in to support those programs. Um, or again, we might have to make those partnerships between other organizations so that those programs can continue. Right. I'm thinking about um Micah's backpack that but that started with a church and it was a grant and they went to Micah's closet and then Micah's garden and they're feeding and I know the woman that has planted Micah's garden, it's her mindfulness activity, but they're feeding so many people. I mean, they collected like 500 pounds of potatoes out of their little garden last year. Um but um eat is it eat live grow live work eat grow like yeah their gardens are opening up this weekend I think or next weekend um for people to use all of that type of education is part of all I mean it's it's a daunting project but it can be done well and to Mr. Miller's point earlier, the involvement of the two towns. Again, that's our population centers. So, those are going to be where your community gardens are probably going to be, your farmers markets. Um, but again, it's it's encouraging um sort of a collaborative effort between the unincorporated areas and the two towns to make sure that those services are are reaching those who may not have them in their backyard and getting the word out. Uh, you know, there are local farmers who who plant

gleaning fields uh where you could go and dig potatoes or beets or whatever, but you know, somebody four miles away probably doesn't know. And often we don't have the networks necessary for not everybody knows about Micah's backpack, for example. Yeah. and and again how these uh these issues cross collaborate. We have a food pantry in the library in Shawville Ellison. Um that was an initiative that the library took on working with the Eastmon Community Foundation. So again, sometimes it's just connecting the resources is all the county's role is there. Um and the it sustains itself because of those partnerships. So all right, anything else there before I move on? Okay. uh public infrastructure. Obviously, this one is uh obviously going to tie into our land use category as well. Uh looking at water and sewer, innovative technologies and utilities. Um we brought in uh the work that we did last year almost two years ago now on solar energy systems. Um looking at electric and gas utilities, obviously broadband county's doing a lot of work in that area, but we want to make sure that we're continuing that. Um and then looking at solid waste. Again, um we're in a unique position here in the county because we really do handle a lot of these issues regionally um through the various authorities that the county is a part of. Um so we've been making sure that we're including uh the New River Water Authority, uh the solid waste authority, and all of our stakeholder conversations. So again, we're not recommending something in the plan that's contradictory to what the authorities are doing in their master planning efforts. Mr. Carl, I'm going to pick on you here because this is this is where you this is where you know the expertise. Yeah. And I I think this comes up all the time with um you know I

think that the nature of the way um the plans are set up is that development follows infrastructure. Um the one thing that's not mentioned here is VOTE and the highway and road system. many of the um issues that come up when we're evaluating development projects or any kind of uh application um kind of reverts back to the the same thing noise and traffic and and uh those types of impacts. So, I I would think that we should have something in here to at least engage and try to leverage what is available to the county um through the VOTE as far as addressing some of the transportation issues that um are are imperative to support all these other goals and objectives that we're we're putting out there. So that's one one topic that I think is something that needs to be integrated into the plan. Yeah. So as you all will remember, we adopted transportation matters. It's been now almost 3 years ago. Um we worked with the same firm uh to do that study. We have sort of intentionally sort of separated transportation matters away from the larger update um because we did so much of that public engagement for that chapter specifically. Um, but what we will start to do after these other goal themes have been finalized is then bring transportation matters back in and make sure nothing's contradictory. Um, but that handles all of our VOTE. Um, it handles our multimodal transportation, our pedestrian networks. But obviously to your point, those are going to impact infrastructure as well. So, we want to make sure those are not in conflict. And

and I don't disagree with that at all, Justin, but I think that it's important enough that it it deserves some specific attention here, if nothing more than just referencing within this plan the um the transportation matters portion as a separate initiative, but to not ignore it, at least with these themes, you know, to at least have it um highlighted enough to make sure that when somebody's looking at these goals, they can pinpoint that the um there's a whole separate effort and initiative directed to the transportation. But I think that's that's something we could definitely add in. The points that come up in the transportation matters document are interwoven to all these anyway. It doesn't seem like it's been three years ago that we did that plan, but it has been. Time keeps marching on. I agree that I was thinking that there needed to be a mention of the transportation piece in this. I thought it might come up after this, but that I see that you pointed it out, so that's good. Yeah. And we've still got to figure out exactly where in the order of the plan we're going to drop transportation matters in. Um, for those of you who might not have been on the commission at the time, there was a decision made um, we desperately needed a county transportation plan. Um, to help us as we moved forward with funding applications through VOTE. So, we made the decision as a staff to to go in that direction and complete that plan as a standalone plan knowing that we were going to be doing a full comp plan update and we would want to make sure we integrated it in. So that was kind of the rationale and the thinking there. But I'm going to go ahead and move on again out of the interest of time. We've still got very quickly. Yes.

I think we need to weave into all of this where we're headed with um data centers and the role of AI and how much electricity can be sucked out of any particular system. And I'll I'll let you know. So, innovative utilities was sort of the bucket we were putting data centers in. Um, coincidentally or not, um, after we wrap up the comprehensive plan, we're going to very quickly be moving into a zoning ordinance update. Um, and the reason that we're doing that is again that is the the vehicle that a lot of these recommendations are going to be achieved through is in the zoning ordinance. we are still playing catch-up and the general assembly is still playing catch-up with data centers um particularly the environmental impacts and the noise impacts of data centers. Um so it's definitely something we're going to look at not only here in public infrastructure but also back in environmental resources. Can we speak about that for just a little bit more? It see it seemed like from what I'm reading and hearing the data centers cause a lot of problems in a lot of different areas. And and I'm just wondering how the rest of the commission feels. Should we be more proactive in trying to get something in place that prohibits those or or am I just thinking out of left field? So our existing ordinance would prohibit a data center because it's not a defined use in the zoning ordinance. Um so there is no mechanism within county code for someone to request a data center. I'm good for that. Um there there are a lot of considerations. So they they do require a lot of electricity. They require a lot of water um to cool the systems cuz they're generated those all those computer systems are generating heat

noise. They take a massive amount of land. Um, also, um, and from an architectural perspective, they're just giant voids warehouses with no windows and they are not attractive, right? Um, but all that to say, um, the Urban Crescent in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads in central Virginia are they're running out of space for data centers. Um, Palaski County is currently looking at a proposal for a data center. So, that will be the first Southwest Virginia county um that I know of that will be doing one. So, we're going to be looking very closely at how they're regulating um and any problems that they may have. But what's the upside? Do do we get tax is it taxing? Uh there there is a tax implication for land owners um to have data centers, but really it is to Mr. Miller's point with AI and our digital world continuing to evolve that their the processing power um is really needed and these data centers are going in and paying lots and lots of money for land. So that's the incentive for the property owner similar to solar. Correct. They also do not produce a lot of jobs. Um they're pretty standalone. So beyond the construction and whatever routine maintenance um there are not a lot of of jobs created out of that um what we are hearing from our friends in the north um through some of the organizations that we are with is um noise is a huge issue because it is like a constant hum. Right. Um the other issue is they have gotten to the point that they're building so many up north that their power infrastructure cannot support them. So then they're having to try to find ways to build up their power resources

um to then support the data centers. So it's um it is definitely something that is moving this way. Mhm. The good news is most of the data centers are looking for land that they don't have to do a lot of grading to. It's flat. You know, they want the flat land. Um so hopefully that will deter hopefully that will deter some um from here. But as of right now, it would be a use not provided for in the ordinance. So they would have to request an ordinance amendment in in order to request one in Montgomery County. And is that as strong a deterrent as we can put in place? Um, I will be honest. I do not know what other ordinances say. So, normally what we would do is is look and see what other people are doing across the state of Virginia. Um, as of right now, it's the best deterrent we've got is that it would have to go through an amendment. it. I would suspect that the board would direct us to do it very similar to how we did solar, which would then require a comp plan amendment and then a zoning ordinance amendment. And you all know in going through solar that was not a real quick process. So, it would be a more lengthy lengthy process and and sometimes time is on your side um when you have to do something like that. And it also begs the issue of local autonomy. And I think all of us in the Commonwealth need to be aware that a small group of people in Richmond could take away lots of local rights. Correct. I I will say from watching the legislation there to date does not seem to be the same push to limit local authority in regulating data centers as much as solar. Um which is not to say

that it's not coming. Um I believe as we continue to need more and more data and more processing of that data that that might change in Richmond. Well, I I just want to weigh in on this as well. I I think we also need to keep in mind that technology is going to evolve also. And just because they're noisy and suck a lot of energy today, some of those issues are being dealt with, I think, to try to improve um through technology advancements. Um, and then also just kind of an analogy, you know, we may not like data centers today, but we want to use them. It's not unlike a a cell tower. We don't want a cell tower in our backyard, but we sure do want our cell phones, and we don't want calls to drop when we're talking to somebody. So those are the kind of things that I think looking at it to say well we don't want data centers in in the county might be shortsighted and that if we if things are moving in that direction I think we need to start thinking about from a planning perspective how could we make it work and what are the issues that would need to be addressed um in order for it to make sense in in our community. I I think we need to be careful about a wholesale. We don't want data centers in the county, so we're just not going to allow them at all. And as far as the buildings being ugly, one could say that same thing about a a warehouse or a Walmart distribution center. And so there's there's a lot of things there that I think we need to

keep in mind when we're discussing this particular topic. And I think if solar taught us anything, it we we need to be thinking about what those restrictions would look like. Um and then you know I I imagine and what most communities do is these are special use permits for these facilities anyway. Um, so on a case-byase basis, we could determine or the board could determine yes, we do or we don't want that particular facility, but we need to have some some um some guidelines and a framework. And we're in a good position, too, because we can learn from others mistakes and some of the the the issues that other communities have dealt with. Unfortunately, you know, if we can learn from them and and I think that will help help us come up with a better solution for for the uh the overall benefit of the community, right? And that goes back to what you were talking about earlier with balance. Um it's a balance. Okay. So, you know, if if you want to build a data center, we allow it in our code, but here's all the things you have to do. And so, it's it's that balance. So, how how can you mitigate the noise? Maybe we require sound walls. Maybe we I mean, there there could be all kinds of different things that that you could do to mitigate that. And and I sometimes it's great to be on the leading edge of things and oh, you know, we want to be the first to have this ordinance, but other times it's really good to be the follower because then you can learn from those other localities mistakes, but then we also we're not reinventing the wheel either. so we can see what other people have done that have been successful. Um, but definitely when we get into the zoning ordinance rewrite, it is already on the top of our list um to to look at data centers and and what we will do with them. I would say it will be something very similar to what we did with solar in that okay, we'll allow you to get a special use permit for a data center, but here are the things that you have to do, those

supplemental regulations that we like to build in. Well, and and that brings up the whole notion of being nimble and being able to respond in a a meaningful way, in a thoughtful way, in a strategic way when things come up that we haven't talked about or dealt with in the past. And I think that's something else that um I don't know how it could be integrated into the plan. But being able to um you know to be nimble and you know if if it takes two years to uh develop to research and develop a a code amendment that will allow a land use that's not currently um specifically allowed in our zoning ordinance. Uh that's not very nimble. And so I think if it is some maybe maybe the collective wisdom is we don't want a data center but what if there's some what if it's something that we do want and everybody wants it and it's not specifically allowed. So being able to be adaptive and nimble to changes, budgetary changes, um you know, environmental changes, there's a lot of things that um you if our hands are tied, you we lose opportunities sometimes. Well, and and the last thing I'll say on this before we move on to Mr. Miller's point of what Richmond might do. Again, looking to solar, the communities that are outright saying no solar are the ones that are getting the eye of the legislature and the reason that are causing some of this legislation to say we're just going to take local authority away. Um, I think the approach that we took, again, I think there was a lot of skepticism on a lot of folks parts on on whether solar should be allowed at all. We found again that balance, that compromise of well, we're going to allow solar, but it's going to be on our terms as a community that we've done the public engagement to

find out how we can mitigate the negative impacts. Um, so I would hope that if we were to move forward with data centers, we would take that similar idea that we wouldn't do an outright ban and have the general assembly have us in their crosshairs. Um but we would do something that's responsible and again what our citizens would like to see. So all right I am going to move on again in interest of time. Uh last section here under health and services is public safety and welfare. Um again public safety emergency services collaboration and cooperation uh and vulnerable communities again making a reappearance here as a theme. Um, again, we've had really great response from the sheriff's office uh throughout this as well as our emergency ser or excuse me, our fire and EMS department. Um, they've changed names a few times over the past couple of years. Um, but they've been really wonderful. We've been looking again in that state of the county report. We have response time maps uh again as a data point um that we can look to to ensure how we're working with service. I think collaboration is going to continue to be an important theme in emergency services. Um we have seen a decline in volunteerism nationally. Um but we still heavily rely on volunteer departments here for fire protection in the county. Um so making sure we're balancing our career staff with our volunteer staff is going to be something that's very important as we move forward. Um and has been something that we've heard uh through our public engagement. So any thoughts here? Okay, Mr. Miller, just as an aside, I was very pleased to see that our board of supervisors made sure that we had adequate emergency communication throughout the county. Thank you. And again, that's one of those very high ticket items um that I think they're

also thinking in the future, not just what our current needs are. They're thinking for future needs. So again, tying back into Mr. Carl's point earlier of making recommendations and how that's going to be paid for in the future. All right. So, I know I've went over a lot with you this evening. Um, I really do hope that you all will take some time to sit with that memo that I sent you, look at the goals, think of some strategies and some objectives. Um, if within the next two weeks you can get those over to staff, we can get those integrated into our presentation that we're going to do um at the McGomery Matters steering committee meeting and our action matters open house on the 29th. Um, action matters will be here at the government center from 5:00 to 7:30. We really hope you'll join us. um see where we're moving in terms of strategies and recommendations. Um and then after we get through May, then we're going to be shifting toward our village level engagement. Um so we have continued to work with the project team um to define villages and what criteria an area needs to have to be considered a village. Part of that is going to be asking each individual village what they believe makes them a village or what they would like to see changed to feel more like a village. Um, so we've got a lot of data that we're going to be sharing. Hopefully in the next couple of months we'll be able to bring that to you and give you a little bit more of an idea of what we're looking at at the staff level. We've spent a lot of time looking at what land in the villages is actually developable. um taking out areas that are within flood planes or on steep slopes or areas that are in protected areas, conservation easements. Um it's not a lot of land when you take all of those things out. So, if we still want to have development occur within our villages, we're going to have to look at what those boundaries look like. Um and if we choose not to, uh understanding that the county still needs to have

space to grow, we get to figure out where that growth is going to go. And that again is going to tie back into our future land use map. Um, as I mentioned, we'll be working in the individual village areas. We're going to be doing two villages a month. So, we'll be in June, July, and August, maybe into early September. Um, depending on how we can get things scheduled. Um, but again, our goal is to be within the communities. We're working with the schools now to identify locations to hold those village meetings. Um what will come out of those village planning efforts are going to be village level goals. Um and then again looking at how those village goals will support the larger county goals. Um as you all can see a lot of moving parts um are part of this comp plan update. Um we're really happy with the progress that we've made. I know that we would not be able to have gotten the level of detail that we've gotten without our consulting team or without the support and the help of our stakeholders and our citizen steering committee. So, I wanted to say thank you to them this evening. We're still hoping for a December or January adoption of McGomery Matters. So, with that, I'll take any final questions that you have, and I'll look forward to getting your feedback after today's meeting. Uh Justin, I just to toss out a couple items that need to be or I would suggest I'm not sure where they fit whether it's economic development, housing or land use, but um some of the objectives I think to address some of the concerns we continually hear about um development pressures and and encroachments, but um adaptive reuse um redevelopment, rehabilitation, essentially trying to

leverage our existing infrastructure. um infield development I think is is an important consideration and I know we don't have a whole lot of brownfields in the county but brownfields also I think so if we could address some of those buzzwords in the objective somewhere to help guide development towards um utilizing to the extent we can what we already have instead of having to break new ground and and uh sprawl. Yeah. And I don't think that's going to be an entirely new concept for us. We already we all we we already have rankings of sites that are desirable for cell phone towers for uh we did that within the solar ordinance of these are the most desirable lands to place these. So I think we've already started thinking in that way, but I agree with you integrating it into other areas of the plan is going to be really important. And and I think those items of redevelopment, rehabilitation, infill, I think you're going to see those come out a lot when we're doing the villages because like Justin stated, we're we're running out of land um that can be developed when you start to look at those things. And so what what we're thinking in several of the villages, we're nearing a point that there's not a lot of developable land left in that village. there's not a lot around it. So, it's not like you can extend out. So, we're going to have some villages that are moving more towards redevelopment, rehabilitation, maybe a little bit of infill here and there um versus, hey, this is really where we can grow and expand. And also just in in closing comment, and I'll be quiet the rest of the night, you guys are to be commended. you and your team have done a great job getting to this point.

So, I just wanted to to mention that that did not go unnoticed. It's a lot of work, but we are having a very good time doing this. It's a lot of fun. Um, talking to the citizens. Um, again, to Bree's earlier point, we hear a lot of the negative when folks come out to public hearings. um the citizens that are participating in our open houses, that are participating in the surveys, that are coming out and speaking to us, they love living here. They want to continue to live here. Um and we hear the positive stories more often than not when we have these meetings. And for us as staff, uh this is why we do what we do. So, we appreciate your all support as well. I would like to add a comment. I know you said you're doing those village um meetings in June, July, and August. And so there's a whole population of temporary citizens, our student population that's mostly not here during that time and they utilize a lot of our resources and put demands on our resources. So, I don't know how you're going to how you going to like take that into consideration because I know county administration and the university's administration and the town's administrations, I believe they've met to talk about that, but I don't know how that can factor into what you're doing with this and how to get that input and see if it's actually something that needs to be addressed in here. So, we have actually had quite a bit of um student participation through our engagement already. Um, so we've had several come here to the government center during our open houses. We met with a lot of them. Um, in particular when we were at Stepping Out. Um, we talked to a lot of students. Um, most most, not all, but most of the students live within the town of Blackburg. Um, most of them do not live within our village areas with the exception of of maybe a maybe some out in Prices Fork. Um but most of them live within the towns. So when we go out to the

villages, we're we're actually looking for those full-time community village members. Um but we have reached out to Virginia Tech. Um Emily Gibson, former planning director, she works for Virginia Tech and is um the liaison between the university and the county. She has been very good um to distribute all of our information across campus, not just to the students, but to the staff there, too. And so I think that has greatly improved our participation from campus. I will say I think we have had more participation from Virginia Tech this comp plan than we definitely did last time. Yeah, they were able to share our survey. We had a lot of survey responses from students. Um and those students who maybe are living in the village areas that are more permanent residents during the summers um we're going to be um targeting through postcard mailings um to everyone that lives within the village boundaries. So, if they're here for the summer, they're going to get that mailing and we'll be able to participate as well. Any other questions for me? I've talked a lot at you this evening, but I appreciate your patience. Yes. All right. Thanks. Thank you very much. Mr. Miller, would you like to entertain a motion to leave work session? And we got a second. A motion and a second to exit the work session. All in favor signify by saying I I and those likewise oppose likewise. Uh so then we're we do not have any old or new business on our agenda. So we'll move into liaison reports. Um Mr. Mr. Grassy. Yes sir. Good evening commissioners. Uh thank you. Um, Justin, great job on that update.

Um, I just want to start by sharing my appreciation for the the curiosity, the intuition, the questions that you guys ask. It's it's always fun to be at these meetings and um, you know, it was I just got to see it again here. It was your interacting with Justin. So, so thank you for all you guys do. Um, I was going back through our agendas since your last planning commission meeting, just trying to come up with uh with some updates. And so, obviously, one of one of the big ones that landed on the board of supervisors desk was uh down there in Ellison. Uh, and and so, as you may be aware, the board of supervisors did um go ahead and approve that amendment to the comp plan. Um, it wasn't a um unanimous vote. Uh but that is moving forward. Um we we've tried to do uh some work in making sure that the public as I'm sure they came to this meeting too and and spoke out understand the the difference between the amendment to the comp plan and then what may come down the road in terms of the zoning uh resoning requests and things like that. Um, we adopted the county budget for FY2526. Um, which included a a one penny uh increase to the property tax rates. Um, and then the, you know, the other big thing kind of going back to, um, the Elliston project is that spurred a, uh, pretty lengthy discussion at the most recent public service authority board meeting, you know, regarding infrastructure capacity and and and things like that. So, uh, we're going to be requesting, uh, a study or presenting the opportunity for a study to be, uh, conducted at the expense of the developers, uh, to evaluate that and and make sure, um, that everybody kind of knows what they're getting into with this project, uh, before it goes

forward. But, uh, that's about it. Any questions for me or anything? Thank you very much, sir. All right. Appreciate you. Thanks. I'm Blackburg Planning Commission report. I'm sorry. Okay. And the Christian Planning Commission, I I think Mr. Holtz, they did meet had a uh reasonzoning request for the old um moose lodge for an industrial site and I I don't think they took action. Um so that'll be at the next meeting as well. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, sir. and Radford Planning Commission with Miss Simpkins. Yeah, I attended their April 21st meeting. They had one new business item where they approved to go to the city council to develop 21 acres into a subdivision of 55 lots for single family homes for Golden Triangle development that's going to be called the Glade subdivision on a property known as Prospect Hill and it's being done by um West Ward, but the property was already zoned R3. So I feel like it would be be approved. They didn't follow up to see what the city council did, but they were short and sweet on that because the next thing ended that meeting and then they went to city council meeting for their budget. So, um I I left. But yeah, that's all they had. How many lots? 55 lots and um so be 55 single homes. So, they're really I mean that was really a big deal for them for Ratford City. Sounds good. Tourism council, Mr. Miller. and the parks and wreck with uh Mr. Workman. We met last Thursday. Um obviously a lot of talk tonight about their master plan that they're going through. The consultant will be at their June meeting. So I'll hope to have more to report back after that in June. Thank you. And u the planning director's report, Miss Hopkins. Yes.

Yes. I have just a couple of things. Um, first, our new GIS analyst will start to work on June 3. So, we're very excited about that. We will be back at full staff in our GIS department. Um, we also have a planning intern that you guys may see. Um, she will be starting in late June and um will be with us through the summer. So, we are excited to have her. And then we are going to be conducting interviews for a planner 1/planner 2 transportation planner position that was actually approved last budget year. We've advertised it two or three times now. Um we're on our fourth time now is what Justin is telling me. So we we did get um several applications this time and we actually have four so far that we're interviewing. The the application period does not close. So people can still apply and um we will look over those as as we go. It's kind of open until field. Um so we are excited and and hoping there is some end in sight. Um the joint meeting that I spoke to you about with the board of supervisors that has been postponed till around September just because of various things that's that's on the on the schedule coming up. So you will hear more about that. Um we do have an open house here May 29th. We would love to see you all come out. And then I saved the um best news for next to last. Um we just got notified a week and a half, two weeks ago um that we received the highway safety improvement funding for the other half of Route 8 Riner Road um going towards Floyd. So if you remember last year we received the portion from the town of Christensburg to the Floyd village. Well, now we've received from the village to Floyd. Um, so we were very excited. Those two

projects total $12.2 million. Um, we added up the funding we have received within the last 5 years on Route 8 and we are at um $23.2 million. Um that includes a um smart scale funded project that is currently under design and should begin construction soon. Recreation access funds for the new till park and um it also includes the HSIP programs that we've received and safe routes to school money for the trail on the school property and also a revenue sharing project at the intersection of Route 8 and Fairview Church. So, we're very excited about that. Um, we we really have been promoting the fact that it's multiple funding sources um because we want we want to be that example of this is how you can use the multiple funding sources um that are available to you and um so we're very excited. The other exciting news is they did announce today that they have hired a tourism director. Um it's Miss Livy. Um you may know her. She's from Onward and so she will be beginning on June 3rd as well. We are all very excited um that she is coming on board to be tourism especially our deputy county administrator um Chris Lawrence who has been serving in that position temporarily. I think he is ready for her to come on board. Um so that that is a bit of exciting news as well. That's all I've got for you. Any further comments? Entertain a motion to adjurnn. Motion in second. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. Thank you.